DIVINE IMAGE 7 ,- I.Il 11, .L
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
THE DIVINE IMAGE 7 ,- i.iL 11, .l,-. - . - ., -- -'C',, -, 8..-. :.'- ,, , , BY THE SAME AUTHOR Socinianism in Seuenteenlh-Century England ' Human Rights in Retrospect and Reality 1'-h ITHEDIVINE IMAGE- P' The Old Nonconformity in Fulwood l i' RELIGIOUS HUMANISM FROM HOMER TO HAMMAESKJOLD p p,- 'The theologian who surveys the broad fields of thought and experience sympathetically may be deemed a humanist. He is in favour of a humane social order and universal peace.' J. K. Mozley, Tendencies in British Theology / First published 1g72 The Lindsey Press, 1-6 Essex Street, London, WC2R SHY O The Lindsey Press I972 S\ Foreword .her the terms of her will, Miss Susan Minns of Boston established a fund in memory of her brother, Thomas, 'a descendant of John Wilson, the first Minister of the First Church in Boston'. The larger part of the income from the fund was to be used for a lectureship under the management of the First Church and of King's Chapel, Boston. Since 1941, six lectures have been given each year. The lectures for 1969 were delivered at King's Chapel, Boston, and at Meadville/Lombard Theological School in the University of Chicago. The aim of the lectures, which now appear in slightly expanded form, is to ex- amine the origins and discuss the development of what I have called 'Christian Humanism'. They were inspired by a suggestion of the late Victor Gollancz which he made some years ago in an Oxford common room- namely, that man's great need today was a religious Designed by John Rowland humanism or 'a more humanistic religion'. These lec- Set in Baskerville 10 on I I point tures are a contribution to the present debate, from a Printed by The Anchor Press Ltd, point of view that has not yet been ventilated. They try I to show how the humanist emphasis derives in part, and and bound by Wm Brendon & Son Ltd, in particular, from Jesus and a stream of undogmatic both of Tiptree, Essex 11, Christianity which has not received the attention it deserves. I am most grateful to the Trustees of the Minns Foundation for their kind invitation to deliver the lec- tures and to the ,Trustees of the Dr. Daniel Jones Fund and the Hibbert Trust for generous help towards pub- lication. JOHN MCLACHLAN Stratton House Cambridge Contents Chapter I. The Need for a Religious Humanism or a Humanistic Religion Chapter 11. The Roots of Christian Humanism : (i) Biblical Chapter 111. The Roots of Christian Humanism: (ii) Classical and Renaissance Chapter IV. The Flowering of Erasmianism Chapter V. The Origin and Emergence of a Humane Theology in the 17th and 18th Centuries Chapter VI. Non-traditional Religion and the New Humanism THE NEED FOR A RELIGIOUS HUMANISM OR A HUMANISTIC RELIGION 'The purpose of life seems to be to acquaint man with himself. The highest revelation is that God is in every man.' Ralph Waldo Emerson, Diary, written on his way home from England. e Need for a Religious Humanism manistic Religion rthodox religion', writes Colin Wilson, author of The Outsider, %as been dying for several centuries, and it is now at its last gasp.' This is, perhaps, a pardonable exaggeration, but it contains an important truth. Religion is certainly not the power in Western Civilisation that it once was, nor Ian it be claimed at the present time that it promises to come-back'. Indeed, the Dean of King's College, ridge, the Rev. Dr. D. L. Edwards, author of the study Religioln and Change (1969), remarked to rlier this year that the danger was that religion t get shunted into a ghetto. In England, at all nts, Christianity, as represented by the mainstream hurches, has suffered a severe setback in the past fifty ars, and does not look likely at the present time to age a quick recovery. One ha5only to keep one's eyes pen when walking about our larger towns and cities 6 see quite a nurr&er of buildings, formerly churches, khat have been turned into warehouses, stores, and work- shops. Near my old home in Manchester, for example, there are three such, quite dose together, which I re- member as flourishing congregations in the I 920s. All are now serving non-ecclesiastical purposes : one is a large furniture Htore, and the unitarian church whose choir my mother sang as a young woman, is now the Centre, another a museum, a third is closed. In York property of the British Broadcasting Corporation and it is much the same. used as a depot for their 'outside broadcast' trucks and We are faced with the same problem of too many apparatus. churches in Cambridge, whilst in the rapidly growing This is symptomatic of the decline of religion in the centres of population in the Midlands and South-east United Kingdom. The population of the country be- the difficulty is to find clergy and churches in adequate tween I g I I and I 96 I increased by well over ten million supply. Today, organised institutional religion in Eng- (viz. 191I : 4~,08~,0oo;1961 : 52,673,000)~but the num- land is losing grip. In my lifetime it never had too firm ber attending churches diminished considerably. Figures a hold on the masses, but in the years since 1920 the for church attendance are very hard to come by. Pub- retreat from the churches has been steady and unmis- lished statistics of membership are also difficult to obtain. takable. In the past two decades the pace of it has in- Those available indicate, however, unmistakably grave creased. reductions in numbers in recent years. For example, in Many writers have attributed this (I think correctly) I g I 2 the Baptist denomination counted 4 I 8,600 mem- to the secularisation of life in all its aspects. The Church, bers. ,Today it numbers around 200,000, a reduction which once formed part of the accepted scenery of daily of over fifty ;er cent. I suspect that this sort of percent- life, with the vicar and parson as welcome and respected age reduction may be true of most of the other churches. figures in the public eye, appears to many to be merely Church of England confirmation figures fell by over an anachronistic survival from a dead past. The tide eleven per cent per thousand of the population between of public events sweeps by, little, or not at all, affected by I 956 and 1966 (1956 : 34.5 ; I g66 : 23.2 per thousand), religious precepts or practices. What churchmen call and Easter communicants in 1966 numbered only 'the faithful' become rapidly fewer, and involvement with 2,074,673 out of a population of over fifty-three million. organised religion represents an attitude on the whole Methodism early in the 1960s numbered 'about 750,000 rarer today amongst intelligent and sensitive people than adherents' (Chambers' Dictionary). In I g66 the figures at almost any time in history. The flight from faith is a showed a marked decline to 678,7616. Congregational- fact, but inertia ensures that a certain number of people ism in 1959 counted 2 I 2,o I 7 adult members; in January continue to attend church services-'because of the I 966 : I 80, I 7 I. It is fair to say that a similar decline children' or 'because we like the man' (i.e. the minister), probably affected all the major denominations. (Both or because 'we don't swallow all the doctrines of the the Church of Scotland and the Presbyterian Church Church, yet we feel the need of some such centre for of England have reported a loss of membership over the the spiritual nourishment of our minds and hearts'. past year. Membership fell by 18,190 in the Church of Further, the concepts of a medieval theology no lon- Scotland, and by 1,975 in the Presbyterian Church of ger appeal to the great number even of regular church- England !) goers today. The straitjacket of the 4th and 5th century As you know, we have some fine old medieval churches creeds that the Church fastened on Christianity still in many of our cities. In York and Norwich, for instance, cramps the spirit of religion, and the mode of interpret- there are so many churches in the older parts of the city ing the Bible which rejects reason in favour of 'revela- that you are never out of sight of one or more. They tion' prevents acceptance of a fresh and meaningful are devoted to various uses. In Norwich one is a Youth understanding of Scripture in many quarters. In the 1,. context of modern scientific thought and methodology tion. The disengagement of theology from imagina- the old confessional logomachies and conflicts appear tion is all but complete.' unreal and unimportant. The attention of the thinking This is a terrible admission. It means that orthodox public is concentrated not upon theological niceties, Christianity has really lost touch with a principle that is as it was three, two, or even one hundred years ago, but fundamental to religious thinking, namely, that God in- upon social and political factors that appear to have carnates Himself continually and universally; that all vital and significant bearing upon daily life. the time and in our time He is present, if we will only Hence it is a fact that faith and hope-for-the-future look for Him sensitively and imaginatively. As Francis are not related, on the whole, any longer to the Church, Thompson reminds us, to organised religion. They are derived from, or inspired 'The angels keep their ancient places;- by, other activities and concerns : by human need of one '* ' Turn but a stone, and start a wing ! kind or another-poverty, handicap, distress, disease, 7: 'Tis ye, 'tis your estrang6d faces, destruction; by the need to find homes far the homeless !.