The Henson Journals

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9th Sunday after Trinity, July 28th, 1929.

Officer, the Vicar of Rookhope, a little parish far up in Weardale where the Wesleyans are so firmly established that the Church counts for nothing, tells me that he knows of four, & thinks there are six, houses in which Hastings' Dicty of the Bible is possessed & studied. The house–holders are lay–preachers who work through the district, & who are despatched on their weekly tour of evangelisation with much devout enthusiasm. I suspect that many of the Anglican clergy do not possess so substantial a work, and, if they did, would have neither the disposition nor the ability to study it intelligently. The low mental type and inadequate standard of pastoral duty which mark a considerable proportion of the clergy of my diocese are the worst features in ecclesiastical life. I think that it is probably true that such candidates for Ordination as come to us from the working classes do not represent the best of their description, who prefer to work as Dissenting ministers.

[224]

THE PASTORAL LETTER OF THE 2 ABPS

I celebrated the Holy Communion at 8 a.m. in the Chapel. We numbered 12 communicants, including Peter Richardson and the Brydens.

The Pastoral Letter to the Church of England which is to be read today in the parish churches throughout the country is certainly not a great document. It is too long, too vague, and too discursive. The conclusion to which is leads is halting & almost trivial.

"But our aim is very definite. It is to ask all members of the Church, clergy and laity alike, to make some continuous study of the Gospel of God's revelation of Himself in Christ, of the Bible & the Creeds wherein that Gospel is set forth, part of the corporate life & work of every parish throughout the land".

As if such "continuous study" were not the normal business of the Ministry in the regular preaching on the Lord's Day. It had been more useful if their Graces had dealt with the Sunday question.

[225]

THE PASTORAL LETTER OF THE 2 ABPS

An extremely vague paragraph about "the difficulties in the ordering of our Common Prayer" is the only reference to the issue between the Church & State, which is in all our minds. Nothing could be feebler, or more suggestive of a timorous complaisance. There is not a syllable to assist the rank and file of churchmen to understand the question, on which they must soon be required to pronounce. There is no reference whatever to the existing confusion, and the potential value of the Revised Prayer as an instrument for restoring some degree of order. The Archbishops avoid every subject of urgency, and by limiting themselves to innocuous platitudes, escape criticism at the cost of forfeiting influence. Of course it might be pleaded that the condition under which alone the Letter could be read in all the churches was the absence from it of anything that could offend any of them i.e. that it should be specimen of platitudinous verbiage which in fact it is.

[226]

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I motored to Eastgate, and conducted Divine Service in the little parish church. I did everything except read the lessons which was done (very badly) by the Vicar's churchwarden, Mr. Hildyard, a local land–owner. Before preaching the sermon, I read the Archbishops' 'Pastoral Letter' which displeased me more than ever. So many solemn, sonorous platitudes leading up to an impressive appeal for – more Bible classes! After service I lunched with old Croudace who was amazingly alert & cheerful. He is evidently set on having a layman, so that my project of employing Officer found small favour! I went on to have tea with Mr. J. A. Hillyard at Horsley Hall, and had some conversation with him. He is a bachelor, 68 years of age, educated at Eton and Cambridge, is much attached to old Croudace, of whom he speaks in the highest terms. He is much absent from home, and generally spends the winter in a warmer climate, e.g. the West Indies. He seems a courteous, melancholy man without much interest or purpose in life.

[227]

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"It may be safely said that there is no country in the world where the difficulty (sc. of Church Establishment) is so great, the problem so complicated, as it is in our own: the seat of a vast empire, extended over a great variety of races & religions, & itself inhabited by a population divided by endless diversities of opinion & belief, & subject to a monarchy so tempered by constitutional restraints. That no small sagacity is required to determine where the centre of power is to be found, & it is only certain that it depends on the concurrence of many subordinate agencies. It is clear that rules of action which under a system of personal government might be binding on the conscience of the ruler, would become utterly inapplicable to a Legislative Body, representing widely divergent religious sentiments, & of masses too large & powerful to be ignored or neglected. The practical neutrality or impartiality which in the one case would have been a fault or a sin, becomes, under altered circumstances, a necessity & an obligation. The zeal which was a duty, becomes an error and a weakness."

[Thirlwall. ii.215]

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