Edinburgh Councillor Supports the Sabbath.
At a meeting of Edinburgh Town Council last September there was a proposal to increase the Corporation’s grant to the Scottish Tourist Board. Councillor George Horne opposed this and gave reasons. He declared that tourist representatives in England had criticised the Scottish Sabbath as drab and dull. He said, “What they really call a bright Sunday is having public-houses and clubs open. If visitors do not like our Sabbath they can stay away. The Scottish Sabbath is the envy of the world.” But he failed to find a seconder for his motion to reduce the grant. It is refreshing to read of anyone, like Councillor Horne, on public bodies who are not ashamed to testify against the Sabbath-breaking pleasure seekers and business organisations of to-day. Too many so-called Christians are afraid, or just ashamed, to speak out on the side of the truth against a worldly and irreligious majority. To witness for the Lord’s honour and be unsupported by those around us, is the rule to-day. A deadly indifference has laid hold upon many who knew and saw Sabbath-keeping in their youth.
Archbishop of York on Drift from Religion.
Dr. Cyril Garbett, Archbishop of York, while lecturing to his people, deplored the drift from religion, that is, the Christian religion. He spoke of the decline in Churchgoing, or in other words, the decline among us of the public acknowledgment of God and His precious Word. “Theft,” he said, “is no longer regarded as a serious crime provided it is not on too large a scale.” He might have gone further than this, and declared that increasing numbers are making theft on a large scale their business, until detected. But we were especially gratified that the Archbishop spoke very plainly in exposing novelists whose morals are lax. He declared that some of the novelists in this country are almost fanatical in preaching a new gospel of sexual licence. He added that their autobiographies too often show that they practice what they preach. The moral and religious state of the nation we know to be at a low ebb, in addition to our disregard for the law of the Sabbath; and it is a dereliction of duty that such as the Archbishops of the Church of England do not speak out more frequently on the fact of national sin in the light of Scripture. Then maybe millions under their jurisdiction would not be left so much to the darkness and delusions which prevail regarding the evil and bitter nature of sin against God. The national “conscience,” as well as the individual conscience, requires light, reproof and Scriptural counsel. But the ecclesiastical leaders of the national and indeed the most of Churches, do not discharge their duty as they ought, in warning the nation of the fact, evil and danger of widespread wickedness and backsliding. In the visible Christian Church in our land to-day there are thousands of clergy who are but “dumb dogs that cannot bark.”
Royal Commission on Capital Punishment.
The Royal Commission on Capital Punishment, whose report was published on the 24th September, was not asked to deal with the question of the abolition of Capital Punishment, but with the questions, Who should die for murder? and How should Capital Punishment be administered? Much of the report published in the press makes difficult reading for the sensitive mind, at least to the Christian mind. We do not state this from the point of view of some in Parliament and outside it, who would have Capital Punishment abolished in this country, but from the consideration of the inexpressibly solemn issues involved in the fact of a fellow creature being ushered into the great Eternity and the presence of the Judge of all, for crime against God and society. When the question of the abolition of the death penalty for murder was debated in the House of Commons some time ago, we as a Church opposed the abolition, on Scriptural grounds, and we stated so in these columns. But there has arisen again, following upon the publication of the aforesaid Report, a renewed campaign for abolishing the death penalty, led by certain members of Parliament. We trust that this campaign will come to nought. “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made He man” (Genesis ix. 6).
St. Paul’s Cathedral and Romish Memorial.
The Protestant Truth Society, 184 Fleet Street, London, have issued a 30-page pamphlet on the subject of a proposed new Empire Memorial in St. Paul’s Cathedral, on behalf of Commonwealth people of all creeds and races who lost their lives in two world wars. The Memorial is to consist of a new high altar, an extra large-sized crucifix, and what is called a baldachino, i.e. a special canopy covering the so-called altar. All this artistically designed, wood, stone, silver and silk, devoted to the eyes of worldly men and the idolatrous hearts of Romanisers in the Church of England, is to cost over £20,000 at least.
Christ and Him crucified as set forth in the Scriptures and in the Gospel can never be portrayed by cunning workmen in gold or silver. The crucifix stands for idolatry, out and out. The high or low altars of Rome or St. Paul’s Cathedral have nothing whatsoever in common with the table at which the blessed Lord Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper or the Lord’s Table as a sacrament. Apart from theological implications of the “altar” with its priests and offering of blasphemous masses, the fact is that it is just one of many pieces of showmanship in the religious worship of those who are grossly ignorant of the mind of the Lord. And as to the canopy to overshadow the “altar” in St. Paul’s Cathedral, men holding high office in the Church of England, in arranging for this decoration, are aping the Papacy, and in placing significance upon such a thing in the professed House of God, are manifesting the mentality of children. Truly the substance and glory of the Gospel have departed.
Archbishop of York and the Bible.
Dr. C. F. Garbett, Archbishop of York, addressing the York Convocation on 14th October, gave reasons why the Bible was an unknown book to many people. He said many find no time for reading it, on account of other books, and wireless, etc., and to those who live and work in the cities much of it seems irrelevant and unreal, because he said, “It was largely written by countrymen.” Further, the neglect of the Bible was due to failure to give intelligent teaching about its nature, he declared. What the Archbishop did not say was that the carnal mind in man, as a sinner, is in enmity against God, and that the carnal man has thus no love to the Bible, no appetite for it and no mind to give time to the reading of it. But the Archbishop went on to attack the Bible himself. He said, “Those who were brought up to regard it as verbally inspired or as an infallible guide on every kind of matter had their faith in it destroyed.” He gave the usual reason for this, given again and again by the enemies of God’s inspired Word, viz., “It contained statements which they could not reconcile with modern science or recent historical research.” This is the old story of the higher critics. And this is one of the basic reasons of long standing as to why so many people in Britain to-day do not read the Bible. And so Dr. Garbett shares with others part of the responsibility for this Bible neglect; and from his own lips we draw this conclusion.
A Modern Minister’s New Approach to Religion.
At the beginning of October a prominent daily paper published a very full account of the methods adopted by Rev. Robert Paterson, King’s Park Church, Glasgow, to instruct especially children from his pulpit each Lord’s Day. He has brought a cabbage into the pulpit. Once it was a bowl of tadpoles. Another time it was a bugle. He has played the bagpipes in his pulpit, blown bubbles, held up a pair of patched trousers, the skeleton of a fish, and so on, and he has played with a “Yo-Yo,” a children’s toy, in the pulpit to illustrate his talk. These extraordinary antics are part of the Sabbath morning service before the whole congregation which is said to be a large one. It is reported that the people wonder what this caricature of a minister will bring to the supposed house of God next Sabbath. He explained in an interview that some people had to be won over to his ways and that there might still be a few who object. “My approach to the children,” he said, “is just part of the new approach to religion.” But here we may well ask—What kind of religion? The religion of the flesh and of men who, in our opinion, have not commonsense itself, not to speak of the fear of God. Mr. Paterson also stated that ideas have to be revised. He asked, “Why, for instance, shouldn’t we laugh in Church?” The press reported that there is a lot of laughter in King’s Park Church, as when Mr. Paterson made some remark about his favourite football team on one occasion. What strong delusion has taken hold upon the minds of men when they dare to claim to be servants of the divine and holy Saviour and reveal at the same time the vanity, flippancy and irreverence of their unregenerate and spiritually ignorant hearts and minds! And what a low level the professed public worship of God has reached in the Church of Scotland, King’s Park, Glasgow, when the children and adults are entertained with trivialisities, instead of being instructed in the truth that “God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth” (John iv. 24).
The Free Church and Prayers at the Grave.
In the October issue of the Monthly Record of the Free Church of Scotland reference is made to some dispute in the Vancouver Congregation attached to the said denomination, over prayers at the grave. In refusing to give space to letters on this subject, the editor of the Free Church Magazine states that it would “be dragging across our faith as a source of discord a matter that has its roots in the witness of another denomination.” The latter part of this statement obviously refers to the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, as the only denomination to-day in Scotland which does not practice prayers at the grave. Our only intention here is to put this matter in its true light. The practice, that the Free Presbyterian Church refrains from prayers at the grave at funerals, is not rooted in the witness of the Free Presbyterian Church at all, which should be well known by all conversant with the documents attached to the Confession of Faith, which documents include The Directory for the Public Worship of God. Our disapproval of prayers at the grave is rooted in the aforesaid Directory of 1643, according to the following terms of the Directory, under the section Concerning Burial of the Dead, viz. ” . . . And for that praying, reading, and singing, both in going to and at the grave, have been grossly abused, are no way beneficial to the dead, and have proved many ways hurtful to the living; therefore let all such things be laid aside.” And the Directory for Public Worship in requiring the laying aside of prayers at the grave has the full support of Scripture, in as far as recorded accounts of burials of God-fearing persons therein are concerned; and of course there were no prayers at the grave of the blessed Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed, to come right up nearer our own day, we understand that in some places at anyrate, even about 50 years ago, the Church of Scotland did not practice ordinarily prayers at the grave. But prayers at the grave became in due course their general practice, and now prayers for the dead are by no means confined to St. Giles’ Cathedral, Edinburgh.