The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-06-20 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

Sut,—Your correspondent of Tuesday last, who signs
himself " A Liverpool Churchman," has, I am sure;
utterly mistaken the intention of" the Anglican Church
touching the point of weekly communion, as I hope toi
convince him, if he will accompany me in a brief examina-
tion of the eucharistic office.

The last of the- four rubrics wrirch precede the office
refers wholly to matters of ritual'. It commences by
ordering that "the table at the communion-time shall
stand, &e., having a fair white linen cloth upon it." There
is neither direction nor permission to commence the office
except at a table thus arrayed; and' the presence of this
linen cloth would surely seem to imply at least an inten-
tion or readiness on• the part of the priest to celebrate.
All that follows up to the rubric preceding the Prayer for
the Church Militant is plain enough; but there we read,
"And when there is a communion, the priest shall then
place upon the table as- much bread and wine as he shall
think sufficient." This certainly implies that there may BE
no communion, but gives no rule for deciding upon what
days it is to be celebrated and upon what omitted. Turn
we now to the rubrics post fixed to the•office. The second
and third of these taken together decide that there shall
be no celebration except " four (or at least three) commu-
nicate with the priest. Clearly, then, there is no autho-
rity for breaking off at the end of the Prayer for the
Church Militant—much less at the sermon—except when
less than three persons are prepared to receive. And were
the Church's rules carried out, the priest would never be
in doubt upon this point, as she requihs intending com-
municants "to signify their names to the curate at least
some time the day before." So far, then, the intention of
the Church would appear to be, that there shall be a cele-
bration at least every Sunday and holyday ; but she pro-
vides for the possible case of no communion for lack of
communicants.
That such should ever be the case "in cathedral and
collegiate churches and colleges, where there are many
priests and deacons," she evidently deems almost impossi-
ble ; and therefore she enjoins that in such places " they"
e. the clergy) "shall all receive the communion with
the priest every Sunday at' the least, except they have a
reasonable cause to the- contrary." In spite of this, the
practice in Cambridge, when I was resident, was to cele-
brate in each college once a-term, i. e., thrice in the year.
No one will dare to say that this was in accordance with.
the Church's intention •; and it is equally absurd to endea-
vour to deduee her intention from the lax practices which
have too long prevailed in• our parochial and other places
of worship.
The first rubric following-the Nicene Creed directs that
"then (if occasion be) shall notice be given of the commu--
nion,"—a vied voce notices I presume, distinct from the-
exhortation which is ordered to be read at a later period
of the service. And from this your correspondent deduces.
an argument in favour of his position, that weekly cora-
murnon is not the Church's intention. I confess that I"
cannot see this. Let us suppose a case. We have a church,
in which monthly communion obtains, and next Sunday
happens to be the ordinary day for it, while the Sunday
following happens to•be Easter Day. The priest celebrates
on Sunday next, and also gives notice for the Sunday fol-
lowing. In doing so he neither violates the letter nor the
spirit of the rubrics ; nor would he if he were to celebrate
every Sunday under similar circumstances. I would
observe that an examination of the first and second Litur-
gies of Edward VI. cannot fail to throw much light upon
this point ; and I would remind your correspondent that
the first of these assumes the practice of daily communion.
Upon one other point in your correspondent's letter I
am unwilling to touch, because I conceive it to• be one
utterly unsuited to the pages of a newspaper (and forgive
me, Sir, if I say that you would have exercised a sound
editorial discretion had you struck out the part to which
I allude). Suffice it to say, that he could not have objected
as he has done to Mr. Wray's term " offering that sacred
memorial," had he been acquainted with the- early litur-
gies, or with the writings of those Catholic fathers with
whose teaching our Reformers expressed their earnest ,
desire to conform.

Weekly communion is, of course, a Tractarian conceit.
Everybody knows that. But few are, perhaps, aware that
it is a practice of many most undeniable Protestants also.
The congregation of Independents in Glasgow, so long
presided over by the late Dr. Wardlaw, and one of Bap-
tists irk Paisley, are within my own knowledge as rejoicing
in this primitive custom • and not a few may be found in
England pursuing a similar course.—l am, Sir, yours, &c.,
K. 111Acrmizrn PuGue.
[The writer of the above thinks we "would have exer-
cised a sound editorial discretion, had we struck out" a
particular portion of "A Liverpool Churchman's" letter
which appeared in our columns last week. We have
repeatedly stated, that we hold ourselves to be in no way
identified with the opinions expressed by correspondents ;
and, in reference to the Proposed Free Church, we have—
from that spirit of fairness which it has ever been our
aim to preserve—been more indulgent than ordinary to
writers on both sides, with whose letters we have not
interfered, either by way of correction or omission,
from the conviction that, so long as such a controversy
is conducted with temper and moderation, the cause of
truth is sure to be triumphant.]