|
____ |
[3] Bishops Present. THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF DUBLIN._____ THE BISHOP OF LONDON.
THE BISHOP OF WINCHESTER.
THE BISHOP OF LLANDAFF.
THE BISHOP OF RIPON.
THE BISHOP OF NORWICH.
THE BISHOP OF BANGOR.
THE BISHOP OF GLOUCESTER & BRISTOL.
THE BISHOP OF CHESTER.
THE BISHOP OF ST. ALBANS.
THE BISHOP OF HEREFORD.
THE BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH.
THE BISHOP OF LINCOLN.
THE BISHOP OF SALISBURY.
THE BISHOP OF CARLISLE.
THE BISHOP OF EXETER.
THE BISHOP OF BATH & WELLS.
THE BISHOP OF OXFORD.
THE BISHOP OF MANCHESTER.
THE BISHOP OF CHICHESTER.
THE BISHOP OF ST. ASAPH.
THE BISHOP OF ELY.
THE BISHOP OF ST. DAVID'S.
THE BISHOP OF TRURO.
THE BISHOP OF ROCHESTER.
THE BISHOP OF LICHFIELD.
THE BISHOP OF SODOR & MAN._____ THE BISHOP OF MEATH.
THE BISHOP OF DOWN.
THE BISHOP OF KILLALOE.
[4] THE BISHOP OF LIMERICK.
THE BISHOP OF DERRY.
THE BISHOP OF CASHEL.
THE BISHOP OF OSSORY._____ THE BISHOP OF MORAY. Primus.
THE BISHOP OF ST. ANDREW'S.
THE BISHOP OF EDINBURGH.
THE BISHOP OF ABERDEEN.
THE BISHOP OF GLASGOW.
THE BISHOP OF BRECHIN.
THE BISHOP OF ARGYLL._____ THE BISHOP OF DELAWARE.
THE BISHOP OF NEW YORK.
THE BISHOP OF OHIO.
THE BISHOP OF PENNSYLVANIA.
THE BISHOP OF WESTERN NEW YORK.
THE BISHOP OF NEBRASKA.
THE BISHOP OF PITTSBURGH.
THE BISHOP OF LOUISIANA.
THE BISHOP OF MISSOURI.
THE BISHOP OF LONG ISLAND.
THE BISHOP OF ALBANY.
THE BISHOP OF CENTRAL PENNSYLVANIA.
THE ASSISTANT BISHOP OF NORTH CAROLINA.
THE BISHOP OF NEW JERSEY.
THE BISHOP OF WISCONSIN.
THE BISHOP OF IOWA.
THE BISHOP OF COLORADO._____ THE BISHOP OF HAITI.
THE BISHOP OF SHANGHAI._____ THE BISHOP OF MONTREAL. Metropolitan.
THE BISHOP OF FREDERICTON.
[5] THE BISHOP OF NOVA SCOTIA.
THE BISHOP OF ONTARIO.
THE BISHOP OF HURON.
THE BISHOP OF TORONTO.
THE BISHOP OF NIAGARA._____ THE BISHOP OF MADRAS.
THE BISHOP OF COLOMBO.
THE BISHOP OF BOMBAY._____ THE BISHOP OF GUIANA.
THE BISHOP OF KINGSTON.
THE BISHOP OF ANTIGUA.
THE BISHOP OF BARBADOS.
THE BISHOP OF NASSAU._____ THE BISHOP OF SYDNEY. Metropolitan.
THE BISHOP OF ADELAIDE.
THE BISHOP OF NORTH QUEENSLAND._____ THE BISHOP OF CHRISTCHURCH. Metropolitan.
THE BISHOP OF DUNEDIN._____ THE BISHOP OF GIBRALTAR.
_____ THE BISHOP OF CAPETOWN. Metropolitan.
THE BISHOP OF ST. HELENA.
THE BISHOP OF MARITZBURGH.
THE BISHOP OF BLOEMFONTEIN.
THE BISHOP OF PRETORIA._____ THE BISHOP OF RUPERTSLAND. Metropolitan.
THE BISHOP OF BRITISH COLUMBIA.
THE BISHOP OF SASKATCHEWAN.
____ [6] THE BISHOP OF THE FALKLAND ISLANDS.
_____ THE BISHOP SUFFRAGAN OF DOVER.
THE BISHOP SUFFRAGAN OF GUILDFORD.
THE BISHOP SUFFRAGAN OF NOTTINGHAM._____ BISHOP PERRY.
BISHOP McDOUGALL.
BISHOP RYAN.
BISHOP CLAUGHTON.__________ Officers of the Conference.
_____.
THE BISHOP OF GLOUCESTER & BRISTOL,
Secretary of the Conference.THE BISHOP OF EDINBURGH,
Secretary of Committees.ISAMBARD BRUNEL, D.C.L.,
Chancellor of the Diocese of Ely,
Assistant Secretary.[7] CONTENTS OF LETTER. __________ Introductory 9
Report of Committee on "The best mode of maintaining Union among the various Churches of the Anglican Communion" 10
Report of Committee on "Voluntary Boards of Arbitration for Churches to which such an arrangement may be applicable" 20
Report of Committee on "The relation to each other of Missionary Bishops and of Missionaries of various branches of the Anglican Communion, acting in the same country" 24
Report of Committee on "The position of Anglican Chaplains and Chaplaincies on the Continent of Europe and elsewhere" 31
Report of Committee appointed to receive questions submitted to them, in writing, by Bishops desiring the advice of the Conference on difficulties or problems they have met with in their several Dioceses, and to report thereon 33
Conclusion 42
Notes 44
[9] LETTER.
________TO THE FAITHFUL IN CHRIST JESUS, GREETING-- WE, Archbishops, Bishops Metropolitan, and other Bishops of the Holy Catholic Church, in full communion with the Church of England, one hundred in number, all exercising superintendence over Dioceses, or lawfully commissioned to exercise Episcopal functions therein, assembled, many of us from the most distant parts of the earth, at Lambeth Palace, in the year of our Lord 1878, under the presidency of the most reverend Archibald Campbell, by Divine Providence Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate of all England; after receiving, in the private Chapel of the said Palace, the blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Body and Blood, and after having united in prayer for the guidance of the Holy Spirit, have taken into our consideration various definite questions submitted to us affecting the condition of the Church in divers parts of the world.
We have made these questions the subject of serious deliberation for many days, and we now commend to the faithful the conclusions which have been adopted.
[10] Report of Committee on the best mode of maintaining union among the various Churches of the Anglican Communion.
__________ 1.--In considering the best mode of maintaining union among the various Churches of our Communion, the Committee, first of all, recognize, with deep thankfulness to Almighty God, the essential and evident unity in which the Church of England and the Churches in visible communion with her have always been bound together.* [* Note (A). page 44.] United under One Divine Head in the fellowship of the One Catholic and Apostolic Church, holding the One Faith revealed in Holy Writ, defined in the Creeds, and maintained by the Primitive Church, receiving the same Canonical Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as containing all things necessary to salvation--these Churches teach the same Word of God, partake of the same divinely ordained Sacraments, through the ministry of the same Apostolic orders, and worship one God and Father through the same Lord Jesus Christ, by the same Holy and Divine Spirit, Who is given to those that believe, to guide them into all truth.
.
2.--Together with this unity, however, there [10/11] has existed among these Churches that variety of custom, discipline, and form of worship which necessarily results from the exercise by each "particular or national Church" of its right "to ordain, change, and abolish ceremonies or rites of the Church ordained only by man's authority, so that all things be done to edifying." We gladly acknowledge that there is at present no real ground for anxiety on account of this diversity; but the desire has of late been largely felt and expressed, that some practical and efficient methods should be adopted, in order to guard against possible sources of disunion in the future, and at the same time further to manifest and cherish that true and substantial agreement which exists among these increasingly numerous Churches.3.--The method which first naturally suggests itself is that which, originating with the inspired Apostles, long served to hold all the Churches of Christ in one undivided and visible communion. The assembling, however, of a true General Council, such as the Church of England has always declared her readiness to resort to, is, in the present condition of Christendom, unhappily but obviously impossible. The difficulties attending the assembling of a Synod of all the Anglican Churches, though different in character and less serious in nature, seem to us nevertheless too great to allow of our recommending it for present adoption.
[12] 4.--The experiment, now twice tried, of a Conference of Bishops called together by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and meeting under his presidency, offers at least the hope that the problem, hitherto unsolved, of combining together, for consultation representatives of Churches so differently situated and administered, may find, in the providential course of events, its own solution.* [* Note (B). page 44.] Your Committee would, on this point, venture to suggest that such Conferences, called together from time to time by the Archbishop of Canterbury, at the request of, or in consultation with, the Bishops of our Communion, might with advantage be invested in future with somewhat larger liberty as to the initiation and selection of subjects for discussion. For example, a Committee might be constituted, such as should represent, more or less completely, the several Churches of the Anglican Communion; and to this Committee it might be entrusted to draw up, after receiving communications from the Bishops, a scheme of subjects to be discussed.5.--Meanwhile, there are certain principles of Church order which, your Committee consider, ought to be distinctly recognized and set forth, as of great importance for the maintenance of union among the Churches of our Communion.
(1.) First, that the duly-certified action of [12/13] every national or particular Church, and of each ecclesiastical Province (or Diocese not included in a Province), in the exercise of its own discipline, should be respected by all the other Churches, and by their individual members.
(2.) Secondly, that, when a Diocese, or territorial sphere of administration, has been constituted by the authority of any Church or Province of this Communion within its own limits, no Bishop or other clergyman of any other Church should exercise his functions within that Diocese without the consent of the Bishop thereof.* [* This does not refer to questions respecting missionary Bishops and foreign chaplaincies, which have been entrusted to other Committees.]
(3.) Thirdly, that no Bishop should authorize to officiate in his Diocese a clergyman coming from another Church or Province, unless such clergyman present letters testimonial, countersigned by the Bishop of the Diocese from which he comes; such letters to be, as nearly as possible, in the form adopted by such Church or Province in the case of the transfer of a clergyman from one Diocese to another.
Passing to details, your Committee would call attention to the following points:--
I.--Of Church Organization. 6.--Inasmuch as the sufficient and effective [13/14] organization of the several parts of the Church tends to promote the unity of the whole, your Committee would, with this view, repeat the recommendation in the sixth Report of the first Lambeth Conference,* [* Note (C), page 47.] that those Dioceses which still remain isolated should, as circumstances may allow, associate themselves into a Province or Provinces, in accordance with the ancient laws and usages of the Catholic Church.
II.--Of Common Work. 7.--Believing that the unity of our Churches will be especially manifested and strengthened by their uniting together in common work, your Committee would call attention to the great value of such co-operation wherever the opportunity shall present itself; as, for example, in founding and maintaining, in the missionary field, schools for the training of a native ministry, such as that which is now contemplated in Shanghai, and, generally, as far as may be possible, in prosecuting missionary work, such as that which the Churches in England and Scotland are maintaining together in Kaffraria.
III.--Of Commendatory Letters. 8.--(1.) This Committee would renew the [14/15] recommendation of the first Lambeth Conference, that letters commendatory should be given by their own Bishops to clergymen visiting for a time other Churches than those to which they belong.
(2.) They would urge yet more emphatically the importance of letters commendatory being given by their own clergymen to members of their flocks going from one country to another. And they consider it desirable that the clergy should urge on such persons the duty of promptly presenting these letters, and should carefully instruct them as to the oneness of the Church in its Apostolical constitution under its varying organization and conditions.
It may not, perhaps, be considered foreign to this subject to suggest here the importance of impressing upon our people the extent and geographical distribution of our Churches, and of reminding them, that there is now hardly any part of the world where members of our Communion may not find a Church one with their own in faith, order, and worship.
IV.--Of circulating Information as to the Churches. 9.--It appears that the want has been much felt of some centre of communication among the Churches in England, Ireland, Scotland, America, India, the Colonies, and elsewhere, through which [15/16] ecclesiastical documents of importance might be mutually circulated, and in which copies of them might be retained for reference. Your Committee would suggest that the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge might be requested to maintain a department for this purpose, supported by special contributions; and also that provision might be made for the more general dissemination, in each Church, of information respecting the acts and current history of all the rest. They recommend that the Reports and other proceedings of this Conference, which it may think fit to publish, should be communicated through this channel. They further think it desirable that the official Acts, and other published documents of each representative body of this Communion, should be interchanged among the respective Bishops and the officers of such bodies.
V.--Of a Day of Intercession. 10.--Remembering the blessing promised to united intercession, and believing that such intercession ever tends to deepen and strengthen that unity of His Church for which Our Lord earnestly pleaded in His great intercessory prayer, your Committee trust that this Conference will give the weight of its recommendation to the observance, throughout the Churches of this Communion, of a season of prayer for the unity of Christendom. [16/17] This recommendation has been, to some extent, anticipated by the practice adopted of late years of setting apart a Day of Intercession for Missions. Your Committee would by no means wish to interfere with an observance which appears to have been widely accepted, and signally blessed of God. But, as our Divine Lord has so closely connected the unity of His followers with the world's belief in His own Mission from the Father, it seems to us that intercessions for the enlargement of His Kingdom may well be joined with earnest prayer that all who profess faith in Him may be, one flock under one Shepherd. With respect to the day, your Committee have been informed that the Festival of St. Andrew, hitherto observed as the Day of Intercession for Missions, is found to be unsuitable to the circumstances of the Church in many parts of the world. They, therefore, venture to suggest that, after the present year, the time selected should be the Tuesday before Ascension Day (being a Rogation Day), or any of the seven days after that Tuesday; and they hope that all, the Bishops of the several Churches will commend this observance to their respective Dioceses.
VI.--Of Diversities in Worship. 12.--Your Committee, believing that, next to oneness in "the Faith once delivered to the saints," communion in worship is the link which most [17/18] firmly binds together bodies of Christian men, and remembering that the Book of Common Prayer, retained as it is, with some modifications, by all our Churches, has been one principal bond of union among them, desire to call attention to the fact that such communion in worship may be endangered by excessive diversities of ritual. They believe that the internal unity of the several Churches will help greatly to the union of these one with another. And, while they consider that such large elasticity in the forms of worship is desirable as will give wide scope to all legitimate expressions of devotional feeling, they would appeal, on the other hand, to the Apostolic precept that "all things be done unto edifying," and to the Catholic principle that order and obedience, even at the sacrifice of personal preferences and tastes, lie at the foundation of Christian unity, and are even essential to the successful maintenance of the Faith.
12.--They cannot leave this subject without expressing an earnest hope that Churchmen of all views, however varying, will recognize the duty of submitting themselves, for conscience sake, in matters ritual and ceremonial, to the authoritative judgments of that particular or national Church in which, by God's Providence, they may be placed; and that they will abstain from all that tends to estrangement or irritation, and will rather daily and fervently pray that the Holy Spirit [18/19] may guide every member of the Church to "think and do always such things as be rightful," and that He may unite us all in that brotherly charity which is "the very bond of peace and of, all virtues."
[20] Report of Committee on Voluntary Boards of Arbitration for Churches to which such an arrangement may be applicable.
1.--Your Committee beg to submit the following Report:--
2.--The necessity for considering the subject which is entrusted to your Committee--namely, Voluntary Boards of Arbitration for Churches to which such an arrangement may be applicable--has arisen from the fact that there is no appeal from the Ecclesiastical Tribunals in the Colonial Churches to any of the ordinary Ecclesiastical Courts of England, or to the judicial Committee of the Privy Council, when advising Her Majesty on appeals from Ecclesiastical Courts. No questions relating to the exercise of discipline in a Colonial Church can come before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, except on appeal from civil courts in the colony, exercising jurisdiction in matters affecting property or civil rights. The subject, therefore, before your Committee is not the constitution or jurisdiction of Provincial or Diocesan tribunals, but whether there should be some external tribunals, or "Voluntary Boards of Arbitration," to which an appeal or reference ought to be made; how such Boards, when necessary, should be constituted; [20/21] and under what circumstances they should be
approached.3.--Your Committee, having taken into consideration the whole question, especially with reference to the action of some of the Colonial Churches since 1867, when a Report bearing upon this subject was prepared by a Committee of the Lambeth Conference held in that year, would make the following general recommendations:--
4.--I. (a) Every Ecclesiastical Province, which has constituted for the exercise of discipline over its clergy a tribunal for receiving appeals from its Diocesan Courts, should be held responsible for its own decisions in the exercise of such discipline; and your Committee are not prepared to recommend that there should be any one central tribunal of appeal from such Provincial tribunals.
5.--(b) If any Province is desirous that its tribunal of appeal should have power to obtain, in matters of doctrine, or of discipline involving a question of doctrine, the opinion of some council of reference before pronouncing sentence, your Committee consider that the conditions of such reference must be determined by the Province itself; but that the opinion of the council should be given on a consideration of the facts of the case, sent up to it in writing by the tribunal of appeal, and not merely on an abstract question of doctrine.
6.--(c) In Dioceses which have not yet been [21/22] combined into a Province, or which may be geographically incapable of being so combined, your Committee recommend that appeals should lie from the Diocesan Courts to the Archbishop of Canterbury, to be heard by His Grace with such assistance as he may deem best. The circumstances of each Diocese must determine how such consensual jurisdiction could be enforced.
7.--II. As regards the very grave question of the trial of a Bishop, inasmuch as any tribunal, constituted for this purpose by a Province, is necessarily a tribunal of first instance, it would, in the opinion of your Committee, be expedient that, when any such provisions can be introduced by voluntary compact into the constitutions or canons of any Church, the following conditions should be observed:--
8.--(a) When any Bishop shall have been sentenced by the tribunal constituted for the trial of a Bishop in, any Ecclesiastical Province, if no Bishop of the Province, other than the accused, shall dissent from the judgment, there should be no appeal; provided that the case be heard by not fewer than five Bishops, who shall be unanimous in their judgment.
9.--(b) If in consequence of the small number of Bishops in a Province, or from any other sufficient cause, a tribunal of five comprovincial Bishops cannot be formed, your Committee would suggest that the Province should provide for the [22/23] enlargement of the tribunal by the addition of Bishops from a neighbouring Province.
10.--(c) In the event of the Provincial tribunal not fulfilling the conditions indicated in paragraph 8 of this Report, your Committee would suggest that, whenever an external tribunal of appeal is not provided in the Canons of that Province, it should be in the power of the accused Bishop, if condemned, to require the Provincial tribunal to refer the case to at least five Metropolitans or chief Bishops of the Anglican Communion, to be named in the said Canons, of whom the Archbishop of Canterbury should be one; and that, if any three of these shall require that the case, or any portion of it, shall be re-heard or reviewed, it should be so re-heard or reviewed.
11.--(d) In cases in which an Ecclesiastical Province desires to have a tribunal of appeal from its Provincial tribunal for trying a Bishop, your Committee consider that such tribunal should consist of not less than five Bishops of the Churches of the Anglican Communion, under the presidency of the Archbishop of Canterbury, if His Grace will consent thereto, with the assistance of laymen learned in the law.
[24] Report of Committee on the relation to each other of Missionary Bishops and of Missionaries of various branches of the Anglican Communion, acting in the same country.
1.--Your Committee beg to submit the following Report:--
I. 2.--Your Committee have had before them the question of providing Books of Common Prayer for converts from heathenism, suitable to the special wants of various countries; and they recommend as follows:--
3.--They think it very important that such books should not be introduced or multiplied without proper authority; and, since grave inconvenience might follow the use of different Prayer Books in the same district, in English and American Missions, they recommend that, whenever it is possible, one Prayer Book only should be in use.
4.--It is expedient that Books of Common Prayer, suitable to the needs of native congregations in heathen countries, should be framed; that the principles embodied in such books should be identical with the principles embodied in the Book of Common Prayer; and that the deviations [24/25] from the Book of Common Prayer in point of form should only be such as are required by the circumstances of particular churches.
5.--In the case of heathen countries not under English or American rule, any such book should be approved by a Board consisting of the Bishop or Bishops under whose authority the book is intended to be used, and of certain clergymen, not less than three where possible, from the Diocese or Dioceses, or district, and should then be communicated by such Bishop or Bishops, or by the Metropolitan of the Province to which any such Bishop belongs, to a Board in England, consisting of the Archbishops of England and Ireland, the Bishop of London, the Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, together with two Bishops and four clergymen selected by them, and also to a Board appointed by the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.
6.--No such book should be held to have been authorized for use in public worship, unless it have received the sanction of these two Boards.
7.--In any Diocese of a country under English rule, all such new books, being modifications or versions of the Book of Common Prayer, should be submitted, after approval by local authority, to the Board in England only.
[26] II. 8.--Your Committee have considered the case of Missions in countries not under English or American rule, and they recommend as follows:--
9.--In cases where two Bishops of the Anglican Communion are ministering in the same country, as in China, Japan, and Western Africa at the present time, your Committee are of opinion that under existing circumstances each Bishop should have control of his own clergy, and their converts and congregations.
10.--The various Bishops in the same country should endeavour, as members of the same Communion, to keep up brotherly intercourse with each other on the subject of their Missionary work.
11.--In countries not under English or American rule, the English or American Church would not ordinarily undertake to establish Dioceses with strictly-defined territorial limits; although either Church might indicate the district in which it was intended that the Missionary Bishop should labour.
12.--Bishops in the same country should take care not to interfere in any manner with the congregations or converts of each other.
13.--It is most undesirable that either Church should for the future send a Bishop or Missionaries to a town or district already occupied by a Bishop of another branch of the Anglican Communion.
[27] 14.--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.
III. 15.--Your Committee have had before them a communication from the Bishop of Calcutta, dated June 4th, 1878, containing Resolutions of the Bishops of India and Ceylon, also a letter from Bishop Caldwell, dated June 1st, 1878, on the subject of the relation of Bishops abroad to the Missionaries in their Dioceses or districts.
16.--The questions raised by the Bishop of Calcutta's communication relate to the power and authority of the Bishop in respect of giving and withdrawing the licenses, 1st, of the clergy under his charge; 2nd, of lay readers and catechists; also to the rights of the Bishop in reference to changes in the management, order of service, and place of worship of any congregation.
17.--As regards the licensing of the clergy, it is admitted generally that every Missionary clergyman, whether appointed by a society or otherwise, should receive the license of the Bishop in whose Diocese he is to labour; but your [27/28] Committee are of opinion that, in case of refusal to give a license to a clergyman, the Bishop should, if the clergyman desire it, state the reasons of his refusal, and transmit them to the Metropolitan, who should have power to decide upon their sufficiency; such reasons should also be accessible to the person whose license is in question. Where there is no Metropolitan, the reasons should be transmitted to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who should decide in like manner.
18.--As regards the withdrawal of a license, your Committee find that in some Provinces the mode of proceeding for revocation has been fixed by canon, and the jurisdiction thus created has been established by consent. For these places it is not necessary to make any recommendations. Where no such jurisdiction exists, your Committee recommend that the Bishop should in no case proceed to the revocation of a clergyman's license without affording him the opportunity of showing cause against it, and that if the Bishop shall afterwards proceed to revoke the license, he should, if the clergyman desire it, state the reasons for his decision to such clergyman, and also to the Metropolitan, who should have power to sanction or disallow the revocation. In cases where there is no Metropolitan, the Archbishop of Canterbury should be regarded as the Metropolitan for this purpose. No such revocation should take place, except for grave ecclesiastical offences.
[29] 19.--The Bishop would probably find it desirable, where the clergyman is connected with one of the great Missionary societies, to communicate with the society or its local representatives before taking steps for revocation of a license.
20.--With regard to lay agents, your Committee consider it desirable that such as are employed in more important spiritual functions should have the license or other express sanction of the Bishop; and that other laymen employed in Missionary work should be considered to have the implied sanction of the Bishop, and should not continue to be so employed, if the Bishop see fit, for a grave reason, to forbid them.
21.--The authority of the Bishop in appointing places for public worship has been always admitted in the Church. Every place in which the Holy Communion is regularly celebrated should have the sanction of the Bishop.
22.--Your Committee have been asked for an opinion as to Subordinate, Co-ordinate, or Suffragan Bishops in India, to minister to native congregations, within the limits of another Diocese. Your Committee think that there are manifest objections to the appointment of a Bishop to minister to certain congregations within the Diocese of another Bishop, and wholly independent of him. Your Committee think that, for the present, the appointment of Assistant Bishops, whether [29/30] European or native, subordinate to the Bishop of the Diocese, would meet the special needs of India in this matter, and would offer the best security for order and peace.
[31] Report of Committee on the position of Anglican Chaplains and Chaplaincies on the Continent of Europe and elsewhere.
__________ 1.--Your Committee have to report that they have agreed to the following recommendations:--
2.--I. That it is highly desirable that Anglican congregations, on the Continent of Europe and elsewhere, should be distinctly urged not to admit the stated ministrations of any clergyman without the written license or permission of the Bishop of the Anglican Communion who is duly authorized to grant it; and that the occasional assistance of strangers should not be invited or permitted without some satisfactory evidence of their ordination and character as clergymen.
3.--II. That it is desirable, as a general rule, that two chapels shall not be established where one is sufficient for the members of both Churches, American and English; also that where there is only one church or chapel the members of both Churches should be represented on the Committee, if any.
4.--III. That it be suggested to the Societies which partly support Continental Chaplaincies, that, in places where English and American churchmen reside or visit, and especially where Americans outnumber the English, it may be [31/32] I desirable to appoint a properly-accredited clergyman of the American Church.
5.--IV. That your Committee, having carefully considered a Memorial addressed to the Archbishops and Bishops of the Church of England by four Priests and certain other members of "the Spanish and Portuguese Reformed Episcopal Church," praying for the consecration of a Bishop, cannot but express their hearty sympathy with the Memorialists in the difficulties of their position; and, having heard a statement on the subject of the proposed extension of the Episcopate to Mexico by the American Church, they venture to suggest that, when a Bishop shall have been consecrated by the American Church for Mexico, he might be induced to visit Spain and Portugal, and render such assistance, at this stage of the movement, as may seem to him practicable and advisable.
[33] Report of Committee appointed to receive questions submitted to them, in writing, by Bishops desiring the advice of the Conference on difficulties or problems they have met with in their several Dioceses, and to report thereon.
_________ Attention has been called to the following subjects by questions submitted to your Committee:--
A. (1.) The position which the Anglican Church should assume towards the "Old Catholics" and towards other persons on the Continent of Europe who have renounced their allegiance to the Church of Rome, and who are desirous of forming some connection with the Anglican Church, either English or American.
(2.) Applications for intercommunion between themselves and the Anglican Church from persons connected with the Armenian and other Christian communities in the East.
(3.) The position of Moravian ministers within the territorial limits of Dioceses of the Anglican Communion.
[34] B. (1.) The West Indian Dioceses.
(a) Their proposed Provincial organization.
(b) The position of their Diaconate.
(2.) The Church of Haiti.
C. Local peculiarities regarding the Laws of Marriage.
D. A Board of Reference for matters connected with Foreign Missions.
E. Difficulties arising in the Church of England from the revival of obsolete forms of Ritual, and from erroneous teaching on the subject of Confession.
A. The fact that a solemn protest is raised in so many Churches and Christian communities throughout the world against the usurpations of the See of Rome, and against the novel doctrines promulgated by its authority, is a subject for thankfulness to Almighty God. All sympathy is due from the Anglican Church to the Churches and individuals protesting against these errors, and labouring, it may be, under special difficulties [34/35] from the assaults of unbelief as well as from the pretensions of Rome.
We acknowledge but one Mediator between God and men--the Man Christ Jesus, Who is over all, God blessed for ever. We reject, as contrary to the Scriptures and to Catholic truth, any doctrine which would set up other mediators in His place, or which would take away from the Divine Majesty of the fulness of the Godhead which dwelleth in Him, and which gave an infinite value to the spotless Sacrifice which He offered, once for all, on the Cross for the sins of the whole world.
It is therefore our duty to warn the faithful that the act done by the Bishop of Rome, in the Vatican Council, in the year 1870--whereby he asserted a supremacy over all men in matters both of faith and morals, on the ground of an assumed infallibility--was an invasion of the attributes of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The principles on which the Church of England has reformed itself are well known. We proclaim the sufficiency and supremacy of the Holy Scriptures as the ultimate rule of faith, and commend to our people the diligent study of the same. We confess our faith in the words of the ancient Catholic creeds. We retain the Apostolic order of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. We assert the just liberties of particular or national Churches. We provide [35/36] our people, in their own tongue, with a Book of Common Prayer and Offices for the administration of the Sacraments, in accordance with the best and most ancient types of Christian faith and worship. These documents are before the world, and can be known and read of all men. We gladly welcome every effort for reform upon the model of the Primitive Church. We do not demand a rigid uniformity; we deprecate needless divisions; but to those who are drawn to us in the endeavour to free themselves from the yoke of error and superstition we are ready to offer all help, and such privileges as may be acceptable to them and are consistent with the maintenance of our own principles as enunciated in our formularies.
Your Committee recommend that questions of the class now submitted to them be dealt with in this spirit. For the consideration, however, of any definite cases in which advice and assistance may, from time to time, be sought, your Committee recommend that the Archbishops of England, and Ireland, with the Bishop of London, the Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, and the Presiding Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, the Bishop superintending the congregations of the same upon the Continent of Europe, and the Bishop of Gibraltar, together with such other Bishops as they may associate with themselves, [36/37] be requested to advise upon such cases as circumstances may require.
With regard to the special questions now raised respecting Moravian Orders,* [* Footnote, see next paragraph] the above- mentioned prelates are recommended to associate with themselves such learned persons as they may deem eminently qualified to assist them by their knowledge of the historical difficulties involved.
[* The special questions submitted were the following:--
"1. If a Moravian presbyter or deacon desires to be received into the Anglican Ministry, ought I to (a) ordain him absolutely; (b) reordain him conditionally; (c) accept his "orders as valid, and simply give him mission in the Anglican Church?
"2. Can I canonically and regularly commission a Bishop of the Unitas Fratrum in my Diocese either to confirm or to ordain for me, or to do both Episcopal acts according to the Anglican ritual?
"3. Am I justified, if called on, to confirm children, or ordain presbyters or deacons, or do both for the Moravians, in their churches, and according to their ritual?
"4. May Anglican presbyters and deacons, with their Bishop's sanction, officiate and minister the sacraments in Moravian churches, according to their ritual, and invite "Moravian presbyters or deacons to execute the functions appertaining to their office in Anglican churches, and according to Anglican ritual?" End of footnote.]
B. 1. (a) With respect to the West Indian Dioceses; assuming such Dioceses to desire to be combined into a Province, your Committee advise that the formal consent of the Diocesan Representative [37/38] Synods, if free (as regards their relation to the State) to give such consent, be first obtained.
The Bishops of the several Dioceses would then forward such formal consent, or expressed desire, to the Archbishop of Canterbury, requesting him to give his sanction to the formation of the Province.
Whether the General Synod of the Province should consist of the Bishops, with representatives of the clergy and laity of the respective Dioceses, or should consist of the Bishops of the Province only; and, in the latter case, what limitation should be imposed on the powers of such purely Episcopal Synod, is a question which ought to be left to the Diocesan Synods to decide, with the approval of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
If the West Indian Dioceses be formed into a Province, it seems desirable that a Metropolitan should be, in the first instance, elected from and by the Bishops of the West Indian Dioceses.
(b) The questions* [* Footnote see next paragraph] submitted respecting the [38/39] peculiar circumstances of the West Indian Diaconate appear to your Committee, upon full consideration, to be such as can be adequately decided only in Diocesan or Provincial Synods.
[* These questions raised the following points:--
1. The desirableness, or otherwise, of recognizing a Diaconate which, in certain cases, shall be practically permanent, instead of regarding the Diaconate as the invariable step to the Presbyterate.
2. The desirableness, or otherwise, of permitting Deacons to engage in such secular callings as are not inconsistent with the due and edifying discharge of sacred functions.
3. What modifications, if any, should be allowed as regards the intellectual qualifications and tests to be required of, and imposed on, such laymen as desire to become Deacons without relinquishing their secular vocation.]
2. Your Committee desire to express their satisfaction on learning that a Church in connection with the Anglican Communion has been planted in the island of Haiti; that a Bishop has been consecrated thereto by Bishops of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, and the Bishop of Kingston, Jamaica; and that successful efforts are being made for the training of a native Ministry; and your Committee trust that God's blessing may rest upon the Bishop, Priests, and Deacons, and all other members of this Church.
C. With regard to those questions in connection with the Laws of Marriage, which have been submitted to them, your Committee, while fully recognizing the difficulties in which various branches of the Church have been placed by the action of local Legislatures, are of opinion that steps should be taken by each branch of the Church, according to its own discretion, to maintain the sanctity of marriage, agreeably to the principles set forth in the Word of God, as the Church of Christ hath hitherto received the same.
[40] D. With respect to what has been submitted to us on the subject of Foreign Missions, your Committee are of opinion that it is desirable to appoint a Board of Reference, to advise upon questions brought before it either by Diocesan or Missionary Bishops or by Missionary Societies. Your Committee are further of. opinion that the details of the formation and constitution of such Board ought to 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 United States of America, with the Bishop superintending the congregations of the same upon the Continent of Europe, and such other Bishops as they may associate with themselves, who should communicate with the authorities of the various Colonial Churches, and with the existing Missionary Organizations of the Anglican Communion.
E. Considering unhappy disputes on questions of ritual, whereby divers congregations in the Church of England and elsewhere have been seriously disquieted, your Committee desire to affirm the principle that no alteration from long-accustomed ritual should be made contrary to the admonition of the Bishop of the Diocese.
[41] Further, having in view certain novel practices and teachings on the subject of Confession, your Committee desire to affirm that in the matter of Confession the Churches of the Anglican Communion hold fast those principles which are set forth in the Holy Scriptures, which were professed by the Primitive Church, and which were reaffirmed at the English Reformation; and it is their deliberate opinion that no minister of the Church is authorized to require from those who may resort to him to open their grief a particular or detailed enumeration of all their sins, or to require private confession previous to receiving the Holy Communion, or to enjoin or even encourage the practice of habitual confession to a Priest, or to teach that such practice of habitual confession, or the being subject to what has been termed the direction of a Priest, is a condition of attaining to the highest spiritual life. At the same time your Committee are not to be understood as desiring to limit in any way the provision made in the Book of Common Prayer for the relief of troubled consciences.
__________ [42] These are the Reports of the Conference, and the practical conclusions at which we have arrived. Some of these conclusions have reference to the special circumstances of different branches of the One Church of Christ, according to peculiarities of their various Missionary work for the heathen, or their labours amongst their own people; some embody principles which apply to all branches of the Church Universal. They are all limited in their scope to those subjects which have been distinctly brought before the assembled Bishops. We invite to them the attention of the various Synods and other governing powers in the several Churches, and of all the faithful in Christ Jesus throughout the world.
We do not claim to be lords over God's heritage, but we commend the results of this our Conference to the reason and conscience of our brethren as enlightened by the Holy Spirit of God, praying that all throughout the world who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be of [42/43] one mind, may be united in one fellowship, may hold fast the Faith once delivered to the saints, and worship their one Lord in the spirit of purity and love.
Signed, on behalf of the Conference,
A. C. CANTUAR.
__________ C. J. GLOUCESTER AND BRISTOL,
Secretary of the Conference.HENRY, BISHOP OF EDINBURGH,
Secretary of Committees.I. BRUNEL, Chancellor of the Diocese of Ely,
Assistant Secretary.[44] NOTE A (page 10). The Churches thus united are, at this time, the Church of England, and the Churches planted by her in India, the Colonies, and elsewhere, most of which Churches are associated into distinct Provinces (*) [* Footnote see next paragraph]--the Church of Ireland; the Episcopal Church in Scotland; the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, with its Missionary Branches; and the Church in Haiti. Among the external evidences of the unity of these Churches, none is more significant than that which frequently occurs,--the uniting of Bishops of different Churches, e.g., of English, Scottish, and American Bishops, in that most important function, by which the Episcopal succession is continued. On more than one occasion, also, the Church in Scotland has consecrated a Bishop in behalf of the Church of England, when legal difficulties have impeded the consecration in England.
[(*) There are six Provinces, viz.:--
India, with six Dioceses.
Canada, with nine Dioceses.
Rupertsland, with four Dioceses.
South Africa, with eight Dioceses.
Australia, with twelve Dioceses.
New Zealand, with seven Dioceses.And there are twenty Dioceses not yet associated in Provinces.]
NOTE B (page 12). One of the results of the first Lambeth Conference was the appointment of a Committee to prepare a Bill [44/45] for placing on a more satisfactory footing the status in England of clergy ordained by Bishops of Colonial and other Churches, outside the Church in England.
A Bill to effect this object was introduced by Lord Blachford into Parliament in the Session of 1873, and became law in the Session of 1874, under the name of "The Colonial Clergy Act, 1874." (37 & 38 Vict., cap. 77.)
The Act does not apply to the clergy of the Episcopal Church in Scotland. The legal disabilities of the Scottish clergy were removed, and their position defined, by the Act, 27 & 28 Vict., cap. 94.
With this exception, the Act of 1874 deals with the status of all clergy ordained by Bishops other than Bishops of Dioceses in England and Ireland. It proceeds upon the assumption that all clergymen so ordained may be admitted to exercise their functions in the Church of England; but that the Bishops of that Church have a right, in respect of these clergy, to discretionary powers, analogous to those which they have in the case of ordination.
The following are the provisions of the Act which affect the clergy ordained by Bishops other than those of (I) Dioceses in England; or (2) The Church of Ireland; or (3) The Episcopal Church in Scotland.
"Section 3.--Except as hereinafter mentioned, no person who has been or shall be ordained Priest or Deacon, as the case may be, by any Bishop other than a Bishop of a Diocese in one of the Churches aforesaid shall, unless he shall hold or have previously held preferment or a curacy in England, officiate as such Priest or Deacon in any church or chapel in England, without written permission from the Archbishop of the Province in which [45/46] he proposes to officiate, and without also making and subscribing so much of the declaration contained in 'The Clerical Subscription Act, 1865,' as follows: (that is to say,)
'I assent to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, and to the Book of Common Prayer, and of the Ordering of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. I believe the doctrine of the Church of England as therein set forth to be agreeable to the Word of God; and in public prayer and administration of the sacraments, I, whilst ministering in England, will use the form in the said Book prescribed and none other, except so far as shall be ordered by lawful authority.'
"Section 4.--Except as hereinafter mentioned, no person who has been or shall be ordained Priest or Deacon, as the case may be, by any Bishop other than a Bishop of a Diocese in one of the Churches aforesaid, shall be entitled as such Priest or Deacon to be admitted or instituted to any benefice or other ecclesiastical preferment in England, or to act as Curate therein, without the previous consent in writing of the Bishop of the Diocese in which such preferment or curacy may be situate.
"Section 5.--Any person holding ecclesiastical preferment, or acting as Curate in any Diocese in England under the provisions of this Act, may, with the written consent of the Bishop of such Diocese, request the Archbishop of the Province to give him a license in writing under his hand and seal in the following form: that is to say,--
'To the Rev. A.B.,
'We, C., by Divine Providence Archbishop of D., do hereby give you, the said A.B., authority to exercise your office of Priest (or Deacon) according to the pro` visions of an .Act of the thirty-seventh and [46/47] thirty-eighth years of Her present Majesty, intituled 'An Act respecting Colonial and certain other Clergy.'
'Given under our hand and seal on the day of
'C. (L.S.) D.'
"And if the Archbishop shall think fit to issue such license, the same shall be registered in the registry of the Province, and the person receiving the license shall thenceforth possess all such rights and advantages, and be subject to all such duties and liabilities, as he would have possessed and been subject to if he had been ordained by the Bishop of a Diocese in England: Provided that no such license shall be issued to any person who has not held ecclesiastical preferment or acted its Curate for a period or periods exceeding in the aggregate two years."
The Act also contains the following provision as to the Consecration of Bishops:--
"Section 12--It shall be lawful for the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Archbishop of York, for the time being, in consecrating any person to the office of a Bishop, for the purpose of exercising Episcopal functions elsewhere than in England, to dispense, if he think fit, with the oath of due obedience to the Archbishop."
NOTE C (page 14). The following extract from the Report refers to this subject:--"Your Committee strongly recommend that all those Dioceses which are not as yet gathered into Provinces should, as soon as possible, form part of some Provincial organization. The particular mode of effecting this in each case must be determined by those who are concerned."
[48] The Committee would also call attention to the concluding paragraph of the same Report:--
"In the case of the limits of an existing Province being altered, the consent of the Synod of that Province would be required for the alteration."