The Henson Journals

[54]

8th Sunday after Trinity, July 25th, 1926.

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I rose, bathed & shaved without assistance, which proves that it was fully time for me to emerge from the benevolent despotism of the excellent Alexander! We went to the village church for service, an abbreviated Matins with sermon. During the afternoon I sate with mine host & hostess, talking large. There came to tea two young soldiers, Eden and Clayton (?). The latter had been in the Soudan, and spoke very intelligently. He says that a good deal of slave–raiding still proceeds in the remoter parts of the Soudan, the slaves being sold in Abyssinia. After tea some of us walked to the Dene Pond. Lady Gurney talked freely to me about the ecclesiastical situation in Walsingham, where an extreme Anglo–Catholic holds the living. The ruins of the Abbey are in her husband's grounds, and pilgrimages are now organized to "Our Lady of Walsingham's" healing spring. Father Vernon had challenged her on the subject of auricular confession, which was the "Alpha & Omega" of his preaching. The extravagances which she described as proceeding in her parish church almost exceed belief. Her son, John, who has just taken his degree in Oxford (New College) is vehemently opposed to all this folly. He was particularly incensed at finding in a parish church in Berkshire, a notice conspicuously placed in the porch. This was signed by "John, Archbishop of Canterbury", and contained his rules for reserving the Sacrament! Abp John was none other than Archbishop Islip Peckham.

[55]

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The completeness of the break–down of law in the Church of England was brought home to me by Lady Gurney's account of the situation in her own parish. The Bishop of Norwich appears, like Gallio, to "care for none of these things". Yet, if legal action for the restraint of ceremonial and doctrinal lawlessness were ever requisite, it surely was so there. The parson has recently set up in the church a statue of S. Anthony, and has expounded to the people the Saint's virtue as a recoverer of lost and stolen properties. He bade them call to mind any losses they may have experienced, and, with full assurance of faith, to address themselves to St Anthony. He retailed from the pulpit instances of the Saint's answers to prayer, & assured them that they would also gain his aid. I enquired whether the parishioners approved these absurdities, & was assured that many of them did so, though the local Dissenting Chapel was flourishing. The impressive thing in all this is the complete inaction of the Bishop. For all intents and purposes, the parish church might be the incumbent's private chapel. But this lawlessness is almost universal. The service in this parish church today was shortened illegally. Only part of the appointed psalms was sung: only part of the appointed prayers was read. The very short lessons may have been authorized. In these illegalities there was no introduction of illegal ceremonies illustrated by illegal doctrine: still, they show the way the wind is blowing, and demonstrate the completeness of our ecclesiactial anarchy.

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