5 JULY 1935, Page 22

THE CHURCH AND DIVORCE

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] gin,—Apparently Mr. Lindfield did not read my letter before replying to it. I never referred to the question of remarriage in church after a divorce, and for the purposes of my argument I assumed that the Church was not subject to the civil law of the land. I confined myself to protesting against a member of the Church of England who has married again after a divorce, being, for all intents and purposes, ex-com- municated according to the taste and fancy of his parish priest, especially as such ex-communication was expressly prohibited by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1909: If any parish priest has power to ex-communicate a practising member of the Church of England in defiance of the Arch- bishop of Canterbury, I should like to know what ecclesiastical authority ecclesiastical law can have.—Your obedient servant, E. S. P. HAY ICES. 0 New Square, Lincoln's Inn, MC. 2.