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The Church In the World
By Shaun Herron

THE FREEDOM OF THE CHURCH

How far would a Christian society be a free society? I confess that I have no more faith in the Christian man's ability to distinguish between the freedom of the Church and the privileges claimed by "the Church," than I have in the One Party man's ability to make the same distinction for the Party.

Ecclesiastical cheese makers in the United States claim tax exemptions for their monastic cheese, apparently on the ground that they are not merely ecclesiastical cheese makers but the makers of recheese. In the long run one does not judge men's understanding of the meaning of social and political freedom by the great 'principles they proclaim, but by their usage and abusage of their detailed application of the principles, and by the extent to which they see the relation of the details to the principles.

The British Broadcasting Corporation limits severely opportunities for the direct expression of non-Christian views "outside the main stream of the Christian tradition." The BBC has the official support of the Churches in the administration of this policy but no less important, when an agnostic humanist and university teacher, Mrs. Margaret Knight, was given the opportunity to explain her position in a series of talks on the air, the violence of the outcry from Britain's small minority of Christians was quite disturbing. It occurred to only a small minority of the Christian minority that "a free society" does not mean a society in which only Christians are free.

In Canada, the Toronto City Council imposed restrictions on the holding of open-air services in the city's public parks because the use of public address systems caused annoyance to those who lived around the parks. A storm raised by some Churches prompted the City Council to remove its restrictions. The Churches concerned were both what appear to be called evangelical Baptist. It seems that they could not make themselves heard without their public address sys-

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tems. Apart from the question whether a quiet Sunday includes freedom from the braying of public address systems used by Christians, there is the assumption that it is legitimate for Christians to disturb other people merely on the ground that they are preaching what they believe to be the Gospel. It is further assumed that freedom to preach this Gospel absolves the preaching agency from the limitations that would apply to other forms of trespass upon people's right to the undisturbed enjoyment of the quietness of their own homes. It is still further assumed that in this situation being restricted to the unaided human voice is an encroachment on the preacher's freedom to preach the Gospel.

I find something deeply sinister in the, assumptions behind trivial, affairs of this kind. It makes an interesting game to check the points, at which similar assumptions are made by most of the Church people," we all know and respect and by ourselves.

NO CHURCH UNION IN ENGLAND

There has been for many years in the English and Welsh Free Churches a group committed to and working for an organic union of the Free Churches into one Free Church of England (and possibly Wales). After prolonged pressure from this group, coupled with robust and informed polemics from The British Weekly (based, on information about delays and evasions from inside the appropriate committees, relayed to the paper by frustrated members of the committees), the Free Church Federal Council polled local Free Church Councils on the issue and were told that "the time is not ripe" for, Free Church union.

As all the world knows, the Free Churches are in dire straits, each year recording further losses (the Presbyterians are the sole exceptions, gaining about a modest 100 a year). But the question of Free Church union is now much more complicated than it was before the Archbishop of Canterbury's famous Cambridge Sermon. That sermon was taken up by the Free Churches en bloc, but the Methodists quickly began their own conversations with the Anglicans, and there has been no further joint Free Church approach since then. The Methodists are divided between those who believe they are bred in the bone Free Churchmen and those who believe their natural union to be with the Anglican Church. While there is any Methodist hope

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of Methodist-Anglican union, there is no prospect of a Free Church would prejudice such a hope.

But there is no hope of Methodist-Anglican union on terms that measure acceptable to most Methodists. The unity of Church of England is the determining factor, and the Anglo-Catholic "party" sits in the seats of power in the person of the Archbishop of York, Michael Ramsey, a gracious, brotherly man but no compromiser on what he believes to be fundamental. Some of us were inclined to believe that Dr. Ramsey's appointment to York was Canterbury's tactical means of ensuring that the Church of England ever be tempted to put inter-Church unions before the unity Church of England. It may or may not be so, but it has that any event.

Apart from current Methodist indifference to Free Church union, it is undoubtedly true that any formal union would split in half the (Baptist Union of Great Britain and Ireland. There are no signs of recovery in the English Churches, and the survival of some of them as significant bodies depends on an effective union that will eliminate the disastrous waste of scarce man power and pitifully inadequate economic resources. Where there are congregations of particular interest or importance, they cross all denominational boundaries and have no bearing on the question of denominational recovery.

NEWMAN AND THE ROMAN CHURCH

The advance of Roman Catholic influence in Britain has been a steady progression for a little more than a hundred years. It should be regarded as a case history by the Protestant world, but not many English Church leaders (F. G. Healey, General Secretary of the Presbyterian Church of England, is an exception) have given it much thought. The Anglo-Catholics and what are called (not infrequently by themselves) "lapsed" Anglo-Catholics have taken the Roman advance more seriously than any others. A good example of informed and intelligent concern is William Glyn Simon, Bishop of Llandaff (South Wales). It is little more than a hundred years an Church in England was a weak fragment. Today protocol has changed from the old order of precedence: (1) Archbishop of Canterbury (Church of England), (2) Moderator of the Free Church Federal Council, (3) Archbishop of Westminster

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(Roman Catholic). Today the Roman Archbishop is second, and a strong second. Analysis would show that the Roman Church owed a great deal to Irish-European immigration into Britain, but it is foolish to pretend that this is the real reason for Roman Catholic, influence in every area of Britain's public life.

The matter comes to mind again with the news that Roman Catholic Archbishop Francis Grimshaw of Birmingham has established a diocesan court to collect evidence in support of the cause dear to the heart of the Birmingham diocese, the beatification of John Henry Cardinal Newman. The opening session of the diocesan inquiry took place June 17 in the Oratory of St. Philip Neri which was founded by Newman. Newman was born in London in 1801 and ordained priest in the Church of England 23 years later. He became a Roman Catholic priest in 1846 after a prolonged season of conflict in the Anglican Communion.

Enquiries of this nature have three aspects. The court will concern itself first with Newman's life and personal virtues. Next, the court will investigate his writings (the most famous of which are Idea of a University, Apologia Pro Vita Sua, and Grammar of Assent), and finally it will determine whether there has been any cult associated with his name. Any public veneration of Newman would (in theory) automatically invalidate the whole process. Whether it does in fact is a nice point, for with more plebeian figures than Newman under investigation it is difficult to see how in Roman Catholicism a cult could be avoided. There is certainly an intellectual cult of Newmanism in English Catholicism; how one could prevent it in the face of the foundation of Newman Societies it is difficult to see. Presumably it depends on how "cult" and "veneration" are defined, and presumably definitions depend on the value to the Church of the person involved. There is, after all, a certain handy pragmatism about Roman definitions.

RECRIMINATIONS AND REPENTANCE

Now and again the internal evidence suggests that some Communist accusation against a Christian or Christians is true, and there is a peculiar satisfaction in the small sign of grace which does no more than state the case against the Christian, without extravagant embellishments.

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The Hopei Daily News (Hopei Province, China) carries a report which seems almost wholesome from both points of view. The report tells of a month long "Socialist Study Session" for Protestants in Hopei Province. It was also, as these things are apt to be, an "accusation meeting" with five Protestant pastors on the mat. Pastor Ma Hsing-ki of the Congregational Church of Paoting (himself a Deputy and a member of the Provincial and Municipal China People's Consultative Committee) was accused of telling the clergy not to listen to the party and not to endorse it. It's an altogether likely sort of remark. Pastor Shang Chin-Cheng was accused of having said the Hungarian revolt was "an internal conflict of the people and not an act of imperialist subversion." I can well believe the good pastor to have been guilty of uttering this reasonable statement. "A third fellow, Tung Chao-Jui, was said to have unburdened himself of the opinion that Communist regulations are more severe than those enforced by the Japanese during the occupation. It is the sort of thin an exasperated man would say and in many places under some circumstances it is in fact true. The thing that puzzles me is the fact that the paper merely reported the case without any Fascist-beast additions. The accused, it appears, pleaded guilty, but there was some doubt in the minds of the accusers whether the plea included repentance. The plea of guilty was therefore judged to be inadequate. As Barbara Mullins would say in her rich West Irish tongue, "I believe every word of it." One can see the moithering expressions on the faces of the accused, leaving the accusers in the monolithic doubt which stems from the absence of the familiar formulae of self-accusation and abasement.

An altogether different atmosphere derives from two East German reports, the first, the attacks on the Evangelical and Roman Catholic childrens' homes, and the second, charges of assault against a priest. The children's homes are run, the accusation says, with "most cruel educational methods" and the "inhuman and Fascist practices of the Evangelical home management will no longer be tolerated by the population." The case of the young priest is one of revealing interest. At a dance in the Roman Catholic parish hall, a young drunk became violent and was thrown out by the priest. The lad returned next day and apologized for his behavior. The priest was nonetheless convicted of assault and his right of appeal denied. The last German attack on the Church is now one of pathological and petty malignancy.

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THE CHURCH IN POLITICS

The official Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano first attacked opposition parties and later called upon Roman Catholics to vote for the Christian Democrats in this year's general election in Italy. The Church denies that this official directive to the faithful was an intervention in an election.

In Belgium the first election violence of recent years took place when Roman Catholic demonstrations against the Socialist-Liberal government's school subsidy policy led to the arrest of over 100 persons, Police had to be called to Bruges Cathedral when the Bishop instructed the congregation to vote for the Social Christian party.

I need make no comment on the comment of Joseph Ernest Cardinal Van Roey, Archbishop of (that ancient and medieval ecclesiastical city) Malines, and Primate of Belgium. He said: "In no way have we intervened politically. The Church is not subject to any party in Belgium or elsewhere in the world. It bows neither to the right nor to the left. In regard to the temporal power, the Church has to assert the supremacy of the spiritual, and it must defend the faith, morals, and justice. The Ministers of Education and of Colonial Affairs, both thoroughly anti-religious and sectarian, have on a national scale plunged the Catholic schools-the only ones acccessible to the faithful-into inextricable difficulties. [They reduced the state subsidy.] On the Colonial level they have systematically hindered missionary activity and introduced dissension and disorderly [They tried to hold the ring for all missionary bodies.] Therefore, can anyone justly reproach us for having instructed the faithful to combat immense perils and to warn them in order to avoid the danger of grievous error and to give suffrage only to those who respect our rights and are willing to mend past injustices?"

The italics and brackets, of course, are mine. The definitions are the Cardinal's.

COMMUNIST LITURGIES

I have written thousands of words on the East German Youth dedications (all appropriately indignant and sympathetic), but there comes a point where the machinery of state, devoted to a political

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sectarian imitation of the institutions of the Christian faith, becomes in fact a form of low comedy. We have all laughed-maybe a little sadly for the people who make the orders-at the Slovaks ordering that "Christmas," "Easter," "Bible," and words of this kin should henceforward be printed christmas, easter, bible, and so on (but god" may have a capital "G"; this is a concession to God), but the Germans, being thorough, do the thing properly.

There are now official and secular name-giving ceremonies for "all newly-born children regardless of the faith of their parents," and I am formed by a trustworthy source that provision is made for what for want of a better name" are still refered to as "Godparents." The "Godparents" must pledge their best endeavors to ensure that the children will be brought up to serve "peace, be class-conscious, and socialist." "Socialist weddings" improve on our average efforts in one respect at least; soloists who sing The Lord's Prayer or I'll walk beside you or I love you truly or Because, are not to receive invitations to attend; the music of Beethoven is being used. This may compensate young brides for the pressure that will be brought to bear upon them when they reach the maternity wards and meet the naming brigade whose job it is to persuade them to register their infants for Socialist name-giving ceremonies.

The group I like best, however, is from Bantzen in Saxony where a committee called the "Socialist Funeral Orators" has been formed. Its members are available for famous last words at the graveside. Some funeral orations to which one is now condemned to listen are agonizing enough to justify a reappraisal but the possibilities of professional communist funeral orations are limitless and hilarious. An uncle of mine once paid a stirring graveside tribute to "this gallant civil war veteran" and was perhaps a little surprised to learn that the funeral to which he had been so hastily summoned was that an old Negro family servant. This modest misunderstanding indicates only mildly the possibilities open to an ardent orator anxious to make the best use of the limited material available to him. The Nazis (as Paul Schneider knew) had the advantage of the Horst Wessel Heavenly Brigade as a focal point for funeral orations. Having no heaven, the Bantzen group must improvise; there must be somewhere for a Fascist-beast to go! It would be too frustrating to believe that he was at last really out of reach of the regime.

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THE WORLD COUNCIL AND CYPRUS

There was an interesting exchange of telegrams and messages between Geneva and Athens on civil violence in Cyprus early this summer (the World Council has quite the telegraphic atmosphere of a center of urgent diplomacy and governmental immediacy these days. Air mail lacks the flavor of urgent and effective participation in world affairs). The General Secretary of the World Council of Churches cabled the Archbishop of Athens that "Christians everywhere heard with sorrow news of the civil strife in Cyprus and pray for rapid, just, and peaceful settlement. World Council officers will continue doing everything they can for this purpose."

The Archbishop of Athens had earlier requested the W.C.C. to use its influence to effect an end to attacks on Greek Cypriots. "The Church of Greece," he said, "beseeches that God Almighty will strengthen the badly-tried Greek Cypriots. . . . We hope that our sister Churches will do the same." There is no record that at any time since violence first began on Cyprus the Greek Church or any of its leaders has spoken against the use of murder as a political weapon. Death and grave injury have come to Turkish policemen, whose duties were ordinary police duties and in no way political, by the action of Greek Cypriots, but the Archbishop was silent and the Church was silent. It is only the violence and the death that the Greek Cypriots have at last (after several years) called down upon themselves that the Churches of the world are to pray about.

Bishop Anthimos of Kitium, the acting Ethnarch of Cyprus, has "warmly appealed" to the World Council to "use its high influence so that an end may be put to this unbearable situation. But the Bishop himself is claimed by the British to be actively implicated in the Greek Cypriot campaign of bushwhacking which has persisted, for so long. It is only Turkish bushwhacking which he finds "unbearable." There would have been a great deal more sympathy for these appeals by Christian men to Christian men if those who made the appeals had at any time in recent years responded to the pleadings of Christian men that they publicly deplore the long succession of murders and attempted murders carried out by their followers. Their blunt refusal to do so has identified them with the acts which brought about a state of virtual civil war in Cyprus.

One of the ecclesiastically bizarre episodes of the prolonged Cyprus

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affair is the Archbishop of Canterbury's invitation to Archbishop Makarios to attend the Lambeth Conference ("a purely non-political initiation") which gave the British public yet another occasion to be angry with Dr. Fisher (there are almost monthly occasions), and his subsequent reported and very public description (on television) of Makarios as "a bad character." The Cypriot Churchman was unable to attend , and the Cypriot Church was unable to send a substitute. It would appear that more ways than one all the Archishops are, in Churchill's words on another matter, "all mixed up."