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© Revd Patrick Comerford The Revd Richard Enraght served as a Curate at Sheffield's Parish Church of St Peter & St Paul in 1865 as well as the Travelling Secretary of the National Association for Promoting the Freedom of Public Worship. In 1914, Sheffield's Parish Church was elevated to Cathedral status. |
From the Revd Richard Enraght to the Editor of the London Review,
SIR, I have no doubt that all the friends of the “National Association for Promoting the Freedom of Public Worship” will be much obliged to you for having devoted two articles to the advocacy of their principles. But, as in your last article upon the subject, you ---
1. Take for granted that our movement
will end in the universal abolition of Church-rates;
2.
Take for granted that the “endowments” of the English Church are
“State endowments” ;
3. Affirm that a considerable number of us have come to devoutly wish that these endowments should be abolished ; and,
4. Give Dissenters the credit of originating the offertory system ;
May I be permitted to say, with
reference to the first point, that we believe the result of
the success of our movement would be the gradual restoration of
Church-rates where they have been lost. We believe that when the
people come to find out, from practical experience, that the National
Church is the church of the people, and not the church of a minority
merely, those who have for some time refused to pay Church-rates will
gladly begin to pay them again for the support of fabrics upon which
they have at last begun to look as their own.
With
reference to the second point, let me say the English Church’s
endowments are not “State endowments.” The State has done little
else that rob the Church. Our endowments were originally the
“voluntary offerings” of the pious sons of the English Church in
former days. The Million Act, for instance, did no more than give
back a few drops of the sea of robbery perpetrated by Henry VIII. And
Elizabeth.
With reference to the third point, let
me say that I have been the secretary of the Sheffield Association
for some considerable time, and also a member of the General
Committee ; and I have never met with one single advocate of our
views who would dream of wishing for the abolition of tithes and
endowments. We desire that the offertory should be resorted to
instead of pew-rents in any case where an endowment does not exist,
and should still be employed where there are endowments, as the best
channel through which the alms of the faithful may be given to the
various objects, at home and abroad, which need our aid.
With reference to the fourth point, let me remind you that before Nonconformists thought of adopting weekly offerings, the rubric commanding the use of the weekly offertory (in accordance with 1 Cor. Xvi. 1, 2, and other passages) was in the English Prayer-book in accordance with the immemorial practice of the Church of Christ, although this pious practice, along with many others, had been neglected in lax and almost infidel days. Upon a revival of greater spirituality in the Church, this, along with many other pious practices, has been revived.
Your faithful servant,
RICHARD W. ENRAGHT,
The newly-appointed
travelling Secretary of the
National Association for Promoting the Freedom of Public Worship
Sheffield, October 23, 1865
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SEE:- Revd Richard Enraght Biography pages
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Transcription by D. Sharp 2025