The Henson Journals

[194]

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23rd Sunday after Trinity, November 10th, 1912. Boston, Mass.

3.30 a.m.

The position of the Unitarians in this country puzzles me. They seem to be nowise distinguished from the rest of non–episcopal denominations. Their distinctive, & wholly disqualifying, heresy does not seem to be regarded as of any special significance. Unitarian ministers are as freely admitted to episcopalian pulpits as others: and there is no question save among the strictest sacerdotalists of excluding Unitarians from Holy Communion. The Bishop assured me that Unitarianism was now a mere label, without any distinctive meaning: that Unitarians both repeated the Apostles Creed, & worshipped Christ: that there could hardly be said to be any organized Unitarian Church, but that Unitarians were just the liberal section of the Christian community in Massachusetts. I inquired what might be the rule with respect to Baptism. He replied that generally they used no Baptism, & that where the ceremony was used, the orthodox formula was not employed. All this seems to me to constitute a grave practical bar to free religious intercourse. Indeed, it is hard to imagine any conceivable basis of unifying the Churches, if the worship of Christ as Divine be made a matter of option.

[195] [symbol]

The Bishop expressed himself somewhat contemptuously of the Committee for Church Unity, which Mr Pierpont Morgan has endowed with 100,000 dollars. I agree in thinking that no result of value can come from negotiations which have not first found a reasonable platform. 'It was just a piece of Morgan's impulsiveness, the giving of that money’, observed the Bishop, 'but he was taken with the notion that Episcopalians should be willing to negotiate, & offered his gift at once. It is only the money that gives any special importance to the movement.’

(10.a.m.) The position of the millionaires in the religious world is not pleasing, &, probably, is not helpful to Religion. It was with something of a shock that I read the name, 'John Jacob Astor’ inscribed largely on the base of one of the large pillars of the apse in the cathedral in New York. Other names of less well–known millionaires are carved on the other pillars. The suggestion of a church built on Mammon, bridled by gold, & running on lines of metal, is insistent & hateful. I must needs think that the general conscience is offended by such a parade of millionaire–patronage. I said all this to mine host & he agreed. Bishop Lawrance is alone among his episcopal brethren in standing outside the cathedral–building fashion, which has set in generally, notably in Washington & New York. His modest cathedral is, & will remain, a working church.

[196]

Miss Lawrence went with me in the motor to Appleton chapel. There was a good congregation – larger than last Sunday. Miss L. told me that the undergraduates turned out for me much more numerously than for the Bishop of Winchester, a fact which pleases my modest and generous spirit! I conducted the whole service, using the prayers from the Prayer Book. My sermon was from the text "the Word of the Lord was precious in those days: there was no open vision."

A curious fact was told me by Miss L. Since the river has been dammed to make a lake, there has been a plague of flies. These in turn have attracted a multitude of spiders, which have become such a nuisance as even to affect the letting value of the houses which border the lake. She said that her aunt, who occupied one of these infested houses, had spent hundreds of dollars in a vain effort to destroy them!

The "Boston Globe" has a report of my speech to the Twentieth Club. The headlines are rather alarming; but the substance of the report is not substantially incorrect. An old reporter called during the afternoon to beg the MS. of my sermon, & to have an interview. I promised the first but the last came to nothing before my statement that a proof must be sent to me. He could not guarantee a proof as everything had to go in to the Editor this afternoon.

[197]

I preached in Trinity Church at the 4.p.m. service. There was a considerable congregation. I used the sermon "No temple in Heaven", which I preached in Montreal on Sept. 8th (v.p. 42). Then we had tea with the Rector & his wife.

Appleton Lawrence & his wife came to an early supper at 6.30.p.m: & accompanied me to the cathedral. Mrs Lawrence also came. There was a very large congregation, to which I preached from the words "Behold the lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." The Bishop picked us up after the service in his motor–car.

So ends the 11th Sunday spent on American soil. I have preached no less than 25 times, of which 6 sermons were on week–days, & 19 on Sundays. I have also given 11 addresses, & 3 lectures, besides the daily talks to the students at Harvard, & several similar addresses elsewhere.

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