Readers of this blog cannot fail to have noticed the controversy which has centred around the name Iwerne and latterly, the Titus Trust. Iwerne is the name of a village in Dorset. Here, for many years, a school complex, empty during the summer holidays, provided accommodation for summer camps for boys under the leadership of E.J. H. Nash (known as Bash). In later years, these camps have proliferated and now take place at a variety of centres across the country. Some of these camps still focus on male pupils from privileged private schools while others are more open and include young people from day schools. To attend one of the camps in the past, one had to go to one of only about 15 of the most elite boarding schools in England. Amid the changes that have been overseen by Iwerne/Titus trustees, one thing seems not to have changed. That is the continuation of a narrow form of Christian teaching, of the kind taught by Bash in the 1930s and continued by his successors. It is difficult to describe Bash’s theology and the theology of Iwerne in a few words. It combines conservative Biblical ideas with notions of male elitism. It could also be said to be anti-intellectual. Bash himself was said to have based all his teaching on a single 19th century book by R.A. Torrey, What the Bible Teaches. This book attempted to place every item of classic Protestant teaching into a series of Bible texts. Thus, the Iwerne approach never ventured beyond the text of the Bible, even while it was emphasising a version of Christian doctrine that would have been understood better in the 16th century than in the world of the New Testament.
Ideas have consequences. Conservative protestant theology has always held many of its followers in a straitjacket of discipline, sometimes even of fear. Notions of hell, handed down to the Protestant reformers from the Catholic middle ages, still had the power to grip the imagination. Contemplation of Christ’s suffering on the cross also has the power to arouse, in his followers, strong emotions of pity and devotion. But any emphasis on suffering can, in extreme cases, have malign results. The Christian adherent might come to believe that deliberately seeking to share the suffering of Christ was part of his vocation. John Smyth, for a decade the chair of the Iwerne Trust and present at many camps, seems to have followed a reading of Scripture which believed it was spiritually beneficial to suffer and inflict pain. Christ suffered for our salvation, so it is right that we seek to share his pain and encourage others to do so. The exact reasoning that Smyth followed, and the way that it fitted into his disordered psychological profile, will never now be known to us. We may, however, suggest that the closed incestuous world of Iwerne theology made it possible for such distortions of teaching to emerge. The other con-evo organisations that currently intersect with Iwerne/Titus are also not open to a wider theological vision that could challenge such ideas. The notion of being ‘sound’, when uttered in this context, seems to be extraordinarily narrow for those of us who look in from the outside. The theological horizons of the 16th century are extraordinarily suffocating to many of us reared in broader theological traditions.
In recent days the Titus Trust has put out a statement. It is reorganising the work of the Trust. The emphasis is now on organising the camps into regional structures. But there is one major new change. The Iwerne name, so long associated with these camps, is to disappear. Why is this so significant? It has recently come into the public domain that the Titus trustees, in their attempts to fight legal claims for the historic behaviour of John Smyth, have employed the service of Alder UK. This, according to Julian Mann who writes for Anglicans Ink, is a very expensive PR firm. This firm has, in all likelihood, been involved in suggesting that the word ‘Iwerne’ is now toxic. It is toxic for its association with John Smyth, Jonathan Fletcher and others under police investigation for abuses against boys. Andrew Graystone helpfully wrote about these wider enquiries in the Church of England newspaper and they are quoted in the recent article by Julian Mann in Anglican Ink. http://anglican.ink/2020/05/06/alleged-iwerne-abuser-now-under-police-investigation/ With at least two reports expected in the next twelve months looking at the careers of two individuals, closely associated with Iwerne, the time has clearly come to jump ship and cast away the Iwerne name.
The wise (probably very expensive) advice handed to the Titus Trustees is understandable. But there is a problem in this strategy, as Andrew Graystone has pointed out in a statement to Premier Radio. While it is possible to shed a name, the really important part of reform is to examine the culture of the past and the corrupt theologies that have and continue to have harmful effects on individuals. When I think about Smyth, I do not just think about the pain he and others inflicted on so many to satisfy perverse appetites. I think about the way that a theology was allowed to fester within a whole organisation, making it possible for the young men to believe that this treatment was somehow part of Christian discipleship. Smyth and those like him could only have acted out their nefarious schemes within an organisation that had already, theologically speaking, ‘softened up’ victims to become vulnerable to them. Iwerne/Titus is responsible for an overall theology that allowed such things to happen. Whether it was an over-emphasis of the passages from Proverbs about a father disciplining his son or some morbid preoccupation with pain, the background and culture of Smyth’s activities needs to be better understood and then renounced. It was incubated within Iwerne/Bash’s theology and will continue remain there as long as it is not firmly understood and repented of. Changing a name will not remove the poison of the past, both in the harm it did and its continuing ideology.
It would be unrealistic to expect Keith Makin and his study of John Smyth to get to grips with the theology of the Winchester and Iwerne beatings. The only people capable of doing this are members of that network themselves. I may be cynical but somehow, I doubt that this will ever happen. The conservative theological tradition within which Titus supporters operate, is not one that seems ever to engage in self-criticism or re-examination. Whatever else is wrong with liberal theology, it cannot be accused of staleness since it recognises the need to revisit its presuppositions constantly in the light of a changing world. Theology is always a work in progress for a theologian working in the liberal tradition. When necessary, thought patterns from the past can be discarded. With the conservative traditions we have associated with the ReNew constituency which intersects with Titus, there seems to be an atmosphere of permanent defensive thinking. One of the comments on a previous blog indicated the way that conservative theology seems to be preoccupied in naming other group,s seeming to be in opposition, as enemies. However much has been spent on the removal of ‘Iwerne’ from the description of the camps that follow in the Bash tradition, those of us who follow the work of Titus will still be reminding readers of the direct links, historically and theologically, to the appalling behaviour of several leaders, including a former chairman of the Trustees. Titus has the power to break that link but it will need to do more than just order a mere change of name.
Can anyone explain why Nash was called Bash? To me, it sounds like the name of a headmaster from a 1950s comic who was famous for overusing the cane!
You’re probably thinking of Jimmy Edwards in Whacko! (Muir and Norden late 1950s)? Or Cor!! Comic’s Whacky with the dreaded Mr Thwackery in the early 1970s?
No. ‘Bash’ was just a typically hearty rhyming slang nickname. This is the sort of way people’s minds are bound to work, the sort of connection that they will make if they possess only 3 pieces of a 30 piece jigsaw puzzle which is why I’ve been trying to inform people on more details of Iwerne to enable their understandings to get beyond the stereotype stage.
Many thanks! I am fascinated by Nash’s dependence on Reuben Torrey. Scion of a wealthy New York family, Torrey studied at Yale, Leipzig and Erlangen, where he repudiated ‘German’ criticism (i.e., modernism). He became a congregationalist minister in a deprived district in Minneapolis where he encountered Dwight Moody who in 1889 asked him to head the Chicago Bible Institute. (MBI). He undertook frequent revivalist tours, but was no rabble-rouser, being likened to an attorney presenting evidence to a jury (William Taylor’s preaching at Bishopsgate is in that mode). Indeed he described ‘What the Bible Teaches’ (1898) as ‘simply an attempt at a careful, unbiased, systematic, thorough-going, inductive study and statement of Bible truth’.
In 1912 Torrey became dean of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles. The Great War had a searing impact upon him, and he attributed German excesses to a demoralisation borne of its higher criticism. He helped to prepare parts of ‘The Fundamentals’ (1910-15) and hosted a conference at his home at Montrose PA which gave rise to the World’s Christian Fundamentals Association, declaring “The old denominational differences have lost their significance. The alignment should be along the line of whether people accept the Bible as the inerrant Word of God or not”.
Thanks partly to the existence of the Plymouth Brethren and the Keswick conferences, fundamentalism was less political in England than the US, but Nash would have noted the splits in student Christianity (with the founding of the Inter-Varsity Fellowship in 1928) and in the CMS. His utilisation of Torrey may have been relatively novel, since Torrey was an advocate of ‘dispensational-premillenianism’ (i.e., history is divided into phases, each ending in disaster, since God expects His people to obey different rules in each phase and they fail every time); this mode of thought had its moment in England in the 1650s (e.g., the Fifth Monarchists), but was otherwise marginal. Yet it was very popular in the US.
Noting Steve Lewis’ excellent comments on the last thread, George Marsden and Norman Kraus identified two essential tendencies in American fundamentalist thought: (i) a fascination with dividing and classifying (viz. Torrey’s application of ‘scientific methods’); and (ii) an exaggerated supernaturalism. The abrupt changes from one dispensation to another assumed by Torrey are antithetical to any notion of ‘development’ and encourage fundamentalists to anathematise their opponents or to block them out completely.
Perhaps Nash might be credited with [un]wittingly Americanising a large section of hitherto genteel English evangelical culture, and doing so along class lines. I find there is something [inadvertently?] fascist in what [little] I know of his outlook. Iwerne has been important, but it has helped make Bishopsgate/HTB a ‘cuckoo in the nest’. It has perhaps been seriously damaging in many ways and should now be shut down.
I think Torrey also looms over the concept (put so well by Janet as well as Steve) of people being ‘in’ or ‘out’ – Janet also cited an example of the [mis]use of Galatians.
What all this suggests to me is that aspects of the conservative evangelical world view are somewhat brittle. Their stock in trade is certainty, but when this is disrupted the inhabitants of the ideological bunker may be especially susceptible to demoralisation. We see this in the trajectory of the evangelical mega-churches in the US from the early 1970s.
A series of scandals from the 1980s and their intimate association with an increasingly discredited right-wing politics has grievously tarnished their reputations. Whilst a significant proportion of their adherents double down, many erstwhile followers have peeled off or have lapsed into doubt. This has been much to the advantage of a rising secularism. Church membership in the US has fallen by *at least* 20% within the last two decades, not just in the liberal ‘mainstream’ denominations, and the rate of decline is fast accelerating. Indeed, comparisons with Ireland in the 1990s may be apt.
If should not therefore be assumed that English conservative evangelicalism will be similarly unaffected by the burden of scandal and disenchantment.
Sorry – the last paragraph is gibberish. What I meant that it is possible that the evangelical movement in the UK could decline as it has in the US, by dint of a loss of momentum, or on account of the corrosive impact of scandal.
Also, I insinuated that Nash was a fascist. As far as I am aware he was not a person of overt partisan views and he did not express political opinions. However, the notion that the masses must be led by a moral, social and economic elite (admittedly an intermittent theme in the history of the Church) is inherently political, problematically partisan and profoundly reactionary. No doubt Nash was much troubled by the General Strike (and possibly elated by the response of many public school alumni to it), and by the threat to Christianity posed by Bolshevism. The camps originated in the 1930s – the era of the fuhrerprinzip and of Buchman – and employed a militaristic code and argot. So not a fascist as such, but also not impervious to the atmosphere of the time. Nor would he have been alone had he espoused partisan views. Some distinguished churchmen of the period were also highly reactionary: W. R. Inge , dean of St Paul’s, was an outspoken proponent of eugenics and of keeping the working classes down; A. C. Headlam, bishop of Gloucester, was vocal in his sympathy for both Hitler and the ‘German Christians’ (both were men of extremely wide culture, had held senior divinity chairs at their respective universities and were senior dignitaries).
Froghole, the social context you provide is apposite.
I should say that the intersection of Iwerne camps with the 1930s and with Moral Rearmament is extraordinarily important and has received too little attention. Certain things were very central and distinctive to both MRA and Iwerne:
(1) The quiet time or morning watch (see e.g. Jack Winslow, ‘When I Awake’)
(2) Pietism – the key thing being the *individual’s* devotion to God as the main way that society gets changed (an idea that’s not necessarily wrong). In one of John Eddison’s last books this comes out in the suggestion that believers attend church at least at the main festivals. All other groups of committed evangelicals would suggest attending every week!
(3) The confession of sins to one another. Relevant to both the Smyth and Fletcher cases but also something that might seem natural and unavoidable if one were to be accountable at all and to take the slaying of giants (within one’s own character) seriously. For example, one Iwerne man Mark Ashton successfully managed to dampen down his former habitual pride. These are to my mind great victories and produce strength for the future. Confession to another is rather mainstream in world Christianity, not cultish. So what did the ex-head of Iwerne typically do in the late ’80s when asking the prospective convert to note down his sins? Tore the whole thing up without looking at it as a reminder that these things are fully forgiven and forgotten.
(4) The personal conversion narrative.
Also people may not realise that Moral Rearmament (which may now be seen as sectarian or cultish – vague and ‘othering’ words both, even in some instances snobbish and assuming that the majority must be right) was extraordinarily mainstream. Julian Thornton-Duesbury was head not only of Wycliffe Hall but also of St Peter’s Hall/College in Oxford University. Jack Winslow was head of Lee Abbey.
Your reference to Torrey also provides important historical context. It may be forgotten what an extraordinarily influential mass evangelist – and mover&shaker – he was at the start of the 20th century. His revival meetings presaged and catalysed the Welsh Revival whose social effects were well recorded by top journalist WT Stead. The WR in turn set off the Christian fire in South Korea which for the last generation has been the most enthusiastically Christian nation with the largest churches.
I don’t know whether this interesting fact has been picked up, but according to Wikipedia Nash was ordained Deacon and served a curacy at Emmanuel, Wimbledon. The Wikipedia article notes that his first application to work with the Scripture Union was rejected, and he spent a period as chaplain to Wrekin College until his second application to the SU was accepted in 1932 when he started to work for them.
While in ministry, he was often known as ‘the late Mr Nash’ – at his funeral it was remarked (with some exaggeration) that it was good/unusual to see him on time for a service.
It is intriguing to consider how the expensive advisors might work with Iwerne/Titus/Newname. Forming a phoenix trust with the new name Titus, but meeting in the same place, Iwerne, is in substance exactly the same organisation as before, if not in legal form. So that was tried and didn’t work. I’m sure the trustees at the time already knew the brand was toxic but hoped it could be resurrected.
Few parents considering where to send their children in the summer, could fail to be aware of the safeguarding issues so widely broadcast about all aspects of children’s work. So with the abuse legacy at Iwerne, however historic, you probably wouldn’t send them there, would you?
Froghole’s practical expedient of shutting it down is the best advice. I’m sure the advisors have already suggested this.
However the roots of this Iwerne idea go deep and far back as described in such detail above. There is a sort of heavy theological inertia. The need for agility and speed in addressing pressing anomalies and concerns is rarely matched until decades later. The blinkered rigidity of refusing change has lead to the fragility that now threatens to break Iwerne.
Stephen Parsons may well have touched on a causative factor here in his mention of “anti-intellectual”. The prohibition of thinking for yourself (and questioning the status quo) is a curious bedfellow for a supposedly intellectual elite. Elite certainly. The methodology was not about thinking, but about compliance. This was ruthlessly enforced with savage beatings as we know, with the suggested piquancy of preferment to those most vulnerable.
Intellectual capacity bears little correlation to mental, physical and spiritual wholeness, in my experience.
I agree that exodus from the fringes will continue as former members find more meaning outside.
Whatever they morph Iwerne into, the central ethos and dogma will no doubt persist, if not the methodology.
They were not meeting in the same place. The name ‘Iwerne holidays’ was retained for many years, but the holidays in question did not take place in Iwerne Minster. I think Norfolk became the main location.
I am mot grateful to the remarks by Christopher and Steve. Yes, Moral Rearmament, as it became in 1938, was a very Big Thing in the 1930s (and even into the early 1960s). I mentioned Keswick, and it was attending one of their conferences in 1908 that lit Buchman’s torch. In Oxford itself the OG/MRA was not only supported deftly by Thornton-Duesbery (who was also fellow of CCC until 1933, but then rather out of the loop in Jerusalem until 1940) and Alan Thornhill (Hertford, and personally close to Buchman), but also by more modernist college chaplains, such as Geoffrey Allen (Lincoln; later bishop of Derby) and Burnett Streeter (Queen’s and Dean Ireland’s professor; provost at the time of his untimely death). However, there were also interlocking circles of influence: in journalism (Arthur Russell, of the Sunday Express and the very important Peter Howard, of the Daily Express), business (Austin Reed, Lynden Macassey, etc.) and politics (the 4th marquess of Salisbury, Ernest Brown, J. C. C. Davidson, etc.). Howard became the effective leader in the post-war era, and the movement, which was already on the wane, received a body-blow when he died in 1965.
Steve and Stephen have touched on ‘anti-intellectualism’. Whilst we should beware of caricaturing fundamentalism as a rural southern tendency (as per the Scopes trial), a number of students of the phenomenon have been at pains to stress that it was a *national* phenomenon across the US (Torrey himself spent most of his life in urban ministry in the north and in California). The core fundamentalists of the Princeton seminary were at pains to study scripture according to what they perceived as ‘scientific’ predicates. Even English variants often went hand in glove with serious erudition (think, for example, of the career of J. W. Burgon, who was convinced that the KJV was the inerrant revealed Word of God). However, the repudiation of the ‘higher criticism’ was frequently anti-intellectual. The celebrated Columbia historian Richard Hofstadter had much to say about this in ‘Anti-Intellectualism in American Life’ (1962). The stock in trade of many fundamentalists, notably Torrey, was the Manichaean dichotomy: the universe is divided into two warring camps – that of God and that of the devil; the supernatural is divided from the natural; righteousness is divided from sin. Therefore, to be saved the individual has to be removed (saved) from one camp and allocated to another. No ambiguity is possible in this world view. So, as the career of Jonathan Fletcher illustrates, any threat to the ‘right’ camp means that the shutters come down immediately. It may also explain why many on the American Right now want the virus to provoke a new Cold War with China.
What really puzzles me is why people of this type should have wished to make a home within the Church of England, where bargain and compromise have long been the norm; it also explains why they are such a threat to it.
Froghole’s description of the Nash culture as “fascist” and “anti-intellectual” is absolutely right given my experience. It is disappointing for me personally for there are characteristics of the constituency that I admire. But in Cambridge 1969-72 what repelled me – and still does – was the refusal to engage with science, particularly embryology (I read Medical Sciences), and the sinister manipulation of thought processes in an attempt to seduce.
I should think so too. Which aspects of embryology were not engaged with? John Wyatt was an All Souls man of approx. that same generation and protege of John Stott, and became a professor in that area at UCL for many years.
I’m talking of students in charge of College CUs. I was never exalted enough to mix with the great and good. We college chapel attenders were sneered at by CU types, in their eyes not Christians at all. It’s another manifestation of the well known phenomenon whereby those new to a situation are often in the hands of the least experienced and most likely to cause harm. When I was a clinical student and a hospital doctor (mid 1970s), it struck me as criminally negligent that the first doctor a patient was likely to see in A&E was the most junior. That may now have changed. I hope so.
When I was a departmental supervisor, my branch manager used to get me to do the first interviews. I would trim the long list down to three or four, any of whom I would be happy to work with, and he would then interview them and make the final choice. This saved him the time which he would otherwise have spent filtering. If I understand Stanley, you are saying this just isn’t always the right tool. One parish I was in had a church plant that was struggling. The incumbent talked herself into believing that she therefore should not waste time on it. She was only there three times a year, and spent most of her time in her own home church, because she thought it was growing. A struggling church needs it’s shepherd more. Isn’t that what going after the 100th sheep means?
Indeed EA. And junior students need teachers who have the intellect and experience to be able to express complex things simply. Lots of other examples, mutatis mutandis. That’s why parish clergy IMO need to be well educated, rather than merely be thrown a few disconnected morsels, reflecting the sometimes arcane interests of staff, on a part time non residential two year course. This is not the student’s fault, of course.
By the way, I didn’t put in the green grocers’ apostrophe! I haven’t disabled the auto correct on the new tablet. It’s on borrowed time!
I can confirm the latter historically. A junior house officer mate of mine was the first to attend a senior politician with stroke in A & E. She was quickly ushered out of the way when the hierarchy got wind of his arrival.
As an aside I refused to do actual surgery as a junior HO. I was absolutely certain my knowledge of anatomy was mediocre at best. My refusal was frowned upon.
Yes, sounds not unlikely.
Which aspects of embryology did they fail to engage with?
Christopher, I don.t want to clog up the blog, and it’s a long time ago but, in short, that our embryology shows us to be products of evolution.
OK, makes sense.
Sorry, it was Stephen who first used “anti-intellectual:. Apologies.
My earlier comment did not so much refer to the fact that “Bash” was ordained (and for a time was a school chaplain), but that he served a curacy at Emmanuel, Wimbledon which, even then in the 1920s, might have provided a clue about his likely churchmanship.
That’s right. Interesting too is your TA comment on Morestead, Hants. The original Channel 4 report drives to the location Orchard House, so you could check that out to see if you (as someone who knows Morestead) recognise it. Vicar of Morestead 1962-5 was Hugh Palmer sr, who departed from there to Rhodesia as did JS. Both Palmers were in subsequent years based in east Norfolk churches, and Hugh Palmer jr, like the victim’s Norwich-based Winchester best friend, visited the JS suicide-attempt victim (then a Norwich Univ student) in hospital locally. The Winchester College contingent in Norfolk also includes the FGBMFI evangelist John Wright.
This has been the subject of a further exchange on the TA thread. I am assuming that the inquiry being carried out for the Church by Keith Makin, and his report when published, should establish when and where the abuse occurred. As I have said on TA, speculation is inappropriate.
My reservation about Orchard House is its geography and logistics involved in relation to Winchester College.
My connection with Morestead, incidentally as occasional organist there, commenced during the 1980s or early 90s, continuing to the present time (although the last attendance was in 2019). Until this was mentioned on TA a few days ago, I was unaware that John Smyth had any connection with Morestead. I don’t think it is surprising that although I have been going to the church there intermittently for 30 years or more, John Smyth’s name has never cropped up in conversation or any other context. Had it done, that fact would have registered as I had encountered Smyth when he was still junior counsel appearing in the Winchester County Court, probably around 1970, and retained a clear recollection of him as an obviously competent lawyer, but a decidedly cool and aloof person.
As a brief postscript to the above, I have re-read various reports from earlier years referring to the garden shed, or Smyth’s home, as being “in Winchester”, and that was the understanding which I took on board. I now see that some said “near Winchester”. I didn’t watch the TV programme exposé, and was totally unaware until now of any possible connection with Morestead – or Orchard House, which I know, but have never visited.
Surely the commitment to the C of E was that it was the best boat to fish from.
That was a comment on Froghole 23 May above.
Dr Butler: I had written a comment earlier. However, it has disappeared into the ether, so just a quick response. I agree with you, but I also agree with Stanley’s reply below.
I do think that a number of people have entered the Church from a nonconformist background. The Baptist Union pension scheme is now a defined contribution arrangement requiring an 8% contribution from its members. The Methodist scheme remains a defined benefit arrangement, but requires a 9.3% contribution from its members.
The CEFPS is almost uniquely generous: it is a non-contributory, index-linked, final salary arrangement with a lump sum (I appreciate it is possible for members to make ‘additional voluntary contributions’). Even the infamous civil service scheme is contributory, and the Treasury has forced its members to make higher contributions even as their salaries have been de facto frozen for a decade. The National Minimum Stipend has not been frozen during that time.
Although the Church in Wales maintains a DB scheme, it became less generous in 2005. The Church of Ireland closed its DB scheme to all accruals in 2013.
I have made comments elsewhere about how high stipends are in England compared to the RCC in France or Italy (English clergy get well over twice as much).
Of course, the cost of stipendiaries, is ruinous for the dioceses in the absence of parish share subventions (which have vanished since lockdown, the dioceses having failed spectacularly to institute immediate campaigns for online contributions, having got by in the process on loans from the Commissioners). The CEFPS is the real killer.
All this results in a convenient zero sum game between stipendiary clergy and church buildings, which the latter are doomed to lose. I suspect that many in authority have been looking for an excuse to liquidate much of the estate to keep the ‘insiders’ in their entitlements, and the virus has probably provided a convenient pretext. The laity and the wider public are being softened up for this, hence the enthusiasm about virtual church and ‘new ways’ of mission outside church buildings. I am sorry to put things in such an infra dig manner, but I think that there is an alternative narrative to the one currently being spun by many conservative evangelicals and their ‘useful idiots’ (to use Lenin’s expression) in the ‘soft centre’ who see the buildings as adiaphora and the virus as a liberation from an increasingly intolerable encumbrance (whereas it is frequently the rising cost of the stipendiaries which is arguably the more serious burden).
The C of E being the best boat to fish from accounts for a significant proportion of today’s ordinands, usually male, who are in truth baptists with neither understanding of nor respect for Anglican polity, who nevertheless find themselves curiously and inexplicably drawn by her terms, conditions, pay and pension. Until now.
Ah, yes. Like Tony Blair not wanting to join the Lib Dems! Most of the clergy I know want to make their congregations Catholic! Let’s not forget them.
Stanley,
Dr Butler’s point is well made, but you are right to draw attention to pay and rations. The Baptist Union in this country closed its defined benefit scheme in 2012 and it requires its members to make contributions of 8% (https://www.baptistpensions.org.uk/churches-employers/how-the-scheme-works/). The Methodist scheme is defined benefit, but requires its members to contribute 9.3% (https://www.methodist.org.uk/for-churches/finance/pensions/methodist-ministers-pension-scheme-mmps/).
The Church of England is quite different: the members of its pension scheme are not required to make contributions (although they can make ‘additional voluntary contributions); it is a defined benefit final salary scheme; it is indexed, and it also provides a lump sum upon retirement (https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-04/2020%20Clergy%20Booklet%20v%201.1.pdf). All post-1998 accruals come from the dioceses; the closure of churches without any countervailing system for online giving has put dioceses into immediate distress – a distress which compounds over time, since they are currently being ‘covered’ by the Commissioners only via loans.
As such it is now a glorious anomaly in the world of pensions. Not even the infamous civil service pension scheme is non-contributory (https://www.civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk/). Indeed, the Treasury has required members of the scheme to make significantly increased contributions in recent years, even with a decade-long de facto pay freeze (you may also note that the National Minimum Stipend has not been frozen during that period, and as continued to enjoy relatively small upward increments). The Church in Wales has an expensive scheme but reduced outlays in 2005; the Church of Ireland closed its DB scheme to future accruals in 2013.
You will also see that the Commissioners are now liable for only 2% of ‘overall liabilities’ for the CEFPS (see p. 7 here: https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-01/Consultation%20Response.pdf), and that it would take a major downwards revision of diocesan contributions – which, of course, come from the parish share – to have a positive impact upon diocesan cashflows, and that was even before the crisis.
Of course, I appreciate that whilst clergy are not motivated by such sordid and mundane details as pay, rations and superannuation, the advent of candidates from a nonconformist background is a matter of intriguing happenstance.
I must, yet again, emphasise, that it is not so much the cost of the buildings which is the chief threat to the finances of the dioceses (and, therefore, to the ability of the Church to project its mission ‘in every community’), as the cost of stipendiary clergy and retirees.
Whilst you, Stanley, are familiar with all this, I want to stress this point to others lest anyone else still has any doubts about the threat the CEFPS poses to the Church (though not to stipendiary clergy!).
James
Stanley,
Dr Butler’s point is well made, but you are right to draw attention to pay and rations. The Baptist Union in this country closed its defined benefit scheme in 2012 and it requires its members to make contributions of 8% (https://www.baptistpensions.org.uk/churches-employers/how-the-scheme-works/). The Methodist scheme is defined benefit, but requires its members to contribute 9.3% (https://www.methodist.org.uk/for-churches/finance/pensions/methodist-ministers-pension-scheme-mmps/).
The Church of England is quite different: the members of its pension scheme are not required to make contributions (although they can make ‘additional voluntary contributions); it is a defined benefit final salary scheme; it is indexed, and it also provides a lump sum upon retirement (https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-04/2020%20Clergy%20Booklet%20v%201.1.pdf). All post-1998 accruals come from the dioceses; the closure of churches without any countervailing system for online giving has put dioceses into immediate distress – a distress which compounds over time, since they are currently being ‘covered’ by the Commissioners only via loans.
As such it is now a glorious anomaly in the world of pensions. Not even the infamous civil service pension scheme is non-contributory (https://www.civilservicepensionscheme.org.uk/). Indeed, the Treasury has required members of the scheme to make significantly increased contributions in recent years, even with a decade-long de facto pay freeze (you may also note that the National Minimum Stipend has not been frozen during that period, and as continued to enjoy relatively small upward increments). The Church in Wales has an expensive scheme but reduced outlays in 2005; the Church of Ireland closed its DB scheme to future accruals in 2013.
You will also see that the Commissioners are now liable for only 2% of ‘overall liabilities’ for the CEFPS (see p. 7 here: https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-01/Consultation%20Response.pdf), and that it would take a major downwards revision of diocesan contributions – which, of course, come from the parish share – to have a positive impact upon diocesan cashflows, and that was even before the crisis.
Of course, I appreciate that whilst clergy are not motivated by such sordid and mundane details as pay, rations and superannuation, the advent of candidates from a nonconformist background is a matter of intriguing happenstance.
I must, yet again, emphasise, that it is not so much the cost of the buildings which is the chief threat to the finances of the dioceses (and, therefore, to the ability of the Church to project its mission ‘in every community’), as the cost of stipendiary clergy and retirees.
Whilst you, Stanley, are familiar with all this, I want to stress this point to others lest anyone else still has any doubts about the threat the CEFPS poses to the Church (though not to stipendiary clergy!).
James
That people without much rootage in the C of E were seeking ordination was a matter of concern to many of us when I was a DDO 1996 ti 2008. Unfortunately with colleges and courses being relatively short and packed with all sorts of things I was saddened that not enough was done about this. Three of my evangelical ordinands now function outside the C of E. despite 3 years at theol college. But for along time there has been little time given to church history and probably liturgy too. “Whats Epiphany” one young priest asked when I was hauled out of retirement to do 3 yrs POT. But its a long standing moan of mine. Fellow DDO’s were often bemused by Perry’s “mordant musings”. They began in the late 70s when I was lucky enough to spend a semester at the Venerable College in Rome. When I came back I sent in a report suggesting ordinands should be better schooled in the history etc of the Church they were entering. I quote from a letter sent me by Prof Stephen Sykes ( 21st Nov 1980) “the project of raising the profile of Anglicanism in ordinands’ minds was vigorously assailed on the education committee…It is regarded as a retrograde step, a form of denominational conservatism wholly out of keeping with the acutely secular challenges of the contemporary world”. Forty years on I am inclined to think one reaps what one sows. At least from this came a friendship with Prof Sykes and the idea of “The Study of Anglicanism” published by SPCK/Fortress ..I was to be co-editor but the American publishers wanted an american academic and not an english curate! It contains good stuff though I think it has been used outside England more than in it.
Just in case anyone hasn’t seen this article by Meg Munn on the nature of reviews I do think it is worth adding it here as it will have an impact on all reviews being undertaken.
https://chairnsp.org/2020/05/22/zooming-along/
My feeling is one of complete shock that any group involved in safeguarding could produce such a damaging, insensetive and institution protecting piece of rubbish.
If a review uncovers serious errors of judgement, that leave abusers at large and victims vulnerable are they seriously saying nothing will happen they will just aim to do it better next time?!
Yes, I saw it. Not what you would imagine, is it?
Thank you Stephen for the blog post and everyone else for the information. It’s fascinating, particularly the links to R.A. Torrey. Could anyone explain to me how the Sydney Anglicans also became so conservative (they play a leading role in Gafcon for example)? Is there also an Iwerne or Oxbridge connection in the past? I often get the impression Sydney and in particular Peter Jensen is now the one influencing the Reform network and although Stephen has written previously about them, I’m not quite sure how it started there. Thank you.
Maurice: Sydney has long been a centre for conservative evangelicalism. Essentially, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries successive low church archbishops became increasingly concerned about the ‘threat’ of ritualism. This was in the context of a city which had a large Irish RC population, one which was also perceived as a threat to what was then known as the Church of England in Australia (until as late as 1981).
Politics also fractured along largely sectarian lines, with the ALP having a large Irish RC component (though it was/is also split along ‘left’ and ‘right’ factions, the Irish predominating in the latter), and the Liberals (and their precursors) being largely protestant. Since the ‘loyalty’ of supposedly Fenian Irishmen to the empire was doubtful (note the visceral issues associated with conscription in 1916, with the critically important RC archbishop Daniel Mannix of Melbourne in the van of the opposition, leading to an ALP split in the wake of the referendum). So there was not only a political but military and strategic dimension to the struggle. Ritualism was perceived by many in authority, and not just Anglicans, as a ramp for the advance of the ‘alien’ and subversive RCC.
Until 1966 (and the ignominious resignation of Hugh Gough), the archbishops were very establishment British imports with Oxbridge pedigrees. Their ‘native’ successors have been groomed at Moore College, and here the decisive influence in the mid-twentieth century was Thomas Hammond, a very protestant Cork man, who had led the Anglican mission to the Irish Catholics in the city. Hammond was nurtured by archbishops Wright and Mowll (both strong evangelicals rather than merely subfusc low churchmen). So during the third quarter of the twentieth century a commitment to asserting evangelicalism became the leitmotif of the diocese. The Jensen brothers had their formation in that milieu, and not, to my knowledge, at Iwerne.
It was therefore somehow inevitable that the Jensens, of leaders like them, should have come to prominence in the 1980s once the transitional figures, Loane and Goodhew (themselves conservative evangelicals, the former being close to the infamous Askin/Lewis/Willis ministry) passed from the scene.
The story of the Jensen brothers’ rise and impact on the diocese (starting with the 10% programme in 1985-6) is told in Chris McGillion’s ‘The Chosen Ones’ (2005).
One other point: in Australia the diocese is everything, and the province almost nothing. Whilst Moore College has had a measure of influence elsewhere, its most decisive impact has been to some extent kettled within Sydney itself. The personalities of the Jensens have also grated on many outside Sydney itself. It should also be noted that the wider political struggle has been won by the RCC; the protestant ‘Anglican’ element has become increasingly marginal, even within the Coalition.
Maurice. Written without having seen Froghole’s erudition!! You ask about why Sydney and why it is so conservative now. No one can answer this issue without writing a 100k word thesis. But here are a few pointers. Back in the 30s the Australian church needed fresh theological blood from the UK to head up the theological college in Sydney. What they found was not an intellectual churchman rooted in British universities but a humble evangelist, T C Hammond. He injected a conservative brand of theology straight from Protestant Church of Ireland. Because he was novel, he had a disproportionate influence in Sydney and as principal of Moore College, he helped to set the theological tone for ordinands and church alike. This Irish influence is still there and every single clergyman is required to pass through its doors to serve in the diocese. Very unhealthy I imagine. The continuation of this Protestant influence on Moore College was also a feature of his successors. Two of them, Broughton Knox and Peter Jensen followed Hammond and carefully nurtured the ultra- conservative stance. These two characters, especially Knox, also had huge influence. Their intellectual influence was bolstered by both of them having obtained English doctorates. The interesting crunch point is that although Sydney Anglicanism is all about the Bible, neither of the two leaders had studied the bible to any particular depth. Both the doctorates of these two men were in the history of the Reformation. They thus were fluent in the ‘biblical’ language of the 16th century rather than the bible itself. Jim Packer, another big chief in the con-evo world never studied the bible academically but like the other two was expert in 16th century reformers. That is my take on the Sydney diocese. They are the victims of a hermetically sealed theological bubble created in the 30s and never allowed to join the wider world of theological thinking. Of course conservatives must have their space, but it is not healthy, as in Sydney, to drive out all liberals and those who want a different theological voice. Clearly there are other political factors, which Froghole has drawn out but my approach has been influenced by reading a fascinating biography of Knox. I found this in my own attempt to understand the problem of why Sydney remains almost exclusively conservative to this day.
Thank you, Froghole and Stephen.
Stephen,
Very many thanks for this (and it would probably help if I proof-read some of my incoherent ramblings before pressing’send’…).
One key component in the Jensens’ strategy was the utilisation of glebe land to fund mission. Prior to effective disestablishment in 1836 the Church of England in Australia received significant grants of land from the various colonial governments on the continent. Some of this was granted almost at the outset of the first settlement (most famously the 400 acre block of land, known as Glebe, in central Sydney, by Adm. Arthur Phillip to the first chaplain of the colony, Richard Johnson, in 1790). So much of this land has become very valuable, in terms of sustaining the Anglican Church and in funding its enterprises. After about 2000 the profits from glebe created a mission fund of about $8m p/a, chiefly for church planting on a systematic basis. However, planting was already commonplace from the mid-1980s.
The upshot of this financial strategy, the dominance of Moore College and the widespread planting of often idenitkit churches, has been the rapid decline in other theological and liturgical traditions in the diocese. The diocese, I should mention, encompasses the city of Sydney, its immediate environs and the seaboard of NSW.
In fairness to Sydney, the Anglican Church – like all mainstream denominations – has been in deep decline across Australia, and although somewhat fanatical and radically out of sympathy with the spirit of Australian public life, I understand that Sydney has been one of the few places where the Church has held up demographically and has registered some growth.
In terms of ‘winning’, the impact of Ne Temere and the advent of ‘New Australians’, many of whom were from southern or central Europe, meant that Catholics had come to outnumber protestants by the time of the 1986 census. By 1996 there was an RC governor-general (Sir William Deane), an RC prime minister (Paul Keating) and an RC chief justice of the high court (Sir Gerrard Brennan, whose son is a prominent Jesuit). This would have been unthinkable a generation earlier. In a sense, the real or perceived bigotry of Anglicanism in Sydney is symptomatic of a once-dominant and secure culture turning in on itself as the outside world becomes increasingly hostile and/or indifferent.
James
Im pleased to see the reference to T.C Hammond. His leadership was key at the time . He represented the Protestant rather than the Caroline strand of the Church of Ireland and he developed a deeply antagonistic attitude to RCism through his experience of the Irish Uprising. But he was an Anglican with a deep love of the Prayer Book and its lectionary. I once served with a priest of the catholic tradition who studied at Moore as,being a Sydney boy,he was determined to be ordained in the diocese. Under Jensen and perhaps before Moore shed its low church Anglicanism for a more hardline unliturgical evangelicalism with its own peculiar ecclesiology. A retired bishop in the diocese told my friend “They have lost the plot”. There are now probably only about 20 so called “stole” parishes left. They have been gradually “picked off”. We will see what happens when the current Archbishop retires.
Stephen, thanks again. I found this post difficult, because my experience of the two Iwerne house parties I attended in 1970 and 1971 was very different from what you describe. For me, it was a very happy place.
Let me address a few issues from your first paragraph.
‘male elitism.’ I remember hearing this charge at the time. As I understood it, Bash wanted to influence the country for Christ, and aimed to present the gospel to the future leaders of society. At that time, this meant boys from the leading public schools. This was if you like a marketing strategy. However, I never had the sense that the clientele there thought of itself as superior to the rest of the country. The atmosphere was of us all having fun together. Bash himself was shy and retiring.
‘anti-intellectual.’ Interesting. I never had any hint of this myself. Indeed, many of the boys went on to Oxford and Cambridge, where there were termly meetings of those that had attended Iwerne. Personally, I have loved applying what intellect I have to my faith, and it never crossed my mind that I was going against some party line in this. I’m also aware that intellect is not highly rated in Scripture. It is love that counts. Moses’ main characteristic was his humility (the most humble man on earth, Numbers 12:3). The disciples were fishermen. Paul was an intellectual, but he set no store by it, and had interesting things to say about the advantage of foolishness in i Corinthians chapter one.
‘non New Testament.’ The heart of every camp was a presentation of the death of Christ on our behalf quoting Isaiah 53:5-6, Romans 3:23 and Romans 6:23. I forget the subjects of the rest of the talks, but I don’t understand the charge you make.
“What the Bible Teaches by R. A. Torrey.’ Yes, Torrey was the thing. I think his straight talk had an appeal. What I gleaned from reading his books was that the Bible is the word of God. See https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/torrey/divine-origin/complete.pdf for the text I read. I found a copy in a wooden box in the classroom at school where the weekly meeting was held. I did own a copy of What the Bible Teaches until a few years ago. I confess I have never read it: I prefer to read the text of the Bible myself and make up my own mind. I never heard this particular book referred to at the time, but then my focus was on the daily program and the activities at camp. I recall Real Tennis with pleasure. One of the officers had a blue in it and made the afternoon a memorable one.
Let me finish with a happy memory from camp. I met a boy one day who was overjoyed. He had bought a Mars bar from the tuck shop and foolishly left it on a surface in the library, where boys came and went all the time. Twenty-four hours later he remembered what he had done and went to look to see if it was still there. To his astonishment he found it had not been taken! He couldn’t believe it. He told me with glowing eyes that he had decided to become a Christian as a…
On the ‘anti-intellectual’ point:
Yes there certainly was and remains some obscurantism and ideology in even the more educated echelons of evangelicalism.
However:
(1) If they were anti-intellectual, then why focus so much on Oxford and Cambridge? (Weekly prayer, termly reunions, annual pupil-conferences with an intellectual main speaker – Profs RJ Berry and O O’Donovan in my time.) The more intelligent the institution, the stronger following the UCCF tends to receive there.
(2) Why run pre-exam reading/revision parties covering all subjects at Easter?
(3) Some boys or students received the fabled personal invitation who belonged clearly to the swots or geeks. I was undoubtedly one, having little else to recommend me apart from music. Together with the son of a famous classical scholar at my school. If you are to be a leader in the future generation (and only some of us attained that, not including myself) then the intellectual sphere is one crucial sphere in which to be a leader. PhDs were attained in the 1970s-80s generation by (among those that spring to mind) CJ Davis, James Steven, Peter Walker, myself, and of course Mark Stibbe (and from an earlier generation Peter Krakenberger). Richard Morse was a wizard at crosswords as was Johnny Juckes at psychology, Patrick Miles & Vernon Wilkins at maths.
David – Thank you for your comment. I do find the constant demeaning of more orthodox Christian belief on this site to be tiring that I have appreciated your fresh honesty.
Dear Leslie, the problem is that some, may I say, rather old fashioned beliefs are no longer particularly orthodox. And it is often the old fashioned and literal people who demean others’ faith because it is not the same as their own. None of us should do that. Different views are ok. This site is mostly about support for those who are hurt. We should all do that, too.
Further to English Athena’s comment (for which many thanks), I would like to add that I very much appreciate David’s observations, and I have had the pleasure of visiting his very thoughtful website, which I would recommend. I suspect I am not alone in being extremely, and warmly, impressed by David’s profound knowledge of Scripture.
I, for one, do not wish to demean orthodoxy. Although a layman, I would not subscribe to the XXXIX Articles with a ‘sigh and a smile’ (as Lytton Strachey put it). No, I mean what I say when reading the Articles or reciting the creeds and I do not care for inadequate liturgical incantations like ‘for the word of the Lord’ in response to lessons. What I want to say is ‘This *is* the Word of the Lord’.
Nor do I see any necessary contradiction between scripture and science. If advances in science have placed scripture in a different perspective, then I am happy to adopt an allegorical interpretation of the latter (a mode of interpretation which was commonplace in the middle ages: https://www.eerdmans.com/Products/CategoryCenter/TGN!HL/henri-de-lubac.aspx, and much else besides). The dichotomy between faith and reason is something which I consider rather bogus – the product of John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White in the US, and Thomas Huxley and his school in the UK – this is simply the simplistic and bigoted mirror image of the dichotomies advanced by ‘fundamentalists’. Nor am I at all certain that a strong faith in Biblical precepts is a restraint upon human progress: Britain made some of its greatest social, moral and scientific advances when the Bible was the keystone in its literary and philosophical arch: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/a-people-of-one-book-9780199570096?cc=gb&lang=en&. I have been much impressed by the series of four very erudite volumes produced by Stephen Gaukroger which has deconstructed the supposed bifurcation between religion and science (including one published earlier this year): https://global.oup.com/academic/product/civilization-and-the-culture-of-science-9780198849070?q=gaukroger&lang=en&cc=gb, an interesting counterpoint to the great series on the philosophical contest between religion and ‘reason’ produced by Jonathan Israel for the same publisher.
One of the reasons for my being an Anglican is my subscription to Richard Hooker’s notion of authority deriving from scripture, tradition and reason, all in a happy equipoise.
Thus I might be sceptical about every aspect of life and human endeavour, and yet I believe – I have made the ‘leap of faith’ – and have done so as an orthodox Christian.
Hear, hear. Although I’m not sure what label to put upon my own faith. Still evangelical. Liberal? Humane, I hope. But I’m still here.
Anti-intellectualism. Interesting. What I mean is not that CU members were dull or unable to think – clearly they were not, and as Mr Pennant hints many go on to illustrious careers in business and professions displaying that there is no lack of brain power. “Intellectual” to me implies not merely an ability to memorise and ratiocinate, but a willingness to imagine, to say “what if?”, to challenge premises and change them if necessary, and to have no holds barred. To use my own experience as an example, CU members I knew back in the day and their successors I have met since are well able to reason and argue – until they come up against biology, specifically embryology and the insights and evidence it gives us into life forms on the planet. Then the shutters come down. God made man in his image. This is not the place for a more detailed exposition, and anyway many more eloquent and knowledgeable than I have done so and are doing so. Suffice it to say that the notion that we are animals (reptiles really – there have been few structural changes since), mammals, primates (apes not archbishops), is a step too far. Some Christians can’t reconcile this with their theology, with their Christology, and with words written down 2000 years ago in a different language with different idioms and worked on by redactors and translators. For me, theology is a product of the human mind, and the fact is that different people think differently because of inherited patterns of brain wiring, of brain chemistry, of thought processes, and the way all these can be modified and “trained” by upbringing and experience. Were it not so, we would still be scrabbling around in caves. I don’t imagine that CU types (I’m not being pejorative) and I would agree, but I hope that they would not condemn me. Unfortunately, I had the feeling that they did – and maybe I did them, though not now.
I am inclined to think that one aspect of Iwerne etc. which is often overlooked in these discussions is the influence of the public school tradition itself. Smyth was at a public school in Canada, which describes itself as fully in the English public-school tradition. All these men had been at major public schools, most likely preceded by preparatory schools from the age of 8. It is becoming increasingly recognised in psychology/therapy circles how potentially damaging to the emotional & sexual development of an individual that is.
Underlying, and seamlessly interwoven with, the public school tradition is the tradition of “Muscular Christianity”. The genesis of this movement was in the mid Victorian era at a time when fear of sexual temptation in the years between puberty and marriage was at its height. Muscular Christianity produced a distorted relationship between the Christian and his own body, where in its crudest formulation the male body was seen as as an object to be tamed, controlled and subdued. This tradition was still the dominant force in public school education well into the late 20th century. The theological angle is important, but I think the activities of Smyth, Fletcher, etc. have to be understood in the light of this. The sexual formation, if you like, of boys in this tradition took place in the context of other boys, in an atmosphere of confusion, ignorance and bravado. Many of these men effectively remained in the public school milieu all their lives, by taking up careers in such fields as the military, politics and the church where they were able to remain within a coterie of other public school boys. The public school tradition also provided a context where beating was considered an entirely healthy and appropriate form of punishment. I would therefore suggest that theological and biblical resources are appropriated in a particular shape to match this public school tradition. So if you’ve been brought up with beating as a healthy masculine form of punishment, it’s not difficult to find resources from the Bible to back it up. I’m suggesting this as an alternative context rather than a full explanation, so for example Smyth clearly had a disturbed psychological profile, and found the Iwerne/public-school/muscular Christianity tradition a great vehicle in which to practice it.
John Duncan, thanks. Interesting. I have personally regretted being at boys only schools from 8 to 18. Cambridge followed, where the ratio of men to women was 13 to one. I found that trying to be a fully rounded adult after that upbringing was difficult.
Another matter arising. It seems to me that the phrase liberal theology begs the question – liberated from what? Why, the strait-jacket of conservative theology of course. And why does the latter have a tendency to become rule-based, even fierce and severe at times? Because of the liberal approach that waters down the truth. No wonder there is a hostility between the two. They are like sparring partners in a boxing ring.
I recall an old story of the Scotland Road Free School set up by some earnest young people for the deprived children of Liverpool. There were to be no rules. This was emphasised – NO rules (except this one). The young people were to learn in an atmosphere of freedom. Things went well for a while, until one day one of the leaders discovered a boy in the basement with sticks, paper and matches determined to burn down the school. Now what?!
On the one hand, Paul could be very fierce at attempts to water down the truth, e.g. in his letter to the Galatians. He was also firm about the Romans paying their taxes and showing respect, but then an interesting thing happens: his thought moves straight into love being the crucial thing, without missing a beat. “Love is the fulfilment of the law (Romans 13:6-10).” Perhaps he had the best of both worlds. Jesus, we recall, was full of grace and truth (John 1:14). Fascinating.
David, like you I’m from a conservative evangelical background and I suspect we’e read many of the same books. Jim Packer’s ‘Knowing God’, A.W. Tozer’s ‘The Knowledge of the Holy’, and I’ve also read ‘Hudson Taylor and Maria’ among others. I’m not sure, however, that I would describe liberal theology as being hostile to conservative theology in the way you describe, or that liberals are ‘liberated from’ conservative theology. Many have never been conservative.
The Oxford English Dictionary gives 4 definitions of ‘liberal’, and none includes the idea of being freed from something. The concept is broadly that of being generous, open-minded, ‘respecting behaviour or opinions different from one’s own’.
I think many liberal theologians – and I would certainly include Stephen among them – are not watering down the truth but merely acknowledging that truth is complicated and life is messy. The Bible itself amply illustrates both of these. Indeed, there are many uncertainties in interpreting what the Bible has to say to us. Even St. Peter admits that St. Paul’s letters are difficult to understand and that some twist them and other scriptures to their destruction.
I agree with you that some rules are necessary, and most liberals in all fields would agree that boundaries are essential. You won’t find Liberal Democrats urging that we abandon the rule of law, for instance. Children especially need to know what the limits are if they are to grow up to be contented and balanced adults.
I agree with you also that love is paramount. I appreciate the way you frequently bring us back to that.
Thanks Janet. So helpful, and thoughtful.
More on the intellectual question. There were other recommended books besides Torrey. The ones I read were the volumes by G. F. Dempster about rescuing people in London’s East End (The Love that Will not Let Me Go, Finding Men for Christ etc) which still move me profoundly, the two volume life of Hudson Taylor, the nineteenth century missionary to mainland China, by Mr and MRs Howard Taylor (i Hudson Taylor in Early Years and ii Hudson Taylor the Growth of a Soul, hardback) which I have read many times with awe, and the four books by S. D. Gordon (Quiet Talks to Men etc) which I never took to. I also recall being told of Jim Packer’s recommendation of the seven volume Treasury of David, a compendium commentary on the Psalms – “Sell the shirt off your back to get it.” I was able to get a copy without parting with my wardrobe, thankfully. I worked through a volume and a half of it before tiring. Very worthy, but long.
Does that help in the intellectual / anti-intellectual discussion?
It doesn’t help me, David, because as I said I take the word intellectual to imply vitality, suppleness, ability to think differently both from others and from what I thought last week based on new information – to test, to explore, to push at boundaries to see where that leads. Your examples are all theology/bible/church.
You sound like a man after my own heart, Stanley.
I’ve thought so too, Christopher. Our views on theology might be different, or not, but I enjoy being made to think afresh.
Thanks, both. Suppleness and rigidity. Interesting.
Americans are about to go into space in their own rocket again this weekend, recalling the space shuttle which exploded due to the O rings in 1986. The O rings were designed to be supple within a certain temperature range, but for political reasons the shuttle was launched when the temperature was too low. The O rings did not bend as they should, gas escaped, and there was a tragedy.
On some matters I want to be supple, and on some I want to be rigid, and I use my intellect to decide which is which. Suppleness is not always a virtue to my mind.
What do you think?
Yes to your thought of being able to change my view when new information comes in. Agreed.
Yes – suppleness is obviously not a virtue per se, though the ability to be supple when appropriate is. It’s just a case of going with the evidence.
So what was on the Iwerne bookstalls? Here I am indebted to David’s memory. I remember the central emphasis being on pastoral nurture, together with robust study. The quiet time could combine both.
O Hallesby, Prayer. John Stott, Basic Christianity, commentaries on Johannine and Pastoral letters. John Eddison titles. Yes, Torrey was being passed around. So was ‘Bash: A Study in Spiritual Power’. At our school CU (Iwerne-based, but possibly a slightly different sort of selection of books) we had books by the 1970s evangelists: Watson, Green, Delve, and also adventure stories liks God’s Smuggler, The Hiding Place, The Cross And The Switchblade, Run Baby Run. On camp, a personal copy of a book by Wimber was heavily critically annotated by a camper who was later to do doctoral studies in such questions.
When Stott’s The Cross Of Christ came out soon afterwards, it could be seen as a well argued book that was in agreement with the theology that had been dominant at Iwerne, the theology also summarised in John Eddison’s hymn ‘At The Cross of Jesus’.
Which brings us onto hymnody. For some years, and certainly throughout the eighties if not later (so: post David Fletcher) there was a little book of 4-liners or 8-liners that were sung, with a best thought or 2 then being picked out of the words, and then re-sung. (Ratio of number of words to brain capacity is not normally so generous in a typical parish church.) Those central to the mission of Iwerne would be (together with Eddison’s hymn) Swinstead’s ‘There’s a Way Back To God’ and ‘Out there Among[st] the Hills’; the song of pastoral assurance ‘My Sheep Hear My Voice’ (in Youth Praise II but with the tune rewritten); Be Valiant Be Strong Resist The Powers of Sin; Christ Jesus Stands Among Us and calls us to begin a Life Of Joy And Purpose with victory over sin; Behold I Stand; Mine Are The Hands to do the work; Make the Book live to me O Lord (and/or Master, Speak?); the Owenses’ ‘Freely, Freely’. The Geoffrey Beaumont and Michael Brierley and Patrick Appleford tunes c1960 were sometimes approved for simplicity and wholeheartedness. When the New Churches (Kingsway) songs came in, it was again mainly the shorter and wholehearted simple ones that were selected for use: Ascribe Greatness, Majesty, You Are The King of Glory, Jesus Is Lord. Full length hymns would normally be reserved for the Sunday service: e.g., I’ve found a friend; How firm a foundation.
Aha! I do know the last few songs/hymns! I don’t know the earlier selection, but the book list made me smile. I still have some of those.
Thanks EA.
Anyone curious as to the *origin* of the songs should seek out the CSSM songbook of the 1930s – pretty rare but I’m fortunate to have a copy. Rather like Stainer used the constraints of the 4-line tune to jam as much harmonic interest in as possible, these songs use the constraints of the 4-line song to encapsulate some teaching or message as best and as richly and as memorably as they can. (The benefit of that for youngsters, and for Street Missions and Beach Missions and passers-by, are readily apparent.) Winners in the category of that discipline, to my mind, would be:
Wide, wide as the ocean; When the road is rough and steep; There’s a way back to God; Cleanse me from my sin Lord (the last one by Dick Hudson Pope, a great forbear of Iwerne). These cream of the crop survived till Junior Praise (Marshall Pickering 1984-) and onwards.
E H Swinstead RA, a top painter, was responsible for many of the songs. He also wrote a fine and forgotten alternative tune to ‘At Calvary’ (in Sacred Songs and Solos).’
There are also some funny titles like ‘Down went Dagon’ – whatever happened to that? I had a Methodist hymnbook that included ‘Fearfully, timidly’. Paul Kerensa has collected some of these lost ‘gems’.
CSSM (Children’s Special Service Mission) was the precursor to Scripture Union, if I’m not wrong. Their combined history was written up by Iwerne man and prolific biographer John Pollock (‘The Good Seed’) – for anyone seeking a better understanding of Iwerne. Novelist Patricia St John worked closely with them, and the products and culture of their work are typified in the families in ‘Treasures of the Snow’ and ‘Tanglewoods Secret’ (books and films of both).
What a memory Christopher! I used to accompany many of those on the piano at Swanage at the gatherings.
How lovely – one of my regrets is that I never actually became the Iwerne pianist, though I play for the British New Testament Conference and for Harrow reunions.
An historical note of interest is that the first Iwerne pianist was the great Professor Sir Henry Chadwick, who actually read Music at university. Chadwick’s brother Owen (OM) lauded Stott’s CICCU Mission of 1952 as all they had been hoping for: a presentation of the authentic gospel.
As one who relishes obscure connections, The Revd Sir Henry Chadwick was, indeed, a remarkable man, and another who also served a curacy at Emmanuel Wimbledon. He was certainly an accomplished musician, uniquely Head of College in both Oxford (Christ Church) and Cambridge (Peterhouse), studied organ with Henry Ley (a famous name in organ circles) at Christ Church where he also played piano duets with a later organist Sydney Watson who, coincidentally, composed the fine hymn tune “Morestead” named after the village mentioned in several posts above.
I have much enjoyed the exchanges you, Dr Shell and Mr Pennant have had.
Just a bit of silly pedantry, Chadwick served his title a Emmanuel, South Croydon (1943-45), amidst much bombing. It’s where he worked on his famous edition of Origen’s ‘Contra Celsum’ (1953). Emmanuel remains a flourishing evangelical church with a large youth component.
I’ve seldom heard either clerical Chadwick be referred to as ‘Sir’, though they were both KBE. My understanding is that when John Dalton (Hugh’s father and canon of Windsor) was given a KCVO in 1911 there was some discussion and vexation about whether he could use the prefix. His former pupil, George V, decreed that as knighthood is of military origin, a parson and his wife could have the rank of a knight but not the accolade. Thus it is not ‘correct’ to refer to any knighted priest as ‘Sir’. Whether this applies to dames is moot, but it is likely that it does. It is also one of reasons why clergy have been given a KBE (or above), because Kt (for a knight bachelor) cannot be used as a suffix. Peggy Chadwick was almost never referred to as Lady Chadwick. It is also why clergy are simply given the insignia rather than dubbed. However, the rule has broken down in the case of Diarmaid McCulloch, who has never resigned his diaconate, and Bernard Silverman, both appointed knights bachelor. I suspect that in both instances the authorities had overlooked the fact that they were in orders. The rule, incidentally, is a silly one: it has never applied to baronets, even though the position of baronet was also arguably military in origin (as per knight banneret). Apologies for this.
Chadwick was indeed a pianist and organist of rare talents (I write this with trepidation knowing that you, Mr Pennant, Prof. Monkhouse, etc., are gifted musicians), and took a MusB in addition to his BA in the subject. Stephen Darlington recounted Chadwick’s sight-reading abilities in his memorial address at Christ Church: “In Cambridge his reputation as a virtuoso keyboard player was quickly established. In his very first term Boris Ord of King’s College, whom Chadwick described as then the greatest influence on him, summoned him one evening to entertain his dinner guests with Chabrier’s arrangement of his España for two pianos. Chadwick had to read his extremely difficult part at sight. Patrick Hadley, professor of music, turned the pages for him, at every turn thumping him in the back, shouting ‘Bravo!'”
My apologies. I misread about Emmanuel and it should, indeed, have been Croydon and not Wimbledon.
I shouldn’t stray too far on matters musical on this thread. Some very interesting and gifted musicians have been mentioned and I know several amusing anecdotes, especially about Henry Ley. Possibly another time and in another place.
Yes. I do think we are wandering off the topic a bit. If we post anecdotes about famous people who went to Iwerne camps, we would talk for years to come!
Going back over some previous posts, I found some I’d missed. This has been a very interesting exchange. I also was reminded that the discussion about liberal or not is like “fuzzy logic”. Something that they’re trying to get computers to do because it’s so useful. Is it easier for someone science trained like me? I was brought up with a mother who was and is a devout Christadelphian, a pretty fundamentalist group, but having a Botany degree, accepted evolution as a reality. A scientist can always say “I don’t know”, which makes some people uncomfortable. But it seems to me that you can combine holding strong views with saying ” but I could be wrong “. And I would regard that as healthy.