On Thursday the House of Lords gave judgment in what
has been called the Right to the Communion case. It may be remembered that Canon Thompson refused to administer the Communion to Mr. and Mrs. Banister on the ground that Mr. Banister bad married his deceased wife's sister. In August 1908 Sir Lewis Dibdin, Dean of Arches, issued a monition to Canon Thompson to abstain in future from denying the Communion to the parties without lawful cause. Canon Thompson appealed, and the Court of Appeal upheld Sir Lewis Dibdin's judgment. The House of Lords has now confirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeal. Canon Thompson no doubt acted conscientiously, but in truth such action was a monstrous perversion of law and com- monsense. The law is most clear that only open and notorious evil livers can be refused the Sacrament, and it was little short of an outrage to contend that Mr. and Mrs. Banister were evil livers when they had been married in accordance with the law of the land and when every Court in the realm would be obliged to admit the validity of their marriage. Tho decision most distinctly tends to strengthen our contention, that the one and only ground on which the Sacrament can be refused is that of notorious evil living, and that those who refuse it to grown-up people merely because they have not received episcopal confirmation are not acting in the spirit of the law, even if they can shelter their attempt at exclusion behind a rubric primarily intended to prevent children and persons not able to understand the meaning of the Sacrament from taking part therein.
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