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Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont filmds en commandant par la premidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dernidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. Un des symboles suivants appaiaitra sur la dernidre image cte cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbole — ♦- signifie "A SUIVRE" '" symbole V signifie "FIN". le Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmds d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul clich6, il est filmd & partir de Tangle sup6rieur gauche, de gauche d droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 ^ .s^ THE PRESENT STATE -OF — The Church of England IN CANADA ITS CAUSE AND CURE, — liY- HENRY WILSON, D.D., ASSrSTANT MINISTER, ST. GEORGE'S CATHEDRAL, KINGSTON, AND EXAMINING CHAPLAIN TO HIS LORDSHIP THE BISHOP OF ONTARIO. PUBLISHED 6y permission OF THE BISHOP FOR CIRCULA IION AMONG THE CLERGY AND LAY DELEGATES OF THE DIOCESE OF ONTARIO. -•'' KINGSTON : PRINTED AT THE DAIiUV NEWS OFFICE. 1833. ^0tmmm> mm^ttmrnmrnmiitlm I ^.r* ■'tt "■1l # I THE PRESENT STA.TE — OF The Church of England IN CANADA: ITS CAUSE AND CURE, -BV- HENRY WILSON, D.D., ASSISTANT MINISTER, ST. GEORGE'S CATHEDRAL. KINGSTON, AND EXAMINING CHAPLAIN TO HIS LORDSHIP THE BISHOP OE ONTARIO. PUriLISHED BY PERMISSION OF THE BISHOP FOR CIRCULATION AMONG THE CLERGY AND LAY DELEGATES OF THE DIOCESE OF ONTARIO. KINGSTON : PRINTEII AT THE DAILY NEWS OFFICE. 18S3. To THE Lord Bishop, the Clergy and the Laity of THE Diocese ok Ontario. My Lord, my Reverend Brethren and Brethren : With all submission to authority, and with reverent regard to the judgment of those much older and more experienced than myself I beg most respectfully to lay before you the following facts regarding the status of the Church of England in Canada, as shewn by the last Dominion Census. Next I would submit what I believe to be the chief causes of this status — and lasdy suggest the remedy therefor. The facts will speak for themselves. In comment- ing upon them I shall use great plainness of speech, as becomes so important a matter — ^and yet while speaking the truth I shall endeavour to do so "in love," and Vv^ith tender regard to the feelings of others. And should any word of mine give offence unjustly I hereby and beforehand ask pardon for that offence, and request my brethren thus offended to believe that my words are meant only for those deservinor them. F, •' » irst then Tlie Status of the Church of Eniflaiid Iti Canada. The last Dominion Census gives the Roman Catho- lic population as 1,791,982, the Presbyterian of all names as 676,265, the Methodist as 743,629, and the Church of Engtand as 574,818. Thus we stand FOURTH in the Dominion in mere numbers. Next as to rate of increase. The same authority tells us, that during the past ten years the Methodists 4 The Present State of the have increased 35 per cent., Presbyterians 24, Baptists 24, Roman Catholics 21, and Church of r:nL(land idy^. So that not only do we stand fourth in nuiiihers, but we stand fifth in rate of increase, ranking- in ' this respect even below the Baptist body by /i/^ per cent. This is for the Dominion. Now for our own Didcese. The gain in ten years from uS;! to 188 1 in the protes- tant population has been 35,883 or 13^^ per cent. Our proportion of gain out of that increase ought to be 7,000, -vhereas it is only 1,535. To keej? pace with the population, the Church of England in this Diocese ought to-day to number 86,242. ' She actually does number about 79,242. Her increase ought to be 7 per cent, it is actually 2 per cent. So that instead of holding our own we are in the 5th rank, and only mcreasing at the rate of 2 per cent, against 42 per cent of the other bodies around her. The following are the returns* for 1861, '71, '81 : T3 o .u ,• ^^^^- I^?!' iSSi, STh^st^r.":: ::::::: ^,TS \Ts^l '''•'?' Presbyterian 73,018 ^^,^66 Hj^iaiH The total population was, respectively, in 1861, 37}^375^ in i^/i, 391.603, and in 1881, 446,436. The relative strength of these bodies was Roman Catholic '^^'^ '^JI' '^^'■ Methodist f^ -11 -3° Church of England ::::::; -J :ii -H . Presbyterian .n ^^^ rru , . ; ^^ -^9 .19 Ihe actual increase between 1871 and i8^^i is as follows : Roman Catholic oz, of^T «- Methodist '3.361 or 42 per cent. Church of England ,;^^o or not 03 •• •■ ^Presbyterian 7,^3^2 „, ^3 _ _ _ The Church or England shews a decrease of 1,020 since 1 86 1. In 188 1 it formed 23 per cent of the population in what is now the Diocese of Ontario now It forms something under 18 per cent. ■* Church of England in Canada. g The pcrcenta^^a; of increase belvveen 1871 and 1881 was Total pnpulati(jn Mi,-ti.u.ii.st ...■.■.■.■.■.■.■.'.■;. s ^'i'' ""?'" J'ioman Catholic Ir I'reshyterian ' Church of Kiiglancl '. '. '. '. ...'. 02 " '• ^ l^here has been a dc^-n^ase since ihe census of 1871 in the church population in the iollowino- ch'stricts viz • Glen<,^arry, Stormont, Dundas. Prescott', North Leeds and Grenvillc;, South Lt^eds. North Lanark, PVontenac Lttnnox and Prince Edward. .In the Cathedral City of Kin.L,rston the increase has been iSo. In 1871 the population was 12,407 In 1881, 14,091. The religious census shews as follows : ii^yi- 1881 Roman Catholic -, _«_ Church of England ". \f,{ 4.451 Presbyterian... ,^'^5 J,bi5 Methodist :'i^' ^■^"o ^'^40 2,338 The increase has been : Methodist 498, Roman Catholic 455, Presbyterian 259, and the Church of Lngland 180. In 1 86 1 the church population in Kingston was ^14 more than it was in 1881. This may have been due to the presence of a large body of soldiers in the former year. During the decade the relative percentage of the Roman Catholic and the Presbyterian bodies did not change. 1 he Methodists increased 2 per cent. In the City of Ottawa the decrease during the decade has_ been the same as in Kingston, although since 1 86 1 it has fallen 6 per cent. The figures are : ,. „ ,, ,. • 1871. 1881. Roman Catholic t^, un- church of England ^'ll"" '5,901 Presbyterian 4.^74 4.^^25 Methodist........ ''-^^' 3,059 1-550 2,173 Brockville shew.s a decrease of 3 per cent, while the Methodists have a like increase. 6 The Present State of the The figures are : 1871. i«8i. Koinan Catholic i ,904 2,350 Chiircb of Kngland .{,139 3,378 Mtthodist 3,cx)5 3,986 I'lesbyterian i,.S^8 2,022 Hcllcvilli' shews only a decrease of one per cent. In 1863 there were on our Synod Listseventy clergy- men, in 1880 then.' wer(' eighty, and in 1881 ninety clergymen. It is of course gratif\ ing to find that in some res[K:cts the church is fairly holding her own, if not gaining Lrround. For instance, the Bishop of Toronto, in a late charge, calls attention to two facts. Mrst, that the growth of the church in the City of Toronto is healthy, and second, that tlu: present position of the church in the Diocese of Toronto is much more favoural)le than its position in the Province of Ontario at large. To (;stahlish thes(i facts he gives figures to shew that in the City of Toronto, while the increase per cent is less than that of three other bodies, the actual increase of members is by far larger than that of other bodies, and the same is true of the present total mem- bership for the City. In actual membership at the present time the Church of England occupies the second place in the Diocese of Toronto, and the fourth in the remainder of the Province. This and similar statements are most gratifying, and for them we ought to thank God and take courage, They shew that on tht: whole, in Canada, and especially in the United States, the church is holding her own in the cities and larger toivns at least, and is retaining, and in may cases increasing, her hold upon the edu- cated and thou<>htful classes. But still the sad fact remains that here in Canada, after nearly one hundred years of as fair a chance to succeed as a church ever had, with all the prestige of being the Church of England, and of England's Kings and Queens, always on the side of loyalty, and helped Church oj England in Canada. forward by her connt-ction with ahd support of the State, and not as in the nciL^dihourin';; Republic. lia\ ini; to struLj^,L,deJa,Lr;iinst the un[)()pularity of" b(Mn/ and not without, and is deeper far than any incidental circumstance such as emigration or the like. I am strongly persuaded that one of the chief causes of the Church's weakness, and of her failure to take 8 The Present State of the her just position in this country, is her failure to use the agency of the Laity as she mit^ht. We have only to look around us and see the enor- mous amount of work done, not only in temporal matters but in spiritual things, in Sunday schools, Bible classes, class meetings, etc., by the laity among the various denominations, and then note the almost utter absence of any such work among our laity, to under- stand one of the great secrets of their rapid growth and influence and our weakness and want of progress. But I merely mention this important subject now. First, because it would require a separate paper of itself to do justice to it, and second, because there can, I feel sure, be nothing done towards a revival of interest among the laity in the work of the church until the evils of which I am now to speak are remedied, or until at least some effort is made to remedy them. These evils are to be found in tJie ranks of the clergy, and we must loc': them fairly in the face, and do our best to remove them before we can hope for much progress in the church, qjf growth of spiritual life among our people. There are three classes of men among the clergy who must be dealt with firmly and fairly in very mercy to the church as a body, and especially to the people over whom they are placed. The first class are those whom for want of a better name Pmust call Clerical VajjrraiitH. By these I mean a class of men who are a curse to every Diocese in Canada, and I suppose to every branch of the church in the world. They are, as their name implies, wanderers ; men who have wauviered from one sect to another, doing no good in any, leaving generally an imsavoury repu- tativ^n behind them, and each denomination only too glad to pass them on to the next, and so get rid of them. At last they wander into the Church of Eng- land, the church they have abused roundly most of their lives, and only enter it now as a kind of refuge, ii Church of England in Canada. a place where they will eke out a living under a / respectable name, and at last come upon her fiagnds /tx-vw^; ^-n for a pension when unable or unwilling to work any longer. Their whole life shews they have come into the church ^0 get a living out of her, and not to put life into her. They are like barnacle's fastened to a ship, only hindering her progress, or rather they are like leeches which have fastened themselves to the body of the church, drawing away her life blood, and only falling off when they can draw no more nourishment from her. Their theory is that the church and the people exist for theni, and not they for the church and the people, and they say plainly by their lives that they came into the church and stay in the church only to get what they can out of the clmrch. Now, with this class of men the church must deal promptly and firmly. She must say to them ^y her Bishops without fear or favour, You ought never to have been ordained, never allowed to preach or admin- ister the sacraments in the Church of England, you are utterly unworthy of the honourable name of a minister of that church, you have been a curse and not a blessing to every parish you have been in, and you must now go whence you came, for you have no part or lot with us as clergy. I will not suffer you to burden the clergy or cur people with your presence and evil influence further. The second class are The Clerical IflillHtoneM. By these I mean men who have been in the church all their lives and in the ministry for many years, but who have been simply dead weights upon every parish in which they have been placed. Either by constitutional laziness, obstinacy orcroich- etiness, or some such failing, they have neither worked themselvi^s nor l(,'t others work. But they have remained in the church and in the ministry to the 10 The Present State of the detriment of both, adding nothing to the h'fe of the one or the dignity of the other. Under such men there can be no more h'fe or growth in a parish than in a blade of grass covered by a large boulder. These boulders must be removed, and that speedily, or many of our dying parishes will soon be dead and buried beyond hope of Resurrection. The third class are Tlie Clerical Invallda. These are a class to be spoken of with all respect, as men who have served the church well while they had strength and vigour to do so. They have given the best of their days to the work of the ministry, have spent and been spent out tor the sake of Christ and the Church, with, it may be, little reward save that v/hich a sense of duty faithfully done gives, and the hope of rest and a better reward than man can bestow^ with God bye and bye. But they are now past their labour. Through infirmity of body and feebleness of mind they are no lonfi:er able to work as thev once did, or indeed to work at all efficiently, or as the constant requirements of a parish demand. And yet either through an attachment to their position, which by long use has beeome a second nature to them, or it may be;, having no private means to support them, they cling to their parish as their living, and draw their stipend more as a reward for past labour than for present, or for anything they can hope to do in the future. But unfortunately all this time the parish is dying daily. The people seeing no energy in the church or in the parish, grow careless themselves, drop away to dissent or )ecome stayers at home in a wrong sense, and perh;' s lose their faith altogether, and join the ranks of tiie unbelieving. At last the poor l)roke.n down clergyman passes away, but, alas, the parish has passed away also, or has Church of England in Canada. II ^ i* sunk into so death-lik;; a lethargy that it will require years of energy on the part of the incoming rector to recover it, or even half undo the evil of years of neglect and spiritual dcith. That this is a fair picture of the parish of a clerical invalid many an example in this and every Diocese will testify. Well, having spoken thus of the disease, and having given these examples of its worst form, that of the CLERICAL VAGRANT, the CLERICAL MILLSTONE and the CLERICAL INVALID, let me indicate in a brief way the remedy for it, the means we can and must use if we are to recover and become a healthy body as a church. The Xleniedy. The first step towards remedying the evils of which I have spoken is to begin at the threshold and £'uard more carefully the door of entrance into the nmtutry. There must be a longer time o{ preparation 2iX\d proba- tion for candidates for Holy Order's. Mere certificates of good character, college courses and degrees, and passing the Bishop's and Chaplain's examination must no longer be regarded as sufficient guarantee of a man's fitness to exercise the office of Deacon and Priest in the Church of God. We must devise some plan by which candidates for the ministry shall "first be proved" worthy to be entrusted with the care of the human souls, either by putting them under some experienced priest for six months or a year at least, or in some position of no great respon:ubilIty under the eye of the Bishop him- sell to see whether the heart is in the ivork or only the head, ancl how far the man has grasped the idea of the work he is about to undertake. Then, even after long probation, let no license be granted except with the condition of efficiency being attached to its continuance, and give the Bishop or ':he Bishop In Council power to revoke the license on the very first clearly proved case of wrong doing or plain wy 12 The Present State of the neglect of duty. This, or some such rule, must in very mercy to the church be made and applied firmly in the case of Candidates for Holy Orders. And if it is necessary to guard the door of the min- istry against intruders of the church herself, it is much more necessary to do so against men zu/w coine over to us from other denominations to make gain out of the godliness and good name of the church, and under whose evil presence and iniluence the church suffers and groans from the day they enter until they leave her fold. Now, to all applicants for admission to Holy Orders from other bodies, the Bishop must be given power by law to say, You must produce a certiticite under the corporate seal of the body from which )'ou came, or of the presiding minister of the denomination you are leaving of two things. First, oi good moral c/iaracter, and second, of a certain time oi good honest ivork done among the people among whom you last laboured, and you must be able to give me g(5od and suffieient reasons for your leaving the denomination in which you have been serving, and your desiring to become a member and minister of the Church of EnMand. And when all this has been done, and perfect satis- faction given to the Bishop and his Council of the "bona fides" of the applicant, let the term of probation be long and the tist searching, and no license issued until a fair opportunity has been given of proving the man's sincerity and devotion to the church and her work, and even then let the license be so worded that it may be recalled at once or after fair notice on the man's shewing himself either inefficient or immoral, the Bishop, his Council, and the people of the parish being the judges of the inefficiency or immorality. If some such rule were made and acted upon the church would be soon delivered from at least one of the many heavy burdens she is now bearing in the persons of men in the church but in no sense of her, Church of England in Canada. 13 the Clerical Vagrant now scourging her. Let one or two examples be made and others would be kept out. I pass now to the Remedy to be provided in the case of the Clerical Millstone. To men of this class the Bishop must be empowered to say in plain firm language, You have been a dead weight upon the church since. you took Orders. I do not wish to impugn your motives in entering the Ministry. But whatever they may have been your motives your whole life and the history of the Parishes in which you have been abundantly prove that you have mistaken your profession ai.d are simply standing in the way of the church's progress. This as Bishop I cannot allow, I am guardian of the church's interests, and these in- terests you are injuring every day you retain your present position. If you plead length of service I answer, length of time in the ministry you may plead, but certainly not length of service, not honest hard work done for the church and the souls of the people and this it was for which )ou were ordained. And if the case be one in which "Vested Rights" are involved we must remember a " Vested Righf may become a moral wronc;, and when it does it should not be continued. When the " Legal Rights' of one man are standing in the way of the "Spiritual Rights'' of a whole parish the evil should be remedied at once if possible. But as the civil law prevents our taking away these Vested Rights once given by the church' to any indi- vidual for his life time, we must obtain power to pre- vent a transfer of these Vested Rights to any other person. So that hereafter every man taking anv position of emolument in the church shall acquire no vested rights therein, no rights save moral rights, no fixity of tenure from which he cannot be removed by the authority of the church without the risk of incur- ring legal proceedings. If the church which gave cannot take away, she can at least reftise to give again \ 14 The Prc.ent State of the on the death of present Incumbents and save her best positions from becominir baits for men seeking her altcirs for tilthy lucre sake. Let it be also made a law of the church under which the Bishop can act that no man be inducted into any living rectorial or other except on the express under- standing in writing under the Bishop's hand and seal that the person inducted shall hold the living or cur|e "quamcliu se bene gesserit" and no longer, and also that no appointiiicnt so made shall extemi beyond three years unless the people of the parish either as a congre- gation or by their Inwfnl deputies formally request the Bishop to allow the Incumbent to remain for a longer period luith tJion. Such a rule would be an assurance to the people that their parish would not be burdened for a generation or more with a man who having once become their rector by legal right and by no other, retains his grasp upon it in spite of all protests, simply because nothing criminal in the eyes of the law, civil or ecclesiastical, can be proved against him. There would be fewer Clerical Millstones round the neck of the church if some such prompt remedy could be applied. For the third class mentioned, The Clerical Invalids, the remedy is not difficult. To every man in the ministry whose powers of mind and body have become enfeebled through long service, sickness or any other infirmity brought on by faithful devotion to duty the Bishop must be enabled to say. Your day of labour is over, you have done your duty in the past faithfully, but you are no longer capable of managing the affairs of the parish or giving the people the oversight and spiritual instruction they need. However much you may differ from me on this point, the people of your parish and I your Bishop are the best judges of your capability. The EFFICIENCY OF THE SERVICE and not your con- venience must be the first consideration, and just as in Church of En^laini in Canada. 15 her ^hich come lother the ur is (fully, ffairs and you your I your con- Ls in the military service no man at the af^e of 70 or 80 would be allowed to command a Re^^iment in the field — no more must an octogenarian be allowed to occupy a position demanding all the energies of mind and body of a man in the prime of life. Or as in the Civil Service the Government steps in and says to its faith- ful aged servants, You must now retire from active work and allow others to do the duties of vour office efficiently, so must the government of the church step in and save the most iviportant of all services from in- efficiency and neglect through the infirmities of men's minds and bodies brought on by age and hard work. But just as in the Military and Civil Service the aged and faithful officer is not turned adrift to end his days in poverty, but is rewarded for his long services by his half pay for life, or by perhaps two-thirds of his previous salary as in the case of Civil Servants, so the church must trovidk a Fund and very speedily on which to retire her aged ministers. Whether by the Beneficiaries of our present Funds paying a certain percentage of their incomes towards it as in the Civil Service, and the people subscribing liberally towards it, or in fact creating it in some way, the fund must be formed and that very soon if the church is to be saved from death in certain of our parishes once most promising but now on the verge of dissolution through want of some such remedy as that which I am suggesting, and I feel certain that if the laity could be assured that the reforms mentioned were really about to be made, and ihat a fair capital sum was needed on the interest of which these aged clergy- men could be placed that sum would soon l>e subscribed and paid, and maintained and increased as steadily as any of our present trusts. Nothing would tend more to revive the hopes of the people in these dying parishes than the assurance that after a short time their ministers should be honoitrably retired X.O remain among them as a friend and counsel- l! x6 The Present State of the 1 ; ii I I ler, but not to stand in the way of the churcli's life and progress, l)y persistent refusal to retire when every one except himself sees his utter inefficiency for the work of the parish. Let us take some i\c\'\ decided step in this direction of Superannuation, and the laity will not be behind in helping us to carry out our wishes, and them own. by supplying us with the means necessary to the end in view. Let these three things be done speedily* First, 77ic gates of tJic ininistry he guanied more closely against unwortJiy Candidates for the Ministry, and especially against Clerical Vagrants. Second, Let Vested Rights no longer frighten ns from righting grievons moral wrongs, as in the case of Clerical Mill- stones let the spiritual health and salvation of thousands of souls in a parish be thought more of than comfort and living of one individual. Third, Let justice and mercy he shezvn to the Clerical Invalid -aw^ to his parish by his retirement, forced if necessary, after a certain age, or when the powers have begun to fail, fair pro- vision having been made for his decent maintenance. Let these and certain other reforms* on which I cannot touch now be made, and it will require no prophet to say that a very wonderful change will take place, and in a wonderfully short time in the present status of the Church of England in Canada, and instead of beihe as now Fourth in numbers and Fifth in rate of increase she will ere long take her place /;/ the front rank, and become not merely the church in Canada l)ut in a very real sense The CuuKcii OF Canada. I am, My Lord, Rev. brethren, and Brethren, > ' Yours faithfully. ' - HENRY WILSON. Kingston, December, 1882, *NoTE. — These other reforms are so iniportaiit that 1 reserve the consid- eration of them for another occasion. !' ifcancl try one i work recti on lincl in wn, by end in First, closcLy )', and d, Let i\ Mill- visauds :onifort ice and ■; parish certain lir pro- enance. cannot )het to :e, and s of the eihg as ncrease ik, and 1 a verv n. LSON, he consid-