HC Deb 19 May 1911 vol 25 cc2354-61

Order for Second Reading read.

Motion made, and Question proposed,

"That the Bill lie now read a second time."

Mr. WATSON RUTHERFORD

I cannot flatter myself that there is much chance of this Bill being dealt with in the short time available, or of its being permitted to get a vote on Second Reading. The promoters of this Bill have not been fortunate now for some time in getting any reasonable place in the ballot, and in order to call public attention to the state of the grievances dealt with by this Bill it is desirable to avail ourselves even of the short period which is at our disposal this afternoon. The Bill is founded upon the Report of the Royal Commission. That Report was unanimous, and the Commission was a very important one. It held a large number of sittings, inquired thoroughly into the whole subject, and it originated from Resolutions passed in this House and from a Bill which was read a second time on two occasions, and in consequence of which the Royal Commission was appointed. The Commission brought in the unanimous Report in 1906, in which they stated the history of the subject, and I think it is reasonable to suggest that it is the duty of the Government of the day to bring in some legislation, at all events, to give effect to the recommendations of this most important unanimous Report. I must occupy some short time in stating the reasons why we feel ourselves compelled to bring forward legislation of this description, and the reasons will be entirely and exclusively taken from the Report of the Royal Commission, and no other facts or evidence will be referred to except that taken directly and accurately from that Report. The principle which the Royal Commission lay down is this:— The nation has a right to expect that in the National Church the services shall be conducted according to law. It seems a most astonishing thing at this day in the history of our country that it should be necessary for any Royal Commission to make a statement like that, and it only shows to what an extent illegal practices have been going on when it becomes necessary for a statement of that sort to he made. The Royal Commission then reports:— We are satisfied that the great mass of evidence we received is trustworthy. With regard to irregularity in the direction of excess there is a great volume of evidence showing the large development of such practices, and on page 53 we read:— That practices unquestionably significant of doctrine condemned by the Chancellor of England have been shown to exist in considerable numbers. Now these illegal practices are divisible, first, into the mere question of vestments or ritual, and secondly, into more grave points. With regard to the former, the Report of the Royal Commission, page 18, says:— The total number of English and Welsh churches in England and Wales is 14,242, and there were in 1901 1,520 churches where eucharistic vestments were worn. That is to say, out of 14,000 churches, in 1,500 of them illegal vestments were found by the Royal Commission to be in use. What did the Royal Commission do? They not only took this evidence, but they thought it wise to address a direct question to each of the bishops upon this point, and the question they put was:— Have you called the attention of your clergy as a body or individually to the illegality of the use of what are known as eucharistic vestments in their churches, or have you in any way sanctioned or permitted such use? What was the answer to that question? That none of the present bishops has taken any steps for the general prohibition of these vestments, nor has any bishop now in charge of an English diocese required that their use should be relinquished. That passage is taken from page 18 of the Report, Section 91. I submit that if it is shown that in 1,500 churches illegal vestments are worn, and if it is shown that the Commissioners have asked each Bishop "What have you done to stop that illegal practice?" and the Bishops reply that they have done nothing, then I think upon that point at all events we have made out a very strong case. Now I come to some of the more grave questions. From page 32 of the Report I take the following passage:— Numerous instances, nearly 100, show that children are trained in the habit of attending the service of the Holy Communion without receiving the Sacrament. There is no doubt as to the law of the Church of England on that subject. On page 75 the Report states that practices of special gravity and significance exist which are clearly inconsistent with and subversive to the teaching of the Church of England as declared by the articles set forth in the Prayer Book. I am sorry to be obliged to occupy the attention of the House of Commons with details of that sort, but I think I am justified in doing so because, if I do not, in moving the Second Reading of this Bill, it might be thought by some hon. Members, or by the public outside, that there was no case capable of being made out. When these matters which beyond all controversy exist, and which have been found by the Report of the Royal Commission to be the fact, when they not only exist but go on unchecked, then I think we are entitled to remind the House of Commons and the public, on every available occasion, that that is the state of affairs. We desire to deal with that evil, and it is with that object that this Bill has been brought in. The form of the Bill is taken from Reformation times. The idea is that lay commissioners should be appointed, that where-ever the Royal Commission has found that there are illegal practices going on, and wherever the attention of the commissioners is called either to their being commenced in other places or repeated, it should be possible for those commissioners to investigate the subject, and, if necessary, suspend the incumbent.

I venture very respectfully to submit to the House it ought to give this Bill a Second Reading, founded, as it is, upon the Report of the Royal Commission, upon which the Government has not taken any steps to act. If it were read a Second time and sent to a Committee, it would be possible to investigate the machinery and also to investigate the facts, if indeed any further investigation were required, and then we should at all events have done something in this Parliament, as was done in the Parliament under the late Government, towards remedying a state of affairs in the Church of England which is so deplorable, and which undoubtedly exists. I cannot sit down without deploring the action of the Bishops. It is a most unfortunate thing that those who are in a position of authority in the Church should have persistently declined to do anything to clear the Church of this grave scandal. I for one was terribly shocked the other day to see the almost un-Christian and certainly mediaeval attitude adopted by Lord Halifax and some gentlemen of that kind of mediæval inclination when one of the Bishops had the courage to hold out a friendly hand to the Protestant dissenters of his diocese. I can scarcely find a Parliamentary word which is applicable to the subject to describe the outbreak of ecclesiastical sacerdotalism which took place. I have condemned this kind of thing for years, but, unfortunately, I see no improvement in the minds and the attitude of the prelates and their friends on this subject. I see no advance towards Christian unity and Christian co-operation. I very much regret it. I think it will be for this House of Commons some of these days to see whether, in the interests of the common people of the country, we cannot do something to put this matter right, and it is in that spirit I move the Second Reading of this Bill.

Mr. KYFFIN-TAYLOR

I quite endorse all that has fallen from my hon. Friend, and I should like to say that in my view, and in the view of hundreds of thousands of persons throughout the country, the time has already come when Parliament, which after all is the only court of appeal persons who support this Bill have got, should make up its mind to deal with this question at once. A Resolution was passed on 10th May, 1899. It said:— This House.…is of opinion that, if the efforts now being made by the Archbishops and Bishops to secure the due obedience of the clergy are not speedily effectual, further legislation will be required to maintain the observance of the existing laws of church and realm. In the year 1903 the Archbishop of Canterbury said the sands had run out and that the time had come for stern and drastic action. Then we had the Royal Commission of 1906, and now we are in the year 1911, and not only has nothing been done, but, as I think Sir Edward Clarke testified, matters have gone from bad to worse. Sir Edward Clarke, at all events, ought to know. He is a man of great experience, and can by no means be called a Low Churchman. Yet, after close investigation, he has said matters have practically gone from bad to worse.

The bishops are practically responsible for the whole thing. Only this year many of the services condemned by the Royal Commission—services adapted from the Roman Catholic missal, have taken place—such as Blessing and Imposition of Ashes, Distribution of Candles, Creeping to the Cross, the Adoration of the Cross, and the Mass of the Pre-Sanctified. I suppose the bishops will say that they have tried to stop them. But the fact remains they have not stopped them; they are still going on. One of the strongest points that can be put before this House is that the proper people to stop these proceedings have not lifted a little finger to stop them. I believe some have tried, but, notwithstanding that, these services are still going on.

My first point is that these services are of a character condemned by the Royal Commission. I should like, next, to point out the very bad effect this lawlessness must have on hundreds of thousands of loyal churchmen, who see that one body of persons are allowed to break the law of the church with impunity. The Bishop of Manchester the other day had occasion to interview a number of his clergy. He asked them what court they did recognise. He said: "Since you refuse to accept the law as declared by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and cast doubt on the validity of the Lincoln judgment delivered by a purely spiritual court, do you recognise the authority of any existing court in matters of ritual?" He was assured, in reply, that they recognised none. Thus there has been a distinct advance. Not merely have ritualists made up their mind that their consciences are unable to allow them to obey the decisions of the Privy Council, but they now say, "There is no court we can recognise." They tell the Bishop of Manchester quite plainly that they are not going to obey the orders of their bishops. Therefore, in the view of those who support this Bill, the time has come when this House should say, "We will see that the clergy are compelled to obey the law."

There is one other point on which I feel strongly—a point which has caused a great deal of distress and confusion, and which has probably accounted more than any- thing else for the extraordinary earnestness of the people who support this Bill. The ordinary man in the street sees that there are two sets of clergy in the established church; two sets which are preaching doctrines mutually destructive. On the one hand you have preached the doctrine of salvation by faith; on the other hand you have the doctrine of salvation by sacraments. The object of this Bill, which, I think, deals only indirectly with doctrine, is to stop those outward observances which the ritualistic party claim as symbolical of their doctrine. What we say is, stop the outward observances and compel the clergy to conform to the Book of Common Prayer, and there will be no room for turning the communion of the Church of England into the Mass. One last point which I take from the Report of the Royal Commission. We are often told that we should wait until Convocation reports. I do not think that Convocation will report, because both the High Church party and the Low Church party appear to think that they had better not deal with the revision of the Prayer Book at all. Probably the High Church party do not think it is the time to deal with it, and probably the Low Church party think that they would go too far. The short point is that there will be no revision of the Prayer Book, and therefore it is rather unfair to ask Parliament to wait until there is. As the Royal Commission says:— The fact that reforms are needed is not an adequate reason for allowing defiant lawlessness to go unchecked pending those reforms. I ask the House with great sincerity to pass the Second Reading of this Bill and to show that at least the House has made up its mind that the time has come when no longer shall a section of the community defy the law as it chooses.

Sir ALFRED CRIPPS

I regret very much that in the short time at our disposal this afternoon it is utterly impossible to deal with a Bill of this character, nor can I enter into controversy with my two hon. Friends who proposed and seconded the Second Reading. Let me say that the objections of most churchmen who agree with me in regard to this Bill are not on points proposed by the Proposer and Seconder, but all who have looked at the procedure agree that it is not only unfair but it is most tyrannical and intolerable in character. I was pleased to hear, both from the Proposer and Seconder, that they were in favour of what had passed before the Royal Commission, and of the recommendation which that Royal Commission made. If they were I wish they had adopted the remedy suggested by the Royal Commission, and not this intolerable procedure of the time of Henry VIII. To my mind it is a very important matter. I think most of us desire that there should not be what have been called disorders in the English Church—that is the desire of most churchmen to whatever side or whatever party in the Church they belong—but there is all the difference between a proposition of that kind and introducing what I feel bound to call an intolerable form of procedure which introduces the old principle of Titus Oates and the common informer, which is in this Bill in the most intolerable form which it is possible to imagine.

The Mover of the Bill talked about medievalism and Christian co-operation. The whole form of procedure adopted in this Bill is mediævalism from top to bottom, and as regards Christian co-operation, I do not know how you are likely to promote that by setting the common informer to work and by instituting a body more like the old High Commissioners Court than any other and which goes even far beyond and outside the body which was instituted in the well-known statute of Henry VIII., to which I suppose reference is made when it is said the Bill is taken from Reformation times. In Reformation times there was a most intolerant attitude in religious matters. The ordinary form adopted then, which I think ought to have been adopted in this Bill, in order to be consistent, was to burn anyone who differed from you on religious questions, and if what is called the precedent of the Reformation times is to be taken it had much better be taken completely. For eighty different offences you were entitled to burn your opponent who did not agree with you on religious topics. That is the spirit of the Reformation times to which this Bill is referred. If I might go a little further than that, I would point out to the proposer of this Bill that we should put on one side the harsh and intolerant spirit of the Reformation times. Charles the II., with whose religious spirit the hon. Member would not have much sympathy, at any rate did go to this extent, that this abominable relic of Reformation times by which people of different religious opinions burned one another, was repealed by him, and the worst part of the Reformation spirit was to that extent brought to an end.

At the same time, I do not know whether hon. Members will really appreciate what this Bill means. You are to constitute a High Commissioners' Court, quite unknown to the law of this country, going far beyond the delegates of Henry VIII.'s time, who were only appointed on special occasions from time to time, and then institute a number of common informers, whether parishioners or not, to drag in any clergyman from whom they may disagree before a court so constituted, which is to have a power unknown as regards either the common law or the Ecclesiastical Courts of this country, by which they can not only thrust a man out of his living, but deprive him of his livelihood altogether, in respect of a matter brought before them in a summary way of that kind. I wish the hon. Member had investigated further the history of this subject, because he would have found that in the last House of Parliament to which he referred two Bills dealing with this subject obtained Second Reading. One Bill, which I had the honour to propose, was passed by a considerable majority, and was intended to introduce a simplicity and ease of procedure which would enable cases of this kind to be dealt with in the ordinary and regular way. Or on the other hand he might have proceeded upon the lines of the Bill brought in by an old colleague from the Liverpool district, by which the powers of the Bishop were superseded. Either of these proposals is comprehensive, and can be discussed in accordance with our ordinary views of justice and equity, whether in ecclesiastical or in other matters. But I am quite certain that when a Bill which constitutes a High Commission for the first time, and then encourages everyone to become a common informer in order to bring the clergy of the Church of England before such a tribunal, is once understood it will never have the sanction of a Second Reading either in this or any other Parliament.

And it being Five o'clock the Debate stood adjourned.

Debate to be resumed upon Friday next (26th May).

Whereupon Mr. Speaker adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 3.

Adjourned at four minutes after Five o'clock, till Monday next, 22nd May.