Page:The Church of England, its catholicity and continuity.djvu/227

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Growth of Church Life
211

for theirs. We should not think of going to a Congregational, a Baptist, or an Unitarian Chapel to demand, for the support of the Church of England, the endowments left to them for the support of their own particular opinions. We do not expect them, therefore, to come to us to claim our wealth. And we shall not allow them to take it unless they take it by stealth or violence.

But to return to the thread of our thought, Dissenters cannot be at one with us because they do not acknowledge the Catholicity of the English Church. They do not seem to grasp the idea that although the Church is a national Church, it is not a national Church alone, but it is the Church of Christ, the Church of all races and all ages. It is a Catholic Church because it teaches the same faith as was taught in Apostolic days by men who received that faith from Jesus. Among the primary teaching of the Catholic faith there is the belief in the necessity of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion and in a regularly ordained ministry. It is on the importance and meaning of these things that Dissenters differ from us.

I would like to make a further criticism on the dissenting systems. The spirit of Dissent is quite opposed to the spirit of the Church, and in every way unlike it. The spirit of most dissenting bodies is this: I must find a form of religion that suits me. But the spirit of the Churchman is: I am contented with that religion which has been tried for ages, which has given consolation and help to millions of people who have gone before me. It is the spirit of the Churchman to sink his own preferences and partictular wishes for the sake of strengthening and increasing the