A RELIGIOUS DISRUPTION IN AMERICA.

Evening Star, Issue 3426, 13 February 1874, Page 3

A RELIGIOUS DISRUPTION IN AMERICA.

A movement has commenced in the United States which may be attended with consequences not less momentous to ecolesiasticiam than those which have flowed from the formation of the old Catholic party in Germany, In the month of October last, the Evangelical Alliance met in New York, and was attended by clerical and lay delegates, representing various Protestant denominations from all parts of the Union, and from Great Britain, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Austria, Turkey, Persia, India, and China. A lengthened session was held, and on the last day of the conference, numbers of the clergy present—the Dean ef Canterbury among the rest—partook of the communion together.' This gave great umbrage to the High Church party in America, and Bishop Tozer, of the Protestant Episcopal Church in that country, addressed a letter of remonstrance on the subject to the Dean of Canterbury. A controversy followed, characterised .by the spirit of acrimony and exasperation which usually animates theological discussions, and Bishop Cummins, of Kentucky, was one of the earliest and warmest defenders of the joint communion. He was immediately and incessantly attacked by some of his co-religionist in consequence • and on the 15th of November he announced to a brother prelate that the bitterness of the censures which had been passed upon him (Dr Cummins) had satisfied him that he must leave the communion of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and labor in some other sphere for the union of all Evangelical Christendom. He says “ I have lost all hope that this system of error now prevailing so extensively in the Church •f England, and in the Protestant Episcopal Church in this country, can be or will be eradicated by any action of the authorities of the Church, legislative or executive. The only true remedy, in my judgement, is the judicious yet thorough revision of the Prayerbook, eliminating from it all that gives countenance, directly or indirectly, to the whole system of sacerdotalism and ritualism.” Bishop Cummins has been twenty-eight years a °d seven years a prelate of the Episcopal Church in the United States; and the Aew York Tribune —in the columns of which paper the controversy was conducted— anticipates that many sincerer ohuiphmen will sympathise stroiicly with Jus views, and will follow him enthusiast! cauy m the road which he points out.” Great excitement is described as prevailing in the diocese fyom which the prelate withdrawn, and the action he has taken is (regarded an to bring aboqt apgopg

the Episcopalians of America results identical with those which are aimed at iu the Church of Rome by Bishop Reinkens and his associates, namely, “th e restoration of a primitive episcopacy and of a pure Scriptural liturgy.”