The Henson Journals

[185]

Saturday, March 11th, 1922.

Draft for a Pronouncement by the Bishops

We have received a petition from the President and Council of the English Church Union, and a gravamen from several members of the Lower House of the Convocation of York, directing our attention to the papers read at a Conference held at Girton College, Cambridge, in the summer of 1921, and since published in a book entitled the "Modern Churchman" vol. XI. Numbers 5 and 6. The petitioners allege that the teaching contained in this book is "entirely subversive of the Christian Faith & the Christian Religion and therefore calls for authoritative condemnation & pray the Bishops to take the doctrinal teaching contained in the book into consideration & to pass judgment upon it."

We think it necessary at the outset to point out that the petitioners, while laudably concerned for the maintenance of the Faith, do not appear to appreciate the actual situation by which the Church in our time is confronted, & therefore fail to – do justice to the motives of those devout Christians who, like the members of the Girton Conference, are consciously addressing themselves to that situation.

We have to take into account the fact that the advances of science & criticism have partially broken the traditional framework in which the truths of Christianity were set in an age when very little was known about the universe in which we live or the laws of nature, & that the consequences of this fact are to be traced in the perplexity & distress of mind which shadow & weaken the modern Church. Moreover the results of biblical criticism have unquestionably created a situation of considerable difficulty since they bear directly on the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures which contain the record of Revelation, & constitute the final authority in all matters of Faith.

In these circumstances we would emphasize the importance, and indeed the necessity, of reviewing the traditional theology with the object of disentangling the unalterable Faith from whatsoever in its setting is obsolete or misleading, & re–stating it in terms more congruous with our present knowledge, & for that reason more intelligible & edifying to modern Christians.

Accordingly, while deeply conscious of the difficulties & dangers [186] inherent in every attempt at theological reconstruction, we must needs desire to encourage devout & competent scholars to address themselves to this work in full confidence that the Spirit of Truth, which is promised to faithful Christians, will bless their pious labours.

It is not possible to check the activities of scholars by ecclesiastical authority without crippling them in their work, 7 it is not desirable to proceed against every scholar who seems to us to have gone too far in departing from Catholic tradition. As in the ancient so in the modern Church the satisfying theological formula will not be soon or easily discovered, & the final victory of truth will be preceded by many essays in error.

We hold it be equitable to consider the Conference at Girton in the light of its professed object, & to regard the opinions there advanced rather as tentative hypotheses than as settled conclusions. So regarded these opinions, while in our own judgment gravely defective & not always consistent, do not appear to us to have been "entirely subversive of the Christian Faith & the Christian Religion", nor do they merit "authoritative condemnation". But even if the case were otherwise, & the opinions expressed at the Girton Conference merited the severe description of the petitioners, we should hesitate long before having recourse to official action such as is requested. For we cannot shut our eyes to the plain lessons of experience in every branch of Christ's Church, & notably in our own. Those lessons teach us the folly & the futility of attempting to arrest movements of the intellect & of the conscience by methods of coercion. We would not willingly bring again on the Church of England such discredit as that which grew from the panic–stricken action of the Episcopate & the Convocations in the case of "Essays & Reviews".

At the same time we think that the petitioners are justified in feeling alarm at certain doctrines which have lately been supported by episcopally ordained clergymen. Christianity is & always has been the worship of an historical Person, & those who separate between the historical Jesus of Nazareth & the Object of the Church's worship, paying homage to the latter, while depriving the former of every title to worship or even reverence, are turning Christianity into a religion of an alien type, which the Church rejected from the first.

[187]

[It is not enough to preach a high sacramental doctrine, or to accept the Church's formulas, if the connexion with the historical Christ has been severed: & we think it right to declare our conviction that the so called Modernist position, of which the ex Abbé Loisy is the most distinguished exponent, is contrary to the Christian Faith.

We are glad to believe that nearly all the contributors to the Girton Conference volume would concur in this judgment, & we do not think that there are any prominent clergymen in the Provinces of Canterbury & York who can justly be charged with not believing in the Divinity of Christ.]

We think it requisite, however, explicitly to declare our disapproval of public conferences as the method by which the delicate & difficult task of theological re–statement should be attempted. In such gatherings the discussions must needs proceed under conditions which are not favourable to the caution & reverence which the subject demands. The Christian conscience is affronted by crude & unsettling declarations, often exaggerated & even perverted by newspaper reports, & a disastrous stimulus is given to the premature & presumptuous dogmatising of sceptical & semi–educated individuals.

It is too easily forgotten that every phase of religious development coexists at the same time in the modern Church, & that formularies which are perplexing & unhelpful to some, are actually indispensable to others. Pastoral charity, therefore, unites with practical wisdom in requiring the greatest caution in public criticism of the traditional & established forms of Christian Faith. While the interests of Truth must ever be paramount in Christian minds, none may safely forget that the dogmatism of negation may be as little favourable to that interest as the dogmatism of bigotry.

Finally, we would remind the Church that the plenary Divineness of Jesus Christ is not only the Rock on which Christianity from the first has rested, but also the only valid pledge of its persistence in a changing world. No doctrine of the Incarnation appears to us adequate or even tolerable which detracts from the uniqueness of His Sonship. The Church worships God in Christ, & reveres in the Crucified Jesus the supreme revelation of the Love of God reconciling an undone & hopeless race by the Sacrifice of Himself.

[188]

No reconstruction of theology can be in our judgment satisfactory if it disturb the proportions of the Faith as they have been for ever established in the writings of the Apostles, which must always remain the standard of doctrine, & the tests of theological speculation.

It is precisely because the ancient Creeds of the Undivided Church express with singular power this fundamental truth of Christ's plenary Divineness, & set forth the Faith of the Church in its due proportion, that we hold them to be not merely qualified for the use of the modern Church, but also possessed of an unique & priceless value as indicating the essential identity of Christian Belief in all ages.

We are fully persuaded that there is no valid reason for consternation, but much for patience, for the temper of mutual tolerance, for earnest prayer, for rigorous & reverent thinking. Instead, then, of yielding to panic – which may be organized by partisans for purposes of their own – let the faithful Christian make an act of faith in the Holy Spirit, & invoke His guidance for the Church's leaders & thinkers in these anxious & difficult times.

Today, as fully as in any earlier age, Christ is with His People, proving His Presence beyond any possibility of error by His redemptive activity, & therein we still possess the original root of Christian Faith, and find the sufficient reason for our own Discipleship. In the experience of Believers the identity of the Christian Religion is secured by the fact that "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, yea, & for ever."

March 11th, 1922.

My dear Bishop,

I think we might issue something of this kind, rapping the Fanaticks over the knuckles, warning the Modernists that we aren't comfortable about them, & don't like their methods, & re–assuring the Faithful so far as we honestly can.

Yours ever

Herbert Dunelm:

The Bishop of Wakefield.

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