THE FREE CHURCHES AND EDUCATION.
[TO THE EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR."3
Sin,—May I be permitted to answer some points in Mr. T. C. Horsfall's letter in your last issue P Mr. Horsfall states that it is an ominous fact that "as the community gains more knowledge of the teaching of the Founder of Christianity, an ever-increasing number of its members withdraw from the Church." This, I beg leave to assert, is not the case. The Church in this realm has during the last decade gained very considerably in the numbers of its membership, and more especially is this the case with regard to those particular Churches wherein the teaching and worship is " advanced," to use the term which many give to such as is incomprehensible to them. Regarding the reason Mr. Horsfall gives for this assumed desertion, unity of action surely cannot be expected where, as in frequent cases, so many of the clergy absolutely ignore the fundamental truths of Christianity as taught by the Church Universal and held by sacred tradition. The lessons of Christ are to be learned in the way that the Church, to whom He left the power, teachos,pnd in that way only; not
by individual construction put upon the meaning of- those lessons. Christ, by His promise- to be always, even to the end of the world, with the Church, has kept His part of the covenant; it is for the clergy to keep theirs, and receive the teaching through His appointed channel.- I would say, in passing, that the teaching of the Catholic Party of the English Church to-day is precisely the same as that which was taught by the Church throughout the world when she was universal and undivided ; that is, up to the middle of the eleventh century. In the matter of education the Roman Catholic methods and principles are beside the question. As interlopers in this country, they must put up with what'they get. The State acknowledges, by acquiescence in her creeds, that the Anglican Church is the Catholic Church in this country, and she ought not to countenance the setting up -of rival altars. As for the Church of England not allowing Nonconformist parents to have their own particular religion taught their children in her schools, is it reasonable to expect a Church to teach the doctrine, or permit it 'to be taught, of those who have separated from her, and set up in opposition to her, in the schools which she herself has built ? The Catholic Party, at least, of the Church of England, are, and always have been, perfectly willing to agree to any scheme of education which permits the child to be taught the religion his parents desire. In conclusion, I would like to ask Mr. Horsfall what he means .by Protestant Anglicans. To me an Anglican of any sort whatever must of necessity be Catholic, unless he denies his creeds, or dates his Church from the time of Elizabeth, when the Church of Rome separated herself from us, and severed the Communion. I prefer to think of our Church to-day as being the same in doctrine and in faith as she was in those early centuries, when unity was unity, when Catholic meant one and universal, and when Protestantism was unknown. Heresies, of course, there were, but present-day Protestantism, which is first-cousin to Materialism, both being allied to Indifferentism,,was not.— I am, Sir, &c., SYDNEY H. CARR. " Arldeby," St. Ives, Cornwall.
Previous page
