St Mary’s Schoolroom, Edmonton
Monday 6th May 1889
The Rev. R.
W. Enraght, M.A., vicar of St Gabriel’s, Bromley, delivered a
lecture on:-
“Some fundamental principles of the Prayer Book,”
at a
gathering in St Mary’s schoolroom, Edmonton, on Monday evening,
convened by the recently-formed Tottenham, Edmonton, and Enfield
Branch of the English Church Union.
The Rev. E. M. Burney, M.A.
vicar of St Mary’s, Edmonton, presided.
The Lecturer said each of the principles of the Prayer Book might form the subject of a separate lecture ; but he proposed to deal in a necessarily disjointed lecture with a number of them, and first principle upon which he was that Christ was the head of His own Church. and that Caesar was not the head. That was all-important : but the world misunderstood it, and an ordinary M.P.., or an ordinary lawyer, if asked, would say that the Queen, for instance, was the head of the Church of England as a part of the Christian Church.
Christ himself said that His kingdom was not of this world ; but the lecturer said that he had been called a lawless, self-opinionated man, who refused to listen to courts, Queen, bishops or anyone else. In the Acts of the Apostles it was written that “These men all did contrary to the decrees of Caesar,” and the Apostles told even the religious body of a religious nation “Whether it be right for us to obey you rather than God judge ye.”
The position was explained in the Thirty-seventh Article. In the days of Queen Elizabeth the monarch said Parliament should leave matters concerning Church doctrine to the clergy. It was quite a new idea that Parliament should legislate in matters not only of Church ritual, but concerning the most spiritual things, not on the initiative of the clergy, but against the will of the Church and of Convocation, as was the case, for instance, with the Public Worship Regulation Act. This state of affairs dated no further back than the reign of George I. Convocation was silenced then, and it remained silent now.
He had been dragged before seven or eight courts, and he found that the judges made matter of indifference those things which he, the chairman, and many others, thought sacred. The judges said they had never heard of such things, and did not know that such things existed. Surely the sacred things of the Church of Christ should not go before such a tribunal as that.
If they
were trying a case of embezzlement the judges would prohibit laughter
in court ; but they permitted it when the subject of discussion
before them was about the Eucharistic Sacrifice, or whether it was
right to wear a special gown at Eucharistic Services as honouring God
and showing that there was a difference between that the ordinary
services of the Church.
He contended that Caesar had nothing to do with the regulation of such matters. The mischief of the matter was that some bishops, being in sympathy with that notorious body the Church Association, had handed over their clergy to be dealt with by the civil power, and had helped the Protestant-minded people of the country to bully them. However, he did not think there was more than one of the bishops who would do that now, so much was the state of things improved. Persecution had purified the church, and it was now much better, more spiritual, more orthodox, more catholic than it was before those wretched persecutions began. (Applause.)
Having dealt with this first point of his lecture at great length Mr. Enraght spoke briefly respecting other principles. His second principle was that Christianity was essentially a sacramental religion, ministered on earth by Christ through men.
This was the crux of Puritanism. It was said that faith alone was necessary to salvation, but while he did not make light of faith, he contended that faith and sacraments were necessary.
Christ had given external witnesses as well as the internal witness of faith : and history testified that those who had made light of external things had ended by losing the internals.
Next he insisted on unity in the Church of Christ, he said, which was not found elsewhere. There were sad and enormous differences between the English Church and the Roman Catholic Church ; but there is more unity between the English Church and any other part of the Church of Christ – Armenian, Russian, or Spanish, for example – than between it and dissenters, with the exception of the Irvingites, on such subjects as baptism (which he believed to be regeneration by water and the Holy Spirit), confirmation, absolution, and the Holy Eucharist (as to which the lecturer said the primitive Christians absolutely believed in the Real Presence, though they had never heard of that peculiar view of the question commonly called transubstantiation.)
On certain matters which were modern there were differences ; but on the old fundamental principles of the Apostolic religion the Church of Christ was agreed, and missionaries representing various portions of the Church put aside their differences and laboured cordially together for the good of heathen. A religion which was preached all over the world was Catholic, and anything more was nothing but pious opinion.
Many such opinions, such as the Infallibility of the Pope, and the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin were of very modern origin. He exhorted his hearers to cling to the good old word Catholic, which had never had a bad meaning, while Protestantism had changed its meaning time after time, chameleon-like, and now meant a conglomeration of all heresies.
The remaining points of which the lecturer spoke were that the Church was Apostolic, having the threefold ministry of apostles, or bishops, priests and deacons, and that worship had always been daily. Christ and his apostles worshipped daily in the Temple or in synagogues, he said, and though daily services were but little attended he argued that they should be maintained by the clergy as a service to the Devine Majesty and a witness to the world.
In greater
part of the Christian Church there had been a daily Eucharist, and it
was legislated for, but not commanded in the English Church.
The
lecturer spoke favourably of its celebration “with light, music,
and honour.”
He concluded by saying that the more they tried to follow out these principles of the Prayer Book, the better Christians, the better Catholics, they would be.
The simple truth was that if they would be like Christ, and like Apostolic Christianity they must cleave close to the churchmanship of the Church of England.
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The Enfield Gazette Friday 10th May 1889, transcribed by D. Sharp 2025
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See the Revd Richard Enraght Biography