Religious Ceremonial

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The Principles of Religious Ceremonial

THE subject of religious ceremonial is one which has a special faculty for stirring strong feeling. From time to time the outside world is surprised, and perhaps amused, at some sudden outburst of violent passions from this source. Bitter attacks followed by sarcastic recriminations are heard on the subject of the cut or colour of clerical vestments; popular feeling runs high about the positions and movements of those who take part in a service. The excitement seems quite disproportionate to the cause; it lasts longer than would have seemed possible; for the attack is surprisingly vigorous, and the defense proves unaccountably stubborn. Moreover, these eruptions are as inexplicable as those of an earthquake, and as inevitable. If a chasuble causes them at one time, equally does a surplice at another, -- at one time the eastward position of the celebrant at Holy Communion, at another the eastward turning of the congregation for the Creed at Morning or Evening Prayer.

In dealing, therefore, with so dangerous a subject it will be well to begin with some general considerations calculated to minimise the dangers of explosion, to disarm prejudice, and to bespeak caution, patience, and charity.

First, it is worth while to discover what there is in the subject itself, and in men's mental attitude towards it, that causes the explosive character of the topic. One chief cause will be found deep down in the constitution of human minds; and thus an elementary psychological inquiry will be of use at this stage to prepare for a discussion of the subject.

The human mind is capable of great varieties of feeling, and these lead to great diversities of opinion; but each man's mind is also furnished with a certain number of individual characteristics or even predilections and prejudices, which belong to his own personal nature and make him fundamentally different in mental constitution from others. One of these radical differences concerns us here. Some minds are helped to grasp ideas by the aid of outward objects and symbols, others are hindered rather than helped by them. The more abstract-minded man likes to shut his eyes, or withdraw them, in order to be able to think the better; but the simple mind finds it hard to think at all without something on which to fix his sight. Now the former type tends to undervalue, or even dislike, all ceremonial; the latter to depend upon having it.

When the ceremonial in question is religious, the gulf between the two types of mind is often only the greater. To the former the externals seem especially distracting and derogatory, when they are associated with thoughts too high for mere mundane symbols; and many a man who values the ceremonial of the Court, the Army, or the Freemasons' Lodge, dislikes ceremonial in church. To the latter class of mind the religious sphere, because it is the highest, is the one where symbolism is most needed; and many a man who is indifferent to the ceremonial of ordinary life finds it very helpful, or even necessary, in prayer and worship.

Here are two widely contrasted types. The world might be classified according to them ; for every one has his affinity either with the mind of the Quaker on the one side, or with the mind of the so-called Ritualist * on the other. And every one who handles the subject of religious ceremonial will do well to think beforehand what his own affinity of mind is, and to make allowance accordingly. It is only by recollecting continually his own personal bias that he will be able to be fair and considerate to others.

* The word is here loosely used in its popular and inaccurate sense. Strictly speaking, a rite is a form of service, while ceremony is the method of its performance. A ritualist is one learned about forms of service, liturgies, etc., and not necessarily either learned or interested in ceremonial. Henceforward the true distinction between ritual and ceremonial will be maintained in these pages.

These two types of mind are not only widely separated; they are also to a large extent inexplicable each to the other. When two men meet who have formed opposite opinions on a matter of fact or argument, there is always some hope that by discussion they may come to agree, or at least to appreciate each other’s view. But when the matter is one of taste and feeling, there is far less room for such hope: discussion can do but little to help matters. The one party still feels one way, and the other the opposite way. Each is confronted with something in the other of which he himself has no perception, which therefore he finds it hard to appraise or tolerate. Moreover, each is unable to explain or justify his own feeling or taste to the other; and the irritation that he is liable to feel at not being able to grasp the other man's point of view is probably increased by his inability to express his own.

To this condition of things is due the well-authenticated experience, that there are no controversies so bitter as those of taste and feeling. Grievous are the animosities in the realms of art: and if the odium theologicum is thought to be stronger than the odium artisticum, it can only because theology touches deeper currents of feeling even than art. How then shall questions of religious ceremonial, which. are both theological and artistic, escape from the operation of this general law, and avoid acrimony and recrimination? Again the warning note recurs, that only those can safely handle the subject of religious ceremonial whose minds have been trained to tolerate an alien, and even incomprehensible, point of view.

Besides these cautions suggested by mental considerations, there are others which spring from historical reflection. The broad general outlines of the history of ceremonial controversy have something to teach by way of caution and patience. Disturbances of this class seem to recur in cycles, and one phase of them follows upon another in a more or less regular sequence. The full cycle may be expressed by three divisions: first comes a period of experiment or innovation; after this has continued for some time, as the controversy attendant upon it dies down, there follows of consolidation and settlement; finally comes a period of quiet, tending to stagnation and formalism, before the cycle begins to recur. This general description is not uniformly accurate: a cycle may be interrupted or partial, or the periods may co-exist and overlap: but history gives continual instances of such an alternation in some such form and sequence.

The early ages of the Church show few signs of ceremonial controversy; but even so, the first settlement of Christian ceremonial was not reached without something of the sort, as S. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians shows. There followed clearly the period of settlement as S. Paul set things in order; and upon that a long period of quiet. A similar cycle is observable in Carlovingian days, when the introduction of Roman ceremonial to the Frankish empire marked a period of experiment and innovation, with attendant controversy, which perhaps hardly ceased until the formation of particular local uses in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries marked the beginning of the second period. Thereupon ensued a long stretch of quiet, tending to stagnation and formalism, which lasted down to the Reformation.

Then began a fresh and a more familiar cycle. The sixteenth century in England exhibits in rapid succession the familiar trio, innovation in no small degree and with no little controversy, followed by partial settlement under Archbishop Parker in the early part of Elizabeth’s reign, and a brief period of comparative quiet under Archbishop Whitgift at the end of the century and the reign. With the new century the cycle began afresh: the earlier part was full of experiment and innovation; bitter controversy followed, until the crisis came of the Laudian era and the Great Rebellion; settlement was not reached till the Restoration, and then followed the Hanoverian torpor.

When this sequence of events has once been grasped, it causes less surprise to find that a new period of restoration, innovation, and experiment should have begun with the revival of Church life in the Victorian era, and that again controversy should wax hot. This is all according to analogy, and not in the least remarkable; and the history should help churchmen to be tolerant towards uncongenial developments, and patient with rash but well meaning experiment. Movement is of the very nature of the Church, as being a living body; there is no real danger in this; it is stagnation that is really dangerous. A living body must grow and must at least be susceptible of 'crisises.' The Church exhibits its life by experiencing them, and its divine character by surviving them, and emerging with added grace and beauty. So let the Muse of History sound a note not only of warning against rash judgment, but also of encouragement as to the results of conflict. These stirs are the birthpangs of some better order, more worthy of the beloved Church and of the worship of God Almighty.

But the services that history can render at this preliminary stage are not yet exhausted. It has further warnings to give. A warning against Erastianism, or at least against that form of civil aggression against the Church which is loosely called by that name. It is very natural, in view of disturbances in the Church, that the State, or even in these days the mixed assemblage of parliament, should hope to mend matters by intervening. But history warns us that such intervention has in past time marred rather than mended. The incursions of the government of Edward VI. into the sphere of ceremonial were particularly unfortunate. The first parliament of Elizabeth's day could not but intervene; but its intervention caused through the Ornaments Rubric the greater part of the troubles that followed in such matters: later ones were only restrained from ill-advised interference by the strong hand of the queen herself. When that was removed there came the disasters of the Commonwealth. More conspicuous because more familiar are the lamentable results of parliamentary intervention in the nineteenth century. Such precedents as these are discouraging.

Further, history reminds us that controversies of this sort are apt to evoke the cry of 'No popery,' and to become poisoned with a virus of anti-Roman prejudice. This cry is usually in England a political rather than a religious cry. It has little or no reference to the real points at issue between the English Church and Home, which lie far deeper than ceremonial. A surplice worn in the pulpit, a choir installed in the chancel, a college cap, an organ, a litany desk -- these and many other familiar features of English worship have in turn been branded as popish. History suggests that such outcries as these should be disregarded. The real matter to be considered, alike in ceremonial and doctrine, is not whether it is Roman, but whether it is legitimate and true. For, after all, not everything that is Roman is wrong.

Again, the conservative mind makes an appeal that is often fallacious to the principles of the Reformation against his antagonist. But history constantly warns us that the observances in whose favour the appeal is made are often mere survivals of Puritan lawlessness or Georgian slovenliness. After all, the main principle of the Reformers was fearless change from current abuses to the more ancient and uncorrupt ways.

The legal mind, it may be, makes a similar appeal to 'the law.' But again history warns us that this appeal is not so simple and conclusive as it seems. The law of the Church must be taken into account as well as civil law. That which is in the fullest sense binding, is that which is arrived at by joint action of Church and State. The action of the State is not ideally necessary for the settlement of ceremonial matters; the civil power, unless forced by special circumstances, does not concern itself with them; but the action of the Church is essential. Therefore the position of the Privy Council as an ecclesiastical Court of Appeal cannot he recognised as satisfactory by churchmen, because it was set up in 1832 by the State alone, through a mere blunder, and without the consent of the Church. Its position is not adequately constitutional, and its decisions therefore do not properly represent the law on points of ceremonial. History warns us here not to be deceived by the speciousness of this appeal to 'the law'; and it might, did space allow, have a great deal more to tell of the blunders of civil lawyers who attempt to dabble in ecclesiastical matters without understanding either them or the principles which govern them, or of the inconsistent character of the ecclesiastical decisions of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in particular.

Chief of all, history utters warnings against the spirit of panic; and this has been a very disturbing element in recent controversies about matters of ceremonial. When once panic spreads, argument fails. History is full of melancholy episodes of this character, and its warning in this instance comes as the climax of all. The Erastian tendency, the 'No popery' cry, the hot appeals to misunderstood principles and more than dubious law, in these are the very elements out of which an ecclesiastical crisis is made. It cannot be denied that there are evils, abuses, and tendencies in the Church of to-day quite sufficient to cause misgivings to a devoted churchman -- some of them, too, connected with worship. But these are not what are discerned in a panic, or are truly handled by panic orators, or healed by panic legislation. The panic largely affects the wrong people and fastens upon the wrong things, hinders the true settlement of difficulties and creates new ones. The Nonconformist under its influence is apt to develop an exaggerated jealousy for the Protestant character of the Church from which he has separated. The Press makes good copy out of fiery eloquence and spreads the conflagration. External organisations interfere; members of parliament are heckled by their constituents and urged to give impossible pledges; peers are beset by well-meaning ladies and regaled with highly-spiced reports, till both Houses are in a ferment.

Argument and religion are by this time alike left out of account. It is vain to point out that in the churches and congregations from which this stir has spread, all is going on in peace and quietness -- as is usually the case apart from factious intervention -- the clergy quietly doing God's work, and their people at one with them. What does that avail, when anti-Christian and anti-Church journalism is stirred, and a Free Church Council is thundering menaces? It is vain to point out that the bishops are doing the work for which they were consecrated, that of guiding and ruling their dioceses, and that it is their business to deal with irregularities -- so far as the State-made chaos of ecclesiastical courts will allow them to do so. What can that avail, when every busybody claims a right to interfere, and a Protestant caucus is forcing itself as an unwelcome intrusion into the already troublous arena of party politics?

These are the familiar features of panic, or what is called 'a crisis in the Church.' History witnesses to the melancholy recurrence of such outbursts, and warns every sensible man against saying or doing anything that may help to evoke or forward them. It warns us also that it is not by such proceedings that God's work is carried on, nor the defects of the work remedied. There is more to be hoped for from patient investigation and sober deliberation, such as can be given by the Royal Commission on Ecclesiastical Disorders now sitting; more still from the quiet continuance of wise and patient episcopal government; most of all from the disappearance of wilfulness and contentiousness before a growing force of prayer, zeal, and penitence.

So much for the sedatives that may be found by reflection on the nature of the human mind in relation to externals, and on the lessons of history. There still remains a further consideration to be taken into account, which, like the others, is calculated to evoke patience, and that in a quarter where it often seems to be lacking.

The plain man has little interest in psychological or historical points, but depends chiefly for his views on the judgments passed by an irrational and irreformable authority called his 'common-sense'; and he is apt to be more intolerant than the rest in matters of ceremonial controversy. The points at issue, he thinks, are so petty; they concern mere externals -- mere 'man millinery.' He habitually mistrusts alike warmth and formality in devotion; this controversy brings him dangerously near to both of them; and his common-sense rebels in some alarm.

No doubt there is much truth in this view. The points directly at issue are petty in themselves and only concern externals: there always is a danger, whether ceremonial be much or little, that worship may degenerate into formalism. Ceremonial, it may be truly said, either safeguards piety or else degrades it; and any changes in traditional ways bring within the horizon the peril that some may value the changes, not as ancillary to devotion, but for some less worthy reason -- for novelty's sake, for their artistic beauty, and so forth; and if so, degradation has set in.

But it is also to be remembered that there are, in reality, no such things as 'mere externals.' Every external implies and has reference to something internal, and must be estimated accordingly. Ceremonial is an external because it is an expression of an inner reality; this reality is often of such a sort as to baffle expression by any other means. Reverence, for example, is more eloquently signified by the Publican's bowed head than in any other way. Irreverence too is equally plainly signified by an attitude or a gesture. No other method of expression could be so expressive. And in general it must be urged that externals are not 'mere externals,' but things pregnant with importance, because of that state of mind which they signify or express.

Ceremonial again is expressive of religious truths. Sometimes these are better defined by a gesture or a symbol than by theological definition. Many a poor sinner can express his trust in his Divine Saviour far better by kissing his crucifix than by attempting to expound his conception of the doctrine of the atonement. The like is true of eucharistic doctrine; and though there is, as there has been from the earliest times, an extensive scope for differences of opinion on these mysteries within the Church, and in fact English churchmen do differ extensively in their apprehension of them, yet that minimum belief which is common to all the schools of thought which the Church can legitimately include, contains quite enough to justify, if not in some cases to require, a solemn and distinctive eucharistic ceremonial. Low churchmen as well as High churchmen express their views by externals over the larger area in which they are agreed as well as the smaller in which they differ; in fact it is impossible to do otherwise.

It is therefore a form of blindness, not common-sense, that prevents a man from recognizing that behind ceremonies there lie realities -- principles, doctrines, and states or habits of mind. No one can hope to judge fairly of matters of ceremonial who does not see that the reason why they cause such heat of controversy is that they signify so much. The attack and the defence alike are worth all the force expended upon them, when under the guise of externals great realities are being contended for.

No doubt there are externals which are not really significant of anything great, which are mere matters of custom or habit or taste, others even which are merely survivals. No doubt also there is a tendency to fight over these, as if they belonged to the class of significant externals and really stood for something of importance. Few things are so desirable in ceremonial controversy as the sorting out of the points at issue into these two classes, and the assigning to each point its own proper importance or unimportance accordingly. It is hoped that the discussion of principles which follows in this volume may help, at any rate in some small degree, towards this most desirable result. But if such a sorting is to be done by experts, or commended when done to the judgment of the larger world, including the plain man, it is essential that there should first be, not only among the experts, but also among the general public, a distinct recognition of the real importance of some externals because of that which they signify. When this is recognised there is better hope for the decline of controversy and the development of a fresh unity.

It is difficult to say how far unity of doctrine and feeling precedes unity of ceremonial, or how far it follows it. Ceremonial is at one moment the outcome of doctrine, and at another the inculcator of it. The two are real allies, but really independent; for all might agree in ceremonial and yet differ to some extent in doctrine, and all might agree in doctrine and yet desire to express it externally in different ways. But this is no place to discuss the mutual relation of the two; it is enough for the present purpose to emphasise the intimate connection subsisting between them, and to express the hope that along each line the Church may be led to a fuller expression of its own essential unity in Christ.

THE PRINCIPLES OF RELIGIOUS CEREMONIAL