Papurau Newydd Cymru
Chwiliwch 15 miliwn o erthyglau papurau newydd Cymru
5 erthygl ar y dudalen hon
- WELSH DISESTABLISHMENT.
WELSH DISESTABLISHMENT. Now that the Government has introduced into the House of Commons a measure for the Disestablishment of the Church of England in Wales, and have promised to pass it through its third reading during the present Session, the question is attract- ing considerable attention among English Liberals and Nonconformists outside the Principality. At the meeting of London Welsh Liberals, held at the Holborn Town Hall last Tuesday week, it was hoped that the Revs. R J. Campbell and Dr. Clifford would have been able to be present, but previous engage- ments prevented them from being able to take part in the proceedings. Dr. Clifford wrote thus to the Secretary of the meeting Dear Mr. Thomas,—I deeply regret it is not possible for me to be present at the meeting on Tuesday for the promotion of the Bill for the Disestablishment of the Anglican Church in Wales. That measure is long over-due. It is a con- tinued and increasing injustice to deny it and delay it. It is due to the Welsh people in the interests of justice, religious equality and social reform but primarily in the interests of religion. And it is an aggravation of the wrong to withhold it lest the grant of what is right to religion in Wales should imperil the monetary interests of the Anglican Church in England. May I add that I trust the Government which has introduced this Bill will not only carry it through the Commons, but will also send it up to the House of Peers-to that mediaeval institution that is still permitted, alas for us! to determine the fate of the great Democracy of Britain.—Assured that your meeting will help forward the good cause, I am, yours faithfully, JOHN CLIFFORD." At the same gathering the following letters were read from leaders of the move- ment in Welsh political life who were unable to be present Lord Rendel wired Warm thanks for kind recognition of my continued devotion. I trust to be able to support the Bill in the Lords, but could not, for physical reasons, engage to be present at your public meeting." The Right Hon. Reginald McKenna wrote from Portsmouth :—" I am unavoidably pre- vented by official engagements from attend- ing the meeting to-morrow night in support of the Disestablishment Bill. My heartiest good wishes for the succes of the meeting and of the cause." The Right Hon. D. Lloyd-George wrote to the Chairman: Dear Mr. Jones, I wish I could be with you at the Holborn meeting to-night in support of the Welsh Disestab- lishment Bill, but as you are aware, I must remain here to defend my Budget proposals. I hope you will have a successful gathering. It is amazing that any intelligent and fair- minded person could be found anywhere in these days to resist the demand of a nation for equal treatment to all creeds honestly professed by its people. We ask for fair play and we must get it." On Monday last the question was further discussed at the National Liberal Club, when several Welsh Members and prominent leaders placed the matter before a representa- tive gathering of English Liberals, and it was unanimously resolved that every assistance should be given by the English Members to the just demand made by the Nonconfor- mists of Wales. The previous week Mr. William Jones, M.P., bad secured the sympathy of the Free Churches of Scotland, whose members are determined to bring the question prominently before their Parliamentary representatives. In Wales itself, a strenuous campaign is being carried on by the National Liberal Council, and it is admitted on all hands that the Church is beginning to realise that the Government on this occasion is determined to grapple with the question, and is pre- pared to sacrifice many other measures in order to clear this long-delayed matter, and to redeem its many pledges to the Welsh people. All that is needed at present is that the Welsh representatives themselves should unite in a course of action, and assist the Government in pushing forward this overdue piece of legislation. The day for petty bickerings and personal jealousies is long past, and if the present members of the Welsh Party are true to their pledges and to their constituents, it will not be necessary for the nation to wait much longer before it has this generous Bill placed on the Statute Book of Britain.
DISENDOWMENT-IS IT PLUNDER…
DISENDOWMENT-IS IT PLUNDER ? (Continued.) In the interests of true religion, which is no less dear to the nonconformist than it is to the most ardent of his opponents, no effort should be spared to secure the passage into law of the present Bill. The majority of the people are favourable to disestablishment. If they do not lend their support to form a public opinion strong enough to compel the acceptance of the measure it will be because they are deceived by the misrepresentations of the opponents of the measure; because they are alarmed by the assertion that dis- endowment endangers the rights of pro- perty. Their instinct already tells them that there is something false and hollow in the assertion. But we know that in important matters, men decline to be guided by in- stinct alone. They insist that instinct shall be supplemented by a conviction born of analysis and argument before they will help to alter the existing state of things. The duty of the nonconformist is therefore clear it is to supply the analysis and argument that will induce conviction. He must sweep away the misrepresentations of his opponents; he must show the people that there is no occasion to be alarmed for the safety of property that the proposal to disendow the Church involves no attack on, no weakening of, the true and proper rights of property. To the men who toiled and bled to secure free Parliamentary institutions for England there would be something distinctly offensive and treacherous in the assertion that disen- dowment is robbery. All rights of pro- perty were created by the State the State Church itself was created by the State and the capacity to hold property belongs to it only by right of State creation. Surely the State has the right and the power to dispose of the objects of its own creation in the way it judges best, or the supremacy of the State has become an empty expression. If the right and the power do not belong to the majesty of the State, to whom do they belong ? What becomes of our much vaunted free institutions and form of self- government if we are to learn at this period that we are after all the thralls of an aristo- cratic or an ecclesiastical oligarchy ? Let us have an end of nonsense, or confess ourselves slaves. If there is such a thing as treason against the State (and our ancestors believed that there was), it is such treason to question the right of the State to dispose of the pro- perty of the State Church-to maintain that the resumption by the State of a part of such property is robbery. A State whose concern with property was limited to the function of safeguarding it, and which was denied the power of dis- posing of it, would not be a sovereign power. In such a State property would be the sovereign power. In England the State is still at least nominally supreme and that supremacy carries with it the right to pre- scribe the disposition of property, and to resume public property when it no longer serves the purpose for which alone it allows it to exist—effectively to serve the public interest. It is no new thing in England for the State to assert that right. But a striking commentary on our growing materialism and the decline of public spirit is afforded by the reflection that the assertion of that right in former days was, and is, regarded as the manifestation of a healthy national conscious- ness, but its assertion to-day is proclaimed an iniquity and a robbery. If disendowment means robbery to-day, it was equally a robbery in the days of the Tudors. Where then is the sincerity and the honesty of some of the opponents of disendowment to-day ? Their broad acres are the proceeds of a disendowment in the days of Henry VIII. On their own argu- ment Henry VIII robbed the Church. Their ancestors were accessories to the robbery when they received part of the pro- ceeds of the robbery from the arch-robber and they themselves are accessories as long as they hold those lands. If they are honest and sincere they will restore the plunder to the rightful owner, and no longer support an honourable name with the profits of dis- honesty. But we do not hear that they propose to do that. Can it be that they object to the proposal to apply the resumed public property to more urgent public needs ? Is it that the action of Henry VIII was just because he bestowed the plunder on his favourites, while a similar action to-day be- comes unjust and iniquitous because the whole State will reap the benefit. D. (To be continued.)
New Jewin Mutual Improvement…
New Jewin Mutual Improvement Society. Several members of the above Society visited the Houses of Parliament on Saturday last, and were conducted over by Sir Francis Edwards, Bart., M.P., and Mr. Vincent Evans. Sir Francis Edwards made the visit very interesting by giving a descriptive lecture, and at the close enter- tained the party to tea at the House, which brought a very pleasant and successful afternoon to a close.
[No title]
WE regret to announce the fact that Miss Eunice Evans (sister of Mr. Tim Evans, Farringdon Street) passed away at her home in Llanpumsaint, on Monday afternoon, after a very painful illness. IT is with deep regret that we have to chronicle the death of Mrs. Leason Thomas, wife of the Hon. Secretary of the Glamorgan Society in London. The deceased lady died from syncope on Sunday afternoon, at Ty Gwyn, Summerland Avenue, Acton.
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