“Standing Room Only” at Hungarian Mission, South Bend, Indiana (1941)

From Forth: The Spirit of Missions

“Standing Room Only” at Hungarian Mission, South Bend, Indiana

April 1941, volume CVI, No. 4, pp. 28, 31.

“STANDING room only” is an everyday occurrence at a little mission in South Bend, Ind., where scores of Hungarians, the only Magyar congregation in the American Church, gather to participate in services in the language of their homeland.

“Standing room only” is the rule, too, at these people’s Episcopal Society meetings, when sixty persons crowd into a store meant to hold thirty. And when there is a tea or a festival or some other social activity centered around the church, attendance is numbered in the hundreds.

For nearly thirty years these Hungarians have been worshiping in little Holy Trinity Mission, which they long ago outgrew. From the little group that petitioned the bishop to be received into the Episcopal Church, they have grown to a congregation of nearly two hundred communicants.

On Sunday the little church, which seats only a hundred, fairly bulges with worshipers. They sit in pews and on folding chairs, standing every available spot, and kneel in the aisles.

            The members of Holy Trinity are among thousands of Hungarians who have come from Europe over a period of years and have settled at South Bend. A good many of them are American-born sons and daughters of the immigrants. For the most part they are factory workers. The young people, especially, are having a hard time to find jobs. But if they cannot give as much money as they would like to the support of their mission, they make up for that with work.

The pulpit from which their pastor speaks was made by the men and boys of the congregation. A prayer desk is the work of a layman. One family made a humeral veil (scarf worn during the celebration) and pulpit cover. When the entrance needed redecoration and the floors needed repairs, the members of the congregation did that work. When the people wanted more trees and shrubbery on the grounds, they did the planting.

Their plebanos, or pastor, is the Rev. Harold G. Kappes, who knew no Magyar when he assumed the office a little more than two years ago. At first he needed an interpreter for his pastoral work, and only the hymns and chants were in Magyar. Now he [28/31] conducts services in Magyar and English.

Fr. Kappes is keeping the Magyar tongue alive among his people. Every child must be able to recite the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer and other devotions in that language as well as in English before he is presented for confirmation. On the other hand, Fr. Kappes spends one evening a week giving Americanization and English classes at the clergy house. He makes a fair trade with the people, for while he teaches them English he absorbs more and more Magyar.

He is only the third clergyman to minister to this congregation in nearly thirty years. The Rev. Victor von Kubinyi, a Hungarian, was first. The Rev. Edwin E. Smith came in 1918, learned the language at 55, and served for twenty years before he retired. He still lives among the Hungarians at South Bend and is their pastor emeritus.

For many of these Episcopalians, social life as well as religious life centers around the church. Besides the meetings of the Episcopal Society, an active organization that gave the church a new heating system recently, there are huge Hungarian dinners, harvest festivals and butchering festivals reminiscent of the homeland. For such events the young people dress up in colorful, lavishly embroidered costumes, full-sleeved shirts and starched aprons from Hungary.

An annual outing at lovely All Saints’ Chapel at Lake Wawasee is one of the most popular events. Another is the tea of the Episcopal Society, which as many as 450 have attended.

Holy Trinity has no parish house, so the social events and meetings must be held in rented halls, stores, and other such places. But it would take more than the lack of a parish house to daunt his enthusiastic Hungarian congregation.

Iconoclasm Boomerangs (1950)

By the Rev. Gregory Mabry, Rector, St. Paul’s Church, Brooklyn, N. Y.
New York: St. Mary’s Mission House, 1950.

HUMANISM leads eventually to a dilemma, Western materialism or Communism.

Americans are dead set against Communism; yet the same end comes of our prevailing philosophy of life, Humanism.

We are an altruistic people, but our altruism rests on sand, materialism. While Communist materialism revolts us because of its heartless inhumanity, we are deceived by our own brand because of its apparent generosity. But like Communism, Humanism, too, is seen to be on close inspection a distortion of Christianity; for both face manward.

History has pretty well demonstrated that man can not save himself by any political, economic, or social system; nor are they his fundamental need. His fundamental need is reconciliation to God. Of His great mercy God has provided the means of mediation through the ministerial Priesthood of His Son, which brings Christ’s work of reconciliation into the here and now. .

Turning to the Book of Common Prayer, and leafing over to the Form and Manner of Ordaining Priests we read in the introductory rubric “how necessary that Order is in the Church of Christ. . .

Why priests? Why is that Order necessary in the Church of Christ?

Because of God’s love and man’s sin. Because in reconciliation to God through Christ lies peace—peace in the hearts of men, peace between men, peace between nations, harmony in the universe. Because reconciliation to God is the key to peace. Because Jesus Christ is not only the Prince of Peace but the High Priest of Peace. Because Jesus Christ is peace.

I. THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER

We turn to the Offices of Instruction in the Book of Common Prayer for the Church’s definition of the Office of a Priest. There we read, “The office of a Priest is, to minister to the people committed to his care; to preach the Word of God; to baptize; to celebrate the Holy Communion; and to pronounce Absolution and Blessing in God’s Name.”

The Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that in the beginning of Christianity, and incidentally for fifteen hundred years after, “no man taketh this honour unto himself.” From whence then do our priests derive their commission? The Church, the New Testament, Tradition, and the Book of Common Prayer give us the answer: From our Lord Himself, through His Apostles and their successors, the Bishops of that Church which is described in the Creeds as “One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic,” and so re affirmed in the Offices of Instruction.

How did our Lord transmit His Priestly Authority to His Apostles? The Apostles to them who were soon called Bishops? And the Bishops share it in large degree with those ordained Priests?

Christ’s ordination of His Apostles was done in a series of acts, commands, and commissions, extending from the night of His Betrayal to the day of His Ascension.

The Two Essentials of Priesthood

On Maundy Thursday, in the cathedral of the Upper Room, our Lord instituted the Holy Eucharist; and embedded in the institution was power given to His Apostles to consecrate His Body and Blood and offer the Eucharistic Sacrifice; “Do this in re-calling Me”—the command conveying the power needed for fulfillment. So He endowed them with the first essential of Priesthood, authority to offer sacrifice.

Again, in the same Upper Room, on Easter evening, the Risen Lord appeared among His Apostles, saying, “Peace be unto you; as My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you. . . . Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whosoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whosoever sins ye retain, they are retained.” And there is the second essential function of Priesthood, authority to forgive sins.

Then the scene shifts to a mountaintop in Galilee, and the time is close to His Ascension, when before more than five hundred witnesses the Victorious King, in farewell gives His last command and bestows His final commission on the Eleven, sealing it with His promise, saying, “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” And so the Apostles came to be completely clothed with all of Christ’s own Priesthood, and merely await, again at His injunction, the infusion with the Holy Ghost at Pentecost, which received they went out into the world fulfilling His commands.

“The Same Office and Ministry”

We turn now to the essential form and matter for the making of a priest by our Ordinal, wherein a bishop of the Apostolic Succession, first reciting the Prayer, “Almighty God, and heavenly Father,” and then laying his hands on the ordinand’s head, says, “Receive the Holy Ghost for the Office and Work of a Priest in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the Imposition of our Hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained. And be thou a faithful Dispenser of the Word of God, and of His holy Sacraments; In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

There we have all the commissions, so far as they are delegated by a bishop to a priest, given by the Great Bishop of our souls to His Apostles brought together; the same form and matter are transmitted unbroken down through the twenty centuries of the Christian dispensation, “that,” as expressed in the Epistle to the Hebrews, concerning our Lord’s own Priesthood, “he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God; to make reconciliation for the world.”

There in the same form and same matter we have God’s peace treaty, the New Covenant, signed in His own Blood.

There is but one Priest and one Sacrifice, transcending all time and space, a continuous Action and Actor reaching every altar, and sweeping over the far horizon to eternity.

“Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens,” why do not men come boldly unto the throne of grace . . . “and find grace in time of need?” Because modern man is the victim of a colossal self-hoax.

Iconoclasm Boomerangs

Our present passion for man’s temporal welfare has misled many, very many, into thinking that Christianity is, essentially, concerned with an action toward that welfare; all religious ministers are conceived of by modern society in terms of “doing good,” and not in terms of priesthood at all; the ministry is measured by its manwardness. This, in fact, is Humanism. It is too “broadminded” to smash altars with axes and hammers; it is subtle in its iconoclasm, it causes men to ignore them. Such a false emphasis has reduced life to a material level, and the price has become a burden almost too heavy to bear, for it has led our world into stalemate, and filled men’s hearts

II.  THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY

All too many Christians in trying to measure God’s love look back over the centuries into the crude Crib of Bethlehem, and contemplate the Cross of Calvary. But He epitomized His charity in the Upper Room in the night in which He was betrayed, when in the Eucharist He set forth His Sacrifice, and turning to His disciples “gave himself with his own hand,” for a transfusion of His own Life—the very Life of very God—into the souls of men. In the Holy Eucharist therefore we have God’s supreme expression of His love given to us in instruments of measurement whose scale we can at least begin to read in the Bread which is the Body and the Wine which is the Blood. Bethlehem was but the first visible manifestation of the continuing process of reconciliation, and Calvary the costly physical climax of the solemn spiritual Offering of the night before. The Great High Priest became the Great High Victim, opening wide the flood-gates of mercy and peace to men in an Action which is to continue “to the end of the world.”

The mystery of the Christian Sacrifice is great indeed. Because many cannot comprehend it, they reject it. Yet since the beginning of time men have found sacrifice intrinsic to life, although they have never been able to fathom why it is so. Christians are no exception. There have been a multitude of theories of the Eucharistic Sacrifice, past and present, with which men have belabored their minds; but those theories which are not outright heretical are too circumscribed; and, after all, they are but human speculations. We ought to face it: the Christian Sacrifice being heavenly transcends men’s minds, and lies beyond their power of definition. We do well to content ourselves with the statements of the Sacrifice in our Prayer of Consecration, for they satisfy both heart and mind. But it may be that by a little analogy we can gain a clearer understanding of how it is that the Church can continue to offer Christ Himself in Sacrifice. Let us begin with something our intellects already comprehend:

Energy Is Life

What do we mean when we present at the Offertory the bread and wine, purchased with our own money, or, as in former times, in kind, and say, “We humbly beseech thee most mercifully to accept our oblations?” And, again, in the Canon, what does the Church mean when in our behalf it says, “And here we offer and present unto thee, O Lord, our selves, our souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice unto thee?”

In the case of money, it is not a mere symbol, as generally thought, but a fraction of our life, for did we not expend energy to obtain it? And what is energy but life? Is not, then, the offered bread and wine it has bought truly a part of our life ? Do we not mean, then, when the Church says on our behalf, “And here we offer and present unto thee, O Lord, our selves, our souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice unto thee” that we are offering our spiritual, mental, and physical energy?

Now if we identify energy with life when we offer our selves, our talents, and our means, even our money, to God, we can better comprehend how the Church can continue to offer Christ’s Life—His Energy—to the Father in Eucharistic Sacrifice, in that Bread and that Wine which are energized through the power of the Holy Spirit with His Life and become truly His Body and His Blood; and that we in union with Him can continue His Sacrifice for our sins and for those of the whole world.

The Wonder Sacrament

The power of Absolution involved in the Christian Priesthood is not difficult of comprehension if we see all sin as that which is against God. Reason dictates that only He against whom we sin can forgive it. Had Christ not delegated authority to forgive sin to representatives on earth, He would have betrayed His justice and mercy. For a Christian there is no question that all sin is against God. There is no question of the necessity of forgiveness. If we believe in Christ at all, we see that He has provided for our need. But there is the very serious question of acknowledgement of our sin, and our seeking His forgiveness. It may be that our greatest sin is that of presumption, taking for granted that God forgives without our acknowledgement and penitence. Such presumption does not remove guilt and its torture. If a man would know peace, he must take the step which will make acknowledgement and express penitence. Otherwise there can be no reconciliation, since sins do not die of old age.

Gratefully our generation is learning through the new science of Psychiatry much of what causes men’s confusion, unhappiness, and illness; and that articulated acknowledgement is the primary step necessary for “release” from them. But we have yet to learn that psychiatric confession is not enough; and that possible consequent release does not integrate personality on the highest level. For that, man requires compulsion by a love of the highest, God.

Many of the psychological complexes are symptoms of what the Gospel calls Sin, the individual’s or some one else’s. Christ removed the symptom by eradicating the root, through the revelation and manifestation of God’s love. The Magdalene is an example of the power of His remedy.

A man can not banish his own sin. He may rationalize it, employ escapes of one sort or another, or lock it up in the dungeon psychiatry labels “libido,” and so he may find quiet for a season. But he will not be rid of it, for concealed sin festers in the secret recesses of the pre-eminently important subconscious, and sooner or later, perhaps to his utter surprise and chagrin, it will erupt in acts quite contrary to his intention or desire. Then guilt arises to torment beyond the pain of physical torture.

But if a man sees his complexes as symptoms of sin he will know it to be against his Creator; and if ever his citadel of pride collapses he will fall on his knees before the Heavenly Father and in the spirit of the Prodigal Son confess, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.” But, alas, too often because the confession is subjective, and he knows not how to make it objective, he may not be released from his sense of guilt, much less know the joy of forgiveness and the security of restoration. Quite likely when the experience is past it will seem unreal, and he will treat it as such, so leaving him in a worse plight than before. Psychiatry would insist that he make his confession objective.

The Parable of the Prodigal Son would be pointless for us had not God ordained a means whereby it could be objectively played all the way out, by forgiveness and restoration, for man being finite requires a sign before peace can again reign in his soul.

The objective medium Christ instituted in His Church is the sacrament of Penance, and a duly accredited priesthood to administer it.

In the Episcopal Church we find this sacrament of reconciliation and the proper ministers for its mediation, since the power of Absolution is specifically conferred in every priest’s ordination.

Sacramental Penance is not only the cure for sin, but it is a powerful preventive; and it is even more than a medium of reconciliation, for it sustains a proper relation to God and our neighbor. We could not hear too much of its joys.

Nothing has been said of the other functions involved in the Christian Priesthood, for in our consideration of “how necessary that Order is in the Church of Christ” we have been thinking of the two primary ends to which all other of its functions are means; for the supreme prerogatives of Priesthood are “the duty of calling sinners to penitence and absolution, and of the primacy in public worship of the offering of the sacrifice of the Eucharist through Christ to the Father.” (The Apostolic Ministry, Kirk, p. 50.)

What a loving God we have, that He has provided the Priesthood of Reconciliation, to cleanse men and fit them to return that love through the Sacrifice of the Altar and the dedicated living which flows from the Eucharistic Offering.

Indelible Service

Recently a certain diocesan convention witnessed the loveliest sight vouchsafed to mortal eyes. The bishop of that diocese has the good custom of summoning to him those priests who have borne the yoke of Christ for fifty years, and with citation conferring on them what is called “The ——— Distinguished Service Cross.” This year one of the old priests who knelt before the bishop provided the thousand persons assembled with a living picture of yet another Curé d’Ars or Charles Lowder, of what a man looks like whose character has been molded by the faithful exercise of Christ’s Priesthood. In his face was the calm trust of a lamb who knows and loves his shepherd. One could not be faulted that St. John Baptist’s figurative salutation ran through his mind, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” That old priest had become a living sacrifice! Men perceived that in him again had been fulfilled what the prophet had in mind when in God’s Name he said, “I will raise me up a faithful priest, that shall do according to that which is in mine heart and in my mind.” He had been faithful for fifty years making reconciliation for the sins of the people.

The one word “Reconciliation” explains “The Duty and Office of such as come to be admitted

Priests; how necessary that Order is in the Church of Christ, and also, how the People ought to esteem them in their Office.” So, in the Christian Religion there must be priests to deliver us from all false religions which ensnare men’s souls, and to return us to the waiting arms of our Heavenly Father.

“And now, O Father, mindful of the love
That bought us, once for all, on Calvary’s Tree,
And having with us him that pleads above,
We here present, we here spread forth to thee,
That only Offering perfect in thine eyes,
The one true, pure, immortal Sacrifice.”

A Visit to St. Alban’s, New York: A Memorandum for Future Antiquarians (1868)

Unsigned article in Putnam’s Magazine, April 1868, pp 416-420.

[By Jesse Ames Spencer]

I had heard something, in the talk of the day, of the ceremonial observances at the Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Alban; and though I confess being what may be called an old-fashioned churchman, on principle and by education, and therefore not likely to be in favor of any considerable departure from the usual worship of the Church, yet I determined on this occasion to be strictly impartial, and to go simply as an observer, a “looker-on in Vienna,” to see what these things might be. If the reader has any curiosity on the subject, the following report is at his service.

One bright Sunday morning, then, not long ago, I visited the “Church of St. Alban.” It is situated in 47th-street, near Lexington Avenue, quite beyond the business portion of the city, and is rather a plain-looking brick building, with a peaked roof, low, stained glass windows, and a bell on the gable in front, surmounted by a cross. I arrived some little time before the commencement of the services, and had an opportunity to look about a little, and note the interior arrangements. I found the church to be capable of holding about two hundred and fifty worshippers, with plain wooden benches for seats on each side of a central aisle, and every bench having an announcement posted upon it, as follows:

“The seats of this church are all Free, on the following conditions, a compliance with which is an obligation binding on each person occupying a sitting:

“I. To behave as in the presence of Almighty God.

“II. Not to leave the church during service; remaining until the clergy and choristers have retired.

“III. That each worshipper shall contribute, according to his ability, to the collections, which are the only means of supporting the church. The poor can give little, and are always welcome; but those who are able to give should not be willing to occupy seats (which might be availed of by others), without contributing their just share to the expenses.”

The pulpit, which is elevated only three or four steps, stands on the left-hand of the congregation, close to and in front of the vestry-room door or passage. The stalls adjoin the organ in a recess on the vestry-room side, with others facing them on the opposite side for antiphonal chanting or singing. The lectern, or stand on which the Bible is placed, for reading the lessons, is on the right side opposite the pulpit. There is no reading-desk for other parts of the service, as in most of the Episcopal churches.

The arrangements of the chancel occupy considerable space for a building no larger than this, and every thing is very elaborate and ornamental. It is elevated by several steps, and inside the rails is still further raised, so as to bring the communion table, or altar, prominently into view. This altar is very large, built against the rear wall of the church, with a super-altar, having a tall gilded cross in its centre. The decorations on the wall and about the chancel-window are of the most approved pattern, drawn from the highest authorities in ritualism and church decoration. These words, in beautiful old English letter, crown, as it were, the altar in St. Alban’s: “He that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me.” (John vi. 57.)

On either side of the large gilded cross, on the super-altar, is a lofty candlestick, with a candle in it, about seven feet high, or perhaps more. Four other candlesticks not quite so tall, and four others less lofty than these again, are on each side of the altar by the wall; and standing in the chancel, some little distance from the wall, on the right and left hand, are candelabras, with branches holding some twenty candles each. None of these were lighted when I entered. Soon after, the bell having stopped ringing, the organ began a voluntary, on a low note, introductory to the opening of the service.

Presently the introcessional hymn was begun, and then, emerging from the vestry-room door or passage, the first thing visible was a large wooden cross, which had to be lowered to get it through the passage, and which, when elevated, reached some six feet above the head of the small boy who carried it, and was, of course, in full view of the congregation. This boy, and others following, had on white robes or surplices. Two of the boys carried banners, with devices, and all, with a number of adult choristers, advanced slowly towards the chancel, singing the introcessional. Last of all came the three officiating priests or ministers, with purple-velvet, crown-shaped caps on their heads, and white garments, made like sacks, and ornamented with various colors and symbols. Profound obeisances were made towards the altar; the hymn was ended; the choristers took their places; and one of the priests, on arriving in front of the chancel-rail, began the intoning of the Litany. Morning Prayer had been said at an earlier hour.

The Litany was said as in the Episcopal Prayer-Book, directly after which, notice was given that there would be a meeting of “The Sodality of”—exactly what and whom I did not catch at the time. The priests then retired for a space, during which the two candles on the altar, and the branch candles on each side in the chancel, were lighted by a boy having a long stick or pole with a light on the end for the purpose. This boy passed half a dozen or more times in front of the altar, and every time made, or attempted to make, an obeisance, but it was not with any great success. The frequent repetition seemed to reduce it to little more than the “fashionable nod.”

The introit was one of the psalms of the Psalter. While it was being chanted, the priests returned, and with lowly bowings, even to the knee, passed within the chancel and advanced to the front of the altar. The Ante-Communion was then said, the Epistle and Gospel being read by different persons; after which notice was given of the communion, and “a high celebration,” to occur during the week. The people stood up, and remained standing, while one of the priests left the chancel, proceeded to the pulpit, and, after crossing himself, said, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

The congregation being seated again, a discourse followed, about twenty minutes long, earnest in tone and manner, and with much good exhortation in it. Some of the preacher’s figures were rather startling, especially when speaking of the Lord’s Supper; he told his hearers of “the bleeding hands of the Almighty” offering them Christ’s flesh to eat, and Christ’s blood to drink. The homily ended with the priest’s turning to the altar, and saying, “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.” He then went back to the chancel, where the others had been sitting, caps on, to listen to the discourse.

The plates were next passed around, and the alms, being collected, were placed on the altar. Then, from a side table on the right, the two boys on duty in the chancel handed to the priest the vessels containing the bread and wine, which were placed on the altar. The remaining candles were then lighted. After this the communion service proceeded; and when the officiating priest faced the congregation, to say the exhortation, &c, one of the others, a step below him, held the book open for him to read from, thus serving, as it were, for a reading-stand. Wherever possible, the priests studiously preserved a position with their backs to the congregation. In the part of the communion service where the bread and wine are consecrated, the officiating priest said the words in silence; in like manner, when he partook of the sacrament himself, it was done in entire silence, with crossings and the lowliest of kneeling and postures of adoration. Without professing to be at all learned in the meaning of the rubrics in the Prayer-Book, I venture to think the language in regard to this part of the service to be plain enough, and to require that the officiating minister shall say it all openly, and in the presence of the people; so that they can see or witness what is done by him on every such solemn occasion. But at St. Alban’s the priests had their faces to the altar and backs to the congregation, and thus it was hardly possible to see any thing, and be sure of what was done or left undone.

A large portion of the congregation now went forward to the chancel-rails, along or on top of which were napkins or cloths, placed so as to prevent a single crumb, or a single drop, falling to the floor. While the people were engaged in kneeling at the rails, the priests remained standing and holding aloft the paten and chalice, with their contents, for reverent and profound admiration. The administration of the sacrament was as is usual in the Episcopal Church, save that the first part of the words (“the body of our Lord Jesus Christ,” “the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ”) was said when the bread or wine was given to each communicant, and the latter (“take and eat this,” “drink this”) was said to three or four together. The cup, too, was retained in the hands of the priest, and not “delivered” into the hands of the communicant.

When all had gone forward who wished to partake of the Lord’s Supper, the vessels were replaced on the altar and carefully covered, the concluding prayers were intoned, the Gloria in Excelsis was chanted, and the parting blessing was given. After a few moments, the whole congregation stood up, and remained standing, while the priests, having received water from the boys, with napkins, carefully cleansed and wiped the vessels, giving them to the boys to place on the side table. The little fellow took up the big cross again, the others gathered in line, with the older choristers, and slowly moving, with music, to the passage at the side, the priests finally disappeared in the vestry.

The service on this occasion occupied exactly two hours, after which the people were allowed to go their way and profit by what they had seen and heard.

The congregation in general were quiet, attentive, and disposed to join in the services. A large portion were, I think, visitors, drawn by curiosity, and anxious to see the strange and novel things, as they seemed, in an Episcopal church. Among the regular attendants, I could not but notice several near me who were exceedingly devout, making obeisances at the recurrence of the name of Jesus Christ, at the Gloria Patri, and on other occasions, even to the bowing down to the very floor. Many, like myself, not initiated as to the times and places of obeisance, could not do what they saw others do, and could be only lookers-on, rather than partakers in the full and complete services as they are taught and performed by the priests and people of St. Alban’s. As I was leaving the church, I heard several expressions of surprise and wonder on the part of those who had never witnessed any thing of this kind before, and who, with old-fashioned notions and habits, as in Episcopal churches generally, seemed to be not a little perplexed as to whereunto all this would grow. It was too much to expect that they should be able to understand or appreciate the assumed advanced ritualistic position of St. Alban’s; for that requires an acquaintance with the details of the subject, and a training in the observances of earlier rituals, far beyond what one out of a thousand in the Episcopal Church has any notion of. It was no matter of astonishment, therefore, to hear the charge of “popery,” folly, extravagance, &c, made freely against St. Alban’s, and to observe among visitors a strong disposition to condemn what they saw and heard, because it was all new to them, all contrary to the practices to which they had become accustomed, all unauthorized, as they unhesitatingly concluded, and all, to an ordinary looker-on, very much resembling the public performances in a Roman Catholic church.

On my walk homeward, I had abundant leisure for thinking over the matter, and considering some of its points of interest and possible importance at the present day. Recurring to the state and condition of things, quite in the recollection of middle-aged men, it is plain that a great change has taken place in the metropolis in respect to churches and places of public worship. New York has grown with marvellous speed in wealth and luxury, and as its citizens have become rich, they have erected houses to dwell in which may be termed palaces for the elegance and profusion which belong to them. In earlier days, the merchant had his business on the first floor, and his family occupied the rest of the building for a residence; in those days, too, New York was a good-sized town, doing a fair business, and all within a mile and a half of the Battery. Now, massive warehouses, five, six, seven stories high, solely for business purposes; now, splendid residences in the upper part of the city; now, mile after mile devoted to trade and commerce, as well as art and beauty, show what giant strides the metropolis has made. Of course, churches have shared in this change. The former barn-like structures of a preceding generation, with square windows and green blinds, without decoration or taste, inside or out, and the farthest remove from any thing ornamental or beautiful, have disappeared; and as the churches and congregations have moved “uptown,” professional architects have been employed, and tasteful edifices erected of the Gothic and other styles, cruciform in shape, with towers and spires reaching up into the sky, with elegant windows, crosses, and symbols, internally evidencing the growth of the aesthetic element in our advancing civilization. Hundreds of thousands of dollars have been expended on single churches. One church in New York—St. George’s—has a most magnificently decorated interior, the painting of which alone is said to have cost $25,000; and, to a very large extent, art and taste have been brought to bear in rearing and adorning the temples devoted to God’s worship and service, so as to render them somewhat proportioned in splendor and comfort to the private residences of those who attend them.

It struck me, however, as rather curious and interesting, that, although we have in our city a large number of noble and imposing church edifices, still the order and performance of public service have retained, almost everywhere, the simplicity of half a century ago. In this respect, the change has been much less than might have been expected. In the Episcopal Church, for example, the same plain surplice, bands, and gown, which were in use in the time of our grandfathers, are still the prevailing garments, without decoration or any thing of the kind. There has been no alteration in the form and arrangements of the service, nor any as to postures, places, and modes of going through with it. Church music, it is true, is much improved, and organs and trained choirs are everywhere to be found. But there is, as yet, no general attempt to introduce the highly adorned garments, the stately processions, the awe-inspiring symbols, the crucifixes, banners, pictures, and the like ecclesiastical furniture and upholstery. The Episcopal Church, as a whole, appears to shrink from these exhibitions, and deems it enough to have beautiful and striking temples, like St. George’s, Grace Church, and others, without bringing in the ceremonial observances which ritualists, as they are called, are advocating in England and the United States, with considerable force and persistency.

It would be out of place here, of course, to undertake to argue the question, or to venture to pronounce upon the points in dispute, between the ritualists and the quieta non movere portion of Episcopalians. The ritualists urge strongly the necessity of adding to the impressiveness and force of religious worship, in order to meet the wants of the masses, who must (whatever public education may effect) be reached mainly through the senses of sight and hearing; and they strive to accomplish this by an increase of ceremonial observances; by the free use of symbolic representations, as lights, crucifixes, incense, pictures, &c.; by the clothing of the priests and ministers in rich and variegated garments; by giving to the Lord’s Supper, and every thing connected with it, the character and appearance of the most awful of mysteries; by employing processions, grand music, and the like; in short, by any thing and every thing which shall strike men’s senses with awe-inspiring thoughts, and add to the solemnity, grandeur, and majesty of the public worship of God. The anti-ritualists urge, on the other hand, that all these things are absurd, and out of place and time, belonging to the dark ages, obscuring the simplicity of the Gospel, contrary to law, in violation of the fundamental principles of Protestantism, mischievously assimilating the Episcopal Church to the Roman in appearance, with the further intention of bringing it to Roman obedience in doctrine at the earliest practicable period.

Let the reader judge for himself. Davus sum, non Œdipus. Apart from all question of right or wrong, law or violation of law, expediency or inexpediency, ritualism, it must be admitted, has made progress, and may be destined to make still greater; and, from various significant indications in the religions world, it would appear that Protestant churches, especially in cities, have begun to find that the stern, hard, bald system of worship and service bequeathed to them by their Puritan forefathers, does not suffice for the age in which we live; or, at least, does not adequately meet the longings of certain people, who, having secured noble and beautiful temples in which to worship God, now desire other things in keeping therewith.

But how far all this is to go; what are the proper proportions of ceremonial and ritualistic observances; what is to be done, and what to be left undone—these are points which it is not my province to discuss; and so, I leave the subject for the consideration of others.

Transcribed by Richard Mammana, 2017.