This document is available in Adobe Acrobat format as part of the CSCA Chung Hua Sheng Kung Hui Source Documents collection compiled by Michael Nai Chiu Poon of the Centre for the Study of Christianity in Asia, Trinity Theological College, Singapore
1. Preface.
2. Editorial, "SPIRIT OF MISSIONS." June, 1881.
3. Bishop Schereschewsky to Archbishop Tait. 1881.
4. Reverend W. J. Boone to Bishop Moule. 1881.
5. Bishop Bedell to the Editor of the "STANDARD OF THE CROSS."
6. Bishop Bedell to Archbishop Tait. June 30, 1881.
7. Bishop Bedell to the Bishop of Dover. July 4, 1881.
8. Archbishop Tait to Bishop Bedell. July 21, 1881.
9. The Bishop of Dover to Bishop Bedell. July 26, 1881.
10. Archbishop Tait to Bishop Bedell. August 9, 1881.
11. Bishop Bedell to the Bishop of Dover.
12. Bishop Bedell to Reverend J. Kimber. September 9, 1881.
13. Bishop Bedell to Archbishop Tait. September 9, 1881.
14. Editorial Spirit of Missions. February, 1883.
15. The Bishop and Standing Committee in Shanghai to the Presiding Bishop. 1896.
16. Bishop Graves to Bishop Moule. December 17, 1896.
17. Bishop Moule to Bishop Graves. December 23, 1896.
18. Bishop Graves to Bishop Moule. January 8, 1897.
19. Resolution 12 of the Conference of English and American Bishops in China. 1897.
20. Reverend J. Kimber to the Bishop of Albany. May 21, 1897.
21. Report of the Committee on Episcopal Jurisdiction. 1897.
22. Bishop Moule to Bishop Graves. April 12, 1898.
23. Bishop Graves to Bishop Moule. June 4, 1898.
24. Bishop Moule to Bishop Graves. July 4, 1898.
25. Resolutions of The House of Bishops, General Convention, 1898.
26. Notification of the above to English Bishops in China. January, 1899.
27. Resolution of Conference of English and American Bishops in China. 1903.
28. The Standing Committee of the District of Hankow to Bishop Graves.
PREFACE EPISCOPAL JURISDICTION IN CHINA HISTORY. The American Church sent a Bishop (Boone) to China in 1844, and the Church of England sent a Bishop to Victoria (Hong Kong) in 1849. The dioceses of North China and Mid-China were established in 1873 and 1880, and Western China in 1895.
The seat of the American Bishop has always been Shanghai.
About the same time that the American Bishop took up his residence in Shanghai (1845) the Church Missionary Society sent a missionary to Shanghai.
The question of the jurisdiction of the English and American Bishops has arisen from the fact that they have both had missionaries in Shanghai since that time. Shanghai is the only point where the missionaries of the two Churches work side by side.
The question arose first in 1853, after the arrival in China of the Bishop of Victoria. In that year the Board of Missions of the Church in the United States laid the matter before the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Bishop of Ohio had a conference with the Archbishop and also laid the matter before him in writing. No settlement was, however, attained. (See Spirit of Missions for 1853, pp. 466-479.)
In 1859 the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested to the Bishop of Victoria that he should make any arrangement that would be agreeable to Bishop Boone and himself, and the Bishop of Victoria proposed to leave the Province of Kiangsu to the occupation of the American Episcopal Church, while the missionaries of the Church of England should labor in the Province of Chekiang. Had this proposal been carried out, all difficulty would have been avoided.
In 1880, after the consecration of Bishop Moule, Bishop Schereschewsky addressed Archbishop Tait on this subject.
In 1895 Bishop Graves brought the matter to the notice of the House of Bishops and the resolution was referred to the committee appointed to suggest subjects for the Lambeth Conference. The committee forwarded it to the Archbishop of Canterbury separately.
In 1896 there was a correspondence between Bishop Moule and Bishop Graves. This correspondence, with a memorial setting forth the facts of the case, was sent to the Presiding Bishop. A committee, consisting of the Bishops of Albany, Pennsylvania and Shanghai, was, in consequence, appointed by the Board of Managers to lay the matter before the Archbishop of Canterbury (1897).
In April, 1897, when the Conference of English and American Bishops met in Shanghai, the whole matter was laid before them by the Bishop of Shanghai, and a resolution was adopted (Res. 12) asking for a settlement of the question. This resolution was forwarded to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Presiding Bishop of the Church in the United States.
DIFFICULTIES OF THE SITUATION. The present difficulties arise from the fact that the warrant under which the Bishop of Mid-China was consecrated includes within his jurisdiction all the territory where the American Church has been working, and in which, with the exception of Shanghai, there are no missionaries of the Church of England; also, from the fact that there is an action double jurisdiction in Shanghai itself, where, for instance, the English Church of the Holy Trinity is popularly called "the Cathedral," though the Bishop of Mid-China resides in another province (Che-Kiang), in the city of Hangchow.
SUGGESTED SOLUTION. That such action be taken as will leave to the American Church the provinces of Kiangsu, Hupeh and Nganhwui and the parts of Hunan and Kiangsi which are adjacent to the Yang Tsz River, and that a double jurisdiction in the city of Shanghai shall be avoided, so far at least as Chinese converts are concerned.
Such an arrangement can, we think, be arrived at, and would give the greatest satisfaction to the Bishops concerned, whose sole wish is to provide by the joint action of the two Churches for the better carrying on of mission work.
LETTERS, DOCUMENTS, &c. [2] SPIRIT OF MISSIONS, JUNE, 1881. EPISCOPAL JURISDICTION. The question of Episcopal jurisdiction in those countries where the English and the American Churches meet in the common work, touched upon in the foregoing article, is one that has long been under discussion. It seems, however, to be in the way of fair adjustment.
By the mail just received, Bishop Schereschewsky writes:
"The successor to the late Bishop Russell, of Ningpo, has arrived in Shanghai. There has been some discussion about the suitability of his title, and also as to his proposed installation in the Cathedral (so-called) at Shanghai. I have communicated with the Archbishop of Canterbury on the subject, and upon further and correct information as to his title--"Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China"--have withdrawn my objections on that score; but I still object to his installation in the Cathedral [that in Shanghai to which Dr. Bunn above alludes], as that would present the appearance of having two Bishops in one See, which would be contrary to precedent and to the Resolution passed at the Lambeth Conference."
The Recommendation of the Lambeth Conference, to which the Bishop refers, we find quoted (upon p. 271) in The Journal of the General Convention, 1880:
"When it is intended to send forth any new Missionary Bishop, notification of such an intention should be sent beforehand to the Archbishop of Canterbury, to the Presiding Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, and to the Metropolitan of any province near which the Missionary Bishop is to minister."
Upon the basis of this, our House of Bishops adopted the following resolution (Journal, p. 272):
"Resolved, That it be referred to the Board of reference aforesaid [defined in a previous resolution] or to the members of it appointed from this House, provided no general board shall be formed, to act with power, in conjunction with the Bishops of Japan and China respectively, in indicating the districts within which the said Bishops of China and Japan shall labor, and that this House of Bishops hereby assents to the changes of limits of jurisdiction and of title, if need be, accordingly."
The question in China, so far as is understood, turns upon the English Bishop's seat being in the city of Shanghai where we have been established so many years. It is further understood that in the event of an English Bishop being sent to Japan, the line of jurisdiction between him and Bishop Williams is likely to be drawn.
[3] BISHOP SCHERESCHEWSKY TO ARCHBISHOP TAIT. (Written from Wuchang in the spring of 1881.) My Lord Archbishop:
Your Grace's favor of January 9th in answer to a telegram sent to your Grace, protesting against Bishop Moule's title and his enthronement at the Cathedral--so called--at Shanghai, has duly reached me. The telegraph was occasioned by the following circumstances. It was announced in the English papers, both ecclesiastical and secular, and also by the local press in Shanghai, that Dr. Moule was consecrated under the title of "Bishop of Mid-China," without mentioning any limitation or qualification. Again, one of the English clergy at Shanghai imparted the information that Dean Butcher (now absent from Shanghai) had sent directions for the installing or enthroning of Bishop Moule at the said Cathedral. With this, as we thought, authentic information before us, myself and the clergy of the American Church in Shanghai could not but think that both the title "Bishop of Mid-China," as well as the proposed enthronement of Bishop Moule at the said Cathedral were contrary to the letter and spirit of the resolution passed by the Lambeth Conference with regard to the different jurisdictions of the missionary Bishops of both Churches now laboring in China.
I am glad to say, however, that I have subsequently learned, and have this information confirmed by your Grace's letter, that Bishop Moule's title is "Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China," which of course changes the aspect of the case, and to which no reasonable objection can be made.
As to the question of his enthronement in the Shanghai church, although undoubtedly, as stated by your Grace, the church belongs to the English Community, I respectfully submit that there is quite a difference--and trust your Grace will admit it, between Bishop Moule's simply being "connected"--the expression used in your Grace's letter, with the Shanghai church and being enthroned in the same as the Bishop in his Cathedral and which will of course imply that Shanghai is his see; whereas, the Ameican Bishops have been residing in Shanghai almost ever since the founding of the bishopric about the year 1845, with the exception of an interval of a few years during which Bishop Williams, now of Yedo, in Japan, was also Missionary Bishop in China. I need scarcely mention to your Grace that the fact of the so-called Cathedral in Shanghai being owned by the English Community does not imply at the same time that Shanghai is a British colony, like Hongkong, for instance. Were it so, to constitute it an English see although an American Bishop may have been residing there previously, might not perhaps have afforded ground for the same objections that can be made in the present instance, although even then, I humbly submit it would be contrary to ancient usage and precedent. I am happy to say that the enthronement has not taken place as yet, and I venture to hope that your Grace may see fit to take steps to prevent its taking place, as it strikes me that it would be contrary to the words and the intention of the Lambeth Resolution, and to say the least, it would afford occasion to those not belonging to the Anglican Communion to point with something like ridicule to the strange anomaly of two Bishops belonging to Churches in full communion with each other and substantially the same occupying apparently the same place or see, could the principle of constituting sees in China be admitted.
I trust your Grace will pardon the omission of a letter immediately following the telegram. Knowing that Bishop Moule was on his way out I was desirous of first seeing him and obtaining further information from him before writing to your Grace. But having been called away to this interior station, I have not as yet had the opportunity of conferring with him personally, but I hope I may have the opportunity of doing so before long.
Thanking your Grace for your letter and hoping that what I have written may meet with your grace's approval,
Believe me,
My Lord Archbishop,
Your Grace's obedient serv't,
S.I.J. SCHERESCHEWSKY, D.D.,
Miss'y Bishop of the American Church.
Shanghai.
To his Grace, the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury.
[4] REV. W. J. BOONE TO BISHOP MOULE. (Undated, probably 1881.) The Right Reverend Geo. E. Moule, D.D., Missionary Bishop, etc., etc.
Right Reverend and Dear Sir:--As you expressed an interest in the history of our Missionary Episcopate here at Shanghai, will you allow me to lay before you a few facts in this connection. In 1821 our Episcopal Church in the United States, which had been struggling hitherto against the reproach of its English bias, and conservative spirit took courage and began to work towards extension westward in our own fair heritage, a work which has since grown to very extensive proportions. In 1835 the awakened sense of our duty abroad led to a resolution that every baptized member of the Church was by duty and privilege a member of the general Missionary Society. Missions to the heathen to be known as Foreign Missions were begun in Africa and China, and to churches in decay in Greece and Asia Minor. China had been brought into relations with America and Morrison had been obliged to cross over to New York to find his way out. The American Board was already since 1829 in the field, and the Church naturally desired to do her part for this great empire. The Reverend Messrs. Hanson and Lockwood first came out in 1835, and began work for Chinese at Batavia. They were joined there by the Reverend W. J. Boone, M.D., in October, 1837. The two former broke down under the climate and returned home soon after and Dr. Boone suffered greatly from this cause and his efforts to learn Chinese and Malay and to carry on a boarding school for Chinese boys. Afterward he moved to Macao, and the war of 1841 opened the way for his settling at Amoy in June, 1842. Later on the death of his wife in the latter part of 1843 he took his young children home and very strongly pressed the great work to be done on leading minds in the Church. The result was renewed interest, and Dr. Boone was elected and consecrated bishop by the General Convention of 1844. (The General Convention which meets triennially is composed of all the diocesan bishops and of elected clergy and laity from each diocese, and is our supreme Church Council.) He was at first directed to locate at Amoy, but four days later it was resolved "That if found practicable and expedient on his arrival in China it be recommended to the Missionary Bishop to make Shanghai the station for present operations." This establishment of our Missionary Episcopate was only undertaken after due notification of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who replied: "I can venture to answer for our Bishops as well as for the Societies in connection with our Church, that they will be happy to co-operate with the Board of Missions of the P.E. Church in the United States, without other interference than such as may tend, if occasion offer, to promote the accomplishment of the great object to which our labors are alike directed." Bishop Boone reached Shanghai in June, 1845, with two married clergy and two single ladies, and others were added from time to time. From this date until his death at his post in 1864 he was held by our Church to be the Missionary Bishop of Shanghai. In 1859 Japan was added to this jurisdiction and the Reverend Messrs. Liggins and Williams detached from this field for work there. Thus Bishop Boone was in occupation when Dr. Smith was appointed to the See of Victoria and some question as to jurisdiction was then raised. Propositions for any formal division were rejected. In March, 1853, Bishop McIlvaine, of Ohio, being in England as representative of the Board of Missions (our Church body in charge of all Mission work), had conference with the Archbishop of Canterbury with no determinate result. The Board reported on this matter to the next General Convention in 1856, and that body appointed the Bishops of New Jersey, Delaware and Illinois a Committee to correspond with the Church of England. Their letter gives the history of the case condensed above. The Archbishop of Canterbury's reply was somewhat delayed pending the arrival of Bishop Smith in England. Its substance is that there was no practical trouble and that Bishop Smith's Letters per Order of Council specially instanced sundry ports of which Shanghai was one, and that "any alteration therefore in the Bishop of Victoria's jurisdiction could only be made by authority of the State." This it was thought would be doubtful and would be more inconvenient than any trouble likely to arise. Thus the matter stood until in England itself further action was taken as to dividing the work between North and South China in 1872. Meantime after Bishop Boone's death the General Convention of 1865 elected the Rev. C. M. Williams his successor, who was then laboring zealously in Japan. He carried on his double work with increasing difficulty until in 1874 he asked to be relieved and proposed two sees for China viz: Shanghai and Wuchang (where our work was begun by the Bishop himself in 1868), and one for Japan as proof of the Church's sense of the great openings in these Empires. The Board seconded his request but the General Convention (1874) postponed action as to Wuchang and took the following action viz: "Resolved (I) That this House hereby constitutes Japan as a separate Missionary District. Resolved (2) That this House appoints to the supervision of said district the Rt. Rev. C. M. Williams, D.D., the present Missionary Bishop to China and Japan, with the title of Missionary Bishop of Yedo, having jurisdiction in Japan. Resolved (3) That this House hereby constitutes China a separate missionary district and will proceed to elect a Missionary Bishop therefor to be designated as Missionary Bishop of Shanghai, having jurisdiction in China." Later it was resolved as the Rev. W. P. Orrick, Bishop-Elect, under said resolution (3), had declined, "That until the consecration of a Missionary Bishop of Shanghai that the missionary jurisdiction in China be laced under the charge of the missionary Bishop of Yedo."
This was the case until in 1877 the present Bishop, the third in the succession, was consecrated for the aforesaid Missionary Jurisdiction of Shanghai.
Yours respectfully,
WM. J. BOONE.
[5] FOREIGN MISSION FIELD. JOINT FOREIGN MISSIONARY JURISDICTION. To the Editor of "The Standard of the Cross" (p. 305, 1882). At a late meeting of the Convocation of the Southern Province, the president, the Archbishop of Canterbury, is reported to have spoken as follows in reference to some of the relations of the missionary work of our two churches:
"A most unpleasant difference seemed to be brewing between the American Church and ourselves. He had received a letter from Shanghai which alarmed him very much. We had sent out a bishop to Shanghai, and the letter to which he alluded was from the American bishop, warning him off the premises. The English bishop had been appointed without the slightest intention on our part of creating any contention between the two churches. We were acting in the spirit of the resolution adopted at the Lambeth Conference. An experienced missionary bishop was sent out; but this occurred--the English inhabitants of Shanghai, at an enormous expense for them, erected a chapel for their own use. The chapel, he understood, was erected by English money, and was intended to be in connection with the Church of England, and a clergyman of the Church of England was appointed to the living. The question arose, where was the English Bishop to be enthroned? In the innocency of his heart, he caused himself to be enthroned in the English chapel, called the Cathedral of Shanghai, though he quite granted that he had no authority whatever outside the limits of the cathedral.
"Unfortunately, the same kind of difficulty sprang up in Japan. He thought that every conceivable pains had been taken to avoid a collision with the American Bishop of Japan, and Bishop Williams' opinion was taken as to the propriety of having an English Bishopric established there. Acting on what was believed to be his willing assent to accept a Bishop, one was sent there, but difficulties arose which were not easily arranged. We were willing to give up the Capital. But Bishop Williams was not ready to give up the other great towns south of the Capital, which would too greatly curtail our field of operation. Difficulties had arisen which would require much negotiation."
It is somewhat of a surprise that any member of the Convocation should wonder that the Missionary Bishop of Shanghai and the Missionary Bishop of Yedo [Tokio] object to the intrusion of a Bishop of the Church of England into their respective jurisdictions.
As to Shanghai.--His Grace has certainly described a clear case of intrusion. No parallel could be conceived as possible England, where a strong Government as yet protects the National Church. But a case is at least conceivable within the bounds of a neighboring church, which would have sufficient parallelism for our purpose. The Government of the British Empire no longer gives any other protection to the Church in Ireland than that which the paternal Government of China gives to our Missionary Church in Shanghai. Suppose, then, that an English colony has settled in Dublin for business purposes. It is dissatisfied with the ministrations of the Church in Ireland. The colony builds a chapel, employs a chaplain, enjoys the Liturgy of England; but it is not willing to recognize the authority of the Venerable Archbishop of Dublin. Some scattered English missions also exist. The English residents desire the presence of an English Bishop. His Grace appoints one at the solicitation of a Missionary Society, allows him to go to the Capital, and the new Bishop, "in the innocency of his heart," "causes himself to be enthroned in the English Chapel," in the very sight of Dr. Trench. It would be difficult, I think, for even that "Master of words," to express his discontent at such an act of intrusion, without manifesting some indignation. The evil is not less but greater when we transfer the case to Shanghai, where the Bishop already resident for five years, is too poor to be enthroned in any other Cathedral than the hearts of his fellow Churchmen.
Our Church consecrated a Bishop for the Mission in China in 1844. Our Bishops have been in undisturbed jurisdiction in Shanghai for 38 years; Bishop Williams succeeding in 1864; and Bishop Schereschewsky in 1877. If any title is given precedence and possession, our Bishop may claim it.
As to Japan.--In order to avoid the possibility of such an unseemly contest between brethren of the same Church, Bishop Williams communicated to the Lambeth Conference, a suggestion that arrangements for a territorial division of the missionary jurisdiction should be made, before an English Bishop should be sent out to Japan; for, he foresaw that such an appointment was certain, and deemed it desirable.
Such arrangements were made by the Lambeth Conference, and have been faithfully carried out by our Church. But if they have not been ignored by the Church of England, at least, we have had no notice to the contrary.
The Lambeth Conference decided (Section D, p. 494 of the Journal of General Convention, 1880) that the formation of the Board of Reference, by whom such questions as those now in hand as to missionary work and jurisdiction should be concluded, should be referred to the Archbishops of England and Ireland, the Bishop of London, the Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, the Presiding Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the U.S.A., with the Bishop superintending the congregations on the continent of Europe, together with such other Bishops as they may associate with themselves. These were to communicate with the authorities of the missions concerned, at home and abroad.
Accordingly both "in the spirit of the Lambeth Conference" and in compliance with its letter, our General Convention appointed the following Bishops as the Board of Reference on the part of our Church, who assembled in New York on December 13th, 1881, and organized as follows: The Presiding Bishop (Smith), President; the Bishop of Connecticut (Williams), chairman; the Bishop of Ohio (Bedell), Secretary; the Bishop of Pennsylvania (Stevens), the Bishop of Long Island (Littlejohn), Superintendent of Churches on the Continent.
But, as far as we are advised, no action has been taken in England, under the above recited decision of the Conference; for, in the earlier part of his address, the Archbishop said: "At present there was no central body to which to refer questions fit for reference."
So soon as the Churches of England, Ireland and Scotland shall agree in the formation of a Board of Reference, "a Central Body," will have been constituted; for on our side, the House of Bishops took the precaution (see p. 272 of Journal General Convention, 1880) to give plenary power to the five Bishops before named, in conjunction with the Bishop of Yedo, to arrange the limits of his jurisdiction.
It is true that Bishop Williams gave "willing assent to" the appointment of an English Bishop for the Church Missionary Society's Missions in Japan. But he is not willing, as I have informed His Grace, to abandon our important work in Osaka, and generally in the south of the Islands. Our missions and the Bishopric were established there long before the English Church entered on the field; and we have heretofore maintained there a stronger missionary force. It would scarcely appear consistent with comity that the English Church should not take territorial possession of all our mission field south of Tokio where we are most efficiently engaged, should thereby confine our missions to the north, and then (still not satisfied) should, as is suggested in the last communication received, last week, desire that the English Missions at the north should also be under the supervision of the English Bishop of the south. It would not be surprising if Bishop Williams, and the members of our Board of Reference, should regard such reciprocity as being all on one side.
We share the anxiety of our brethren in the Church of England lest such anticipated difficulties should impede the progress of the Gospel in heathen lands, or disturb the concord of our fraternal association in work. Time must be allowed for mutual conference, and possibly, as his Grace suggests for "much negotiation." But if both the spirit and the letter of the Lambeth decision shall rule in England, as it does here, we shall act in perfect concert.
G. T. BEDELL, Bishop of Ohio, and Secretary.
[6] BISHOP BEDELL TO THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY. Diocese of Ohio, Kokosing, Gambier, June 30, 1881.
Most Reverend Your Grace:
May I be permitted to remind you of a communication addressed by direction of the Commission appointed by our General Convention, immediately after the close of the Session; I think that it was dated early in November last. The Commission was appointed in compliance with an important decision of the Lambeth Conference under the Presidency of our Grace.
By a letter from yourself, I was informed that it had been referred to the Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol. But I have as yet received no reply from him.
By the papers which I enclose and which I send in type because more readily referred to, your Grace will perceive that considerable uneasiness exists as to the intrusion of Missionary Bishops of the Church of England within the fields occupied by Bishops of our Church in China, Japan and Africa.
The purpose of the resolutions of the Lambeth Conference was that all such conflicts of Jurisdiction, or appearance of it might be prevented.
Our General Convention complied with the suggestions of the Lambeth Conference with great unanimity, feeling that it is of main importance that the utmost cordiality and the most brotherly cooperation shall exist between the Branches of the Anglican Communion in heathen lands.
The continued purpose of the English Church to establish a Cathedral in Shanghai, which has been the See of our Bishops for thirty-six years, is a surprise to us. Bishop Boone was seated there for nine years before the English Church had sent a Missionary to China. Bishop Williams has been in Japan since 1866. If a Bishop of the English Church should now be sent to that kindom, as is no doubt desirable, the arrangement of Jurisdiction should be the subject of careful consideration.
The singular "intrusion" of Bishop Crowther into the field of our Missionary Bishop at Cape Palmas, has never been explained. I trust your Grace will pardon me for calling attention again to these incidents; and expressing the earnest desire that the whole subject of sending Bishops of the Anglican Communion into fields already occupied by any member of that Communion, may be the subject of consultation and adjustment by the Board appointed under the direction of the late Conference at Lambeth. The published paper inclosed, appearing in our Missionary publication, "The Spirit of Missions," will not only open the facts referred to in this letter, but will show that they are attracting attention.
Knowing how cordially your Grace has always responded to the suggestions made on this subject by members of our House of Bishops, I have the less hesitancy in addressing you on this occasion; and I have the honor to be,
Respectfully and very cordially,
(Signed.) G. T. BEDELL,
of Ohio: and Secretary.His Grace, the Archbishop of Canterbury.
[7] BISHOP BEDELL TO THE BISHOP OF DOVER. Diocese of Ohio, Kokosing, Gambier, July 4, 1881.
My Dear Bishop Perry:
Remembering so pleasantly our intercourse at the Lambeth Conference, and sympathizing so largely in the principles which guide the work of the Church Missionary Society, I am impelled to write to you.
Our Missionary Committee and our Missionary Bishops in China, Japan, and Africa are much troubled by the want of that fraternal consultation in regard to the appointment of English Bishops and the lines of their jurisdiction, which was to have been expected.
Our Missionary work has the same end. Nothing could hinder it more seriously among the heathen that they should see any appearance of conflict. Yet, so far as we understand, an English Bishop is to establish a Cathedral at Shanghai, where we have a Bishop and a College; and had a Bishop before England sent a Presbyter there.
Our excellent Bishop Williams, of Japan, writes (in a letter now before me of May the 16th):
"Our work in Osaka is greatly hindered because of the questions that are arising from the sending of an English Bishop."
He wishes a Bishop to come from England; but both he and we desire that the settlement of the question of Jurisdiction should be left to those two Bishops to be reconsidered and ratified by the Board appointed under the authority of the Lambeth Conference.
The intrusion of Bishop Crowther into Liberia, and the confusion which it produced in Bishop Penick's work, are still causes of lamentation among us. These matters can all easily be settled by brotherly conference; but it will be painful to us, and will cause a feeling much to be regretted, if the inconsiderate or worse, the deliberate action of the English Church should force us to abandon stations upon which we have spent much labor and prayers.
I have written officially to His Grace the Archbishop; and would be very glad if you would talk over the matter quietly with him.
Sincerely and affectionately yours,
(Signed.) G.T. BEDELL,
of Ohio.Right Rev. The Bishop Suffragan.
[8] THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY TO BISHOP BEDELL. Lambeth Palace, S.E., July 21st, 1881.
My Dear Bishop Bedell:
I beg leave to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of our letter of the 4th inst.
I need not assure you that the matter is receiving my attentive consideration, and I am making inquiry into the circumstances to which you allude. Dean Butcher of Shanghai is now in England, and I am making arrangements to see him, after which I will write to you again. I hope the matter is in course of perfectly amiable settlement. Before receiving your letter I had been in communication with Bishop Williams of Japan, returning him on behalf of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel our best thanks for his kind co-operation and supervision of the Society's Missionaries. I am also making inquiry into the facts of what took place in Liberia.
Believe me to remain, my dear Bishop,
Very truly yours,
(Signed.) A. C. CANTUAR.
The Rt. Rev. Bishop Bedell, Kokosing, Gambier, Ohio, U. S. A.
[9] THE BISHOP OF DOVER TO BISHOP BEDELL. July 26th, 1881, The Precincts, Canterbury.
My Dear Bishop:
I have had some communication with the Archbishop of Canterbury on the subject of your letter to me dated July 4th.
The Dean of Shanghai, Dr. Butcher, is now in England, and the Archbishop is, I think, in communication with him, and others upon the subject, which is of real importance.
I venture to hope that conference and patience may extract from present circumstances not merely a modus vivendi, but unity of action and co-operation. It would certainly be a thousand pities that the "heathen Chinee" should have it in his power to point at an English and an American Bishop in partibus fighting over the ground on which they are to work for Our Lord. It would be a poor outcome of our pleasant and useful Lambeth gathering.
Believe me, my dear Bishop, yours very truly in Christ,
(Signed.) E. DOVER,
The Rt. Rev. Bishop Bedell.
[10] THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY TO BISHOP BEDELL. Addington Park, Croydon, August 9, 1881.
The Rt. Rev. Bishop of Ohio:
My Dear Bishop:
I beg leave, in reply to your letter of the 30th of June, with reference to the relations between English and American Bishops in Foreign Parts, to inform you that I hope before the end of August to have some conversation with the Bishop of Western New York, which I trust may lead to a perfectly satisfactory understanding between the English and American Churches upon this point.
Meanwhile, I may briefly inform you of the results of my enquiries into the cases of "intrusion" mentioned in the pamphlet "Our Mission to the Heathen."
With regard to Mid-China and Japan I may simply express my belief that the correspondence which has passed, directly or indirectly, between the Bishops abroad, the Secretaries of the Missionary Societies and myself, may have produced a satisfactory understanding by this time.
With regard to Africa the case seems to stand thus:
Bishop Crowther, after receiving two invitations from "members of the Standing Committee of the Diocese of the Church in Liberia," visited Monrovia in February, 1878. Bishop Penick had not then arrived in Monrovia: his ship passed into harbor as Bishop Crowther's passed out: and the fact that Bishop Crowther was actuated only by the most kindly intentions towards him seems evidenced by the great regret he expresses that he was unable to meet Bishop Penick and by the circumstance of his writing at once a full account of his visit to the Board of Foreign Missions at New York. I should be sorry if what seemed a kindly wish to help a neighboring Church should be misunderstood. I have no doubt that Bishop Coxe will take this view of the matter: and I trust that our conversation may lead to a good understanding between the two Churches.
Very truly yours,
(Signed) A. C. CANTUAR.
[11] BISHOP BEDELL TO THE BISHOP OF DOVER. Diocese of Ohio, Kokosing, Gambier, Sept. 9, 1881.
To the Lord Bishop of Dover and Suffragan:
Rt. Rev. my dear Brother: Your good letter encourages me to write again.
It is not proper that I should intrude further upon the time of His Grace the Archbishop; and I somewhat fear that he might misunderstand me, as if I were writing in the name of the Amer. part of the Board of Reference. Whereas, as my former letter will show, I am writing at the suggestion of our Presiding Bishop, solely to make it evident that the Board should be organized, and that these troublesome questions should, by its action, be settled.
Will you kindly take some opportunity to explain the case to the Archbishop. At the same time it may be well to say to him that the change of Title of the Bishop of Mid-China, whilst satisfactory on that point, cannot relieve the serious difficulty that would arise from the Consecration of a Cathedral in Shanghai.
It will be evident from the copy of the letter which I inclose that Bishop Williams is reluctant to relinquish either of the two principal posts which he has occupied.
The Liberian difficulty lies deeper than is revealed by the invitations given to Bishop Crowther by members of Bishop Penick's jurisdiction; and was increased by that visit.
The report of the Com. on For. Miss. of the House of Bishops, made to that house Oct., 1880 (see the Journal of General Convention in your hands), will give you some idea of it.
I know that you sympathize with us, and so does the Archbishop, in the desire that these conflicts of jurisdiction may be quietly set at rest and prevented in the future.
Therefore I have ventured to trouble you again in hopes that you own and the Archbishop's influence may lead to their being laid before the Board of Reference for mutual explanations and for decision.
Believe me, dear Bishop, Your Brother.
(Signed) G. T. BEDELL.
[12] BISHOP BEDELL TO REV. JOSHUA KIMBER. Bethlehem, N.H., Sept. 9, 1881.
Rev. and Dear Brother:
I wrote originally at the suggestion of the Foreign office, and that of the Presiding Bishop; with the double purpose of helping to solve the complications, and also with the hope of inducing the English Church to carry out the suggestion of the Lambeth Conference in the appointment of a Board of Reference, to whose adjustment all such cases as the present shall be referred. As you will see by the Gen. Conv. Journal, the Amer. portion of that Board has been appt.: and indeed, is authorized to act separately from the English Church; should no joint Board be established.
But the For. Com. will observe from the letter of his Grace, that he considers his own powers in the premises sufficient; and hopes to settle the difficulty.
It is to be hoped that he may settle it thus quietly. Yet, unless the English Church relinquishes its intention of a Cathedral in Shanghai and its intention of taking either Tokio or Osaka as a Bishopric, it is evident that our Bishops of Shanghai and Tokio will not be content; nor will the American Branch of the Board of Reference. Bishop Williams' late letter, of which you have a copy, is evidence as to the latter half of the statement.
I submit, therefore, to your judgment (consulting the For. Com.) whether I shall continue the correspondence with our English Brethren. I send a letter to the Bishop of Dover, which may be forwarded or withheld as the For. Com. deem wisest; sending through your office to be used or not at their discretion. I think that the letter to the Archbishop had best be forwarded to him; although on that point also I submit to the judgment of the Foreign office. It is evident that the Archbishop was not aware that Bishop Penick was residing in his Diocese at the date of the intrusion; and it seems to me that he should be in possession of all the dates.
It affords me great satisfaction to be made useful in any manner or degree in the work of the For. Com.
Believe me dear Brother, Yours,
(Signed) G. T. BEDELL.
Rev. Joshua Kimber, Sec. For. Com.
[13] BISHOP BEDELL TO THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY. Diocese of Ohio, Kokosing, Gambier, Sept. 9, 1881.
To His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury:
Most Reverend, my dear Archbishop: I have great pleasure in acknowledging the letter of your Grace dated August 9. No question arises as to the motives which actuated so true and good a man as Bishop Crowther, in the act to which you refer. But that your Grace may be fully cognizant of the facts bearing on the question of intrusion, I beg permission to give other dates, in addition to those mentioned in your letter.
Bishop Penick was consecrated Feb. 13, 1877.
He arrived in his Diocese at Cape Palmas Dec. 9, 1877. Bishop Crowther Ordained and Confirmed on Feb. 3, 1878, and held two Confirmations subsequently in Liberia.
Bishop Penick arrived at Monrovia from Cape Palmas, as your Grace relates, whilst Bishop Crowther was passing out of the harbor.
Bishop Crowther's visit was therefore made whilst the Bishop of the Diocese was resident and officiating within it, and had been resident and officiating for two months.
With sincere regard, I am very truly yours,
G. T. BEDELL.
We recur to this topic, to which several allusions have been made heretofore, and which was treated at length in the Report of the Foreign Committee issued last September, for two reasons: That we may announce the receipt of very favorable news with regard to the question of the jurisdiction of American and English Missionary Bishops in Japan; and that we may correct an error into which the Foreign Committee were unwittingly led in their last Annual Report.
(I.) It will be remembered that the relations of English Bishops to those of this Church in China and Japan have been the subject of fraternal negotiations between the authorities of the two Churches for some time past. At the meeting of the Foreign Committee held in October last a letter from Bishop Bedell was submitted, in which, referring to the Committee, he said:
"Pray suggest to them to express an opinion on the general idea contained below:
"Each Bishop of Anglican Churches abroad in Foreign Missions to reside in a separate city. No two in one city. Jurisdiction not territorial; but over his own Missions. Title not of a city, but at a city. As to Japan--Bishop Williams to continue resident at Tokio. Osaka to be common ground; no Bishop residing there."
With these suggestions before them, the Committee resolved:
"That the Foreign Committee (in response to Bishop Bedell's request) express their entire concurrence in what Bishop Williams says upon the question of Episcopal Jurisdiction in Japan in his letter of June 12, as follows: 'That the English Bishop might make Nagasaki where the English Church has its most flourishing Mission, his seat, and the American Bishop have his seat at Tokio, as at present. Osaka and Kyoto might remain common ground, and either Bishop be free to go there to perform Episcopal Acts for his own Mission.'" Bishop Bedell, in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, under date of April 26, 1879, suggested that the Northern Island (Yezo) might "remain common ground until it shall appear wise to place the Mission under a Diocesan Episcopate." If the Northern Island may be "common ground" there seems to be no very good reason why Osaka and Kyoto may not be also. There are doubtless objections to this plan; but considering all the difficulties of the case, it seems to me that this will be probably the best solution of the difficulty.'"
On the evening of the day on which the above mentioned action was taken, this resolution was submitted to the Commission appointed by the General Convention to act upon the matter of jurisdiction with a similar Commission of the English Church. We understand that Bishop Bedell, as Secretary, then communicated similar resolution of the Commission to the two great Missionary Societies of the Church of England. One of them, the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, had already placed its Missionaries in Tokio under our Bishop. We are, therefore, much gratified in being able to announce now the favorable action of the Committee of the other, the Church Missionary Society, upon the proposal of the Commission of our Church, as will appear by the subjoined correspondence:
Diocese of Ohio, Gambier, December 16th, 1882.
Rev. and Dear Brother:
I have the pleasure to inclose a note from the Secretary of the Church Missionary Society received this week. Its contents are gratifying.
Yours faithfully,
G. T. BEDELL.
The Rev. JOSHUA KIMBER
Church Missionary Society,
Salisbury Square, London, E.C.
November 29th, 1882.Right Rev. and Dear Sir:
I beg to acknowledge with thanks your kind letter of the 28th ultimo, enclosing a report of the action of the Commission appointed at your last General Convention in reference to certain matters connected with Japan.
As regards the Bishopric, I was able to bring the subject before a special meeting of our Committee, which was summoned for another purpose, and to communicate at once to the Archbishop of Canterbury the readiness of our Committee to acquiesce in the three points as to residence, jurisdiction and oversight, and arrangement of residence, insisted on by your Commission. Perhaps we might have been glad to plead for Osaka as a good centre of residence; but from Kobe it is so accessible that we felt we had better not raise the question.
I am, Right Rev. and Dear Sir, with much respect,
Yours very faithfully,
FRED. E. WIGRAM, Hon. Sec.
The Right Rev. G. T. BEDELL,
Bishop of Ohio, Cleveland, Ohio.We believe that this action of the Church Missionary Society will settle satisfactorily the delicate question of the jurisdiction of American and English Missionary Bishops in Japan.
(2.) The error in the last Report of the Foreign Committee to which we have referred to is in the following paragraph:
It appears that, not with the consent of the American Church, but on the contrary in the face of the protest of Bishop Schereschewsky, the new English Bishop for Mid-China was "enthroned" in the English Consular Chapel, called his Cathedral, in Shanghai, where for thirty-seven years we have sustained a Bishop.
Since the publication of the Report, from which this extract is taken, we have been informed by the Missionary Bishop of Yedo, who has recently visited Shanghai, and by one of our Missionaries in China, that Bishop Moule, who was referred to, has not been enthroned, as the Committee had good reason to believe had been the case. Our correspondent in China says:
"He came out and the paper reported that he would be enthroned. We waited on Bishop Moule and stated our objections, and asked him to wait at least until he could confer with Bishop Schereschewsky. He cordially agreed; said his legal title was [Bishop] of the Church of England in Mid-China, and that he had no wish to make any trouble. It is hard, therefore, that he should be published as a troubler of our Israel."
We regret very much that in the Report there should have been any appearance of injustice to the English Church or to the Bishop in Mid-China, who is well known to the members of our China Mission as entertaining the most friendly relations toward them and their work, and has lately testified his good will by uniting with Bishop Williams in an Ordination Service at Shanghai. That the Foreign Committee at the time their Report was prepared had sufficient reason for believing that Bishop Moule had been enthroned will be clearly seen at once when we state the basis of their belief.
A member of the Standing Committee in China had written to the Foreign Committee of the proposed enthronement of Bishop Moule, and no doubt by inadvertence afterward failed to allude to the subject in any way. His letter was before the Committee at the same time their Report was framed, and the inconvenience of the omission was experienced. Recourse was then had to an article in The Standard of the Cross of March 30th, 1882 (mentioned in the Annual Report), in which is embodied the following statement, taken from an English paper, of remarks made by the late Archbishop of Canterbury, at a then recent meeting of the Convocation of the Southern Province, which was accepted as conclusive. The Archbishop was reported as having said:
"A most unpleasant difference seemed to be brewing between the American Church and ourselves. He had received a letter from Shanghai which alarmed him very much. We had sent out a bishop to Shanghai, and the letter to which he alluded was from the American bishop, warning him off the premises. The English bishop had been appointed without the slightest intention on our part of creating any contention between the two churches. We were acting in the spirit of the resolution adopted at the Lambeth Conference. An experienced missionary bishop was sent out; but this occurred--the English inhabitants of Shanghai, at an enormous expense for them, erected a chapel for their own use. The chapel, he understood, was erected by English money, and was intended to be in connection with the Church of England, and a clergyman of the Church of England was appointed to the living. The question arose, where was the English Bishop to be enthroned? In the innocency of his heart, he caused himself to be enthroned in the English chapel, called the Cathedral of Shanghai, though he quite granted that he had no authority whatever outside the limits of the cathedral.
It is a source of great gratification that we are able to make so favorable a report on both these subjects.
Shanghai, January 5th, 1896.
To the Right Reverend John Williams, D.D., LL.D., Presiding Bishop.
Right Reverend Father in God:--We beg to lay before you, on behalf of the China Mission, the following facts relating to the position of our Church here and the Episcopal jurisdiction of its Bishops, and to call your attention to them as of great importance in relation to the future work of our Mission in China.
I. A meeting of the Bishop and Clergy of the English Church in Mid-China was held in the city of Ningpo on the 26th of October, 1896, and a copy of the printed minutes was sent by the Bishop, the Right Reverend G. E. Moule, D.D., to Bishop Graves.
On reading this paper, it was noted that the Chinese name used as the equivalent of the words Mid-China was Kiang Che teng sheng, i.e., Kiangsu, Chekiang and other provinces, also that the Church of the Holy Trinity, Shanghai, was spoken of without qualification as "the Cathedral." Bishop Graves thereupon wrote to Bishop Moule pointing out that the use of these terms implied the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Mid-China in Kiangsu and its chief city, Shanghai, and entering a protest against it. In his reply, Bishop Moule not only asserted his right to such jurisdiction, but extended it to the provinces along the Yang-tsz River, in particular, to Hupeh and Nganhwui where a large part of our work is situated, and where the Church of England has no work whatever. In this connection we would also call y our attention to the fact that, in the official publications of the Church of England, such as the Year Book of the Church of England, a complete division of China into four missionary districts is made, no account being taken of the work of our own Church.
II. We have always supposed that there existed an understanding between the English and American Churches by which the Bishops of either Church were to be left to care for the work in the district committed to their charge according as they were first in the field and that there should not be a double Episcopate established in any portion of the Mission field. Whether such an arrangement exists in writing we do not know, but we believe that it has all along existed tacitly and it is the principle upon which all our arrangements for mission work in China have been carried on. Moreover, since we have confined our work to the valley of the Yang-tsz, and never entered upon ground occupied by the English Missions, leaving the rest of this huge empire to their care, we think that our Church should be left free to occupy the territory that has fallen to her in the natural course of things. On the other hand, if such an agreement has not existed, we still think that in dividing the empire of China into Missionary districts without regard to the previous establishment of an Episcopal Jurisdiction in the valley of the Yang-tsz and Shanghai there has not been due regard paid to the position of the American Church as the first to sent a Bishop to China. And we believe that it will be found upon inquiry that the Church of England acted without having the facts fo the case and is far from wishing to take the attitude she seems to take in this matter.
III. The facts in regard to our own mission are as follows: In 1844 Bishop Boone was consecrated Bishop of Shanghai, before there was an English Bishop in China, and there has always been a Bishop of the American Church residing in that city, while the English Bishop has never resided there. The present Bishop is the fifth in order, and of the five two are buried in Shanghai, itself a strong claim why our Church should be considered the rightful occupant of this province. In 1868 our Church was extended up the Yang-tsz River, and since then has largely increased in the provinces of Nganhwui and Hupeh, as well as in Kiangsu. In 1889 this fact was recognized by changing the title "Bishop of Shanghai" to that of "Bishop of Shanghai and the Lower Yang-Tsz Valley."
Our work has grown year by year, and in all these years there has not been a missionary of the English Church at work within the provinces where we have been working, except in the city of Shanghai. Up to the year 1880 there was never more than one missionary of the Church of England in Shanghai, but after the consecration of Bishop Moule in 1880 he appointed his brother Archdeacon to reside at Shanghai. The force of missionaries has never been more than two clergy with a few lay workers. Meanwhile, we have had a good staff of foreign and native clergy and not only a number of stations around Shanghai, but a large educational work in our St. John's College.
The facts in regard to the Church of the Holy Trinity are, as follows: It is the Church of the English residents and in 1875 was constituted a cathedral by Bishop Russell. The rightfulness of this was questioned at the time, and some correspondence on the point appeared in the Shanghai papers from a member of our Mission. The title has, however, been in common use since. Although Bishop Russell was enthroned in 1875, the present Bishop has never been enthroned, not, as he is careful to explain, because he doubted of his right, but because he thought it somewhat wanting to the due constitution of a cathedral. As being the Church of the English community it is natural that Episcopal acts should be performed there by the English Bishop for the members of his own communion, but it need not be made the basis of a claim to exercise jurisdiction in the province of Kiangsu, nor need what is expedient within the narrow bounds of the foreign concession be made the precedent for action on the broader field of mission work.
It is important to note that Shanghai is the only point where there is any contact between the mission work of the two Churches, and that along the Yang-tsz Valley the services of the Bishop and Clergy are gladly sought by the members of the Church of England, indeed, the only services and sacraments they receive are at our hands.
We would further state that after the consecration of Bishop Moule a formal protest was made to the Archbishop of Canterbury by Bishop Schereschewsky against the exercising of Episcopal jurisdiction in the city of Shanghai, said protest being sent in the form of a telegram by cable and after presented more fully in writing.
IV. In view of the above facts we respectfully request that steps be taken to obtain from the English Church a clear recognition of the rightful position of the American Church in China. We do not seek to intrude into territory where the work of the sister Church is established, but simply to do our own work in that portion of the empire along the Yang-tsz River, which, in the Providence of God, we have been called to occupy. The lower valley of the Yang-tsz begins at Ichang and extends to the mouth of the river beyond Shanghai. We are already working at various points along it, of which the principal are Ichang, Shasz, Wuchang, and Hankow in the province of Hupeh; and Nganking and Wuhu in the province of Nganhwui, as well as our work in Kiangsu in Shanghai and the adjacent towns.
We should consider that a satisfactory settlement of the matter would be obtained if the Church of England would agree to leave to us the provinces of Kiangsu, Hupeh, and Nganhwui, and those parts of the provinces of Hunan, and Kiangsi, which are adjacent to the river and most easily worked from that side and if the matter of the so-called cathedral at Shanghai were so arranged that it would afford no ground for a misunderstanding in the wider field of mission work.
In conclusion we would respectfully urge that it is important at this time to obtain a satisfactory settlement of this question of jurisdiction, before it is complicated by the actual establishment of mission stations of the Church of England within the territory in which we are working, that future difficulties and misunderstandings may be avoided, and that no such complications may arise as lately gave occasion for so much consideration in the case of our bishopric in Japan.
The Bishop and Clergy of the China Mission express their willingness to afford all ministrations of religion that are within their power to the members of the Church of England who reside within that part of China where our work is situated and would welcome missionaries of the Church of England, who might wish to labor within this district, under this agreement.
ELLIOTT H. THOMSON,
Y. K. YEN,Standing Committee: SIDNEY C. PARTRIDGE,
F. L. HAWKS POTT,
JAMES ADDISON INGLE.F. R. GRAVES, Miss'y Bishop of Shanghai, and the Lower Yang-tsz Valley.
[16] BISHOP GRAVES TO BISHOP MOULE. Shanghai, December 17th, 1896.
My Dear Bishop Moule: I have received and read the copy of the proceedings of the Church Council at Ningpo which you kindly sent me. You are to be congratulated upon the successful formation of your Diocesan Synod, which I hope will do much to forward the work of the missions in your diocese.
I regret that there is anything to which I must take exception, but I notice that in the Chinese title of the Synod the name of the province of Kiangsu appears, which would seem to be a direct claim to jurisdiction in this province by the Bishop of Mid-China. If I am not mistaken, the only work of the English Church in Kiangsu is in the city of Shanghai. Again, section b. ix, the words "the Cathedral at Shanghai," are used. These words virtually include the same claim, for where the cathedral is there is the Bishop. As both these expression occur in the record of the acts of the first Diocesan Synod of Mid-China, I deem it my duty to respectfully call your attention to them and to enter a formal protest. Since 1844 the American Bishops have exercised jurisdiction in Shanghai, and I am sure that neither you nor the clergy under you would wish to leave on record anything that even by implication would seem to derogate from the due privileges of our Church.
I am desirous that the expressions I have noted should not be allowed to pass without correction, lest they become in the future a cause of misunderstanding, if not for us for our successors, and I know that you will be anxious to avoid anything that might in any way interfere with the cordial relations that have always been maintained between the missions of the English and American Churches.
I remain, my dear Brother, Faithfully yours in Christ,
F. R. GRAVES,
Bishop of Shanghai and the Lower Yang-tsz Valley.
[17] BISHOP MOULE TO BISHOP GRAVES. Hangchow, December 23, 1896.
My Dear Bishop Graves:
Your letter of December 17 entering a formal protest against an implied assumption on my part, as English Bishop in Mid-China, of episcopal jurisdiction within the city and settlements of Shanghai reached me yesterday. Such assumption seemed to you implied in certain phrases of the "Proceedings of a Meeting of my Clergy at Ningpo" on last October 26, which you were good enough to accept from me.
You are quite right in thinking that "neither I nor my clergy wish to leave on record anything that even by implication would seem to derogate from the due privileges of your Church."
I hope, however, that upon reconsideration you will see that the phrases you object to do not imply any such derogation.
They have been in common use for upwards of sixteen years past; and represent legitimate ecclesiastical arrangements of the Church of England, which in her opinion do not infringe the prerogatives, nor interfere with the jurisdiction, of the Protestant Episcopal Church of America.
Dr. Russell was consecrated in 1872 "Bishop in North China," and I, in 1880, "in Mid-China"; both geographical expressions including Kiangsoo and its great sea port Shanghae.
We are thereby commissioned not to interfere with other Churches, whether in communion with the Church of England or not, but to oversee the members and ecclesiastical affairs of our own Church within the wide limits of our assigned episcopal districts. There has been occasion for such oversight from almost the first occupation of Shanghae as an open port; and Dr. George Smith, as Bishop of Victoria, with jurisdiction over members of the Church of England in China, had exercised it. For instance, on Good Friday, 1863, I assisted him in the ordination in the Church of the Holy Trinity, of the first Chinese Deacon of our Church, receiving at the time the kind hospitality of your Mission in Hongkew.
Mid-China is not a Chinese expression; and "Kiangsoo, Chekiang, and provinces in the same category" (Kiang Che teng sheng) was from the first adopted as an equivalent phrase. Until Bishop Cassell's consecration the "provinces" included parts of Kiangsi Hunan, and Ssu-ch'uan as well as Nganhwui and Hupeh. There is no assumption of jurisdiction over these provinces, but within them in the affairs of the Church of England. You are good enough to style me "Bishop of Mid-China," where Mid-China includes, of course, Kiangsoo.
With regard to "the Cathedral at Shanghai"--the Church of the Holy Trinity was constituted a Cathedral in May, 1875, in the presence of the British Minister and Chief Justice, the American Consul General, and other officials; when Bishop Russell was ceremonially "enthroned"; and, in the Holy Communion which followed, the Epistle and Gospel were read by clergymen of the Protestant Episcopal Church of America. On my appointment as Bishop I declined the ceremony, not because I doubted of my legitimate jurisdiction over clergymen and members of the Church of England in Shanghai, but because in my opinion there was much awanting to the due constitution of a Cathedral Church, and I saw no likelihood of advantage likely to accrue from the ceremony.
I endeavored to make this plain to a deputation of Clergymen who called on me, on my arrival in 1881, from Bishop Schereschewsky, and I thought at the time that we had arrived at an understanding on the mutual recognition by each Bishop, or the rights and duties belonging to the other, in Shanghae as elsewhere in China, with regard to the members and clergy of their communions severally. And having this in view, I welcomed in a later year the request of my lamented brother, your predecessor, for the use of the Cathedral on the occasion of his consecration by Bishop Williams. That the phrase is used absolutely--"the Cathedral"--is an oversight due to the fact that we were deliberating for persons and matters within the sphere of our own Communion. We certainly had no thought of ignoring either your own Episcopal seat or that of the Roman Church at Shanghai.
The meeting of which the printed "Proceedings" have occasioned this correspondence, was not the first Diocesan Synod of Mid-China, but a clerical Meeting convened by me with a view to taking counsel with my Presbyters on the possible constitution of a Synod and other matters of importance.
I will take care that, in any record of the proceedings of the Synod we hope to hold, words shall be introduced to preclude the appearance of claiming for the Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity the exclusive character of an Episcopal seat in Shanghae.
I am, my dear Bishop and Brother,
With sincere regard, yours ever faithfully in Christ,
G.E. MOULE,
Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China.The Rt. Rev. Bishop Graves, D.D.
[18] BISHOP GRAVES TO BISHOP MOULE. St. John's College, Shanghai, January 8th, 1897.
My Dear Bishop Moule:
In reply to yours of the 23d of Dec. on the question of episcopal jurisdiction, I thank you for the full explanation of the circumstances of the case as you see them. I certainly understand your position more clearly than before. However, I do not feel like reconsidering the letter I previously wrote you; indeed, I am only the more confirmed in my opinion that the present state of things is highly unsatisfactory, especially when you speak of Nganhwui and Hupeh besides. It seems to me that what you really have in mind, and what underlies the letter you wrote, is the theory that the English and American Churches in China are so entirely independent of each other that each is to go on its way, setting up Bishops and dividing the country into dioceses, with no reference to the other, and that there is no question of right to be considered at all, but only one of courtesy. You could hardly have expressed this more pointedly, considering the last bull of the Pope, than by saying, "we had no thought of ignoring either your own episcopal seat, or that of the Roman Church at Shanghai." We have always acted in the China Mission of our own Church on the theory that the English and American Churches were parts of a wide Anglican Communion and were working here for a common end. So strong is this catholic feeling at home that it would be impossible for us to send a Bishop to a place where an English Bishop was already exercising jurisdiction. I believe this broad and catholic principle to be the only one which the two Churches can work harmoniously. If we once desert this ground, that we are parts of one whole, and emphasize the principle of nationality, we shall surely lay up a store of difficulties for those that come after.
As to the Church of the Holy Trinity, it is natural that episcopal acts there should be performed by an English Bishop for the members of the Church of England. But what is expedient in a Foreign Concession in Shanghai ought not, surely, to furnish the rule in mission work.
I will not burden you with anything further on this subject, but shall hope to confer with you upon it the next time we meet.
I remain, my dear Brother,
Faithfully yours in Christ,
F. R. GRAVES.
The Rt. Rev. G. E. Moule, D.D.
[19] CONFERENCE OF THE BISHOPS IN CHINA, 1897. RESOLUTION 12. This Conference of Bishops, English and America, having before them the "Report of Committee on the relation of Missionary Bishops," etc., No. II, of the Lambeth Conference, 1878, and having considered documents laid before them by the American Bishop of Shanghai, one of their number, regarding misunderstandings that have occurred in the past and may recur in the future, arising out of the concurrent jurisdiction in Shanghai of the said American Bishop and of the English Bishop in Mid-China, do hereby
Resolve: I. That they accept the principles laid down in Section II of "Report of Committee," Nos. 8-14, more especially Nos. 13 and 14.
II. That with regard to the actual situation, it is not, in their opinion, significant of any unbrotherly feeling between the two branches of the Church, or between individual Bishops, nor the result of any recent action of the Church of England, but rather has arisen out of action taken under circumstances widely different from those of the present time, when, soon after the opening of China, the Church of America sent out a Bishop to Shanghai with jurisdiction in China, and the Church of England almost simultaneously established a Mission at Shanghai apparently without mutual consultation or notice.
III. That all Members of this Conference will rejoice if the Bishops of the English and American Churches, in concert with the Missionary Organization(s) of the Churches, and in correspondence with the American and English Bishops on the spot, can arrived at an adjustment which shall at once vindicate the due position of the Amercian Bishop in Shanghai and the Valley of the Lower Yang Tsz, and recognize the vested rights of the Bishop and members of the Church of England in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Shanghai.
(Signed)
G.E. MOULE,
Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China.CHARLES PERRY SCOTT,
Bishop of the Church of England in North China.CHARLES JOHN CORFE,
Bishop of the Church of England in Corea and Shing King.FREDERICK ROGERS GRAVES,
Bishop of Shanghai and the Lower Yang Tsz Valley.WILLIAM WHARTON CASSELS,
Bishop in Western China.
New York, May 21st, 1897.
The Right Rev. Dr. Doane, Chairman, 29 Elk Street, Albany, N. Y.:
Right Rev. and Dear Sir: I have the honor to inform you of certain action by the Board of Managers at its meeting on the eleventh instant referring an important matter of business to a Special Committee of which you are Chairman.
Let me premise: At the meeting of the Standing Committee on China and Japan of our Board of Managers, held April 13, the question of Episcopal Jurisdiction (in China especially) was brought to notice by the Presiding Bishop and the Missionary Bishop of Shanghai. Whereupon the Rev. Drs. Brown and Hoffman were appointed a subcommittee to prepare a statement upon the whole subject of Episcopal Jurisdiction in our Foreign Missions.
There was laid before this subcommittee all the information, documentary and from recent correspondence, that was in the Society's possession. It appeared that the controversy first arose in China between the American and English Bishops in 1853. I send with this the report of the Foreign Committee of that year, contained in the November-December Spirit of Missions. [All references are marked in all documents inclosed.] In connection with the 1853 report please notice that even then it was conceded that the English Bishop should have jurisdiction over his countrymen in Shanghai, as I gather, and also please notice that it was believe by our Foreign Committee at the time that no English Missionary had established residence in Shanghai before Bishop Boone located there, as Bishop Graves says, you will observe further on, that the English Bishops claim to have been the fact. The only other point that the English Bishops make, you will remark, is that Bishop Boone was commissioned to China generally. This is fully argued out in 1853. From the Spirit of Missions for 1859, sent you, it appears that this original controversy was very amicably and fairly adjusted. May I call attention just here to the correspondence between Bishop Graves and myself.
At the Stated Meeting on the eleventh instant the subcommittee above referred to reported as follows:
Since their appointment certain letters have been received from the Bishop of Shanghai by the Presiding Bishop of the Church in the United States and the Secretary of the Board, giving a full and succinct account of the whole subject, and of important recent action on the part of the Bishop of Shanghai and the several Bishops of the Anglican Church in China. Copies of these letters are herewith submitted, and we beg leave to offer them as our report with the following resolution:
The resolution recommended by the Committee was amended in the Board and adopted in form following:
"Resolved: That the Bishops of Albany, Pennsylvania and Shanghai be requested to present the subject of Episcopal Jurisdiction to His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury in order that by the proper authorities of the two Churches the question may be definitely settled.
Please find herewith copies of letters as follows:
From the Presiding Bishop to the General Secretary, February 15th,1897.
From Bishop Graves to the Presiding Bishop, January 8th, 1897.
From Bishop Graves and the Standing Committee in China to the Presiding Bishop, January 5th, 1897.
From Bishop Graves to Bishop Moule, December 17th, 1896.
From Bishop Moule to Bishop Graves, December 23d, 1896.
From Bishop Graves to Bishop Moule, January 8th, 1897.
The Associate Secretary to Bishop Graves, February 17th, 1897.
Bishop Graves to the Associate Secretary, March 27th, 1897.
From Bishop Graves to the General Secretary, April 9th, 1897.
I also send you an express parcel which contains the following printed matter:
The Spirit of Missions, November-December, 1853, see page 466 et seq.
The Spirit of Missions, May, 1859, pages 234-235.
The Spirit of Missions, June, 1881, see page 271 et seq.
The Spirit of Missions, July, 1881, page 311.
The Spirit of Missions, November-December, 1882, pages 477, 8 and 9.
The Spirit of Missions, February, 1883, pages 89, 90 and 91.
The Spirit of Missions, September, 1893, pages 409, 10 and 11.
Proceedings Board of Managers for year ending August 31st, 1883, pages 568 and 9.
Report of the Board of Managers, September, 1895, page 4.
From the foregoing printed matter you will observe that first and last the question of Episcopal Jurisdiction has arisen between the American and English Bishops in Africa, China and Japan.
Believe me, Right Rev. and dear Sir, with great respect,
JOSHUA KIMBER,
Associate Secretary.
At its Meeting on the eleventh of May, 1897, the Board of Managers, appointed the Bishops of Albany, Pennsylvania, and Shanghai as a Special Committee "to present the subject of Episcopal jurisdiction to His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, in order that by the proper Authorities of the two Churches the question may be definitely settled."
The said Committee hereby respectfully presents its report.
"The Bishops of Albany and Shanghai arrived in London shortly before the meeting of the Lambeth Conference, and, having consulted together, it was considered important to secure an interview with the Archbishop before the business of the Conference began, though much to their regret the Bishop of Pennsylvania had not yet arrived. Accordingly an interview was obtained on the 19th of June, and the Bishops of Albany and Shanghai met the Archbishop at Lambeth Palace. The Bishop of Corea accompanied them as one of the English Bishops who were present at the Conference of Bishops in Shanghai held in April. The interview was a most satisfactory one, as the following memorandum which was drawn up after the meeting will show. A copy of this memorandum was subsequently presented to the Archbishop, and by him referred with other papers to the Committee on Foreign Missions of the Lambeth Conference, by which we understand that His Grace accepted it as a faithful record of what passed between himself and the American Bishops at the interview.
The Committee of the Board of Managers upon the question of Jurisdiction of Bishops in China, met at Lambeth on Thursday, June 29th, with the Archbishop of Canterbury, by his appointment. The Bishop of Pennsylvania was absent; the Bishops of Albany and Shanghai--and by their request and with the Archbishop's consent the Bishop of Corea--were present.
After going over the various points in question the following results were reached.
I. That while it was not impossible, it was very difficult to alter the warrant of a Bishop already consecrated because it must be done by the Crown, that is of course by the Queen's Ministers; chiefly the Prime Minister and the Minister for Foreign or Colonial Affairs.
2. That there would be no difficulty at the time of the consecration of the new Bishop, for an old diocese to change the boundaries of the diocese by the Queen's Mandate. This, in the case of the diocese in China, or in any similar case, the Archbishop pledged himself to do in accordance with the distribution of Jurisdiction that might be agreed upon between the English and American Bishops concerned. His Grace could not, of course, pledge his successors, although he had no doubt that any Archbishop would readily act in accordance with the arrangement agreed upon between the English and American Bishops as above.
3. The Archbishop agreed that there might properly come before the Lambeth Conference, in connection with subject No. 4, Foreign Missions, a proposal to lay down in more detail the principles involved in this question, as accepted by the Lambeth Conference of 1878, see pages 175 and 176 of the published Report of the Conference with the view that these principles might be worked out into definite rules by the House of Bishops in America and by the Synods of different Foreign and Colonial Churches, which should be recognized by the Archbishops of Canterbury, as representing the Church of England and thus become established as the rules to be observed in any new instances occurring.
4. It being understood that an agreement could be easily reached between the Bishops of Foreign Jurisdictions, which would abundantly provide for the present exigencies, it was felt that no further action was required to deal with the questions involved now, leaving them to be amicably adjusted by the Bishops concerned upon the principles, which for the future would be provided for in accordance with the arrangements above stated.
The subject of episcopal jurisdiction in Shanghai having been referred to the Committee of the Lambeth Conference on Foreign Missions by the Archbishop was discussed in the Committee and was included in their report. The portion of the report which deals with this subject is as follows:
The president of the Conference having referred to the Committee on Foreign Missions a resolution passed unanimously by the conference of English and American Bishops held at Shanghai on April 3d, 1897, in reference to certain questions arising out of overlapping Episcopal Jurisdiction of independent Churches in full communion with each other, with other documents, including an important communication from the Board of Managers of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the American Episcopal Church, the committee, having before them the records of the Lambeth Conferences of 1867, 1878, and 1888 (see pp. 97, 130, 175, 283, 321, S. P. C. K. Ed.), recommend this conference to adopt the following resolutions:
"Resolved, That this conference affirms and confirms the following principles:
"a. That, while it is the duty of the whole Church to make disciples of all nations, yet, in the discharge of this duty, independent Churches of the Anglican Communion ought to recognize the equal rights of each other when establishing foreign missionary jurisdictions, so that two Bishops of that communion may not exercise jurisdiction in the same place, and the conference recommends every Bishop to use his influence in the diocesan and provincial synods of his particular Church to gain the adhesion of the synods to these principles, with a view to the framing of canons or resolutions in accord therewith.
"b. That where such rights have, through inadvertence, been infringed in the past, an adjustment of the respective positions of the Bishops concerned ought to be made by an amicable arrangement between them, with a view to correcting as far as possible the evils arising from such infringement.
"c. That when any particular Church contemplates creating a new foreign missionary jurisdiction the recommendations contained in Resolution I. of the conference of 1867 (p. 97, S. P. C. K. Ed.), ought always to be followed before any practical steps are taken."
After the consideration of the Report the following Resolutions were adopted by the Lambeth Conference:
"24. That, while it is the duty of the whole Church to make disciples of all nations, yet, in the discharge of this duty, independent Churches of the Anglican Communion ought to recognize the equal rights of each other when establishing foreign missionary jurisdictions, so that two bishops of that Communion may not exercise jurisdiction in the same place, and the Conference recommends every bishop to use his influence in the diocesan and provincial synods of his particular Church to gain the adhesion of the synods to these principles, with a view to the framing of canons or resolutions in accord therewith. Where such rights have, through inadvertence, been infringed in the past, an adjustment of the respective positions of the bishops concerned ought to be made by an amicable arrangement between them, with a view to correcting as far as possible the evils arising from such infringement.
"25. That when any particular Church contemplates creating a new foreign missionary jurisdiction, the recommendation contained in Resolution I of the Conference of 1867 ought always to be followed before any practical steps are taken."
In view of the facts above stated, the Special Committee is of opinion that so far as is possible satisfactory principles have been laid down in the Resolution of the Lambeth Conference for the settlement not only of the question of Episcopal Jurisdiction in Shanghai, but of any similar question that mar arise, and that, if the course recommended in these Resolutions be followed by the various Churches of the Anglican Communion, no such difficulty will be likely to arise in the future. Moreover, we possess, in the promise of His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury to do all in his power to correct the mistakes of the past and to provide by the wording of the warrants in future consecrations that no interference or overlapping shall occur, the most practical remedy for the present question and a security against any such situation arising hereafter. It is earnestly hoped and believed that a satisfactory adjustment may be attained by an arrangement between the Bishops concerned, which will be ratified by our own Church, and by the Archbishop of Canterbury as representing the Church of England, and that thus the question which has been discussed between the Churches at various times since 1853 may be finally settled.
Hangchow, April 12, 1898.
To the Right Reverend F. R. Graves, D.D., Bishop of Shanghai, etc., etc.,
My dear Bishop and Brother: I. I have yet to acknowledge the receipt of the letters of Bishop Schereschewsky to the late Archbishop Tait, and of the late Bishop W. J. Boone to myself, bearing on the question of Episcopal jurisdiction as exercised by your Church and the Church of England in and around Shanghai, which I left with you a few days ago at your request. I take the opportunity of offering some observations on the whole question.
II. You were good enough to submit to my perusal, during my recent visit to Shanghai, copies of correspondence on this subject between Bishops and Archbishops of both Branches of our Communion, including Bishop Bedell and, I think, Bishop Doane, on your side, and the late Archbishop Tait and Bishops Perry and Parry on ours.
The correspondence, so far as your copies covered it, commenced in 1881 when I had recently been consecrated and appointed "Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China," a designation which implied episcopal superintendence of members and missions of the Church of England in and near Shanghai as well as elsewhere.
III. As I read these letters, etc., with the most earnest wish to understand the contention of the writers on the American part, and to find if possible an adjustment which might satisfy their desires, I was surprised to find them so inaccurately informed regarding the history of our co-existence as Churches and Missions, in China during the past fifty odd years, and also, in view of the serious tone of their remonstrances that so little was advanced that would be called a definite statement of what was desired.
IV. As an illustration of inaccurate information, I would refer to Bishop Bedell's letter of June 20, 1881, in which he tells Archbishop Tait that Bishop Boone "was seated at Shanghai nine years before the English Church sent missionaries to China;" whereas in fact Messrs. Smith and McClatchie, both in full orders, had already reached Shanghai in 1845, when Bishop Boone arrived there, and the latter (Mr. McClatchie) had commenced a ministry which lasted for many years. The Church Missionary Society, as early as 1836, had sent the Rev. C. B. Squire as a pioneer to South China, and, before the "nine years" indicated from 1845 had passed, nine or ten English Missionaries, besides Civil and Military Chaplains, had reached Shanghai and Ningpo, of whom several were for years engaged in Missionary work there.
V. Again, in July, 1881, this same Rt. Rev. Correspondent, writing to Bishop Perry, speaks of "an English Bishop" (myself) "who is to establish a Cathedral at Shanghai, where we had a Bishop before England sent a presbyter there." The inaccuracy of the last phrase has been pointed out. With regard to the Cathedral, the Church of the Holy Trinity was constituted his Cathedral by Bishop Rupell in 1873, with the concurrence of representative men, American and English, including Bishop Williams, who read the Ante-Communion Service, and two American clergymen who read the Epistle and Gospel, on the occasion of Bishop Russell's "enthronement." The step was taken at the suggestion of Dr. Butcher, the Chaplain of Shanghai, from motives amongst which rivalry between the two branches of the Anglican Communion had no place whatever; and at a time when the then solitary American Bishop in the far East had his seat in Japan, whence with obvious difficulty he carried out the necessary oversight of Missionary operations at Shanghai, Wuchang and Pekin, as well as in Japan itself. On my arrival in China in 1881, although in '75 I had borne no part in the "Cathedralization" of Trinity Church, and then in '81 declined "enthronization" for myself, I willingly succeeded to the Episcopal seat already established there, with a view to the interests of English Churchmen and our Missions in Mid-China. I have had the privilege since then, in concurrence with the Trustees, of lending the Church at Dr. W. J. Boone's suggestion to Bishop Williams for Dr. Boone's consecration, at which Bishop Scott and I were assistants to the consecrating Bishop.
VI. Besides the Letters I have referred to, I found amongst the papers you sent me a long quotation from the "Foreign Mission Field," which contained an agreement founded on a supposed analogy between Bishop Russell's permitting himself to be enthroned at Shanghai as Bishop of the Church of England in North China and the action of an imaginery colony of English (or American) Anglicans at Dublin, who, dissenting from the Irish Prayer Book, are supposed to build a Church, obtain the services of a Chaplain, and ultimately also the consecration and enthronement of a Bishop under the very shadow of (the late) Archbishop Trench's Cathedral. The author of such a parallel can hardly have possessed even a slight acquaintance with the facts. He assumed that American members of the Episcopalian Church were so numerous and so long established in Shanghai, when the Church of England first sent her clergy there, that a just analogy can be drawn between the elder Bishop Boone with his handful of Missionaries, and a still smaller number of American lay Churchmen, and the late Dr. Trench at the head of several Suffragans, and a numerous clergy and laity, and having his Arch-episcopal seat in one of two ancient Cathedrals within his see city. The parallel further ignores the fact that the Commercial "Colonists" of China at shanghai and elsewhere embraced both Americans and British, but the latter in far larger numbers, as they were also earlier in the field.
VII. One cannot but ask: Would it have been possible for the English Church to ignore the claim on her for Episcopal superintendence of her clergy and laity on the China coast, or to accept permanently, if at all, the supply of her own "lack of service" from the American Church?
I do not think Bishop McIlvaine, Bishop Bedell, or any of the American Churchmen who have argued in the direction of exclusive Episcopal rights at Shanghai for the successors of Bishop Boone, have taken sufficiently into consideration the indefeasible obligation of the Church of England to her children settled at Shanghai, and their claim on her for pastoral care and episcopal superintendence, or the obvious presumption that the American Church, when she sent Bishop Boone to Shanghai, had in view, not a territorial episcopate, but a scheme for extending pastoral and episcopal care to American Churchmen and to their Missions within the wide sphere of his nominal Diocese. Otherwise it seems hard to justify seriously his aspiring title of "Bishop of Shanghai with jurisdiction in China," which was the designation of your predecessors as least as lately as 1874. You were not able, at our recent interview, if my memory serves me, to say precisely when, by whom, or by what act, that wide episcopal purview was narrowed to "the Lower Valley of the Yangste."
VIII. A distinction is sometimes drawn between my relation to English Clergy and Lay-Churchmen, and the chief Church of the latter, and that in which I stand to my native congregations and clerics.
One day, I trust, independent of foreign aid of all kinds, a Chinese national Church will grow up on Anglican lines, neither exactly according to our tradition nor revised precisely in conformity with American precedent. You--may God grant it!--may witness the achievement. Such a Church will be indebted to us both, though if I am right, it will decline to follow either of us implicitly, except in maintaining the Catholic principles common to both branches of the Church. Meantime I cannot see that any serious risk to the honor of our Lord, the credit of our Common Faith, or the maintenance of sacred Charity is involved in the present lack of formal demarcation, either with a view to Chinese or to English-speaking congregations. We have long been neighbors, we have mutually given and received services and courtesies, neither of us has consciously invaded the rights of the other, or taken a single step that meant, or, I think, savored of rivalry. To the best of my belief no such step ever will be taken.
IX. Considering the magnitude of British interests and responsibilities in Shanghai, the difficulty is a great one for the Church of England of abrogating her responsibilities, whether to her own children or the Chinese, solely on account of the abstract impropriety of concurrent episcopal jurisdictions. Even the autocratic Church of Rome is not without its irregularities of this nature. At Singapore, for instance, there is a French Mission having at the head of its Clergy List two Bishops, of Malacca and Dardovril, respectively, and also a Portuguese Mission controlled by a Vicar General, not under either of the French Prelates but under the Archbishop of Goa.
X. I have thus endeavored to explain to you how our problem looks to me, and I shall be glad if you see your way to transmit my letter to the Bishops and other members of your Church who are especially interested in this discussion.
I hope it may make it plainer to them than it has hitherto been that the actual condition of things has grown up not without reason in the exigencies of the case, and in view of the responsibilities of both branches of our Church, and that it is not easy to undo what has thus developed during many years, with the co-operation of earnest laymen on the spot and Missionary Societies at home, and certainly without sectarian or exclusive meaning on either side.
XI. May I venture to add that in my opinion, in the absence of any inter-ecclesiastical Tribunal clothed with the requisite knowledge and authority to decree a precise delimitation of sphere or area, the status quo is not without its redeeming features, and has in it nothing that need alarm loyal members of either the English or American Branches of the Church.
I am, my dear Brother,
With cordial regards, yours very faithfully in Christ,
G. F. MOULE,
Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China.P.S. I wrote the draught letter, of which the above is a transcript, on the date indicated, but had not time t o get it copied before I left Hangchou yesterday for Ningpo. As I expected to find little leisure there I have transcribed it iter faciens, and I must ask you to attribute some of my imperfect penmanship to the motion of my boat.
G. F. M.
April 14.
June 4th, 1898.
The Rt. Rev. G. E. Moule, D.D., Bishop of Mid-China:
My Dear Bishop Moule: I received your letter of April 12th while in Hupeh on my visitation, but the press of work on the journey and after my return to Shanghai, in the few days that remained before I sailed for teh United States, prevented my giving it that consideration which the importance of its contents demanded, and i have delayed answering it until i could secure the leisure to think over what you have said.
I. In the first place, may I, in the interest of strict accuracy, point our one or two minor mistakes in your letter.
(a) The letters I showed you were from Bishop Bedell and Bishop Coxe, not Bishop Doane. (b) The date of Bp. Bedell's letter to which you refer was June 30 not 20th, 1881. (c) Bp. Williams was Bishop of Shanghai, and combined with his duties in China the work in Japan. His seat was not in Japan, as you state, in 5 of your letter, until after the two jurisdictions had been divided, though he was naturally forced to reside in Japan part of the time. (d) I think you will find it in my letters, and I am sure I have mentioned it in conversation, that the date when the words "Lower Valley of the Yang-tsz" were added to the title of the American Bishop was 1886. They were added by the authority of the General Convention. There has never been any uncertainty on this point.
2. I do not think that the inaccuracies in the letters of Bp. bedell affect the main argument to any extent, though it is well that you have called attention to them. What the Bishop evidently had in mind when he spoke of "nine years," was the period between 1835 when Mr. Boone was sent to China [When we first sent missionaries to China] as a missionary, and 1844 the year when he was consecrated Bishop. Nor is it greatly to the point that Mr. McClatchie reached Shanghai a few months previous to Bishop Boone in 1845. The real point is that our representative came as a Bishop. Again, it seems hardly fair to say that in these letters there is no "definite statement of what was desired." The writers certainly make it plain that they consider that the rights of the American Church have been infringed and that such infringement should cease. The main contention is clear enough through the whole correspondence, that the American Bishop was consecrated for Shanghai five years before England had a Bishop in any part of China, and that that fact ought to restrain the English Church from setting up a rival jurisdiction in the same place.
3. I will only say in regard to the exceptional case of concurrent episcopal jurisdiction which you quote from the practice of the Roman Church in Singapore, that does not seem to me a satisfactory argument. It is an exception at best, an exception apparently caused by peculiar circumstances of race and language, and a Roman exception at that. Surely it must be to rule and not to exceptions that we must look to guide us in cases like the present.
4. And now, my dear Bishop, I will restate very briefly the main grounds upon which the case of the American Church rests, without attempting to argue them.
a. here was an American Bishop of Shanghai five years before the English Church had a Bishop in China, and he has had his successors till the present time.
b. When the question of episcopal jurisdiction was first discussed between the Churches in 1853 it was decided in 1859 to leave the province of Kiangsu to the occupation of the American Church while the missionaries of the Church of England should labor in the province of Chekiang.
c. We have work in Hupeh, Nganhwui and Kiangsu, in none of which provinces has the Church of England any missionary work except at the one City of Shanghai, in Kiangsu province.
d. From the year 1853, when the question of episcopal jurisdiction first arose between the Churches, the American Church has from time to time protested against Shanghai being made the seat of an English Bishop. That members of our mission were present through courtesy and took part in the service held by Bp. Russell in 1873, to which you refer in your letter, 5, cannot invalidate this fact of formal protests having been made both by three Bishops of our Church in Shanghai and by our Church itself, acting through its Board of Missions, to three different Archbishops of Canterbury.
e. It is manifest that, however free we may be from trouble in the present, some distinct understanding is necessary between the Bishop of Shanghai and the Bishop of Mid-China, and a delimitation by which the American Church may pursue its work in the provinces it has chosen and occupied without the danger of misunderstandings which are sure to arise if the English Church occupies the same ground with a separate episcopal jurisdiction.
5. I cannot but regret most deeply, my dear Bishop, that there seems from your letter so little prospect of securing by an arrangement between us the adjustment for which I have been hoping. So far from that, you say pointedly of Shanghai that you "succeeded to the Episcopal seat already established there," and I have lately received a printed paper from the Victoria Institute, in which Archdeacon Moule, the author, is described as the "Archdeacon of Shanghai," while the policy of the English Mission in Shanghai seems to be directed to further strengthening and extending its work. Instead of an adjustment you give me, so far as I can see, no hope of anything but "Concurrent jurisdiction." To accept this solution would be to leave matters in a worse state than before. We are at present in a position of protest against such a claim and I do not think it likely that, even if I were personally disposed to accept it, the Church at home would consider it for an instant.
6. You have asked me to state definitely what we claim, to give you an "irreducible minimum." What I think we ought to receive is an acknowledgment that the provinces of Kiangsu, Nganhwui and Hupeh are the allotted sphere of the missionary work of the American Church--three provinces out of the eighteen--leaving the other fifteen for the Church of England. The work of the Church Missionary Society in Shanghai is not of sufficient size to prevent such an arrangement being made with ease. This would settle almost everything at once. There is, however, the question of foreign congregations. Over English Church people, I do not, of course, claim jurisdiction. Both I and my clergy have long ministered to them at their request along the Yangtsz Valley, and we shall always be willing to do so. So far as the congregation at Shanghai is concerned, it ought to be easy enough to have it understood that the English Bishop in ministering to them does so because it is the most natural arrangement. But while we are ready to grant this, it is a very different thing if the English Bishop claims Shanghai as his seat and Holy Trinity Church as his cathedral.
I shall submit your letter, as you request, to the Bishops in the United States, and also ask their opinion upon the adjustment which I offer on my part in this present letter. Is it too much to ask that a great and growing church like the Church in the United States should claim a place to work independently and sufficient ground to allow her work there at no small sacrifice, and also because that work has been blessed and is increasing at the present time so that we cannot but feel that it is destined to grow to large proportions.
That the English missionaries and the English Church should make a free and generous acknowledgment of this work and agree to recognize its independent sphere, is not, I trust, even now too late to hope.
I remain, my dear Brother,
Faithfully yours in Christ,
F. R. GRAVES.
[24] BISHOP MOULE TO BISHOP GRAVES. Hangchow, July 4, 1898.
To the Right Rev. F. R. Graves, D.D., Bishop of Shanghai, etc., etc.:
My Dear Bishop and Brother: Your letter of the 4th ult. reached me on the 27th at Ningpo. I have been on the move nearly ever since, and I take my earliest leisure to thank you for it. I shall now send our correspondence, with a copy of this letter, to the Archbishop of Canterbury, by whom I am sure it will receive full and candid consideration.
I. I am sorry that, writing as I did amidst interruptions, I was inaccurate in respect to the name of one of the Episcopal correspondents, and the precise date of one of the letters referred to.
2. My point, with regard to Bishop Williams' footing at Shanghai at the time of the proposal to place the English Bishop's' seat in Trinity Church was, not that Bishop Williams had no jurisdiction in Shanghai, but that, whilst under the title of "Bishop of Shanghai" he laid claim to jurisdiction in China and Japan, those who were interested on the side of the English Church had nothing to guide them as to any reasonable limits of such jurisdiction, nor were aware of any official seat of the Bishop with which their action could be supposed to compete. Mr. Kraup, in a letter to myself, referring to the objection of Mr. Purdon to the contemplated cathedralization, conjectures that such objection was taken "from a national point of view," as Mr. Kraup ""did not think there were any cathedrals in the United States." Mr. Kraup very possibly misunderstood Mr. Purdon, but I quote this to show that, so far as appears, the question of concurrent jurisdiction was not referred to, although an American Churchman was in opposition, and had his own Bishop at hand to advise him.
I do not, however, propose to reargue the case, on which, in fact, I should much prefer to agree with you if I could, nor will I now do more than indicate one or two of its features to which I think neither you nor the distinguished prelates who have taken part in the discussion since 1853 have sufficiently attended.
3. Before I do so, however, I would observe that (referring to your letter, IV, 2), I do not know by whom, in 1859, "it was decided to leave the province of Kiangsu to the occupation of the American Church, whilst the missionaries of the Church of England should labor in Chekiang." Bishop Smith cannot have been a party to such a decision since in 1863 he summoned me to assist him at Shanghai in ordaining a Shanghai convert, Rev. Dzaw Tsanglai, as pastor of our Shanghai congregation, on which occasion your missionaries kindly gave me quarters in Bishop Boone's house. The Rev. W. H. Collins was then our missionary at Shanghai, having joined the mission in 1858.
4. The features of the discussion to which you and those with you have not seemed to me to pay sufficient attention are (a) the absence, down to a very late date, of all definition on the part of the American Church of her jurisdiction in China, and (b) the rights and duties, in relation to the English Church, of a mercantile settlement like Shanghai, largely composed of Englishmen. (a) I am sorry to conclude that I must have been inattentive when you "mentioned in conversation that the date when the words Lower Valley of the Yangtsz were added to the Title of the American Bishop was 1886." I certainly had not realized, till I read your letter, that this limitation of area had taken place at quite so late a date. And I doubt whether those who argue on your side have allowed for the perplexity which the larger claim, previously persisted in, to jurisdiction in all China must have imported into the discussion. To the best of my belief, the English Bishop of Victoria, besides the colony of Hongkong, was given jurisdiction over members and missions of the Church of England at and near the Consular Ports, of which Shanghai was the principal. The purview of such commission was large enough, but it was definitely circumscribed. It is likely that it led those in England who were called to consider the supposed conflict of jurisdictions to the conviction that the American Church can hardly have proposed to do more "in China" than the Church of England did at the ports, namely, provide Episcopal superintendence for members of its own communion. Am I wrong in surmizing that the rights and duties of English Churchmen, residents in the British settlement of Shanghai, have been in some measure overlooked in the whole discussion? When I first knew Shanghai the "British Concession" was as distinct from the American as they are now unitedly distinct from the French. Within the former had been erected a Church and Parsonage, and with the assistance of the C. M. S. a Mission House and School; whilst Bishop Boone's establishment stood on the American Concession. A British community in partibus Sinenesium prior to the appointment of an English Bishop in China, was recognized by a principle of our Church (the Archbishop will correct me if I am wrong) for ecclesiastical purposes part and parcel of the Diocese of London, whose rights and duties were in 1849 devolved on the Bishop of Victoria. I do not think allowance has been made in this discussion for the claim such a community had on the Church of England for Episcopal sympathy and superintendence, nor for the duty of that Church to propagate the Gospel measurably in all the world, but very specially in connection with a settlement or community which, if I am right, was ecclesiastically part and parcel of an English Diocese. Those of the residents who are earnest Churchmen have always kept such rights and duties in view, if I am at all judge from the present members of the "Cathedral congregation," who with the fullest recognition of the rights of the American Church as they understand them and of her great service both in evangelizing the heathen and in assisting to provide means of grace for foreign residents, are not prepared to acknowledge any usurpation whatever in what was done when my predecessor, Bishop Russell, was seated as Bishop of the English Branch of the Anglican Communion in Holy Trinity Church.
5. Meantime I do not think the Church Missionary Society has any intention of extending its work in Kiangsu, and after happy relations with yourself and your two predecessors extending over more than seventeen years, I cannot anticipate friction between the sister branches of our common Communion.
With cordial sympathy and regard, believe me, my dear Bishop,
Your faithful brother in Christ,
G. E. MOULE,
Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China.
[25] RESOLUTION OF THE HOUSE OF BISHOPS. THE GENERAL CONVENTION.
HOUSE OF BISHOPS.October, 1898.
Whereas, Questions have arisen as to the territory in China under the Missionary Bishop of Shanghai and the Lower Yangtse Valley, and
Whereas, The title of the Missionary Bishop does not define that territory with sufficient definiteness; therefore be it
Resolved, That the territory in China under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Shanghai and the Lower Yangtse Valley is hereby defined to consist of the provinces of Kiangsu, Hupeh, and Nganhwui, and those portions of Kiangsi and Hunan adjacent to the Yangtse River;
And that this action be communicated to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishops of the Church of England in China.
Adopted by the House of Bishops and concurred in by the House of Deputies.
Attest,
SAMUEL HART,
Sec'y of the House of Bishops.WM. CROSWELL DOANE,
Chairman.
[26] FORM OF NOTIFICATION. American Church Mission, St. John's College, Shanghai, January 4th, 1899.
The Rt. Rev. C. P. Scott, D.D., Bishop of North China:
My Dear Bishop: I have been requested by the Chairman of the House of Bishops to forward to you the enclosed copy of a Resolution of the last General Convention.
Faithfully your brother in Christ,
F. R. GRAVES.
[27] RESOLUTION OF THE CONFERENCE OF BISHOPS IN CHINA 1903. With regard to the jurisdiction of the English and American Bishops in Shanghai and the Province of Kiangsu:
Having view the present and future interests of the Anglican Communion in China, we consider:
That, although it is necessary to recognize the national distinction as between British and Americans and that the foreign Clergy and the foreign congregations of each of the two nations in Shanghai should continue their present relations with their respective national Bishops;
It is, nevertheless, desirable that all the Chinese Christians and Clergy of the Anglican Communion in Shanghai and the rest of the Province of Kiangsu should recognize the Bishop of the American Church as their Bishop; and
We respectfully request the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Presiding Bishop of the American Church to take such steps as may realize this object.
(Signed) CHARLES P. SCOTT,
Bishop of the Church of England in North China.F. R. GRAVES,
Bishop of Shanghai.J. C. VICTORIA,
With Missionary Jurisdiction in South China.JAMES ADDISON INGLE,
Bishop of Hankow.G. E. MOULE, President,
Bishop of the Church of England in Mid-China.
[28] STATEMENT BY THE STANDING COMMITTEE OF HANKOW. In view of the fact that difficulties have arisen in Hankow because of the uncertainty which exists in many minds in regard to Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, due to the conjunction of that city of American and English Churchmen, the Standing Committee of the Missionary District of Hankow begs to submit the following statement to the American Church, and to urge that the question involved receive due consideration, in order that the Ecclesiastical Status of work in this District may be once for all clearly defined.
The point at issue between English Churchmen resident in Hankow and the American Church Mission is whether the foreign Church of St. John the Evangelist, in the British concession in Hankow, is under the Ecclesiastical Authority of the American Bishop of Hankow, or of the English Bishop of Mid-China.
Several facts may be stated which throw light on the question.
First of all, St. John's Church is a "concession" church, in the sense that it belongs to the British community here; but it is not part of the English Church Establishment. Its history may be briefly stated as follows:
Before the year 1874 there was a British Government chaplain in charge, but in that year, the church in Hankow was disestablished, and turned over as a gift to the Trustees and "their successors duly appointed forever upon trust and for use and benefit of the said British Community on the understanding that the services in the said church shall be conducted as nearly as may be in conformity with the doctrines, principles and services of the Established Church throughout England and Wales." This last point has been legally decided by Justice Wilkinson, of Shanghai, to necessitate Episcopal services when they can be provided. The decision runs that "the Trustees are bound to have the services conducted whenever possible by Episcopally-ordained Ministers."
This decision was given in 1902, the occasion being an objection by Non-conformists to the right of the American Church Mission exclusively to conduct services, while any English ministers, Non-conformists or otherwise, were available.
The decision settled the question in favor of the American Mission, which had conducted services very acceptably without opposition or comment for many years; for there are no "Episcopally-ordained ministers" of the Church of England in Hankow, or in fact within hundreds of miles of Hankow, because of the general division of territory agreed upon in regard to mission work.
After the settlement, Bishop Ingle entered into a definite agreement with the Trustees, by which one of his clergy was delegated to act as chaplain of St. John's in addition to other Mission duties, the Trustees agreeing to pay $600 (Mex.) per year to the Mission as a partial return for services. This arrangement proved very satisfactory to all persons.
Ecclesiastically, the Church has been undisputably under the Bishop of Hankow, confirmations have been performed by him without adverse criticism, as they have been by an American Bishop previously for many years, with no thought that there could be any possible objection to his authority over the church and congregation.
Such was the relationship existing until the beginning of the present month, May, 1904--when a new church building for the community was to be consecrated. Bishop Graves, in charge of the Hankow District, not being able to consecrate the new ST. John's himself, requested the Rt. Rev. G. E. Moule, Bishop of Mid-China, to officiate for him, asking him to explain clearly to the people that he came to officiate only in behalf of the Bishop of Hankow.
The Trustees, however, took exception to the position of the Bishop of Shanghai (temporarily in charge of Hankow), and appealed to the visiting Bishop to give his judgment of the questions whether he acted in his own right in consecrating the church, or simply in place of the Bishop of Hankow. The Bishop of Mid-China answered that he agreed entirely with the Trustees; that he felt that he had jurisdiction in Hankow over English Churchmen (not, of course, over the chaplain); "being a Bishop, not over land, but over men, he could not, therefore, divest himself of his jurisdiction over British subjects in Hankow."
The difficulty of the present situation is evident. The Trustees claim the right to be under the authority of one Bishop, the English Bishop of Mid-China--while acknowledging the chaplain to be under another, the Bishop of Hankow. They desire to retain the services of the American chaplain, and yet not to be under the jurisdiction of the American Bishop.
It is in view of this anomalous position, which the Standing Committee feels to be an impossible one, that the present appeal for settlement is made to the highest authorities of the Church at home, in the hope that the vexed question of the jurisdiction of the English Bishops, in Hankow no less than in other parts of China, may be settled definitely and finally, on a proper Ecclesiastical basis.
(Signed) ROBERT E. WOOD,
President of the Standing Committee.S. HARRINGTON LITTELL.
Secretary.Hankow, China, dated this 28th day of May, 1904.