The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1869-06-05 00:00:00

" FRHE CHRISTIANITY.'

On Tuesday evening a very remarkable gathering—
remarkable partly on account of the objects sought to
be obtained, and portly in consequence of the persona
who to. ,k part in it--was held in Freemasons'
London, which was densely crowded by what was evi-
dently a highly intellectual assembly, most of the
persons belonging to the upper middle classes.
It was a - "• devotional service in connection with a
newly formed "Free Christian Union," the design of
which is "t,, illustrate the spirit of unsectarian Chris-
tianity, to furnish the means of undoginatic religious
instruction, and to incorporate the discoveries of
learning and science in the religious view of the
world." At half-past seven o'clock, the time ap-
pointed for the commencement of proceedings, four
gentlemen, all haldted in black robes, mounted the plat-
form :—They were the Rev. Athanase COI luerel, pastor
of the French Protestant Church; the Rev. James Mar-
tineau, Unitarian minister of Little Portland-street
Chapel ; the Rev. \V. Miall, Baptist minister of
queen's•ro ,d Chapel, Ralston; and the Rev. C.
Kegan Paul, ML, of Exeter College, Oxford, vicar
of Sturininster Marshall, and formerly conduct of
Eton. Mr. Martineau conducted the preliminary
services, commencing with some sentences the first of
which was "God is love." Then followed some
prayers, takenifrcm the Liturgy of the Church of
England, but " adapted " to the purposes of the meet-
ing. Next was sung Charles Wesley's hymn, "The
saints on earth and those above." Mr. Martineau read
as a first lesson some passages from the eleventh and
twelfth chapters of Isaiah, and as a second lesson from
the thirteenth chapter of St. Paul's First Epistle to
the Corinthians. A chant and one or two prayers

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followed.
M. Coquerel then delivered a sermon in French. He
selected for his text the 10th chapter of St. Luke's
Gospel, verse 47: " But one thing is needful." He
pointed out that the great beauty of Christianity con-
sisted in its universality, and contended that as soon
as that great principle was lost sight of its distinctive-
ness was gone. Without it all must be misery and
sadness, leading to endless divisions and irritations.
Au extempore prayer VMS offered up by Mr. Miall,
the Baptist minister, after which Mr. Paul, the Church
of England clergyman, delivered a sermon founded on
the twenty-fourth chapter of St. Luke's Gospel, part
of verse 6—" He is not dead, but is risen." He said
that after the early trashing of the gospel, and after
Christ was missed from the tomb where his followers
expected to find him, sacramental rites grew up and
in these some men thought they found Christ. At the
Reformation the stone was rolled away from another
sepulchre, and men began to ask how they could get
at the Lord who had been hidden under such multi-
tudinous forms; indeed, it was doubted whether God
could be found in a written word. As it was an error
of the Catholics of old to put Christ in visible signs
and ceremonies, so it was an error of later Protestants
to limit the knowledge and action of him to a book.
They could never confine Christ or God between two
covers of a book, holy and precious as that book might
be. God had written his word in science and in
humanity, for science was a canon which could never
be closed. It was no longer possible to imprison truth
in an article or to bury it in a text. The dicta "Extra
ecclesiam nulla sodas," and "The Bible, and the Bible
alone is the religion of Protestants," were now no longer
applicable to the advancing state of knowledge. Those
who had joined the new Society read the Scriptures
under an entirely different light from that which the
Church supplied, and it was sometimes asked how
it was that they could consistently hold their posi-
tions in the Church instead of going out boldly into the
pure Theism which Christ taught. It was because
they believed that Christ was a symbolical name for
collective humanity, which they understood to be God.
He did not think that at any time men would be able
to dispense altogether with all rites, or with spoken
words which had been hallowed by the use of ages, still
he saw no reason why the religion of the future need
unduly clash with the religion of the past. A change
was passing over the character of religion, and men had
now to decide whether they would accept a faith in
opposition to or in harmony with nature, science,
progress, light. Some of them were thankful to
remain in a church which had given them spiritual life,
but others would be inclined to go out in order that
they might be free to worship God on the open hill
side of thought. Whither God might lead them in the
future none of them could at present see. They would
form themselves into a body of Christian men striv-
ing to do God's will, following out his plans as the
women followed Jesus—God as they thought him—to
Galilee.
Mr. Paul then pronounced the benediction. During
the prayers no one knelt, but all stood up during the
hymns and chants. All reference to the Trinity was
struck out of the prayers.