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Collective Sovereignty? Conscience in the Gathered Church c. 1875-1918

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2016

Clyde Binfield
Clyde Binfield*
Affiliation:
University of Sheffield
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Extract

Sovereignty ought to be a natural concept for Christians whose rhetoric is full of words or collections of words like ‘Lord’ or ‘King’ or ‘Kingdom’ or ‘Crown Rights of the Redeemer’. It ought to be doubly natural for the Christian inhabitants of an earthly kingdom whose monarch protects a national church. In fact, ‘sovereignty’ is not a word which comes trippingly to ordinary Christian lips, and it is a religious concept as fraught with theological ambiguity for Christians as it is a political concept fraught with secular ambiguity for citizens. Indeed, for British Christians and citizens the ambiguities merge. For a Roman Catholic who recently edited The Times, ‘Liberty puts the individual in command of his own decisions; his vote is the ultimate political sovereign in a democracy; his purchase is the ultimate economic sovereign in a free market.’ For a critic of the Methodist-turned-Anglican who was Prime Minister when that was written, ‘Where the Church of England lists thirty-nine essential articles of faith, Mrs Thatcher names three: the belief in the doctrine of Free-Will; in the divinely created sovereignty of individual conscience; and in the Crucifixion and Redemption as the exemplary, supreme act of choice.’ Yet to a political journalist, interpreting the same Prime Minister’s view of British sovereignty as opposed to any Western European understanding, it seems that Parliament alone is sovereign: ‘no citizen or subordinate authority can have any unalienable rights against the state, which can lend out power to groups or individuals but never give it away.’ Whose vote then is ultimate political sovereign? Whose conscience then is divinely-created sovereign?

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History Subsidia , Volume 9: The Church and Sovereignty c.590-1918 , 1991 , pp. 479 - 506
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1987 

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References

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13 Ibid., p. 13.

14 Ibid., p. 51.

15 Ibid., p. 53.

16 Ibid., p. 57.

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19 Ibid., pp. 62-3.

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21 Ibid., p. 64.

22 Ibid., pp. 64, 65.

23 Ibid., p. 72.

24 Ibid., p.65.

25 Ibid., p. 66.

26 Ibid., pp. 66-7.

27 Ibid., p. 73.

28 Ibid., p. 69.

29 Ibid., p. 80.

30 Congregational Year Book (1907), p. 272; ibid. (1918), p. 248.

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55 Ibid.

56 Ibid., p. 79.

57 Ibid., p. 80.

58 Congregational Year Book (1923), p. 188; ibid. (1929), p. 154.

59 Davies, In Search of Myself, pp. 86, 89, 90.

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79 Ibid., p. 106.

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82 Ibid., pp. 76-7.

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96 ‘The two things are not so incompatible as might appear’, glossed the Quadrant’s John Dickson of 21st London Company. Quadrant Magazine, 12, no. 2, Feb. 1909, ns, p. 32. I am particularly indebted to Miss Grace Hoy and Mr David Freeman for drawing my attention to The Quadrant Magazine.

97 Quadrant Magazine, 7, no. 11, Nov. 1909, p. 218. For Arnold Freeman (1886-1972), Sheffield educationist, settlement worker, and anthroposophist, see Roberts, J., ‘Sheffield Education Settlement 1918—1955’ (Advanced Certificate of Education thesis. University of Sheffield, 1961)Google Scholar; and Albaya, Winifred, Through the Green Door (Sheffield, 1980).Google Scholar

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100 Ibid., p. 163.

101 Ibid., p. 164.

102 Ibid., pp. 164-6.

103 Ibid., p. 166.

104 Ibid., 13, no. 4, April 1910, pp. 62, 61.

105 Ibid., p. 61.

106 Ibid., p. 63.

107 Ibid., pp. 63-4.

108 Ibid., p. 64.

109 Ibid., p. 65.

110 Ibid., 13, no. 5, May 1910, p. 92.

111 Ibid., 12, no. 6, June 1909, pp. 111, 113.

112 Ibid., p. 114.

113 Ibid., 12, no. 9, Sept. 1909, pp. 174, 172.

114 Ibid., p. 173.

115 Ibid., 13, no. 5, May 1910, p. 84.

116 Ibid., 13, no. 6, June 1910, pp. 104-5.

117 Ibid., 12, no. 8, Aug. 1909, pp. 154—5.