3 1662 AND ALL THAT
By WILLIAM PATON
ANOTABLE appeal was made from the chair of the Congre- gational Union of England and Wales lately by its President, the Rev. K. L. Parry. He said in the course of his presidential address: "I think the time has come for a bold attempt to undo the mischief wrought by '5662 and all that' and to restore a truly national Church of England," and went on to suggest that union among the Free Churches alone was not likely to take place, and was not perhaps wholly to be desired. He urged that the thing alone worth striving for, and alone able to stir the imagination and arouse enthusiasm, was the more comprehensive unity of a renewed national Church.
That this appeal should proceed from one of the principal seats of authority in the Free Churches is, surely, a matter of real im- portance. The speaker urged that the initiative would have to come from the Anglican side, and in this he will be held to be right by most students of recent ecclesiastical pourpar/ers. But it was very much to be desired that a welcome to such action should be expressed in an authoritative way from the Free Church side, and this has now been done ; it is true that no Church, not even his own, is committed by what the President of the Congregational Union said, but it remains none the less significant that he has said it.
Why is this matter of the union, or re-union, of the Churches important? Of course, the deepest reason is simply that no one can possibly believe that the present kind of denominational organisa- tion and division represents the mind of Christ. There is a way to escape from the burden which denominational division lays upon the Christian conscience; it is to hold that one's own Christian society is in fact the true and only Church. You may then still regret the existence of pseudo-churches outside, but you are not yourself involved in the mess. But to anyone who thinks and feels, as I am persuaded the bulk of British Christians do, that the body of Christ is divided, and that the continuing earthly representation of His mission is weakened and confused by that division, the situation is in a strict sense intolerable. I suggest, however, two reasons for re- union of a kind related to the actual and temporary situation in this country, though one of them may be held to be as permanent as that major ground which I have just set forth.
Is it to be supposed that the secular world will accept advice upon the due ordering of society from Christian bodies which find it impossible to overcome their own divisions, in spite of the unique possession of a common Divine message and charter? Men of business and commerce today have consented, not perhaps gladly but willingly, to the most radical changes in their business affairs, the pooling of their concerns and the sharing of their trade secrets: they may without impropriety ask whether in the matter of their organisation the Churches have shown a like willingness to respond to the needs of a desperate time and, if not, on what grounds they expect to be taken seriously.
That is one consideration—not perhaps very profound, but likely to operate in a good many minds. But there is something else happening in the country that is raising the problem of church unity even more acutely. I refer to the many combinet: efforts in the sphere of evangelisation now going on in so many centres. What are called mostly "Religion and Life Weeks" are being held, or in preparation, in more than sixty cities and towns at the present moment. (There has been important co-operation with Roman Catholics in several centres in terms of the recently pub- lished agreement, but the further combined action described is confined to Anglicans and Free Churchmen.) Only in a few cases has there been any kind of stimulus or organising from the national centre ; the idea has come alive, and place after place is undertaking the effort for itself. The movement is becoming nation-wide. No one can take part in such efforts to make the Christian gospel real and relevant to a modern English community in the midst of the strains of war-time without asking himself a question to which, at the moment, there is not much of an answer. It is this: suppose any considerable number of people, moved by their own sense of moral and spiritual need and convinced of the truth of the Christian religion, were to desire to join in the membership of the Christian community, what are they to join?
There is an undoubted stirring amongst us ; the tragedy of our international society has shaken multitudes of people out of a complacent belief in automatic progress and even awakened a sense of that human frustration and inner evil which the Bible calls " sin " ; the Christian religion is manifestly, if we read the New Testament intelligently, not merely a set of ideas b'ut a message of living power incarnated in a community ; where is that community? In other words, if the Churches are caught up into a real movement of evangelistic activity they will be forced to face the question of union or make their evangelism a mockery ; if they do not address themselves to the effective preaching of the Gospel to the masses of the people of this country who are outside the orbit of Christian influence, they had better not exist at all.
Let it be cordially admitted that the idea of Christian unity and of a national Church can be supported by very bad arguments. One such is that a united Church is appropriate to a united nation or even to a united empire. If the unity of the Church is conceived of as merely subserving a political end, then let us welcome the wildest of the sectaries ; at least they will remind us that the Church oasts by the word of God and for His glory. The Nazis have now apparently despaired of making much out of the Church, judg- ing by the very illuminating remarks of Martin Bormann, the new Hess, but at an earlier point they tried very hard to get a Reich church that would reflect the spirit of the totalitarian regime. No thoughtful Christian wants Christian unity for such reasons.
But it is not from such motives that the cause of Christian unity is being urged today. The remarkable drawing together on the part of the Churches during the last thirty years, first in the mis- sionary movement and then in the study of the social order and in the analysis of the causes of division—what is called the "oecumenical movement "—has shown one thing very dearly. There is a very large agreement among the Churches in the matter of the faith that is believed ; there is a larger agreement even in the matter of Church order than has usually been understood, but in the matter of the content of the faith there is a very large degree of unanimity. But if this be so—and to anyone who doubts it I commend a study of
the official statements made by the Churches in the course of the World Conference on Faith and Order—the matter of unity becomes most urgent. That a total distinction between "faith " and "order " cannot be made I should admit ; but to those who wou:d urge as an adequate ground for continued division the need to cherish _ separate traditions, or even doctrinal emphases, the crushing retort of St. Paul is to be commended: Was Paul crucified for you? Apollos or Cephas, Luther and Calvin and Wesley, whatevet the value of the insight they bring or the " contribution " they represent —it is not on them thgt human salvation hangs.. The outward organisation of the Christian Church—or churches—ought to reflect the degree of their agreement upon the substance of the faith ; nothing else matters in comparison with that.
So we return to Mr. Parry and his plea that the Church of England should ask the Free Churches to re-open with it the question of a National Church. "Come, let us reason together." How far do the old reasons for division persist? Are there new ones? In so far as there are differences, are they such as to make continued division necessary? Personally, I hope that such a discussion, if it were initiated—and utterances of both Archbishops at their enthrone- ment suggest how near the theme is to their own minds—might not be merely English. Scotland has much to contribute to the study of a Church that shall be National and yet Free ; no larger unity is possible without spiritual freedom, and the Scots Kirk has sIlown how establishment may be compatible with spiritual freedom. But the main thing is that a start should be made.
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