Bicknell on Article XIX: Of the Church

by Pope Liberius of an Arian creed, the acquittal of Pelagius by Pope Zosimus and the lapse of Pope Honorius into Monothelitism. N.B.—A comparison of the title with the opening words shows that

the Church and the visible Church are the same.

virtually a predicate.

The adjective is

§1. The Article starts off with the assumption that the Church of God is a visible society, The visible Church of Christ.

The Church as it appears in the New Testament is the suc- cessor or rather the continuation of Israel in the Old Testament. Among all primitive peoples religion is essentially social. The God is above all the God of the tribe. The individual worships Him as a member of the tribe. Only slowly does the idea of personal religion emerge. Israel is no exception to this rule. Jehovah made His Covenant with the nation as a whole. The individual Israelite shared its blessings as a member of the nation. To be cut off from Israel was to be cut off from Jehovah (cp. Gen. 17174), The nation as a whole was God’s son (Hos. 11}, Ex. 4%) and God’s servant (Is. 49°°). The idea of personal responsibility and personal salvation did not become prominent till the time of Jeremiah and Ezekiel (Hz. 18). It was indeed only too obvious that the greater part of the nation proved unfaithful to its call. The prophets taught that God’s purpose would be fulfilled through the faithful few (Is. 618, Amos 98, etc.). But this faithful remnant was the true representative of Israel (cp. Ro. 9): it was to form the centre of the coming Messianic Kingdom. The unfaithful were to be purged away, but it was still the visible nation of Israel, thus purified, that was to inherit the Kingdom. Fellowship with it was always the condition of sharing its glorious future.

That was the idea from which our Lord started. He purified the current conception of the Kingdom of God from many false and gross perversions. He insisted on the need for personal penitence. Mere physical descent from Abraham was not enough. But we find nowhere any hint that His Kingdom was not to be a visible body, just as Israel had been. He twice employs the word ‘ecclesia.’ In itself the word simply means a body of people gathered together. It was used, e.g. of the assembly at Athens (cp. Acts 19°). But in the Lxx it was used to translate a Hebrew word that meant the nation of Israel as called forth (ex-cadeiv) from their tents to an assembly for purposes of worship. In this sense it is used in Acts 7 and Heb. 2%. The clearest translation of Mt. 1618, where our Lord employs the word of the Christian Church, would be: ‘On this rock (.e. on St. Peter as the first to confess faith in Himself as Messianic King or Christ) I will build my new Israel.’ The sense in which

He employed it in the second passage (Mt. 1817) is less clear.* Dr. Hort held that it there means the local Jewish community. But in any case it means a visible assembly. Again, Christ’s whole action is in accord with this. He attached to Himself a recog- nized band of disciples (Acts 1222). He chose the Apostles and trained them to be the leaders of the new Israel. He insti- tuted Baptism as a visible means of entrance into His Church, and the Holy Communion as the common meal of its members. So, too, throughout the New Testament the Church appears as a visible society in the world. St. Paul puts on a level ‘the Jews,’ ‘the Greeks ’ and ‘the Church of God’ as definite bodies of men (1 Cor. 10%). He can speak of the distinction between ‘those within’ and ‘those without’ (1 Cor. 51738, ep, 712#. and 39 and 14%) as something perfectly familiar. ‘The Church’ as used in the New Testament means sometimes the whole Christian society (e.g. 1 Cor. 1228, Eph. 12%, 523 ff.). Sometimes it is used for the body of Christians in a particular place which represented the Church of Christ, just as, e.g. the Roman citizens in a place represented the Roman Empire, e.g. Acts 81, 1 Thess. 11, It is even used of particular congregations of Christians worshipping together in someone’s house (Ro. 16°, 1 Cor. 161%, Philem. 2, Col. 4%). But the individual Christian is always addressed as being a member primarily not of any local Church but of the one universal Church (Col. 3%). We do not find a number of independent preachers converting men to Christianity and then those men forming themselves into a local Church or community. Rather they are made members of the one Church, and this Church necessarily has its local branches. These local Churches stand out like islands in an ocean of heathenism. But they are all parts of one universal Church (cp. Acts 2075. The ‘bishops’ are appointed to feed not the Church of Ephesus but the Church of God).

See Goudge, Mind of St. Paul, Lect. IV. Hort, Christian Ecclesia, c. 1.

The Church, then, is a society (coetus fideloum).

(i) On the one hand she exists in the world as a visible society. Like other societies she has a form of admission, a purpose to achieve ; she possesses rules and officers and offers special

• See McNeile, who, however, regards the passage as a later addition.

privileges to her members. In all this she is an object not of faith but of sight. Even an unbeliever cannot deny that in some sense the Church of Christ exists as an institution in the world.

(ii) On the other hand, the Church is the ‘ Body of Christ,’ Eph. 173, §t. Paul speaks of her as the visible organ through which the ascended Christ now lives and works among men, as He once did through His human body. He also calls the Church ‘the fulness of him that filleth all in all,’ or, as it should rather be translated, ‘the fulness of him who all in all is being fulfilled.” That is to say, Christ is in some sense incomplete without the Church, and as the Church grows and becomes complete so He too becomes complete. Further, the Church is likened to a Temple (Eph. 21%, cp. 1 Cor. 31°14’, 1 Pet. 25), the thought being that the Christian Church now fills the place of the Temple at Jerusalem which was the visible sign of God’s presence among men and the House in which He dwelt. In this sense she is an object not of sight but of faith.

§2. The question is often asked, why do we need a Church ? Why does not God deal with us individually ? Is not religion at bottom a personal matter, between the soul and God ? The answer depends upon two main lines of thought.

(a) Man needs a society just because he is man. He is by nature a social being and requires a society of some kind for his development. Such a thing as a purely ‘individual’ man, a self-contained and self-sufficient human being does not exist. Imagine a child born and cast upon a desert island and there in some almost inconceivable manner growing up into manhood. He would indeed possess the body and the bodily needs and appetites of a man. But his moral and intellectual powers, just those that distinguish him from the brute creation, would have remained undeveloped. They can only be drawn out and edu- cated by social intercourse. They need a stimulus in response to which they may be realized. They cannot be actualized as it were in vacuo. The same is true of our spiritual faculties. In religion, as in all our higher life, we are dependent upon others for the training and realization of the possibilities that our nature contains. Human life is dependent upon fellowship. As we have seen, in religion as in other things the individual is heir to the past experience of the society into which he is born. No doubt under modern conditions a man may live a life of

communion with God through Christ, while he withdraws him- self from participation in the life and worship of any Christian community. But he is none the less dependent upon the Christian Church for his religion. He learnt the first truths of the Christian faith from others. The very news of the existence of Christ — reached him through his fellowmen, whether it was by word of mouth or even by the reading of the Bible. He lives in a Christian atmosphere ; the customs and habits of public and social life in which he participates have largely been coloured and moulded by the influence of Christians. It is true that all genuine Christianity demands from the individual an act of personal surrender and personal faith, that he must make for himself and that no one can make for him: but none the less religion from first to last is social, just as all human life is social. This is true of all re- ligions, but especially of Christianity. For Christianity is above all a religion of life and a religion of love. Life cannot. be lived in isolation. Love cannot be practised or even learnt in solitude. As St. John tells us, the love of our brethren is at once the condition and the method of attainment of the love of God (1 Jn. 479, 20-21),

(0) From another point of view the whole work that Christ came into the world to do demanded a society if it was to be continued. We know how among ourselves if any teaching, political or religious, is to be propagated, if men are to be brought to sympathize with and understand the practical bearing of such teaching, a society is necessary. If the ‘pure word of God’ is to be ‘ preached ’ a society is necessary. If our Lord had simply cast loose into the world His teaching: if His life had remained only a memory in the minds of a number of individual disciples, unless these had formed themselves into a society or group of societies, humanly speaking the teaching and memory of His life would have gradually disappeared. At most it would have survived in a book or books, as the life and utterances of a great moral teacher. But Christianity is above all a way of life: it is not a mere moral code. The Church was able to display before the world the Christian life, the practical embodiment of the teaching and example of Christ in a society of men and women. What largely drew men to Christ was the lives of Christians, their love and service one to another. Further, the individual Christian by himself can only reflect a fraction

of the light of Christ. His gifts, both of character and action, need to be supplemented by the different gifts of other men. Just as the individual can only do his best work in a state where he can exercise his special abilities in conjunction with others and where he can do the work that others are less fitted to do, and others do the work that he is less fitted to do, so in the Church every member has not the same office, but every member both needs the others and is needed by them (1 Cor. 121731, Ro. 12%). A foot is quite useless by itself, but is a most useful member of a body. The gifts that are needed for Christ’s work in the world are widely distributed among indi- vidual Christians. Only as they work together in the common unity of the Church can those gifts be utilized to the best advan- tage. A number of individual Christians working independently must from the nature of things be far less effective, than the same number working together in a common organization.

Cp. Simpson, What is the Gospel ? c. 8. T. R. Glover, The Nature and Purpose of a Christian Society. Dean Church, Oxford House Papers, Second Series, ‘ The Christian Church.’ Gore, The Church and the Ministry, c. i. Oldham, The World and the Gospel, c. vi., esp. p. 146 ff.

§3. The Creeds give four ‘notes’ of the Church: One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. These four are most intimately connected with one another and depend upon the truth that the Church is the Body of Christ. In treating of these we must remember the two aspects of the Church. The Church as she exists in actual fact to-day is not the Church as it is God’s purpose that she shall one day become. Not only is the Church in process of growing into what she shall be hereafter when she is full-grown (Eph. 411-16 Col. 21°), but this growth has been hindered by the sins of her members. Sin cuts off that union with Christ from which the Church’s life flows. It is only as we ‘hold fast the head’ that the body will ‘increase with the increase of God.’ But our consciousness of the present imperfection and sinfulness of the Church must not hinder us from viewing her in the light of her glorious future. In this we may compare the Church to the individua] Christian. Scripture calls all Christians from the first ‘saints,’ that is to say, it looks at us with all our present weakness not as we are but as we are becoming, according to

God’s purpose. It certainly does not deny our present im- perfection or sinfulness, but teaches us that in those whom God is drawing to Himself and perfecting, even their sin, real though it be, is not the truest point in their character. ‘ Sinful they truly are: but they more truly are that which by God’s grace they are even now becoming.’ * Just as we are one with the perfected saints that we hope to be hereafter, so the Church is one with the perfect Church of the future. God loves the Church, and we are to love her for what she will one day be. This does not mean that we are to shut our eyes to present failures and shortcomings. We are not to pretend to identify the present Church with the ideal Church of the future. We are to be penitent for her sins and faults. But we are to have a great hope before us and look forward to the day when the Church, full-grown and purified, shall indeed be disclosed in all her glory. The question is often raised, what is the relation between the Church and the Kingdom of God? At present the two are not identical. The root idea of ‘ Kingdom,’ as it is used in Scripture and in the East, is not so much a visible territory, but rather a relation to a person—the king. The Kingdom of God is the sphere in which God rules. The Church at the present moment does not represent the whole sphere of God’s rule and action, even among mankind: nor yet even in the Church is God’s rule fully realized owing to the sinfulness of Christians. But the Church is to be the embodiment of God’s tule among men. God’s Kingdom is the divine idea which it exists to enforce and extend in the world. The Church is to grow into the Kingdom: she is, we may say, the Kingdom of God in the making. The day will come when the two will coalesce. Here, too, we must not separate in thought the Church as she now is from the Church as she is to be. So far as the Church is true to herself and her divine Master, she is the expeditionary force of the Kingdom of God in the world. Cp. Robertson, Regnum Dei, pp. 55 ff., 75 ff., and 358 fi.

(a) How then can we say that we believe in the unity of the Church 2. The Church is visibly divided and rent asunder. Our answer is that the unity of the Church is primarily the sharing of one life, the life of Christ. Just as all the members of our human body hold together only because and so long as they are

animated by one life, so all Christians living and departed are members of one body because they partake of the one life of Christ. ‘There is one body and one Spirit, even as also ye were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all’ (Eph. 44). So in speaking of the Holy Communion St. Paul writes, ‘Seeing that there is one bread, we who are many are one body ; for we all partake of the one loaf’ (1 Cor. 10”, R.V. marg.). The one loaf symbolizes the one life by which alike all Christians are fed. Again, in Jn. 101® Christians are described not as ‘one fold’ (A.V.) but ‘one flock’ (R.V.): their unity depends not on being penned together within a common fence, but on obeying the voice of a common Shepherd. So then the unity of the Church is a unity of life. There are many kinds of unity. There is the unity of a dead thing like a stone. There is a merely collective unity, the unity of a crowd or a class, such as that of a number of grains of wheat or of all the red-haired men in England, who are in some sense a unity as forming a distinct class. But there is a higher type of unity, the unity of an organism in which each part has a life of its own and yet ministers to the life of the whole. The highest type of unity is that of a family or a State. Now it is in this last kind of unity that we find the completest analogy to the unity of the Church. It is not a unity that is merely given, but a unity that is progressive, that has to be maintained and built up by common effort. Take a family. In some sense the unity of a family is a unity that is given. The children are born into it. By their birth they inherit a common physical descent. <A family is one, first in order of time because its members live together and share a common life. But this unity is only a beginning. As the life of the children develops, a new and higher type of unity is demanded, a unity resting upon mutual acts of forbearance, unselfishness and kindness: the full possibilities of family unity are only attained when all its members have learned to live with and for one another. So we get the highest type of unity, a union of free personalities bound together by links of mutual love and service. Family unity of the kind is no longer merely the sharing of a common home or a common physical life, though it is based on these, it is rather unity of moral and spiritual life. Or again, the unity of the English

nation in the first instance depends upon living in the same island and sharing a common descent. But the English nation is something greater than a collection of all Englishmen. It has attained to a true national life and unity by the willingness of its citizens to work and serve together for a common purpose. A nation can only attain to full consciousness of its unity by common suffering and common activity. Thus from one kind of unity it rises through toil and effort towards a new and higher kind of unity which is the goal towards which the best and wisest statesmen labour to direct its life. These thoughts apply no less to the Church of Christ. In one sense the unity of the Church is the gift of God. The Christian, as soon as he enters the Church, finds himself in company with others sharing a common life, serving a common Lord, called to a common calling. The members of the Church are one in virtue of the common life that they receive. So in the earliest days of the Christian Church and in the earliest days of the founding of any Christian com- munity to-day, say in the mission-field, the first unity of the Church is simply a unity that is given, the fact that all Christians as having been made Christians have been placed within one society. But having been placed within it and made members of it they have to learn to live together in it. They have to walk worthily of the vocation wherewith they were called, ‘with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace’ (Eph. 4%). The initial unity given at the start can only be kept by the exercise of such virtues and it is a hard task to keep it. Only through the self-suppression and forbearance of its members as shown in conduct and worship will a higher unity be gradually attained. We are to attain by effort and prayer ‘unto the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God’ (Eph. 4°). The Church is to be built up into this unity in love (Eph. 4°). In the case of the individual, God’s gift of life needs the co-operation of our wills in using and developing it. So, too, in the case of the Church, the full life of the society needs the co-operation of all its members for its attainment. As we saw in the family and the nation, so in the Church, the highest type of unity is a unity of will and mind and feeling such as can only be won by united moral effort. Christians are called to grow into the mind of Christ. By drawing ©

ever closer to Him they are to draw closer to one another. Our Lord prayed that Christians ‘may be perfected into one ’ (Jn. 1778, ets év), Since the unity of the Church is thus made the object of prayer, it is clear that our Lord regards it as con- tingent upon the behaviour of men. In so far as Christians possess among themselves a real moral and spiritual unity, it will show itself in outward unity. They will wish to work and worship together, to encourage and support one another, and to show a united front to the world. But there is a right order. Inner unity of life through union with Christ comes first. Then our own surrender to that life and the continuous moral effort to grow into holiness of heart and will, into the hikeness of Christ. Then the outward fruit of this should be seen in the visible unity of the Church. We can see how this unity has been broken. Christians have fallen into sin. Jealousy, envy, self-seeking, and the like have come in and separated them alike from Christ and from one another. We can see why St. Paul lays such stress on the duty of all speaking ‘ the same thing’ and being perfected together ‘in the same mind and in the same judgment’ (1 Cor. 11°14), or of letting their “manner of life be worthy of the Gospel of Christ ’ and ‘ standing fast in one spirit’ (Phil. 17”), or of being ‘of the same mind, having the same love, being of one accord, … doing nothing through faction or vain-glory, but in lowliness of mind, each counting other better than himself, not looking each to his own things, but each… also to the things of others’ (Phil. 2*4). The neglect of these duties led to the breach of the outward unity of the Church. That outward unity was in God’s purpose to be the outward and visible expression of an inward and spiritual unity, gained and maintained by spiritual effort in response to the grace of Christ. God’s family has been broken up because the self-discipline required for the building up of the home life proved too difficult and too irksome to man’s fallen nature. But God’s purpose for the Church still remains. We still believe ‘in one Church’ because we believe that unity both outward and inward is God’s will for the Church, and that as men draw nearer to Christ, so that unity will be restored. A family is still ideally one even though its members have quarrelled and separated. They still possess one father and are of one common stock, though they have not lived up to

their heritage. §o, though Christians are divided, so far as they are truly Christians they still share one common life, and if they are faithful to it, must in the end be made one in Christ.

Cp. Lacey, ‘‘ The Unity of the Church,” C.H.S. Tracts.

Such then is the unity of the Church as set before us in Scrip- ture. It is a unity of inward life issuing in and expressing itself in outward unity of organization. We may contrast it with two opposite and mutually antagonistic views of Church unity,

(i) The Church of Rome puts outward unity under the Pope in the first place. No doubt it insists upon the need of moral and spiritual unity, but outward unity is regarded not as their natural fruit but as their essential condition. The visible oneness of organization is regarded as so essential to the being of the Church, that not only it should not be but it cannot be broken. If we accept the Pope as the divinely appointed Head of the Church on earth, it follows that the true Church must consist solely of those Christians in full communion with him. Were but a handful to remain faithful to him, the unity of the Church would still remain unbroken. Such a view of unity as resting at bottom on outward allegiance to a single visible head is certainly not the view of Scripture. It cannot be an object of attainment by growth, as St. Paul tells us (Eph. 4%) It bears not the slightest resemblance to that unity between the Son and the Father which Christ holds up as the pattern of Christian unity (Jn. 172°), since it is compatible with great moral and spiritual divisions. Again, unity and holiness are in Scripture always in the closest connexion with one another (e.g. Jn. 171%). The holiness of the Church is certainly far from complete as yet, and therefore we cannot be surprised that its unity is not complete either. The unity that the Church of Rome sets before us is on a lower moral plane than that which Scripture demands. It is an attempt to attain the goal by a short cut, by outward machinery instead of by inward effort. Nothing has, as a matter of simple history, done more to divide the Church than the claims of the Popes. We believe that to demand a visible head of the Church in the Roman sense, shows a real want of faith. It is God’s will that in our present condition we should walk by faith, not by sight. Christ is the one head of

all Christians, living and departed. His viceroy on earth is not the Bishop of Rome but the Holy Spirit. So far as we submit ourselves truly to Him, to be governed by Him in all our desires and acts, He will guide us into that true unity for which Christ prayed. Cp. Collins, Unity : Catholic and Papal. Puller, The Primitive Saints and the See of Rome, c. vi. Gore, 2.C. Claims, ce. 1-3 and 6-8.

(ii) At the opposite extreme stands the view of many though by no means all Protestant nonconformists. They hold that the one thing that matters is for a man to have his heart right with God and have faith in Christ as his Saviour. He thus belongs to ‘the true Church,’ ‘the invisible Church of all true believers.’ * It is no doubt desirable for Christians to associate themselves into societies or churches for practical purposes. But it is of comparatively little importance to which of these bodies a man belongs. He may belong to any or none or change his Church as often as he changes his coat. His general principle of choice is his liking for a preacher or his wish to go where he gets most good. On this view outward unity is of little or no importance. Multiplication of sects may be regarded as a sign of vigorous life. All true believers in Christ are fundamentally at one: the essential point is personal faith and self-consecra- tion. Such a view is not Scriptural. The theory of an ‘invisible ’ Church contains the truth that God alone knows who are His, and that His true servants may be found in all Christian bodies and indeed outside them. But the word ‘church’ has in Scrip- ture a definite meaning. As we have seen, it denotes a visible body. We have no right to take and use it in a quite different sense. Further, it inverts the true relation of the Church to the individual believer. The teaching of the New Testament on this point may be expressed in the words of Archbishop Temple. “Men talk sometimes as if a Church could be constituted simply by Christians coming together and uniting themselves into one body for the purpose. Men speak as if Christians came first and the Church after: as if the origin of the Church was in the wills of the individual Christians who composed it. But on the contrary, throughout the teaching of the Apostles, we see that it is the Church that comes first and the members of it

afterwards. Men were not brought to Christ and then deter- mined that they would live in a community. Men were not brought to Christ to believe in Him and His Cross and to recog- nize the duty of worshipping the Heavenly Father in His name, and then decided that it would be a great help to their religion that they should join one another in that worship and should be united in the bond of fellowship for that purpose. In the New Testament on the contrary the Kingdom of Heaven is already in existence and men are invited into it… . Every- where men are called in: they do not come in and make the Church by coming.’ *

Again, on this view of the Church, just as on the Roman view, its unity cannot be destroyed. You cannot divide an invisible body. Yet St. Paul speaks of it as divided (1 Cor. 11°, Ro. 161’, cp. 1 Jn. 2, Jude 19). For one great value of the unity of the Church is that it is a school for Christian character. Fellowship in the Church is always regarded as a moral dis- cipline. The effort to live and grow in unity calls for humility and self-suppression. Christians are bidden to live not as isolated individuals but as members of one body (cp. Phil. 2! ff, etc., quoted above). If a Christian who is offended or finds his fellow-Christians distasteful can immediately go off and start a Church of his own, the healthful discipline of a common life is evaded. We see how strenuously the Apostles and especially St. Paul contended for the outward unity of the Church. In the dispute between Jewish and Gentile Christians recorded in Acts 15 the obvious solution of the difficulty was to have two Churches, one for each party, when neither side would have been offended by the presence and habits of the other. But this breach of outward unity was not for a moment contemplated. Christians were bidden to learn to behave charitably towards one another. If St. Paul had followed the line of least resistance, he would have been spared continual opposition and persecution. The modern idea of separate free ‘Churches’ ministers to the desires of our fallen human nature by providing a means of escape from the need of self-control. Lastly, the Church exists to carry on the work of Christ in the world, and that work is hindered by open divisions among Christians. Our Lord wished Christians to witness for Him by open unity (Jn. 172°), The

• Sermon preached at the consecration of Truro Cathedral.

world is rightly contemptuous of a merely ‘spiritual unity ’ that gives no evidence of love or self-sacrifice. We must aim at this outward unity. Nevertheless, there can be no short cuts. To sacrifice what we believe to be true in order to win a temporary concord would be fatal. Any truth that is neglected will always take its revenge by causing further divisions in the future. Only by growing into the one mind of Christ will true outward unity be attained.

Cp. Gore, Ephesians, pp. 188 ff. and note F.

William Law, Third Letter to the Bishop of Bangor.

See also articles “ Church” in #.R.H.

(iii) The question is often raised, ‘Why, if you believe that Christ desires outward unity, and that Nonconformists are acting contrary to God’s will in maintaining separate organiza- tions, do you not join the Church of Rome? How can you defend the position of the Church of England while you attack that of the Nonconformist bodies?’ Our answer is that the relation of these bodies to ourselves is very different from that | of ourselves to the Church of Rome.

The Church of England claims to be the historic Church of the nation. In the reign of Henry VIII it was reformed, or rather its reformation was begun and continued until the final settlement in 1660. Reformation was no new thing. The Church had been reformed before and doubtless will be reformed again. No new body was created by Act of Parliament or in any other way. No date can be pointed out when the old Church was dissolved and a new Church formed to take its place. We do not claim that the Reformation was perfect, but some drastic change was certainly needed. The Roman Church itself was reformed very soon after by the Council of Trent. All that we claim is that we had the right to reform ourselves without forfeiting our identity. The Church of England, as reformed, asks of its members belief in nothing that cannot be proved from Scripture and therefore has not belonged to the Christian faith from the earliest days. It has preserved the historic Creeds as a key to the interpretation of Scripture. It has maintained the historic ministry. Thus the pure Word of God is preached among us and the Sacraments duly administered. Our forms of service and our ceremonies are far from perfect, but they are in tone thoroughly Scriptural and there is in them nothing to

which a Christian can reasonably refuse to submit. Accord- ingly there is no adequate ground for separation from the Church either on questions of doctrine or discipline. There is need of patience and room for improvement. But in the interests of the unity of the Church that Christ desired, personal preferences on matters that are not vital should be subordinated to the common welfare. On the other hand, we must confess that there have been times in the history of our Church and there are still occasions when, by our comfortable worldliness and spiritual sloth or by our narrowness of vision and want of zeal, we have quenched the enthusiasm of those who were aflame with the desire for Christian service, and given them every excuse for going outside the Church to find scope for their devotion and the realization of their ideals. Cp. R. W. Church, Lecture on Bishop Andrews in Pascal and other Sermons, p. 64 fi.

Our Place in Christendom, esp. the last lecture.

A. 8. Duncan-Jones, Ordered Lnberty.

As a matter of simple history, the Roman body in England had its origin in a separation from ourselves. At first, in the reign of Elizabeth, Papists joined in our services and communi- cated at our altars. There is reason for supposing that if only the Queen had been ready to acknowledge the Papal supremacy, the Pope was willing to sanction the reformed Prayer Book. But after a commission of the Council of Trent had decided that attendance at the services of the Church of England was grievously sinful, the Pope issued a bull in 1570 declaring Elizabeth excommunicate and deposed. All attendance at the worship of the English Church was declared illegal. Those who remained obedient to the Pope were thus forced to withdraw and become ‘recusants.’ This was the formal origin of the Roman Catholic body in England. At first, as was inevitable owing to the laws of the time, they lacked any outward organiza- tion. Not till 1829 were the civil disabilities of Roman Catholics finally removed. They were governed by Vicars Apostolic appointed by the Pope. In 1850 the present Roman episcopate was established by Pius IX, not without strong protests from the Church of England. Thus it has no historical connexion with the pre-Reformation episcopate. To certain modern Roman Catholic writers the very fact that it comes fresh from the See of

Uv

Peter is a matter of congratulation. Union between ourselves and Roman Catholics is at present impossible. We cannot join them without professing our belief in certain doctrines that we believe not to be true and that certainly formed no part of primitive Christianity. Before a man is admitted into the Roman Catholic Church he has to profess his belief in the supremacy of the Pope and to repudiate all Christian bodies not in communion with him. Further, two new doctrines have in recent years been made ‘de fide,’ ‘the immaculate concep- tion of the Blessed Virgin Mary ’ in 1854, and the ‘ Infallibility of the Pope’ in 1870. Unity is of great importance: but the importance of truth is supreme. On the other hand, Roman Catholics cannot worship with us because the whole status of the Church of England rests upon the repudiation of Papal authority, which is the keystone of their position. If the Roman view of the Pope is right, their position is perfectly logical.

Cp. Holden, The Special Basis of the Anglican Claim.

The earlier Nonconformist bodies were formed by separation from the Church of England mainly on grounds of doctrine. The Church of England rejected Calvinism, and those who were thoroughgoing Calvinists regarded it therefore as apostate from the truth. Accordingly they left the Church and formed bodies of their own. So far their position was from their point of view justified. But time has brought with it a curious nemesis. In old days they condemned the Church of England as not strict enough in doctrine. To-day they condemn us as too strict. Not only have they thrown overboard the Calvinism which was the reason for their existence and which still survives in the title-deeds of many of their chapels, but their doctrinal position is often merely a vague allegiance to Christ and Christian morality. The Wesleyan Methodists, from whom other smaller Methodist bodies have separated, began as a group of religious societies within the Church. John Wesley himself was on many points of doctrine a ‘high churchman.’ His conduct was inconsistent. On the one hand he repeatedly asserted his wish that his followers should not separate from the Church, and he died an English churchman. Onthe other hand, at the close of his life, he claimed that bishop and priest were in origin the same order, and that as a priest he had authority to ordain others and he actually did

so. From this has sprung the present Wesleyan ministry. Further, the real centre of the religious life of the Methodists was not in the Church but in their own societies. When the strong personality of John Wesley was removed, there was no bond strong enough to stay the separation.

In regarding Protestant Nonconformity we must distinguish between the position of the organized bodies as a whole and the position of individual members of them. As organizations their position is undoubtedly schismatical. They work not only independently of but in opposition to the Church, setting up ministry against ministry. From the standpoint of doctrine their position to-day is hard to justify. We demand of them when they joi us no other test of doctrine than the Apostles’ Creed, which they would claim to accept already. Thus our dealing with them is very different from that of the Roman Church with ourselves. The real differences between the Church and Dissent lie not in questions of theology but in questions of organization and worship. While the Church of England im- poses upon its members no open profession of belief in any one form of ministry or organization, in practice she insists upon episcopal ordination and does not receive Nonconformist ministers into her ministry without it. They in turn deny both the need and the desirability of episcopal organization or ordination. The real line of division depends very largely upon different conceptions of the relation of the outward to the inward.

As regards individual Nonconformists we cannot lightly accuse them of being personally guilty of the sin of schism. If they have been duly baptized they are members of the Catholic Church and their separation from the Church is usually due to no fault of their own. They were brought up in some separated body: they have found in it the centre and support of their religion. It has been a real spiritual home, the scene to them of their deepest spiritual experience. They cannot be expected to leave it for the Church, about which they know very little and whose spiritual superiority is by no means overwhelmingly apparent. There is abundant evidence that God accepts their work and blesses it. Others again have left the Church, not because they possess a schismatical spirit or are hostile to the real mind of the Church, but because that particular part of the Church to which they have belonged has repelled them by

its spiritual deadness and want of sympathy, or because its representatives have obscured the presence of Christ by the sloven- liness or wickedness of their lives. We need to remember that even to-day there are many parishes where a religious working- man, who, through no fault of his own, has had small opportunity of instruction in the meaning of Church life, is almost obliged to turn to nonconformity for spiritual help and sympathy. There have been times in the history of our Church when such deadness was very widespread and the Church seemed chiefly to exist as a political institution for the comfort of the wealthier classes. Again, in different places and at different times vital truths of the Christian faith have become obscured and neglected, whether it be the need of personal conversion, or the spiritual independence of the Church or the right place of the sacraments. Those who have awakened to the value of such truths and whose desire to live up to them has been treated with coldness, have naturally turned to another body in whose life such truth find due expression. Only a claim to absolute holiness at all times, which the Church of England certainly cannot make, could justify a rigid and superior attitude to Nonconformity. While we believe that their separation demands from them an expression of penitence on their part, we must equally allow that our own faults, which contributed to that separation, demand a public expression of penitence on our part. Historically the position is further obscured by the action of the State. Questions of religion easily became mixed up with questions of politics. Men separated from the Church because they were opposed to the dominant party in the State, with which the Church appeared to be allied. In the attempt to render Church and State co-extensive as they had been in the Middle Ages, the religion of the Church was forced on men by the laws of the State. So the true nature of the Church and her unity was obscured. Cp. Collins, The English Reformation and its Consequence. Maurice, The Kingdom of Christ. For Nonconformist standpoint : Fairbairn, Studies in Religion and Theology.

Selbie, Nonconformity : its Origin and Progress. The lives of famous Nonconformist leaders, e.g. Dr. Dale.

(b) So, too, we profess our belief in the ‘ holiness of the Church ’ _ though the Church as yet is far from holy. In the New Testament

there are two words for holy, dyws and datos. The former means set apart for God, the latter means the character involved in such separation. The Church at present is holy in the first sense. Its goal is to become holy in the second sense also. In~ the Old Testament the root idea of holiness is ‘separation.’ At first its sense was primarily ceremonial or physical; but it gradually acquired an ethical meaning. That which was set apart for God must be free from blemish, in the first instance physical blemish, and later, as the sense of morality developed, moral blemish. So Israel is a holy nation separated from the other nations by God for His purpose (Ex. 19%, Lev. 1144 and 2076, etc.), and therefore called to live up to this vocation. Our Lord is the * Holy One of God’ (Mk. 14) called and set apart to do the Father’s will (Jn. 10%). The language applied to the old Israel is applied to the Church as set apart in Christ (1 Pet. 1°16, 2°). Christians are saints, dyso., as members of the new Israel. They are to become daily more fit for the divine service. They are being sanctified by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. So the actual sanctification of the Church, like that of the individual Christian, is a slow process demanding continuous watchfulness and effort. At present the Church is incompletely responsive to the Divine will. But God sees her not only as she is but as she is to be. This does not mean that we are to acquiesce in her present imperfection. Though it is true that the Church is a refuge for the penitent and is God’s home for those who wish to be good rather than are good, still, it is the Church’s duty to exclude those who persist in wilful and deliberate sin and show no signs of penitence (cp. Cor. 518). Dr. Gibson has shown that the Article includes such an exercise of discipline in the due administration of the Sacraments.* Con- versely, though we must strive to forward the actual holiness of the Church, we must not make the Church’s slowness of attainment an excuse for separating from her. In all ages there have been men who have desired to realize here and now the ideal of a Church consisting only of the actually holy. That was the aim of the Donatists and the Puritans. They left the Catholic Church because she contained good and bad Christians and joined other societies which were to consist only of the good. But the Puritan ideal has always failed in practice. Sooner or later the old * Gibson, Thirty-nine Articles, p. 495.

inconsistencies reappear in the separated bodies and the logical result is further separation. Moreover, Puritanism is associated not altogether unfairly with hypocrisy and sanctimoniousness. Nothing could be further from the example of Christ, who chose as His disciples not the righteous but penitent sinners. It is through the Church that God’s Holy Spirit sanctifies men. The Church’s holiness to-day is but an earnest of the holiness that is to be hereafter.

(c) We believe in the Catholicity of the Church. In itself the term ‘Catholic’ simply means ‘ universal.’ It is first applied to the Church in the letters of St. Ignatius, who contrasts the one universal Church with the many local bodies of which it is com- posed. Later on, as meaning the Church throughout the world, one in discipline and doctrine, it was used to mark the contrast with heretical bodies that were local, peculiar and isolated in their views. As such the word contains two main thoughts.

(i) Since Christ is the one Saviour of the world, the Church is to include men of all classes and nations. The Gospel is to be preached to the whole creation (Mt. 289, [Mk.] 16%). Every man and people will find in Christ what they need. In Christ distinctions of race and position are abolished (Gal. 378, Col. 310-11), Not only do all men need the Church, but the Church has need of them. Every race has its contribution to make towards the interpretation of Christ. Christ is being fulfilled in proportion as the nations bring in their gifts to the Christian Church (Eph. 173, with Armitage Robinson’s note, cp. Rev. 21%). Though the Church is Catholic im idea and in purpose she is far from Catholic in fact. Whole races at present lie outside her. The Chinese and the Indian have hardly begun to make their contribution to its fulness—a contribution that may well be no less valuable than that already made by the Greek and the Roman. The Church’s Catholicity has been retarded by her slackness in missionary endeavour. In the Church all nations are to be united in the fulness of a common life. The Catholic Church can be content with no ideal short of that.

(ii) The Church exists to teach the whole truth in its fulness and proportion. So Catholic teaching comes to be opposed to teaching that is defective or one-sided. The truly Catholic- minded man is one who rises above the limitations of his age

a

THE CHURCH all

or class or country or temperament. In his zeal for one aspect of the truth he does not ignore or deny another. A heretic, on the other hand, isolates and exaggerates a truth to such a degree that it becomes almost untrue, and shuts his eyes to other parts of the truth. The popular antithesis of Catholic and Protestant is absurd. All true protest against error is based on a knowledge and love of truth. A Catholic love of truth is bound to protest against all error that limits or denies the truth. In a sinful world every man should wish to be at once both a Catholic and a Protestant.

The Church fails in Catholicity in this sense so far as she declines to welcome some distasteful truth or turns away from the effort to grow in the knowledge of the truth. The full

Notes

• Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood, p. 38.
• Cp. Hobhouse, Bampton Lectures, p. 388.