The Henson Journals

[140]

Saturday, January 29th, 1921.

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At breakfast Lord S.[Scarbrough] spoke to me about the Cadet corps connected with the Church Lads Brigade, and invoked my benevolent interest in it. He admitted that the provision of really satisfactory officers was the difficulty: those who most readily volunteer being but too often the least suitable. However, we must needs work through men, and with them, taking such precautions against failure as we can.

I was much impressed by an observation made by the Abp. of Canterbury on Thursday, when we had occasion to discuss the working of "the Blacklist", which is kept at Lambeth, and which his Grace, in one capacity or another, has had to do with for 40 years. "When first I had concern with this woeful record", he said, "the cases were almost always cases of drunkenness: in the interval there has been a complete & rather startling change. The offences now are almost always indecent acts, of varying measures of gravity, with boys." Now this sets one thinking. There is, I think, no doubt that the phenomenon is representative. In this respect, as in others, the clergy do but exhibit the general virtues and faults of their class & time. During the last 40 years 3 changes in the conditions of clerical life and work can be clearly perceived. 1. The rapid extension of the "Catholick" type of religion with its aestheticism, its externalism, and its emphasis on the "confessional". [141] [symbol] 2. There has been an enormous improvement in the condition of the people. They are educated, clean, and better fed. Especially noticeable is the increase of total abstinence & of temperance. 3. Work among & with boys has greatly increased. The young clergyman has to do with boys in a degree which had no parallel in an earlier generation. Choir–boys, club–boys, 'servers', boys' scouts, Church Lads Brigades, Bands of hope – in one connexion or another he lives with boys to an extent which is certainly excessive, and may be in some cases morally dangerous. There is yet another circumstance to be reckoned with. During recent years there has been an astonishing growth of what is called "purity work". Sexual matters are constantly emphasized publicly and privately. The old protecting reticence has been scornfully cast aside, and nothing is any longer too delicate for speech, or too risky for discussion. I cannot help suspecting that this obsession with Sex is the road to ruin in the case of many young clergymen, who themselves morally weak are brought suddenly by their Ordination into a situation which multiplies temptation, and seems to guarantee impunity. It is a most distressing and difficult question how to protect the clergyman without withdrawing from the boys services from him which he ought to be able to render, but verily is not.

[142]

I spent the morning in the Athenaeum, dealing with my post, and revising my sermons. Then I lunched, wrote to Ella, took a short walk, & finally betook myself to 3 Dean's Yard.

There came to dinner the Dean & his wife, Hurst & his wife, Miss Picton Turberville, & two more. It was quite a pleasant party. Mrs Hurst said she was a friend of Angel Colenso: & on that basis we talked quite amicably. For the rest, though there was a considerable amount of conversation, I cannot recall anything that merited record. Barnes tells me that Williams, the Bishop of Carlisle, is a narrow High Churchman: that he "enjoys" bad health: & that he has no business capacity. He had come to know him as they were both chaplains together at Llandaff. This is a rather disconcerting intelligence, for, with the doubtful exception of the Bishop of Newcastle, I shall have no supporter in the Northern province. Lang, Strong, Paget, Burrows, Eden, Williams, & Temple are all, in varying measures, "High" Churchmen. Chavasse, Denton Thomson, & Perowne are undoubtedly "Low". Wild and myself are "Liberal", and "I am na' so sure of Wild"! It is not easy to discover much chance of effecting anything with such an untoward distribution of parties. The sudden extinction of the Evangelical dominance in the Province of York is very astonishing. It is not counterbalanced by any adequate increase of Evangelical powers in the Province of Canterbury.

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