THE ATHANASIAN CREED IN IRELAND.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR: •] SIR,-I requested you to allow me to correct a remark of yours on the resolution carried by me in the Irish Church Synod on the so- called Athanasian Creed. I think I had a right to expect, as a matter of justice, that you would have found room for the very few lines in which I stated the facts. You have not, however, done so, but you have inserted a letter on the same subject from a writer who says that "there is a probability of a different result in a fuller House of Bishops, unless in the interval the Pan-Anglican Assembly of Bishops approves of some such solution of the great difficulty." I do not know what your correspondent's means of knowing the minds the Bishops may be, but must protest against his prophetic statement. Having served on the Revision Committee with the Bishops, I have had opportunities of knowing something of their winds, yet I will not predict what their conduct will be, but will point out that in the Revision Committee, the omission of the damuatory clauses was carried in a very full meeting without a division, and the only members of the House of Bishops who have expressed dissent are the two Archbishops and the Bishop of Derry. I sincerely hope, both for their own sakes and for the sake of the Church, that they will not take the line your correspondent thinks probable.
On another point he also goes somewhat too fast. He says, " They will all be bound by the whole Creed as a standard of faith." I hope not, for in the Revision Committee a resolution was carried, also in a very full meeting without a division, that " an explanatory note should be appended to the Eighth Article, declaring that the words Athanasian Creed' are to be taken to mean such part only of what is commonly called the Creed of Athanasius as shall be appointed to be used in the public service of the Church," and I have sufficient grounds for predicting that some such statement will be proposed for adoption by the Synod next year.
I am very unwilling to ask for so much space as this letter occupies, and yet I must strongly claim it as a matter of mere justice, when you publish statements about an act vitally affecting our Church, and for which I am responsible as the proposer, that you will allow me to give in reply the important facts I have
[We are very glad to have Colonel Ffolliott's explanations. His letter was omitted before, only because we believed that the substance of what he told us had been stated in a letter already in type.—En. Spectator.]
Previous page
