384-e SB 2fl B X 5937 D69 1901 MAIN GIFT OF ROMANIZING TENDENCIES IN THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH SERMON DELIVERED IN CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, BY ITS RECTOR, THE REV. GEO. TITOS. DOWLING, D. D. ^ = JULY 14, 1901 ===== PUBLISHED BY THE VESTRY ROMANIZING TENDENCIES IN THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH SERMON DELIVERED IN CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, LOS AN- GELES, CAL^ JULY J4, 1901, BY ITS RECTOR, THE REV. GEO, THOS, DOWLING, D. D. r i f T n T n o t 5 A N i PUBLISHED BY THE VESTRY RESOLUTIONS BY THE VESTRY. The following resolutions, presented by Judge Albert M. Stephens, and seconded by Judge James A. Anderson, were unanimously passed by the Vestry after listening to the sermon : WHEREAS, we, the Vestry of Christ Protestant Episcopal Church, believe that the discourse delivered this morning by our Rector, the Rev. Dr. Geo. Thos. Dowling, on "Roman- izing Tendencies in the Episcopal Church," dealing, as it did, with that question, in a Christian and judicial spirit, and from the broadest standpoint, reveals facts of a startling character which are not generally known; and, whereas, the circulation of such information is in our judgment most important and timely; therefore, RESOLVED, that we extend to Dr. Dowling our grateful congratulations for his courage in speaking thus openly and cogently, on a topic of such importance. RESOLVED, that we request from him the liberty of pub- lishing said discourse in pamphlet form. RESOLVED, that we appoint our Junior Warden, George W. Parsons, a committee to attend to such publication. RESOLVED, that we do hereby authorize and request Mr. Parsons to use all such measures as in his judgment may re- sult in its widest possible circulation. fROM THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, JULY 15, 1901. A society of clergy and laymen has been formed with the avowed object of "resisting in the I/)S Angeles Diocese Roman- izing Tendencies in the Episcopal Church;" and yesterday Rev. Dr. Geo. Thos. Dowling, one of the most brilliant preach- ers in Southern California, struck out from the shoulder. Dr. Dowling' s sermon is published in full herewith. It will make a sensation. He contends that the issue ^deeper than forms and graver than ritual but ho sermon speaks Tor itself. NOflCt'.*'' Those desiring copies of this discourse for circulation will be supplied by the Vestry of Christ Church at wholesale price twenty for a dollar, postage prepaid. Money must be sent with order. Smaller orders not taken. Address GEO. W. PARSONS, Junior Warden, 107 S. Broadway. Los Angeles, Cal. Single copies for sale at Fowler Bros., 221 W. Second Street, Los Angeles; and at other book stores. "ROMANIZING TENDENCIES IN THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH" BY THE REV. GEO. TI10S. BOWLING, D. D. IN CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, LOS ANGELES, CAL. Gal. II. ii : "When Peter was come to Antioch, I with- stood him to the face, because he was to be blamed." I am not here today, my friends, to condemn ritual; for I am a ritualist, and so are you. The man who shakes hands with his neighbor uses a rite with which to symbolize a thought; and that is ritualism. I could not be a Churchman without advocating its use; but no one can be a good Church- man while advocating its abuse. The distinction between those terms, I shall shortly consider. At the same time I realize that the worst abuse of ritual is the abuse of Ritualists. If there must be controversy, so be it! "As far as lieth in you," saith the apostle, "live peaceably with all men." But there come times when it no longer lies within us, nor should. St. Paul strove with St. Peter, and "withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed." Yet you will notice that St. Paul, who is the typical Broad Churchman of the New Testament, did not assail his motives. He did not charge him with dishonesty. He did not mistake heat for light, nor concussion for discussion. As every broad- minded disputant should, he dealt, not with personalities, but with principles. Two other distinctions and then I shall pass on to the chief burden of my message. When I speak of certain of the clergy as seeking to intro- duce the errors of Romanism into this Church which historians 312794 have been accustomed to speak of as the ' 'bulwark of Protest- antism," I mean just what I say: certain of the clergy, but not the clergy. I believe that the great body of our ministry throughout England and America, are as yet true to the stand- ards of our fathers, and the Holy Scriptures. So far as our own Diocese is concerned I thank God for the character of the clergy, taken as a whole, who have recently come into our midst. It indicates progress, and inspires hope for the future. From all the reports which I hear concerning the past, the outlook is not so dark as it was a few years ago. And I am not forgetful that these changes have taken place under the wise and kindly administration of our present Bishop; a man, whom, whatever our individual views of Churchmanship may be, we all delight to honor and to love; who, if he were to die tomorrow, could receive no more fitting tribute than that which was expressed of the late Arch-bishop of Canterbury, when, with his work finished, he passed from the Church militant up to the Church triumphant, and they said of him, that he was "a High Church- man, with broad leanings and evangelical fervor." If all the clergy of our communion were of such a type as he, whether their individual proclivities were High or Broad or Low, there would be no need that such a discourse as this should be de- livered. NOT OF IT BUT IN IT. And once more for there is nothing like clear discrimi- nation as an aid in straight thinking you will observe that our theme this morning is not the Romanizing Tendencies of the Bpiscopal Church, but in it. Such tendencies are not native to our communion. They are exotics introduced from without; introduced as they tell us rabbits were introduced into Australia, only at last to become a pest. It is true that the word "Protestantism" has never been a legal title of the Church of England; but it is equally true that the thing, Protestantism, has been inwrought into the very fabric of her history. In the litany of the English Prayer- Book in the days of the Reform- ation, and after, there appeared this petition: "From the Bishop of Rome and all his detestable enormities, good Lord deliver us." If that is not Protestantism, what is it? When this American branch of the Church came to be organized, the Mother Church of England, with no question, permitted that word Protestant to become a part of our legal title. As such it stands today; otherwise, why all this turmoil about chang- ing it. The fact is, that the question was never seriously raised, until the so-called Oxford movement of sixty or seventy years ago, when John Henry Newman and his associates, went from the Church of England to Rome, and Edward Bouverie Pusey and his associates once more introduced Rome into the Church of England. And new the successors of these men, in this American Protestant Episcopal Church of ours, propose, if possible, at the Triennial Convention in San Francisco next October, to fling aside our historic name, and call themselves "The American Church." I do not believe they will succeed. I believe the conservative counsel of the wise men of the East, who shall gather there, will outvote them every time; for I have all confidence in this grand old Church of ours, when it comes to a crisis. OTHERS WILL SMILE. But suppose they do succeed, what then? My friends, the only people to be hurt by such folly will be ourselves. These other communions about us will simply smile, and pass by on the other side of the street. We shall present to them only an amusing spectacle of a company of men, arrogating to our- selves, a title to which we have no right, because we are mis- led by an overwhelming sense of our own importance. Would to God that these men had enough saving sense of humor to rescue them from absurdity! But this, aftea all, is a subordi- nate question of comparative irrelevance . What is the real principle at stake? Do not be so silly as to join in the cheap superficiality, that this, which is today arous- ing the English people, shaking Parliament, and is destined to arouse our Church in America, is the old question between High Church and Low and Broad. Years ago that question was settled. Neither is it a mere matter of millinery. If that were all, it would cease to be a struggle demanding respect, and become only a squabble deserving contempt. Neither you nor I would waste our time with such trivialities. But you might just as well say, that when our Colonies threw out their banners in the face of Great Britain 125 years ago and sur- rendered the quiet of peace for the disquiet of war, their battles were only for a bit of bunting. It was what that bunting stood for which gave dignity to their cause. We may be pro- testing against a posture; but if we do, it is simply because that posture, as we believe, teaches an imposture. And that is the abuse of ritual. Ritual is used when it teaches a truth. It is abused when it teaches an error. My friends, listen closely now. The whole question is this: Will this Anglo-Saxon race ever permit itself to be led back again, as, I say it in all kindness, and simply because I think I can show it to be true, as these men are trying to lead it back, to that slavery of mind and spirit from which, by God's grace they escaped, with groans and tears, in the days of the Protestant reformation in the sixteenth century ? Is it true that the Church of the tuture is to be the Church of priest- craft, as in the Middle Ages it was when, with his supposedly miraculous power, and divine authority, the priest, from the day of a man's birth until the day of his death; yes, and after that, following him with his horrible clutch into the realms of shadow; the priest, came between the man and his Maker, and said, with all the awful power of his anathema, * 'Unless you come to God through me, you shall go to Hell ?" That is the question; whether it assumes the form of au- ricular confessional, or the intercessory power of the priesthood with the Virgin Mary and the saints, or the ability of the priest with a word, to change a bit of bread into the very body of God; that is the question; it is the whole question; and it is the only question. Will this Anglo-Saxon people, whose very name is a synonym for liberty, obey the voice of their God when He says to every man : "Arise and stand upon thy feet;" or will it hand over once more its conscience into the keeping of some magic-working priesthood, and permit itself to be robbed of that liberty from such intolerable bondage which the reform- ation gained? THE CONFESSIONAL ATTACKED. Do you ask what bondage? Well to begin with, the bondage of the confessional. Do you realize the awful power 6 which this would give over the susceptible consciences of your wives and daughters? Are you willing that any fallible man, whether he wear the garb of layman or priest, shall teach that it is their duty mark you that word for I shall refer to it in a moment their duty, before they shall go confidingly to father or mother, or any other living person, to go to him, and lay bare to him all their secret words and deeds and thoughts ? Perhaps you do not know the infamous history of the confes- sional. It may be just as well that you do not; but this is what one of our own Bishops, Bishop Wilberforce of England thought of it. Said he: "It is one of the worst developments of popery. In the first place as regards the penitent, it is a system of unnatural excitement, a sort of spiri.ual dram-drink- ing fraught with evil to the whole spirtual constitution. In families it introduces untold mischief. As regards the priest, it brings in a wretched system of cauistry. But, far worse than this, it necessitates the terrible evil of familiar dealing with sin, especially with sins of uncleanliness, thereby some- times even tempting to their growth." And now here is one specimen among many which is pub- lished by the League of the Holy Cross, and circulated by thousands in the Church of England, in which the priest is put before the very father and mother, and the child is taught as follows: "It is to the priest only that the child must ac- knowledge his sins if he desires that God should forgive him. Do you know why? It is because God, when on earth, gave to his priests, and to them alone, the divine power of forgiving sins. Go to the priest, who is the doctor of your soul and who cures you in the name of God. I have known poor chil- dren who concealed their sins in confession for years; they were very unhappy; were tormented with remorse, and if they had died in that state they would certainly have gone to the ever- lasting fires of hell." But perhaps you say that was in England. Yes it was, though precisely the same thing is being taught in this Protes- tant Episcopal Church of America. But this was not in Eng- land; this was in Los Angeles, and less than a year ago; when a priest of this Diocese, a Christian gentleman whom for his learning and piety I profoundly respect, went to a mission 7 station, which had recently come from another communion into this, led hither by its devoted and godly minister. In a booklet, the name of which is "The Pilgrim's Path," a copy of which I now hold in my hand, on the title page of which is the published statement that this issue is of the thirteenth thousand, there appear the following instructions: "How to make a confession. If you have never been to confession, go and ask your priest to advise you how to prepare for it. We should look upon confession not only as a privilege some- thing to do us good but as a duty, something which we owe to God," (and the word "owe" is italicised,) "therefore we should have regular and stated times for going to confession and observe the following rules:" On page 72 of the same book it says : "When you go to your confessional kneel down and think that you are at the feet of Jesus on His cross, and say : In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. I confess to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, before the whole company of Heaven, and before you Father, that I have sinned exceeding- ly in thought, word, and deed, by my fault, by own fault, by my own grevious fault. Especially I remember having com- mitted the following sins since my last confession, which was (so long) ago. Here mention your sins. For these and all my other sins which I cannot now remember, I am heartily sorry, I firmly propose to amend, and ask you, Father, pen- ance, advice and absolution. Now reverently listen to the ad- vice given and the penance enjoined, by your confessor; and joyfully receive absolution." And these people were taught by this priest, not simply that it was a privilege as it is always the privilege of any burdened soul who chooses, to seek the tender counsel of his minister these people were taught, that it was their duty to go and confess to him; and were counselled to do so before they partook of the holy communion. WHAT BONDAGE? Do you ask again, what bondage? The bondage which comes from the assumption of supernatural powers in the holy communion, because of the priestly office. If it is in the 8 clergyman's power, without any figure of speech, to turn that bread into the real body of Christ, and that wine into His real blood ; and if it is essential to your salvation that you shall par- take of it; and if it is within the precincts of his authority to withhold it from you; then again, he stands between you and your God. And this is what these men claim to do, or else, as I see it, the English language has no meaning. In proof of this I quote again from one of their manuals for children. This is the instruction given: "When the priest begins the prayer, that which is on the altar is bread and wine; when the priest ends the prayer that which is on the altar is Christ's body and blood; it is Jesus; it is God. Who does this? The priest acting for Jesus in the power of the Holy Ghost. How does he do it ; I cannot tell you. He does not know himself how he does it; but it is done. It is a work of God, and no one knows how God works. If you were to ask the great St. Michael, he could not tell you. It you were to ask the blessed Mary, she could not tell you. It is God's own secret, a knowledge which belongs to Him and to no one else. We go to the altar and kneel down, and the priest comes to us with the blessed sacrament. We receive that which looks like bread and which tastes like bread; we receive that which looks like wine, and which tastes like wine ; but that which we receive is the body and blood of Christ. It is Jesus Himself; it is Al- mighty God." Is that Protestantism or is it Romanism? Who can tell? Perhaps a Romanist can. Well this is what a Roman Catholic priest, writing from Manchester, England, says: "At this hour 5000 Church of England clergymen are preaching from as many Protestant pulpits the Catholic faith to Catholicizing con- gregations, much more effectually, with less suspicion and more acceptance, that we can ever hope to do. We could desire no better preparation for joining the Catholic Church than the ritualist preparatory school ; and the fact that from them we have secured the majority of our converts strengthens us in our view of it." SOWING THE SEED. Perhaps a Roman Catholic Cardinal can tell. Well this is what Cardinal Vaughan says: "They are doing our work 9 much better than we ourselves could do it ; they are sowing the seed; while we, with folded hands, are standing by waiting to reap the harvest." Now doubtless such a statement as that of the manual quoted, would be considered too extreme by many of the High Churchmen in our midst. Then why should they teach the same thought by the kind of ritual which they employ ? If it is true, or if they think that it is true, let them say it out and out, and then we will know what they mean. But if it is not true, let them cease to imply it by their ritual ; by their flec- tions and their genuflections. This, my friends, is why the Broad Churchman objects to their bowing as they pass the altar with the elements upon it. It is because they are thereby teaching their congregations that that bread has become Jesus, and that is false. This is why we ob- ject to their withholding the cup from the communicant when he partakes of the wine; though the rubrics declare that he shall take it in his hands. It is because they are thereby teaching by ritual, that it is too holy to be touched by any but the priest. This is why we object to their changing their robes for the administration of the holy communion. It is not that we care for so insignificant a thing as how they shall dress. That is a matter pertaining entirely to their own taste. There is absolutely no law in our church to prevent a man going into his chancel in a swallow-tail coat if he were foolish enough to do it. But it is because they therebj^ convey the impression that their ordinary priestly garb, is not holy enough for such an hour. Whether they intend to do so or not, they are practicing a rite which teaches an untruth. It is a poor use to make of ritual, when we employ it to convey to the minds of our congregations an error which we do not dare to express. IN THIS DIOCESE, But in this Diocese there are those who do dare to express it. There is an organization among us, a branch of a British society, who call themselves in plain English "A Confraternity for the Adoration mark that word the Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament." Now that very title means one of two 10 things, and it can mean nothing else. Either trans-substanti- ation has taken place according to the Roman Catholic doc- trine, and that bread and wine has become Almighty God, worthy of being adored, or else it has not. If it has not, then to adore it is idolatry. You can take your choice. In either case it is a practice which is abhorent to all the teaching and the history of our Church. It is true our Lord did say "This is My body." But it seems to me that every man who thinks should know that he was using thereby a figure of speech, pre- cisely as when he said, "I am a door." But a whole sacer- dotal system has been built up about the misinterpretation of four words, and these men are seeking to perpetuate that sys- tem. Thus, in the manual to which I have already referred, the manual which was distributed for use in the Church of the Neighborhood of this city, less than a year ago, there were these instructions: "At the Consecration of the Bread, say: Hail, true body of my Lord Jesus Christ ! Prostrate in lowli- est devotion, I worship and adore Thee. At the Consecration of the Wine say: Hail, true blood of my Lord Jesus Christ ! Prostrate in lowliest devotion, I worship and adore Thee." So, likewise, in England the Venerable Frederick W. Fairer, D. D., F. R. S., Archdeacon of Westminister, assures us that there are churches where the prayer prescribed by the Church in administering the elements is entirely omitted, and nothing is said to each communicant but "The body of our Lord Jesus Christ," and "The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ." Now, what can be the only possible effect of this thing upon thinking men living in this twentieth century ? W T hat has been the effect in this Diocese? Why, men and women, the Episcopal Church was the first religious organization in this city. But, as you see the great congregations pouring forth from the houses of worship of other communions; as you see the number of men among them, young and old, what kind of a commentary is it upon the narrow and sacramentarian teaching, which, until recent years, has almost exclusively prevailed here in Southern California ? Why is that so seldom the men are seen in churches of this type, and the worshipers, as a rule, are composed of children who cannot think, and women ii who, with their sweet and spiritual yearnings, will worship anyhow, even though they have to do it in the midst of super- stition? My friends, it is because the Anglo-Saxon man does not want this thing ; and if he did want it he would go to the Roman Catholic Church where he can find it in its perfection. If I had time I could refer to the practice of high mass and low mass ; to requiems for the dead, and other Romish innovations, which have been introduced into our midst. But I have no time today to pursue this subject further. TO OTHER CLERGY. To my brethren in the ministry I would say and God forbid that I should say it at all, unless I can say it in the spirit of sincerity, and earnestness, and brotherly love to my brethren in the ministry I would say : Why should you alien- ate the various Protestant bodies about you by persistently em- phasizing points of difference, instead of points of agreement ? It is true there are certain historic claims for this Church, which for their sakes as well as ours we must defend. There are truths for which we stand for which I believe no other body of Christ's disciples in the world so fully stands. And it is this which makes me thank God every day that my steps have been led into this fold. Many in those communions are hungering for these truths and they do not know it. They are hungering for just that which you have to give. They are hungering in their services to feel behind them a great Catholic in the only real sense of that word broad, compre- hensive, historic Church, reaching back through the ages. They are hungering for the dignity of our worship, the beauty of our liturgy, the simplicity of our creed, the possible com- prehensiveness of our Christian platform. If you will give them half a welcome they will gladly come to you. But they are Protestants, as we are, and they are Anglo-Saxon Protes- tants. They do not want your elaborate ritual with its Italian accretions, for that only repels and disgusts them. Tell me ! Tell me if you can, why should you turn your back upon them, with whom we have so much in common, and your face toward the only religious body in the world which 12 persistently refuses to recognize you or your orders, and never permits an opportunity to go by to treat you with contempt? I tell you that any possible union of our communion with the Roman Catholic Church is an irridescent dream unless you are willing to fall in complete allegiance at the feet of their Pope. And I ask you in perfect frankness, and am willing to be corrected if I am wrong have I not shown this morning that if there are those in our communion and out of it, who be- gin to harbor the suspicion that this is what all your efforts are leading toward ; have I not shown that they at least have some reason for their fears? WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT? Well, now I will only detain you a few moments more, while I answer the practical question : What can we do about it ? If ever there was a time when we needed to retain that word Protestant it is now, for never has there been so much reason for protest within our own ranks. In every onward movement there are four things which are essential. They are always the same : agitation which may result in education ; education which may result in organ- ization, and organization which may result in reformation. I can refer now only to the first two, leaving the others to follow as God's providence may direct. And let us bear in mind that this agitat ion is not of our seeking. We are men of peace. We would much prefer that these various schools of thought in our midst should represent, not different parties, but only different parts of one grand Church. There is room for all High and I/)W and Broad pro- vided they are in very deed a part of us. This is the boast of our Church, and I rejoice in it. I would not have it other- wise, if I could. I would be broad enough, and I would have you, my people, broad enough to include even what may seem to us to be narrowness. But there is no room, unless the whole battle for purity and freedom, has got to be fought over again there is no room in this Protestant Episcopal Church for Romanism, and the resulting priestly assumption of undue authority. 13 To those of my brethren in the ministry who have written me, only one in the spirit of acrimony, and all the others with kindness and brotherly love, not to precipitate a controversy, I would say : Why my dear brethren , can you not discern the signs of the times ? It is already precipitated. This very day arrangements are being made in San Francisco for the publica- tion of a weekly paper, whose chief object is the dissemination of these sacredotal views, which, in their final outcome, as I think I have shown, represent only another term for Romanism. This very day agents are at work in this Diocese trying to secure subscribers for that paper. The Rev. Stephen Innes, the Rector of the Church of St. Mary, the Virgin, in the city of San Francisco, a Protestant Episcopal Church, in which prayers to the Virgin Mary are offered in Latin, thus frankly states the purpose of this publication. He says : "One of the main objects of the paper will be to counteract to kill Protestantism in the Episcopal Church. We believe the Church is overrun with a particular form of Protestantism that is an- tagonistic to the old Catholic doctrine, and we want to root it out. We hold that the advancement of the future Church de- pends upon the suppression of this Protestantism." My brethren; is it any too soon for somebody on this Pacific Coast to have taken up the gauntlet which these men have thrown down ? ON THE WARPATH. A gentleman said to me this last week, "I understand you have gone on the warpath." And as I thought of such state- ments as that which I have just quoted from the San Francisco clergyman and editor, I answered, "Well, if you call it the war- path, perhaps it is ; but I found when I got there that I had no reason to feel lonesome." These men have been on the warpath for years, and in all this Diocese not a voice has thus far been publicly lifted, so far as I can learn, to declare in the name of our Bible and our Prayer Book, and our beloved Church, that if they are determined to advocate these teachings, in our Protestant Episcopal communion, where they do not belong, it would be better for them, and for us, if they would go into the Roman Catholic Church, where they evidently do belong. 14 And to the men like him whom I have quoted, who are threatening to crush out Protestantism from our midst, I would say, "My dear sirs, you will never succeed. It is possible, though not probable, that you may wipe out the name, but you will never get rid of the thing. You are hammering at an anvil which has worn out a great many hammers, and will wear out a great many more. Your predecessors tried it in the Middle Ages, and though they had all the power of the Inquisition on their side, they failed. You will find, as many others before you have found, that in trying to stamp out the flames you are only spreading the sparks. If you can appeal to men's judgment, then you will surely win, as you ought to win. But if you come to them only with that ecclesiastical authority which you are seeking to borrow from the Middle Ages, you and your associates are as certain to fail in the end, as yonder sun to pursue its appointed course. All your ana- themas cannot bring back the night when the day is already rising toward the noon. Gentlemen, we do not want medievalism. We are not living in those ages of darkness which you prefer to call the ages of faith. We are living today. Our Church exists for the people who are now on earth, and those who are to follow. And with this in view I cannot better close than by quoting, with approval, those ringing words uttered in the House of Commons by the Hon. A. J. Balfour. I believe they are as true of America as they are of England. "I do not conceal for one moment," he says, "my own belief that if this Church is to remain the Church of the great majority of the nation, it must be that ancient institution as it was purified and remod- eled at the time of the Reformation. It is, indeed, the Church of St. Anslem and St. Augustine, but it is something more. It is the Church whose doctrine was purified and whose ritual was simplified in the sixteenth century, and it is only so long as it retains that character that it can hope to retain the affec- tions of the English people. ' ' Syrac "ottf I? ^ate. ro s . >^- U.C.BERKELEY LIBRARIES YC 15835 in CDMSb3Q331 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY