The Henson Journals
Wed 14 October 1925
Volume 39, Pages 278 to 279
[278]
Wednesday, October 14th, 1925.
Disruption seems to me to be a word that can only be used with propriety where very large numbers are concerned. It is a movement that goes right through a church, and it can only be defended if the resultant body is sufficiently large & coherent to be called a church.
Bishop Knox. October 12th, 1925.
I gather from one of my letters that my reckless article on "Conferences" appeared last Thursday in the Evening Standard. An allusion to the ridiculous pretence of the C.E.T.S. to speak for the Church of England has arrested the attention of the liquor sellers, who desire to reprint the article in their own squalid interest! And why not? I wrote to Creed thanking him for "Kenya": & to Old Lord Halifax thanking him sub–acidly for his letter.
Ella went with me to Durham. After discussing with the Bishop of Jarrow the situation in Newbottle, I went to the Castle & instituted or licensed 3 clergy. Then I lunched with Wilson, after which I picked up Lazenby, & motored to Hetton–le–Hole, where I consecrated an addition to the burial ground.
[279] [symbol]
When alternative uses existed in the Middle Ages they did not represent any difference of sacramental doctrine. On that central point they were wholly at one. But difference of usage is asked for now, in order to express a quite different doctrinal position. And to have any church speaking with voices that are not only different but absolutely contradictory on a great central doctrine of the faith, is to reduce that church to a position of futility & imbecility in the eyes of all thinking men.
Dawson Walker P.B. Revision p 20.
My excellent chaplain professes to set forward 'the position of Evangelical Churchmen;' and he makes a good point when he urges the intrinsic reasonableness of the position that there should be doctrinal consistency in a church. But why should not the Church of England definitely take up the position that, as no sacramental doctrine can plead Dominical or Apostolical authority, therefore English Churchmen shall be free to hold what they will, & to express them in recognised 'Uses'.? If we are to hold the Church together, it can only be on the basis of the smallest possible list of credenda, & the largest possible variety of uses.