The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1870-04-09
Failure of a Bishopric.


Our readers will not have forgotten the
visi; TO this country of Queen Emma, of th'
Sandwich Islands, who has her royal resi-
dence at Honolulu. Her visit was made the
( occasion of placing before the public the con
/ ditiof of the Sandwich Islanders, who, it wa:
said, were completely weary of the straight
laced Puritanism of the American missiona'
ries, and anxiously DESTROYS for a freer and
more beautiful form Of the Christian faith
The young Queen was taken about the
country under the auspices of the High
Church party, and the Bishop of Oxford, IN
particular, warmly advocated her cause with
his usual eloquence. He pathetically Ia
mented the unhappy fate OF those children oil
the sun who were forbidden by the grim
Americans TO dance, or 10 engage III any les
tive sports suitable 10 their nature, and were
doomed to spend the whole of Sunday In the
s~trictest form Of Puritanic observance. Ii
was represented that the great majority oil
the islanders were anxious Tor a change III
their religious instructors, and that Angll-
canism Of the more ornate type was the very
thing that thew wanted. An indulgent pub
lie listened to the plausible episcopal orator,
and generously contributed, we believe, some
thousands Of pounds in aid of the blshoPric
of Honolulu.
Intelligence which has just reached us
furnishes a curious commentary on these
proceedings. We learn from the Honolulu
CommerciqL advertiser, Just 10 hand, that the
whole episcopal establishment OF Bishop
Staley has collapsed. The anxiety of the
ISLANDERS for the peculiar form OF Christianity
represented by Bishop Staley has been shown
by their absenting themselves altogether from
the services conducted by him and his clergy.
The Bishop has resigned, the Dean has re-
signed, the clergy under them have resigned,
and all are now on their way to the United
States, happy, no doubt, to have the uncon-
genial soil of Hawaii separated from them by
the vast breadth of the Pacific. In place of
the Right Rev. Lord at the head of the do
cese, and his staff of subordinate clergy, a
Low Church clergyman is invited to proceed
from England to Honolulu, and to undertake
duty as a chaplain, part Of his support being
promised by English and American residents.
So ends, for the present at least, this Angli-
~bishopric.
Had the bishopric of Honolulu been insti-
tuted with a genuine desire to bring PaganS
to the knowledge of Christ, we should have
regarded with very different feelings the
failure of the undertaking but it was
not established with any such desire. The
were already Christianized from end
to end American missionaries had been Ia
boring there for forty years, and the whole
population was under religious instruction.
The Anglican bishop, instead ofbeing sent to
of the numerous islands in the Pacific
the name of Christ has not been heard
"a step which would have been worthy of
the Church Of England-was sent merely for
he purpose of superseding another Christian
For this reason we can feel no re-
yret all his having been compelled to depart
after do expenditure, during six or seven
years, of some 100000 upon the mission.
. similar procedure to that at Honolulu has
1een resolved upon with regard TO Madagas-
1t is just possible that the total of the
one project, Notwithstanding the money that
las been lavished upon it and the titled and
nitred ~eloquence by which it has been advo-
lated, may induce the authorities of the
of England to reconsider the NADIA
yascar project, and to send a new bishop
With his staff of clergy to some region where
he people are in total ignorance of the
Christian Faith.-LOndon Methodist Re
order, FEB. ii, 1870.