STARTLING UTTERANCES BY A HIGH CHURCH CLERGYMAN.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 596, 17 May 1876, Page 3

STARTLING UTTERANCES BY A HIGH CHURCH CLERGYMAN.

The Rev J. Mackonochie, in his sermon at St Alban’s, Holborn, lately, combated the idea that the Church and the Establishment are one and the same thing. Liberationists will smile at his remark that “ established,” as applied to the Church, is only an epithet, “ just as we say that a man is sick.” If the Church were to be disestablished—i.e., following up the smile, got well—she would still be the Church, The rev gentleman proceeded to argue that the Church was through recent legislation freed from allegiance to State courts. The sentence of the Courts bore the same relation to the Church as the sentence of Nero and the* heathen emperors, and it seemed as if it was to teach the Church how sick she was that “ for the judge of the new court had been chosen a man who presided over a court the object of which was to encourage” one of the cardinal sins. Dr F. G. Lee, on Sunday, also indulged in a iiing at the Establishment. Speaking of the Burials Bill he said that when once the faith of the Church of England had been placed in the hands of the Divorce Court it mattered little where they were buried. Many of the rev gentleman’s hearers must have been shocked to hear him declare that if he could live to see the “ traitorous bishops” turned out of their sees he would gladly take off his surplus and stole, and say, ‘ 1 Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace,”