Loyola College - Review Yearbook (Montreal, Quebec Canada)

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LOYOLA COLLEGE REVIEW Religious England “ЧТ а time when the atten- МА tion of the world is `J focussed on England and her gallant attempt for survival as one of the 4 foremost financial nat- 9) ions, it would not be amiss to spend a few moments scrutinising the religious structure of the country. England's religious army may be broadly divided into three camps: Ang- licanism or the Established Church, Catholicism, and the Non-Conformist or Free Churches. The Established Church is undoubt- edly the largest religious body in the state. Out of a total population of thirty-six million, some four and one half millions profess Anglicanism. There are the two Anglican provinces of Canterbury and York; between them, these possess twelve thousand nine hundred and thirty-two parishes, seven- teen thousand five hundred and eigh- teen churches, and about eighteen thou- sand five hundred active clergymen. In the Established Church there are three main parties, the High, the Broad, and the Low. Some attempt shall be made at defining their relative positions, but we must bear in mind that there is no clear-cut division. The Low Church party, once the most important of the trio, has steadily declined in numbers and in influence. There are probably not three thousand out of the seventeen thousand Churches that are of a dis- tinctively Evangelical character at the present time. Low Churchmen are staunch sup- porters of the King, honouring him as the supreme head of the Church on earth in matters both spiritual and temporal. They consider the minister a mere representative of the congrega- tion and have in their ritual no room for a sacrificial priesthood. They count any innovations or approximations to Catholic нар а weakening of рип- ciple. They emphatically deny the Real Presence and believe, rather, in the Real Absence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. They have a number of societies working in their interest; chief of these are the National Church League, the Church Association, and the Church Pastoral Aid Society. They publish the Record and the English Churchman. The Broad Church or Rationalising Party has steadily increased within the last thirty years. Its adherents desire a drastic revision of the creed, worship, and discipline of the Established Church. Broad Churchmen regard the Bible as a mere human document devoid of in- spiration; they reject the supernatural and the miraculous in religion; the peat number consider Christ as mere- y an ideal man, not the Son of God. The success of this branch may be attributed to the exaggerated individ- ualism that lies at the root of all Protestantism and logically leads to the complete negation of authority and unity just as real faith leads to an absolute affirmation of authority and unity. The influence of this party 18 улде- spread and can be observed in both the Low and the High Churches. The most important societies connected with the Broad Church are the League of the Church Militant and the Churchmen's Union. Тһе latter is principally in- terested in the advancement of liberal religious thought and publishes the Mod- ern Churchman fortnightly. The Broad Church numbers about one quarter of КЕЈ

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LOTOLA the clergy and laity of the Established Church. The High Church is numerically the strongest and is, as well, the most in- fluential of the three. It embraces, as do the others, men differing widely in doctrine and practice. There are those whose innovations do not extend be- yond surpliced choirs and altar lights; on the other hand, there are those whose acceptance of Catholic ceremonial is so complete as to lead one to suspect that he is in a Catholic Church. This party unanimously rejects the designation of Protestant and has more recently styled itself Catholic. In the extreme Churches you will find vestments, in- cense, and all the solemnity of High Mass, even, at times, the Roman Missal in place of the Book of Common Prayer; there will be holy water, con- fessionals, a Lady Chapel—in short all the external characteristics of a Cath- olic Church. Devotion to Our Lady, invocation of the saints, the doctrine of transubstantiation, and the primacy and infallibility of the Pope are taught. However, more moderate High Church- men teach only consubstantiation, and, though many allow the primacy, few admit the infallibility of the Pope. The attempt of the High Church party to introduce religious communities for men has been but indifferently success- ful. The Society of St. John the Baptist —the Cowley Fathers—and the Com- munity of the Resurrection are, perhaps, the most prominent. Among women the venture was more successful and some fifty congregations have been established. The Church Times, an ably- edited weekly, is the most advanced and the most widely read newspaper pub- lished by the High Church. The Church of England owes her position to-day in me part to the untiring devotion of her earnest and unselfish clergymen. One fatal flaw can readily be discerned in all three parties. Whether a man believes almost the whole cycle of Catholic doctrine COLLEGE REVIEW with the extreme High Church party, or scarcely believes in God with the extreme Broad Church party, or utterly denies the sacerdotal character of the ministry with the extreme Low party, it is always in the last analysis a matter of mere opinion, not of faith as Cath- olics understand the term. I can do no more than cast a super- ficial glance at the position of the Free Churches. These at one time or another have seceded from the Established Church; hence their name. The Congregationalists or Indepen- dents are the oldest of the Non-Con- formist bodies. They repudiated the authority of the Crown in spiritual matters and claimed complete liberty for each separate congregation to ar- range its doctrine and worship. The chaos that ensued was remedied by the Union of Congregational Churches. This union has about seven hundred thousand adherents. The strongest and most influential of the Free Churches is the Wesleyan Methodist, founded by the dynamic preacher, John Wesley. The Church is governed by the Wesleyan Methodist Conference, which meets annually. It has about one million seven hundred thousand members. The Baptist Church is governed by a Union as is the Congregational. If one includes the minor Baptist Churches— First Day, Seventh Day, and Cave Adullam—then there are some five hundred thousand adherents of this Church. The name ‘‘Baptist’’ is a con- traction of ‘‘Anabaptist,’’ and is derived from the main tenet that the baptism of children is invalid; Baptists advocate baptism by immersion as opposed to baptism by aspersion. After the Established Church, the Catholic is the strongest and most in- fluential religious organization in Eng- land. There are three provinces— Westminster, Birmingham, and Liver- pool— sixteen dioceses, two thousand 181: