The Cass County Republican. [volume] (Dowagiac, Mich.) 18??-1880, 1859-03-03
Rights Of the Churches.


Rights of the Churches.
The controversy between DIR. Chez
ver's Church and some late discon-
tented members thereof, to which be-
fore now we have had occasion to
allude in these columns, is at present
depending before an Ecclesiastical
Council in this city. The origin and
history of that controversy, as our
readers will recollect, were briefly
these: DR.. Cheever being impressed
with the sinfulness of lave-holding-a
sin by the way, to which some men,
bers of his congregation, from the ir
extensive commercial connexions with
the South, might be supposed to have
some special personal temptations
saw fit to introduce that subject into
his pulpit discourses. Some of the
members of the Society and brethren
of the Church, who seem to have ex-
pected of their minister that he should
preach smooth things, or, at least,
should carefully eontine himself to the
condemnation of such sins as the lead
ing members of the Society were will
ling to have regarded and condemned
as such, were highly offended at this
proceeding. As D. Cheever did not
pay much attention, so far as hi
preaching went, to their indiviual
hints and expostulations, some seven
teen of them finally banded together
and sent him letter = whether in the
shape of a round robin we are not able
to say = inviting him to resign. As
neither the Cambridge nor the Say
brook platform contained the least hint
of this form OF procedure, DIR. Chez
yer quietly put this letter in his pocket
md went on preaching as before. So
the discontented seventeen watched
their opportunity, and, in the absence
of DR.. Cheevar, on a Western tour,
called a Church meeting in hopes to
get that body to second their move
ment, but, not succeeding in that, came
out next morning in the newspapers in
sort of manifesto setting forth their
views Of DIR. Cheever's misbehayioI
and unfitness to continue minister OF
the Church of the Puritans. They
hoped, we suppose, if they could no,
compel the Doctor to abandon the
Church, at least to stir up the society
to abandon the Doctor; and, as if tc
set the example of what they doubt
less hoped would prove a regular
stampede, they themselves, with their
female connexions, applied to the
Church for letters of dismission. The
Church, it seems, in ordinary cases
had been accustomed to grant such
letters in the following form:
"This certifies that A.. B. is member of the
Church of the Puritans in good and regular stand
ing. As such, (he or shel is, at Ills Tor her) oxr
| request dismissed, and aiectionatey recommended
| 10 the fellowship of the Church of -, any
may appoint his Tor herr residence; and wher
received by them, his (or herr peculiar relation tc
this Church will cease"
To the female applicants for dismis
sal certificates were given according to
the above form, but in those given to
the nlalcontents the epithet "good,'
applied to their standing, also the affec
tionate recommendation to new Church
relations were omitted, they being
simply dismissed to the fellowship O
any other Church with whom theil
residence might be divinely appointed
while the last clause, implying that, til
| they joined some new Church, the,
would still be considered members O
the Church of the Puritans, was alst
left out.
The point contended for by the sew
enteen malcontents, by whose ex-partt
action the Council has been called
the Church not having joined in calling
it, though itappears by its committee
is this: They insist that they were en-
titled to letters in the usual form; that
being confessed to be in Irregular
standing" it followed, therefrom, thai
they were in "good standing," and
that, being in good and regular stand
ing, they were entitled to be "affec
tionately recommended" to such other
church or churches as they might sec
| fit to join, and, moreover, that, if they
did not see fit to join such other church
or churches, they were entitled to re-
main in the Church of the Puritans, as
a thorn in the flesh for the punishment
we suppose, of the sins of that Church
The Church of the Puritans insist, on
the contrary, that they, and other con
gregational ehurches-tor the question
| is one not OF individual interest merely
butof the rights of the churches gen
erally-are not restricted to this one
stereotype form of dismissal by letter
and that they have a right to vary theil
letters to suit the character of the APP.
plicants, and the circumstances of the
case. -
| Looking at the matter in a merely
common sense point of view, the ques,
| ton would not seem to be a very
donhtful ono TTndsr the r;rrura sfspnes