The Henson Journals

[114]

Saturday, January 5th, 1924.

Little and the incriminated parson came by the same train, and I spent the morning in interviewing them. The case is extremely perplexing, and, if the culprit did not himself confess to the facts, I could not have believed them. I thought it prudent to have the Rural Dean present during the interview in order that there might be a competent & trustworthy witness of what passed.

I motored into Durham, and presided at a meeting of the Sunday School Association. Afterwards I had some talk with Knight, and discussed with him the course to be taken with respect to the thieving cleric above described. He is more mercifully disposed than I am, and even went so far as to volunteer an offer to take him on to his staff as a method of giving him another chance. He dreads the effect of a public scandal in a district where the clergy have been, and are discredited by more "black sheep" than it is pleasant to remember. On the other hand I dread the probable consequences of "covering up" the offence. These evil things always get abroad, probably are already far more widely known that we suspect: and the idea, always present in the popular mind, that "there is one law for the classes, & another for the masses" receives disastrous confirmation. If the injured official had the stolen money returned to him, and he himself forgave the treacherous friend who stole it, there might be a kind of excuse for clemency on my part.

[115]

"We are bound to ask the question: What sort of Christian Church do we desire to see emerging from the reuniting of the forces of Christendom? If such a reunion should come about, this question is of vital importance, though it has been but little considered by those who have been working towards unity. My own conviction is that if a reunion led to the creating or restoring of a universal hierarchical system, dominating human life in all its parts, and dictating doctrine & practice with professedly infallible authority, it would be the greatest disaster which could possibly befall mankind. What could be more fatal to the Church than that it should identify its aims with a system which the world once for all rejected?

I conclude, therefore, that the only kind of reunion we should desire is that which, while holding fast the Christianity of Christ as given in the Gospels, secures ample liberty not only for every individual, but for every type of organized Christian life which has proved really effective in bringing the influence of Christ to bear upon human life. It is not desirable that any one Church should absorb the rest. I conclude, therefore, that these overtures or conversations, or whatever they were, are, as things stand, not likely to help us towards the only reunion we should desire".

Abp. Darcy's Message to the C. of I. (Times Jan 5th, 1924.)

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