The Lyttelton Times. SATURDAY, March 29, 1851.

Lyttelton Times, Volume I, Issue 12, 29 March 1851, Page 5

The Lyttelton Times. SATURDAY, March 29, 1851.

Since last week the seventh number of the Canterbury papers, published in London after the departure of the first four ships, has been placed in our hands. It contains Mr. Godley's first dispatch from the colony, written in April last;—the despatch of the managing committee, most of which Mr. Godley's courtesy has already enabled us to print;—and a minute by the Committee, dated Sep. 3, relating to administration of the Ecclesiastical and Educational Fund in ythe colony. This last paper we print in anojther column : it recalls us to the subject of our last article. There is but little in the minute referred to which gives us any information on the points to which we then called the attention of our readers. The only important sentence is that in which the committee say, " assuming the religious and educational wants of the first small body of settlers to be met for the present by existing arrrangem ents, the

committee will perfect as soon as possible an outline of a scheme for the regulation of the temporalities of the Church, founded on the principles already expressed." And again, " the committee are disposed to recommend to the Association that the administration of the Ecclesiastical and Educational Fund should be vested in a body in the colony, hereafter to be designated, which shall represent the laity no less than the clergy, subject of course to the acknowledged headship of the bishop. Although it does not appeal", as yet, of whom this body is to consist, we are very glad to learn that the Ecclesiastical and Educational Fund is to be vested in the colony. The independance of the Colonial Church government is a necessary consequence of the same principles which have led us to advocate so warmly the independance of the Colonial Government in secular matters. Moreover it appears to us that the Canterbury Association are not suited to be the Trustees of the Ecclesiastical Funds for the colony. The Association have legal power of spending those funds. If the Association were to fall into bad management, such funds might be squandered instead of being invented. The Association ought, therefore, to alienate these monies from themselves, and to invest them in trustees, for the benefit of the church in the colony. Then conies the question, who ought to be the trustees ? The Committee say this body is to be designated hereafter ; we have no hesitation in answering the question at once. They ought to be the corporation of the Church of England in this colony : consisting of bishop, clergy, and laity; and that the members of that corporation ought to be those who are, bond fide members of the church ; that is, who have been baptised and confirmed, and are in the practice of receiving the Holy Communion. The Church property ought to belong to the Church, just as the property of any other corporation belongs to it. Not that even the Church should be allowed to meddle with the endowment. That, should ever be maintained inviolate. Public faith will not be kept with the first colonists, if the capital sum arising from the one pound per acre be expended otherwise than in an endowment. But that capital being secured, the whole disposal of the yearly income should be left to the Church in the colony. We most earnestly hope that the scheme which the committee appear to be now engaged in elaborating, will do this much, and no more, that it will simply provide for the existence of, and independaut action of the Church here, and then leave it alone to work out its own destinies. And surely those good men, who have witli so much zeal and painstaking, founded this branch of the reformed Church in our colony, have faith in that Church being able to work out jits own destinies. We can conceive no argument in favour of an ecclesiastical authority in the Church in England, being exercised over a Church in New Zealand, which, if carried out to its legitimate result, might not be used in defence of the doctrine of the papal supremacy. There are multitudinous arrangements to be made in Ecclesiastical matters in this colony which can only be made in the colony. Any attempt to legislate at a distance would be absurd. The very division of the country into parishes,—the first step in the organisation of a church, —must of necessity be settled on the spot, and ought to be settled with the cognizance and general assent ol those who are to be parishioners. l>ut it is perhaps necessary to all great undertakings, that, incidentally, they involve

other great undertakings, of which the actors were not at first cognizant. And so this attempt of the Canterbury Association to found a Church of England colony, brings to the test, and may be the means of solving, the whole of the difficulties arising from the anomalous position in which the Church in the colonies is at present placed. The great result for which the Association have to strive, is for the corporate existence, and complete independance of our church in this colony, endowing it with the funds arising from the sale of land, as long as it retains its doctrinal unity with the Church of England, and leaving it to deal, within itself, with all the proceeds of such endowment. We perceive that difficulties stand in the way of such a complete arrangement, but that will be most satisfactory, which most nearly approaches such a result.