Dr. Wilson Elected Bishop of Eau Claire (1928)

THE Rev. Frank B. Wilson, D.D., rector of Christ Church, Eau Claire, Wis., was elected first Bishop of Eau Claire by an overwhelming majority of both clerical and lay votes on the first ballot, in the primary council of this diocese, held here yesterday. The election was made unanimous.

The council opened with the conciliar Mass in Christ Church, which is to be the cathedral of the diocese, celebrated by the Rt. Rev. Reginald H. Weller, D.D., Bishop of Fond du Lac, assisted by the Rt. Rev. William Walter Webb, D.D., Bishop of Milwaukee, as gospeller, and the Rt. Rev. B. F. P. Ivins, D.D., Bishop Coadjutor of Milwaukee, as epistoler. After a brief adjournment for breakfast, the council was formally opened in the parish house by Bishop Ivins, and organized with the election of the Rev. R. D. Vinter as chairman pro tern. Following the adoption of a diocesan constitution and canons, the delegates adjourned to the church for the episcopal election.

An informal nominating ballot gave Dr. Wilson forty-eight of the seventy-five votes cast, with six each for the Rev. Frederick D. Butler of St. Paul and the Ven. Milo B. Goodall of Bice Lake, Wis.; five for the Ven. William H. Wolfe of Tomah, Wis.; four for the Rev. Francis P. Keicher of Hudson, Wis.; and the balance scattering. The first formal ballot followed, revealing a decisive majority for Dr. Wilson, and the election was thereupon made unanimous.

Following the signing of the testimonials of election, and a luncheon served by the women of the parish in the guild hall, the council reconvened and elected the following:

Standing Committee: The Rev. Robert D. Vinter, La Crosse, chairman; S. G. Moon, Eau Claire, secretary; the Rev. H. S. Kuth, the Rev. H. E. Chase, the Rev. F. R. Keicher, and Messrs. B. S. Mellinger, Gunner Anderson, and Judge Baldwin.

The trustees of the diocese were also elected, consisting of the Bishop ex-officio, and Messrs. G. Van Steenwyk, Otto Von Schroder, A. R. Owen, and F. S. Thompson. The Rev. A. H. Head was elected secretary of the diocese, and Otto Von Schrader, treasurer; R. W. Owen was elected missionary treasurer, and G. O. Linderman was appointed chancellor of the diocese. Examining chaplains appointed were the Rev. R. D. Vinter and the Ven. W. F. Wolfe.

Some two hundred and fifty people were present at the diocesan dinner, presided over by Claire Crocker of Spooner, Wis. Speakers included the Bishop-elect, the Bishops of Milwaukee and Fond du Lac, and the Bishop Coadjutor of Milwaukee. At the speakers’ table also were Mrs. Mary B. Dulany, whose generous gift to the episcopal endowment fund made the erection of the diocese financially possible, and who was presented with a large bouquet, and the Ven. Henry E. Chase, veteran missionary, whose work years ago as archdeacon in northern Wisconsin laid the foundations of the diocese of Eau Claire. Fr. Chase has been in ill health for a number of years, and when he made his appearance at the dinner, he was given a spontaneous and prolonged ovation.

The Bishop-elect of Eau Claire was born March 21, 1885, in Kittanning, Pa., the son of the Rev. and Mrs. William White. He received his B.A. degree from Hobart College in 1907, his S.T.D. in 1923, and his B.D. in 1923 from General Theological Seminary. He was ordained deacon in 1910 by the Rt. Rev. John Chanler White, D.D., Bishop of Springfield, and priest in the same year by the Bishop of Chicago.

Dr. Wilson was married in 1911 to Miss Marie Louise Walker. He was priest-in-charge of St. Ambrose’s Church, Chicago Heights, Ill., 1910-13; rector, St. Andrew’s Church, Chicago, 1913-15; rector, St. Augustine’s, Wilmette, Ill., 1915-19; secretary-treasurer, diocesan board of religious education, 1913-17; associate secretary, national Field Department, 1924-25; director of diocesan publicity, 1925-26; delegate to the provincial synod, 1910-19-26; served as chaplain with the 86th Division, U. S. Army, and with the 332d Infantry, 1917-19; was field secretary of the Nation-wide Campaign, and was a deputy to the General Conventions of 1922, 1925, and 1928. He is the author of several books, including Contrasts in the Character of Christ, What a Churchman Ought to Know, Religion, and The Divine Commission, besides editor of the Witness.

The Living Church, November 22, 1928.

On Praying with the Orthodox (1929)

On Praying with the Orthodox (1929)
By the Rev. George Clark

IN MANY parishes these days we have some kind of contact with one or more groups of foreign-born Americans who are not in communion with the see of Rome. These people come to us or send for us and we must minister to them as well as we may or answer at the Last Assize as to our failures. But where contact with any such group is steady and sustained, two problems at once arise; the problem of getting the foreigner to understand us well enough to feel at home in our churches, and the far greater problem of first understanding the new American and then leading one’s flock to do the like. This takes time. And related to both is the third problem, how to keep the American-born and English-speaking children at home in the Episcopal Church yet loyal to and proud of the Church of their parents. This last, of course, we can only do when the parents belong to an Eastern Orthodox Church. Lapsed Romans are quite another problem and need separate treatment. Of them this paper says nothing at all.

There are a few Serbs in our parish, but beyond sick calls and funerals they ask nothing of us and we cannot give them more than they ask. But there are Greeks enough so that it is worth giving up a service once in a while to allow them the use of the church for their liturgy. And this means that some of us must work.

Our early Eucharist is said at half past seven. When it is over the altar must be stripped bare and washed lightly with warm water. And this washing must be done by the priest—the Anglican, I mean, not the Greek. Then fresh altar linen must be spread. Technically the Greek priest now has an altar which has not been used that day. Next a square table is put within the altar rails and placed against a side wall. This is for the service of the Prothesis. On it goes a lunch cloth, a cross, and two candlesticks with fresh candles in them. Near the front door is placed a table. On this the Orthodox priest will put his icons and a box of rock salt or sand for the placing of lighted tapers. And it seems to hurt no one’s feelings if a large piece of wrapping paper is placed on the carpet in front of this table. Incense and charcoal are placed conveniently in evidence in the sacristy, and a square of asbestos with an alcohol burner upon it and a small sauce pan beside it completes the preparation of the church. Knowing what we have to do, three of us can get our church ready for an Orthodox liturgy in twenty minutes, for a funeral in ten.

It takes longer to prepare the congregation than it does the church. It must be seen to that everybody is notified that on such and such a day the service will be Greek. Otherwise all those dear, good people who give the Episcopal Church as the one they stay home from will be out in force. Nor is notifying the flock all there is to it. For two or three Sundays beforehand it is time well spent to tell an average American congregation what is going to happen and why it is the same service as our own office for the Holy Communion. Rightly prepared for, an occasional Orthodox liturgy will vastly widen the average parishioner’s idea of the Holy Catholic Church he so glibly professes his faith in and will help him nobly over a lot of unworthy superstitions about liturgical accessories, incense for example.

It seems to be good form, at the least for the American priest, to be present at just as much of the divine liturgy as he can manage. It seems also to help considerably if the parishioners will drop in and drop out quietly as the drama of the Holy Sacrifice goes on. And there will be a few who will want to understand what it is all about. But it is just here that, if seems to me, most of us who are priests are too weak to help those of us who are lay. With the Division of Foreign-born Americans to help us as far as it is able, we are still a pretty helpless lot. Yet we need not be.

To begin with, we have The Service Book of the Greco-Russian Eastern Orthodox Church by Isabel Hapgood (Association Press). This is a rather ponderous book, well worth its price ($3.50), and well-nigh indispensable to the priest who has Orthodox Christians in his fold. But it is too bulky for the average layman, and for the priest it would be greatly improved if it had about a dozen pictures scattered through the text and about a hundred more rubrics. It can be had from the Division of Foreign-born Americans, 281 Fourth avenue, New York. For the layman who wants to follow the liturgy through intelligently but doesn’t want to pack a library with him, there are several smaller books. Father Papastefanou of the Hellenic Orthodox church in Fond du Lac, Wis., has a pretty well arranged edition, in Greek and English of the Anaphora of the Liturgy of Saint Chrysostom which is of great use already, though barely oft the press. His English is at times no English at all, but some of this at least is due to his censor and not to his own lack of skill. It is’a good book for Americans who have no Greek and for the English-speaking children of Greek parents. It is toJ these I have sold or recommended the book. It is the first book to come to my notice which shows a priest of the Greek Church trying to meet American, problems. For this reason I welcome the book. It is called Liturgical Egolpion, costs one dollar, and may be got from Father Papastefanou direct.

In the same class with the Liturgical Egolpion is The Divine Liturgy of Our Father Among the Saints, John Chrysostom, edited by Dom Placid de Meester and done into English by the Benedictines of the Stanbrook Community. It is the work of Roman Catholic scholars, but personally I cannot see that that is anything against it. It contains the Prothesis as well as the Anaphora, the notes are fuller and more numerous than in Fr. Papastefanou’s book, and in places the English is much better. In other places it is not. It will not slip so easily into a coat pocket, as it is both wider and taller than the Liturgical Egolpion. It is published in London by Burnes, Oates, and Washbourne, and costs in paper about $1.00 and in cloth $1.40. The American agents are Benziger Brothers.

For the American who would follow the Orthodox liturgy, whether in his own parish church or in an Orthodox church, the two books just mentioned have one very serious lack. They have no pictures of Orthodox worship. And pictures are almost as necessary as translations of the service. For this reason the Liturgy of the Eastern Orthodox Church, translated into English by the Rev. H. H. Maughan, is helpful. There is no Greek text, but there are eleven illustrations. From the preface I judge they are pictures of Orthodox churches in England. It is an easy book with which to follow a service, but it is even less adapted for American pockets than is Dom Placid’s book. For compactness Fr. Papastefanou has the field—which is not at all the same as saying Fr. Maughan’s book is not a good book to own. It is. It is a Faith Press publication and can be got from Morehouse for $1.40, at which price, it seems to me, he might at least pay postage. Maybe I think so because I’m not selling books but only buying them.

But to go back to pictures. The Faith Press has two portfolios which are useful. They are Russian Worship and The Sacraments in Russia. They do as well for Greeks or Serbs or Rumanians as for Russians. Owned and loaned, they are worth a great deal.

And, while I’m at it, I’d like to add a good word for The Eastern Church in the Western World (Morehouse, $1.25), the joint effort of the three secretaries for the Division of the Foreign-born. It is a good book to own, to read, and to pass, on. And another good book—if you’re fortunate enough to own it— is Greeks in America, which Dr. Burgess wrote back in 1913 when he was a parish priest and there was no Division of the Foreign-born. It is out of print and its statistics are out of date, but it ought to be revised and re-issued. It simply “knocks off the map” J. P. Xenides’ Greeks in America, a study prepared by the patrons of the ill-fated Interchurch World Movement.

There are 500 parishes where the Episcopal Church has contacts with the Greeks. That means 500 parishes where we may help to answer our own Lord’s prayer that we may all be one. And that calls, on our part, for sympathy, for patience, and for prayer. But chiefly prayer. And that we may pray with them with the spirit and with the understanding also is the purpose of this paper.

—The Living Church, February 2, 1929, pp. 473-474.

Charles Neale Field, S.S.J.E. (1929)

Charles Neale Field, S.S.J.E. (1929)
By the Rev. William H. van Allen, S.T.D.

WHEN Father Field was buried, January 17th, it marked the end of an epoch in the history of the American Church. He was the oldest member of the Society of St. John the Evangelist; and when he joined the staff of St. Clement’s, Philadelphia, the habit of the society was rather a reason for suspicion than a recommendation. In these forty years, the attitude has altogether changed; and Fr. Field was himself largely answerable.

Born in Reading, Berkshire, in 1849, the son of a priest, graduated B.A. from Durham, and from Cuddesdon a little later, he was made deacon in 1872 and priest the following year, by the Bishop of Exeter. His first curacy was at Plympton St. Mary’s, Devon; but after several years there he determined to identify himself with the Cowley Fathers at Oxford. In 1890 he joined the staff of St. Clement’s, Philadelphia, afterwards being sent to St. John Evangelist’s on Beacon Hill, Boston, becoming Superior in due course and holding that office for many years. Laying it aside, he remained a member of the order until his death. Strangely, he is the first member in America to fall asleep.

Such are the essential facts of Fr. Field’s career in the Church; yet one had to know him well to clothe those facts with reality. “He was a holy and a humorous man,” one said on the morning of his funeral; and those two qualities, marvelously combined in him, were distinctive. Tall, spare, utterly frank, never concerned too much about his own dignity, no one could meet him first without recognizing his transparent simplicity and sincerity. His enthusiastic sympathy for every sort of constructive good work was never appealed to in vain, whether for discharged prisoners, for the souls in purgatory, or for the unprivileged here. He was chaplain-general of the Iron Cross, president of the Massachusetts Catholic Club, on the councils of the Guild of All Souls and the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament; but, more than these, he was peculiarly the apostle to colored folk. With shame be it said no American-born priest has even shown such aptitude to understand them and their characteristics, for good and for evil, as this Englishman. To see him among the colored children who loved to crowd around him was to learn to love him afresh; and his farm at Foxboro is a perpetual memorial of his affectionate care for the needy little folk of that race.

Like all truly humorous persons, he was admirably patient and forbearing, suffering fools gladly; and his conversation, whether at table, in general society, or alone with one other, glowed with all the qualities which endeared him to people of every type and class.

Of late he had formed the habit of spending the winters in the West Indies, and had made himself a place there such as he had filled in Boston for so long. But this year he remained in the North; and it was at the home of a loving friend that he breathed out his soul in peace.

“O may my soul be with Bedell!” Such was the aspiration of a Roman cleric as he stood by the grave of the holy Bishop of Kilmore, the echoes still in the air of the salute which the muskets of the Irish rebels had fired in honor of that ornament of the seventeenth-century Church of Ireland.

We, who rejoiced in his friendship, may well have echoed that phrase as we passed out today from his funeral, bishops, a goodly company of priests, and members of religious communities. Among all men there was now no suspicion, no wrong ideas, but only a reverent gratitude for all that he had meant to the Church, the city, the community, and to ourselves. May he rest in peace!

—The Living Church, January 26, 1929, p. 432.

St. Elisabeth’s, Philadelphia (1928)

By Louis C. Cadwallader

SO MANY distressing rumors have been floating around the country with regard to the destiny of the historic parish of St. Elisabeth, Philadelphia, that I offer no apology for requesting you to insert this article in order to reassure the thousands of your readers who knew and loved both the church and the saintly priests who have ministered in the past.

The facts appear to be as follows: On the resignation of Father Ward, the vestry felt that, owing to the loss of membership through removals, the influx of foreign-born to the exclusion of the old parishioners, and other causes, they were unable to continue to carry the financial burden of the parish and executed a deed conveying the property to the diocese under certain conditions. The diocese has long felt the need of an adequate center for social and religious work among the immigrant population and decided that in the parish buildings of St. Elisabeth they had an ideal position for the work. They decided, therefore, that the parish should be used for this purpose, and at the same time determined that the standard of ritual and Churchmanship associated with the parish should be rigidly maintained and the habits and traditions so dear to the remaining members of the church be respected as far as possible.

From various sources the rumor spread among the congregation and through Catholic circles throughout the country that the church was to be turned into an Italian mission with an Italian priest; that English services were to be discontinued, and the whole fabric of Catholic worship swept away and destroyed. I desire to impress upon your readers that these reports are absolutely unfounded.

The new priest-in-charge was selected by the Bishop partly on account of his unrivalled knowledge and experience among the foreign-born. He knows their languages, their psychology, their social side, and their literature. He was furthermore selected after consultation with and with the cordial approval of the leaders of the Catholic party in the diocese.

I have recently made an independent investigation of St. Elisabeth, in order to satisfy myself as to the truth or otherwise of these statements, and in justice to Bishop Garland and as a tardy act of reparation for my own action in accepting them I desire to make the results as public as possible.

During my first visit to the church, I found a small congregation hearing Mass in an unknown tongue. I found that they were Ukrainians, who, coming into the city to sell their farm and garden produce, are provided with the services of their Church in their own rite and language. These people were ministered to by Father Crosby in his last parish and have followed him into the city in order to make St. Elisabeth their spiritual home. On subsequent visits I saw Father Crosby dealing with Greeks, Slavs, Russians, and people of whose nationality I had never even heard. He seemed to be general adviser, doctor, lawyer, and priest. I talked to the one or two young people loitering in the street near the church and found that already they are looking forward to the new scheme of juvenile work already in tentative working order. The whole atmosphere of the Church is redolent of vigor, life, and hope, in distinction to the air of gloom and depression that permeated it a few weeks ago.

A few things he said struck me so forcibly that at the risk of undue length I am passing them on to your readers. The gist of his remarks were as follows: This is a Catholic parish and thanks to Bishop Garland’s wise foresight and sympathetic attitude will remain one. Now is the first chance for the Catholic party to support a definite Catholic foreign-born mission and show what they can do. If the Catholics had supported Father Ward in a practical manner and talked a great deal less, the parish would never have become a diocesan mission. Now is their chance; they are writing letters from all over the country expressing their concern about St. Elisabeth, now let us see what they will do.

We do not want much money; once we get started, if the mission cannot support itself, we have failed. The diocese has promised to repair the parish house and the church. The parish house is practically in ruins through dirt and neglect. We have a comprehensive scheme of work which is all ready to start as soon as we have the means to do it.

The diocese is paying the salary and putting the place in repair. If we are to revive the full glory of the services of the Church, we must have Catholic support. We have no organist, no janitor, no choir, no altar boys. If I can raise $3,000 to put us on our feet I have every confidence that we can revive. I am too busy to go out begging. It is the business of the many friends of St. Elisabeth to prove their friendship by coming to the church and helping us. We need prayers, we need voluntary workers, we need a parish visitor.

In conclusion may I appeal to the Catholics of Philadelphia to rally round St. Elisabeth and its priest? Go and see him and the work—see the conditions and what they are trying to do. Attend occasionally the services in the church—if you can spare the time give an hour or so to work among the boys and girls. There is work for all. Let us thank God that St. Elisabeth instead of being a cause for despair bids fair to become a center of Catholic teaching and a beacon of light among those alien brethren in Christ who can only be reached by this church of ours with its sacraments, its Catholicity, and its Americanism.

—The Living Church, December 1, 1928, p. 168.

Bishop Torok (1935)

LAST SUNDAY, in an unique ceremony held in Christ Church Cathedral, Eau Claire, Wis., the Rt. Rev. Dr. John Took was formally received as a bishop in the American Episcopal Church.

It will be recalled that in 1924 Dr. Torok, while a priest of this Church in good standing, was consecrated by Eastern Orthodox bishops for special work among foreign-born Americans who were to be affiliated with the Episcopal Church. Although the consecration was a valid one and was performed in good faith on the part of all concerned, it was an unprecedented and irregular procedure and consequently Dr. Torok’s status as a Bishop was not recognized by this Church on his return to America.

Rather than cause further confusion, Bishop Torok retired from the active ministry, and the project remained in abeyance until last year. At that time it was revived by Bishop Wilson who sought to have the status of Bishop Torok regularized. The council of the diocese of Eau Claire accordingly elected Dr. Torok as Suffragan Bishop of that diocese, but when the ratification of this election was brought before the House of Bishops last fall the House refused to approve it. In so doing no ruling was given as to Dr. Torok’s status. Subsequently the Presiding Bishop appointed a committee of bishops which, we understand, found that Bishop Torok’s consecration is fully valid, though irregular. Acting upon that information, Bishop Wilson has now formally received Bishop Torok as a Bishop in this Church. He will not, of course, have a seat or vote in the House of Bishops, since that is dependent upon election, but he will be able to exercise other normal function of a minister in episcopal orders.

It is to be hoped that the troublesome questions concerning the status of Bishop Torok have now been settled and that he will be given an opportunity to serve the Church in the position of Assistant to the Bishop of Eau Claire (an informal title, similar to that given Bishop Bennett in the diocese of Rhode Island) without further question. Bishop Torok is a comparatively young man and he has a knowledge of the foreign-born that may prove to be exceptionally valuable to the Church. We rejoice with him in the removal of the uncertainty as to his status and wish him Godspeed as he enters into his active episcopate.

—The Living Church, November 23, 1935, pp. 547-548.

Frederick Spies Penfold, Priest (1874-1926)

Frederick Spies Penfold, Priest (1874-1926)
By the Rev. Vivan A. Peterson

THOSE who received telegrams on Sunday morning, November 28th, announcing the fact that Fr. Penfold had suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and was reported to be dying, were shocked only slightly less than when the messages came later in the day announcing his decease. The loss of a friend is appreciable at once. The loss of a distinguished priest to the Church Militant is felt increasingly as his abilities and talents and wise counsel are no longer available. The testimony to the loss that has been suffered in Fr. Penfold’s death is witnessed by the series of resolutions which have been published by the various bodies with which he was associated.

The Rev. Frederick Spies Penfold was born in New York City, March 10, 1874, and died in Providence, R. I., on the First Sunday in Advent, November 28, 1926. Brought up under Baptist influences, he did not come to a knowledge of the Church until he had reached early manhood. He was fortunate, however, in learning the faith from one well able to impart it, the late Fr. Frank Sanborn, to whom he never ceased to be grateful. Entering the General Seminary, he made his preparation for the priesthood and was graduated in the class of 1900, receiving his B.D. degree the following year. He was ordained to the diaconate by Bishop Starkey of Newark, and to the priesthood by Bishop Abiel Leonard of Salt Lake. The first years of his ministry were spent as an assistant priest at Mount Calvary parish, Baltimore, and later at Holy Cross Church, New York City. During the period that he was attached to the latter parish his particular field was the work among German-speaking people, then a flourishing activity. In 1902 he became rector of the Church of the Good Shepherd, Quincy, Ill., and also a canon of Quincy Cathedral. From that post he was called to Marinette, Wis., where he served as rector of St. Paul’s parish, and as archdeacon. In 1911 he became rector of St. Luke’s parish, Racine, Wis. As pastor of an important parish, as a dean of convocation, and as deputy to General Convention he served the Church in the Diocese of Milwaukee. During his rectorate a parish house was built, a chapel arranged and properly fitted, and the entire interior of the church was renovated and practically rebuilt.

War Service in France In the spring of 1917, immediately after the United States had declared war upon the imperial German government, Fr. Penfold was offered a commission as chaplain in the First Wisconsin Field Artillery, which was later federalized and became the 121st F. A. of the 32d (Red Arrow) Division. Accepting this commission, he was ordered to active duty with his regiment at Camp Douglas, Wis., and served with them through the training period in Texas and through their active service in France.

Returning to the United States in April of 1919 he found a communication awaiting him advising him of the fact that he had been elected to succeed Dr. George McClellan Fiske as rector of St. Stephen’s parish, Providence, R. I. To this important post he gave the remaining years of his priesthood. The work that was accomplished during the seven and a half years of his administration was no less distinguished than that which had marked his activity in other fields. With a vastly improved fabric, with large additions to the parish endowments, with the constant work with souls in every strata of society, Fr. Penfold leaves a monument to an effective priesthood. Fortified by the sacraments whose efficacy he had proclaimed throughout the twenty-six years of his ministry, he departed this life.

Varied Activities Busy men are the ones who can be depended upon to do things. Fr. Penfold was such an one. His entire ministry was that of a parish priest. The constructive programs carried to completion under his leadership witness to his industry in the field where he labored. But over and above, there was the ever widening circle of activities of a larger sort, in the diocese and the national Church. Whatever task was laid upon him found him ready and able. As a member of the committee which organized the Priests’ Convention of 1924 he gave largely of his time and strength. As secretary of the first Catholic Congress held in New Haven, Conn., in 1925, he gave himself to a degree that is known only to a few of those on the Congress Committee. Most of his summer holiday that year was given to the labor of organizing and making that gathering the success that it proved. Precedents were established and methods evolved that will be of permanent value in future congresses.

The keen mind and the splendid talents which were shown in these activities that brought him in contact with a wide circle of Churchmen, were ever at the disposal of the Church. By his vigorous pen, which he used from time to time, and by his clear thought and forceful presentation of truth from the pulpit, he did much for the promotion of Catholic belief and practice. A clear thinker himself, he demanded clarity of thought in others. Vagueness of thought and expression which so often indicates looseness of faith and timidity left him cold. He felt that the head as well as the heart must be dedicated to the cause of God. Nothing less than the full counsel of God could satisfy him. A compromise might be a passing phase but it was never a settlement of any question.

It was this tenacity in all matters of principle that gave effect to his words and work. Forceful as a preacher, he nevertheless counted chiefly on pastoral work done with individuals for the results which he gained. Advising a brother priest who was struggling to inculcate certain standards of devotion among a group of poorly instructed people, he wrote, “Do not row them too hard from the pulpit. I have got my results by individual work with one at a time.” The detailed labor which it involved was time well spent. And the numbers of souls who profited by his ministry will continue to look back with gratitude for the blessings that such pastoral care brought. His letters from France during the war are preeminently the letters of a pastor. They are chiefly accounts of work being done among the troops, interest and suggestions for his parish at home, advice for his vicar, and requests for prayer for various objects.

Such unique abilities combined to make an outstanding priest and leader. The parishes over which he presided were enriched not merely in the building up of substantial fabrics, but in the developing of souls, and the devotional life. In each of those parishes he established the holy Mass as the chief act of worship, not merely as the norm during his own incumbency, but as the standard for the years to come. That was his continual thought: the placing of foundations for the future, and the erection of nothing that lacked in permanent value.

“Other men labored, and ye have entered into their labors.” The power of the Catholic movement in America has not been in great leaders in the sense that they have had great leaders in England, but it has been found in the ever-lengthening roll of parish priests conscious of their priesthood and what it involved. By quiet work with souls, by uncompromising adherence to principle, and by a readiness and ability to give an answer to every man for the hope that is in them, the cause is set forward and God is glorified while man is edified. The counsel and the help of Fr. Penfold will be missed by those with whom he worked, but the remembrance of a strong and effective priesthood will be cherished by many souls, both clerical and lay, whose road has been made easier by his work.

Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine. Et lux perpetua luceat ei.

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Anglo-Catholicism Infests the Diocese of Newark (1934)

Our Catholic Corner

ANGLO-CATHOLICISM INFESTS THE DIOCESE OF NEWARK

Grace Church, Newark, and the House of Prayer Centers of This Insidious Movement in the Protestant Episcopal Church

READERS of The Chronicle have been made aware this year of the quiet but sure growth of the cult of Anglo-Catholicism in the Diocese of New York. It has been the hope of The Chronicle’s roving reporter in this season’s series of articles in Our Catholic Corner to acquaint Protestant Episcopalians with conditions in the minor “Catholic” parishes in the New York area and to arouse some of our loyal adherents to action so that this alien movement in our Church might be stamped out in short order and the clerical minority that has been foistering this growth upon us put in its place. Bad as conditions are in the New York area, it is unfortunate that the “Catholic-minded” have been spreading their cult of superstition and Italianate voo-doo throughout the whole breadth of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States.

The Diocese of Newark is just a tube journey from the cathedral of Anglo-Catholicism in the East, the famous Church of Saint Mary the Virgin and the abode of the Merry Monks of Saint Mary’s. Fortified with pencil and paper and missionary zeal, your reporter braved the perils of the Hudson Tubes and traversed the industrial country side of north Jersey. When we arrived in the historic city we made at once for Grace Church. We had been told, dear reader, that Grace Church was on the up-and-up as far as Catholicism was concerned and that the Fathers in charge put on a regal Roman show. This we thought would please our readers and, perhaps, cause a few of our Jersey brethren to be on guard lest this nasty cult spread through their diocese with the speed with which it has recently infected the Diocese of New York. Grace Church is located on the main street of the city and occupies a vantage point in the centre of the fine business section of the town. The sign on the door of the church was one most humiliating for true Protestant Episcopalians, and one calculated to give undue emphasis to the eccentric rites of a small group in the Protestant Episcopal Church. We quote in detail the legend on the prominently located sign: “Holy Communion at 7:30; Children’s Mass at 10; Matins at 10.40 and Sung Mass at 11.” The list also included a Solemn Evensong for Sundays and the catchy postscript “Daily Masses.” This, dear readers, is how the Protestant Episcopal Church is represented on Newark’s busiest street. In the porch of the church a notice called attention to the fact that the Father Rector hears confessions at stated times or by “appointment.” We wonder where they have the confessionals for in our inspection of the edifice we saw no cupboard or cranny that might be used for this Romish device. When we opened the door a whiff of stale incense indicated that we were in one of the centers of Anglo-Catholicism. We looked about for some Holy Water stoups in which we had hoped to freshen up a bit after our arduous trip; but no, Grace has not come to this form of Catholic refreshment yet. The Rector was catechising the Sunday school as we entered. Like their brothers under the cassock, the Romanists, the Anglo-Catholic priests believe in training the children and feeding them noxious pabulum that it is most difficult for them to throw off when they reach the age of reason. Of course Romish doctrine is the usual fare and we remember being told by a curate in one of these parishes that Roman Catholic catechisms were frequently used. This Rector was impressing upon the minds of his charges the importance of the Mass. Said he: “The Mass represents Christ’s death upon the Cross. Our Lord did not command us to say Evensong, but the Mass is the one service that He demanded that we celebrate. Catholic Christians must hear Mass every Sunday and on the greater festivals.” And this, dear reader, is being taught week after week in the Church Schools of the Catholic parishes throughout the Protestant Episcopal Church. Grace Church lives up to the Anglo-Catholic tradition for the garish and tawdry in church interiors. It is passing strange how these aesthetes that are so arty when it comes to designing and embroidering copes and chasubles display such miserable taste in their rococo embellishments. Stations of the Cross indicated that the sacred personally conducted tour can be followed in the heart of Newark. Here and there sanctuary lamps depended from the ceiling, containing the provocative red lights. Seven were before the high altar and one before the side altar. Two chapels flank the chancel, one dedicated to St. Mary and the other to St. Joseph. The former was done in the Calabrian manner and a gilded triptych surmounted the altar. The table contained a tabernacle and the lamp indicated that one of Newark’s wonder workers had enshrined Christ there. The door of the tabernacle was covered with a most Victorian silk portier and a lambrequin hung from the mensa. Eight candles, were on the table to give some-light in the dark place. A sanctus bell and hammer were nearby so that the faithful might be made aware as the sacred moments of the transubstantiation cult drew near. The altar of “Her Most Chaste Spouse” was less ornate than that of the Gran’ Madre di Dio. A plush antependium and a bit of rare old Cluny lace just gave the proper touch to this spot. An Italian Madonna con bambino hung over the table. This was encased in a mammoth gold frame that would have awed a simple peasant from the hill country beyond Naples. There were a number of similar paintings about the crossing and chancel of the church. The high altar was certainly not lacking in candle power. Wax tapers galore is the cry of the Anglo-Catholics and Grace Church is no piker in this respect. A golden door led into the tabernacle in this altar, but as the sanctuary maids of all work merely nodded as they swept by in front of it we knew that the cupboard was bare. Soon a brace of acolytes in red made their appearance and began the lighting of the candles. Matins were said and preparations were in progress for the piece de resistance of the morning, the Sung Mass. Twenty-two candles on this high altar were lighted for this travesty on the Lord’s Supper. A procession of the choir marched in shortly to the strains of a Mozart andante. When they had taken their places in the stalls, they commenced a hymn to the tune of which the second procession chassed in from the vestry door. This latter cavalcade included the Father Celebrant arrayed in an ample chasuble of generous cut. The servers in waiting wore white cotton gloves and red soutanes. The bearer of the smouldering incense pot had on a pair of gauntlets. What, no “asparagus?” We have become so used to the rite of the Holy Splashing in Anglo-Catholic parishes that we were shocked to note that at Grace this liquid refreshment had not yet come into fashion. The celebrant was now at the foot of the altar making his preparation with the customary bowing, fawning and wriggling. Next he mounted the steps and began the Rite of Fumigation. Not a devil nor a moth could have withstood the swings of this acrid smelling smudge. Just the thing, we thought, for our porch this summer when the mosquitoes get bad. The technique of this celebrant in the swishing of the tiny Vesuvius is to be mentioned and, like the man on the flying trapeze, we thought, he swings with “a well mannered ease.” O alas, and alack. One of the candles was giving trouble. It sputtered and carried on until a daring acolyte snuffed-it. Now, dear reader, we are in a quandary. Was the Mass a valid one, with one of the six office lights gone bad? O dear, to think that we really might of missed Mass that Sunday. The poor celebrant was so put out that he muffed his next aria and went horribly off key as he intoned collect after collect. At the gospel a second fumigation took place and the celebrant passed a few curls of the smoke over the Missal ere he sang from it. The Creed came next and we wondered how it was that the Fathers of Grace have not advanced the Gloria to a position in the beginning of the Mass. The Romans have it at the beginning of the Mass, and so do St. Mary’s and St. Ignatius’ and the Prayer Book orders it at the end of the Holy Communion. Here, you see, are a number of reasons why Anglo-Catholics love to introduce the Gloria right after the Kyrie. Throughout the Mass we were delighted at the change in the lighting effects. Now the nave was in darkness, now special lights played upon the celebrant and then again the whole chancel was bathed in light. We remembered the last time we dropped into the Radio City Music Hall for a ballet and we called to mind, as we sat in Grace Church, that Anglo-Catholics do afford a nice sort of ballet divertisement in the Protestant Episcopal Church. When the time came for the people to communicate the celebrant turned to the people, blessed them with the Host, and turned to the altar and consumed the Communion before any in the congregation could file to the altar-rail. This done the blessing was given and the celebrant retired to the gospel side of the altar to recite the last gospel. No kiss of peace was given, and the only osculations that were part of the service were those that the celebrant from time to time implanted on the mensa. On the way out the Father Rector in biretta and cassock greeted the folks as they passed out onto Broad Street.

While in Newark we decided to kill two birds with one stone and visit the other center of the cult, The House of Prayer. If it were possible to kill two parishes with one stone we certainly know two in Newark that would invite our aim. Across the railway tracks in a nondescript neighborhood lies this parish. The place is ancient and the rectory a building of historic interest dating from the days of the American Revolution. These were the days before Protestant Episcopal parishes bore on their door the notices that appeared on the entrance to the House of Prayer. The list included Low Masses, Sung Mass, E. P. & Benediction. The interior is dull, dank and dingy. A table offered the series of tracts by the Holy Cross Fathers. Colored Stations of the Cross point the faithful on a sacred jaunt. Side altars abound. On one of these is a crucifix encrusted with scores of paste rubies. Before the high altar a red lamp indicated that this parish too maintains the Preserved Wafer. Some forty or fifty candles, were set on the table. More in numbers, we are told, than heads in the congregation at the estimable Sung Mass. Hither and yon were glass pots for the reception of pennies. The House of Prayer is raising an organ fund to which Anglo-Catholic readers of this page might wish to contribute. Send your mite to the Rector, The House of Prayer, Newark, N. J., and assist him in his drive for a “mile of pennies”.

And so we took our leave of Newark in a sympathetic mode. Here too, Protestant Episcopalians must stand up and fight the menace that is threatening the very life of our church with its insistence on doctrines and superstitions that were cast off by thinking people at the time of the Reformation and which have no place in a modern world of intellectual freedom.

—The Chronicle (Poughkeepsie), July, 1934, pp. 242-243.

A Sanitary Communion (1934)

Many devout Christians have for a long time rebelled in spirit against the idea of the common cup in the service of Holy Communion. They know all too well how easily disease is communicated by a common drinking cup or any other object used by the public. Because of this knowledge it has long been the established rule—even the law—that in public places there shall be no such thing as public drinking cups, towels or soap.

Yet up to now it has generally been the custom in our Church to employ a common cup which has been passed from one communicant to another frequently without any purging or, if so, by the futile gesture of wiping the rim with a napkin.

With this knowledge in mind—not a few persons while waiting for a place at the communion rail have been much disturbed at hearing some one nearby either coughing or sniffling or unpleasantly blowing the nose. Under the circumstances it is not difficult to think how any spirit of devotion must be completely ruined by the knowledge that mayhap the cup might be passed from this infected person to one’s self. And colds are the least of the things to fear. To mention them all would extend this note beyond the reader’s patience. But one may mention the horrible white scourge of tuberculosis.

In spite of this there are still those who somehow think that because the common cup may have been acceptable in Jesus’ day it still is. In His day undoubtedly there was no idea of segregating tuberculous subjects from the rest of the family and matters of sewage disposal were equally treated in a debonnair way. Since that day we have travelled far in our knowledge of communicable diseases and we should be utterly foolish to disregard that fund of acquired knowledge.

Yet, as we have said, there are those who would disregard the laws of health in our communion service simply because in the time of Christ these laws were not understood. We have in fact been asked by a correspondent “Are people so filthy that we must needs desecrate the sacred feast at the command of men who put more people down in the dust than they keep out of it?”

To the several parts of this question we would like to reply. As to the filthiness of people in general, we would say, “Yes, people, measured by the number of germs they carry in their mouths, are filthy.” As to the questions of desecration we would go further and say that none attaches to the idea of intinction or the individual cup. What Christ was concerned with, if we may reverently interpret his mind, was the idea picturesquely presented by him and not the method of administering the cup. We even venture to think that were He on earth with us now He would recognize the sanity of avoiding a common cup.

—The Chronicle (Poughkeepsie), June, 1934, p. 209.

The Surplice Question

A very pretty public stir
Is making, down at Exeter,
About the surplice fashion:
And many bitter words and rude
Have been bestow’d upon the feud,
And much unchristian passion.
For me I neither know nor care
Whether a Parson ought to wear
A black dress or a white dress;
Fill’d with a trouble of my own,—
A Wife who preaches in her gown,
And lectures in her night-dress!

—The Complete Poetical Works of Thomas Hood (London: Henry Frowde, 1906), p. 657.