The Henson Journals
Sun 29 January 1922
Volume 31, Page 131
[131]
4th Sunday after Epiphany, January 29th, 1922.
O God, who knowest us to be set in the midst of so many and great dangers, that by reason of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright; Grant to us such strength and protection, as may support us in all dangers, and carry us through all temptations; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
This is a comforting collect for a failing Bishop. It is when the knowledge of personal failure coincides with the prospect of public and official collapse that "the heart dies down", and truly that is very nearly my own position. I am consciously inadequate in myself, and I don't see how to "run the machine". 'Out of the deep have I called unto thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my voice". I celebrated the Holy Communion in the chapel at 8 a.m. Frank Berry was among the communicants. I was pleased that he came, for he is a Presbyterian, & is, I understand, religiously disposed. The reunion of the Churches, if it come at all, will come through the action of the humble believers, who, in the consciousness of a common discipleship, will ignore, and by ignoring cancel, the dividing rubricks of the churches.
I stayed indoors, and worked at a sermon for Loughborough. This occupied me most of the day. Lord Thurlow came to tea, and I had some talk with him on the subject of the parish. He says that from Bishop Lightfoot's day until the War, it was the practice of the Bishop to pay out of his own pocket the stipend of a fifth curate. Now there are but 3 curates.
Wilkinson of Witton–le–Wear called in the course of the afternoon, in order to pour out his woes about the absence of a habitable house in his new parish. The income is no more than £250 per annum. Old Dr Hodgson has a pension of £40.
"I leave myself wholly in your Lordship's hands" – that is the formula, and, exactly translated, it means, "I count upon you Lordship giving me the next vacant living"!! I asked W. how old he was, & he said that he was born in 1863, the same year as I myself! Can I decently maintain that he is too old for any parish, when I have the courage to undertake this diocese!