The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-03-29
CHURCH OUARRELS.

From the ". L. tribune.
Our Philadelphia neighbors are just now
treated to a sav0ry dish of scandal from one
Of the Episcopalian churches, by way of flavor
to their Lenten meals of herbs and water.
The rector of st. Clements has been accused
not only of unseemly candles, pOsturings and
genufexions, but of holding auricular confes-
sions, and praying for the dead. The Bishop
accused. The rector responded. The vestry
came in like Greek chorus with wrathful re-
Trains; letters multiplied as though Wilkins
Micawber had the matter in hand. The secu-
lar press have taken it up aud devote eight
or ten columns to the elucidation of knotty
points of doctrine. The letters have grown
into pamphlets full of hard words, if not hard
logic, and the whole Quaker City stands still
to see how the fight will end between the two
men of God piited against each other in
what they call ''this holy Lenten season."
Our English exchanges bring accounts of
like quarrel, though on a larger SCALE in the
same Church. Parliament and people are
convulsed on the question of the burial of
dissenters. Shall Methodist be permitted
to force his unhandsome corpse among
churchmen, or lie apart? Shall he, if he will
thrust himself into the inhospitable grave, be
allowed to hear his own hymns chanted over
the sod above him, or be put to rest by the
instituted gown aud book against his will +?
For more than year this squabble between
the living Church and dead outsiders has gone
on, with no hope Of settlement. 1t is hard to
understand why the public are treated more
frequently to these virulent, ill-bred brawls by
this Church than any other, when we remem-
Der that she represents, both in her ministry
and laity, an exceptional degree of intelli-
gence, culture, and social Sa00tr tdire.
The long habit of power in England may
have made her quarrelsome when the power
is slipping from her, AS it there begins to
do. monarch about to be dethroned may
be forgiven if he is testy with regard to
the respect paid him, even by unbured dead
men. But the Episcopal Church in this
country has no such excuse. Her ministers,
especially in the Evangelical branch,
are, as a rule, body of educated, God-fear
ing, God-serving, iil-pald men; famili trity
with the simple chaste sublimity of their
religious service should serve to educate them
not only as CHRISTIANS, but gentle men. They
She uld have the common sense aud tast to
perceive that their rubric and liturgy. how
ever dear to themselves, are matters of total
Indifference to the world outside. until in
deed, they make them matters of ridieule bv
forcing them into disreputable notice by their
unseemly squabbles
Such quarrel as that in Philadelphia mis-
represents and disgrAces the cause of Chris.
against the will OF every earnest Christian in
the Episcopal Church. Bishops and rectors
are but men, and liable to differ on points OF
candles and genuhexions, az other men do on
Tweed or San Domingo. If the amiable and
sincere pastor of ST. Clements chooses to re-
oeive confessions and pray for his deal
friends. and his equally smiable and sincere
vestry choose to disapprove of it, why should
they drag their unsayoTy virulence and ill