The disturbance of Christian peace which has for some months affected
the Madison Avenue Congregational Church, New York, has impressed us as
disclosing a new phase of inter-church life. To an onlooker the case—the
very heart of the case—is a struggle of a pastor to maintain himself in
full membership with two denominations, against a struggle of men in both
denominations to shut him out of one or the other denomination. This
is the novelty in this New York “church quarrel.” For our part we are
disposed to ask what general principle of morals, equity or discipline
is violated by the Rev. Dr. John P. Newman’s position? He claims to be
the permanent pastor of a Congregational church while retaining his
membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church. Why not? It surely is
not an axiom that a man can not belong to two denominations. Dialectic
theologians may invent a score of arguments, but they will find their
best one in the fact that the practice has been to confine a Christian’s
membership to one branch of the church. But in the advance to Christian
unity we have rapidly changed the practice at several points; and it is
quite possible that Dr. Newman’s “new departure” may be another march on
the general line of our progress.
A few words respecting the Madison Avenue Church and its pastor will
help our readers to understand the case. The church was founded a dozen
or more years ago by Dr. Hepworth, who up to about that time had been a
Unitarian clergyman. It was a very expensive enterprise, and Dr. Hepworth
became satisfied, after a few years, that he could neither fill the
church with an audience nor pay its debt. Dr. W. R. Davis, who had been a
Methodist clergyman, and is now a Dutch Reformed pastor in Albany, N. Y.,
succeeded Dr. Hepworth, and, after a few years of experience like that of
his predecessor, hunted up a successor in the person of Dr. Newman, and
resigned. There were two distinct difficulties in both these pastorates.
One was the large debt; the other was the failure to secure adequate
audiences. The last difficulty suggests no fault in either of the
pastors. Both were gifted and popular. But the church is surrounded by
other churches, and only an extraordinary man can secure a large body of
hearers in it. The church was not at fault for not paying its debt; the
burden was beyond its strength. When it asked Dr. Newman to become its
pastor, it asked him for two reasons: He had friends who could pay the
debt, and he would bring these friends into the church and congregation;
and it was well understood that he could fill the large house with
hearers.
Rev. Dr. John P. Newman has a national reputation as a pulpit orator.
He always has full houses where he statedly preaches. Among his friends
he numbers General Grant, whose pastor he was in Washington in the days
of Grant’s presidency. The ex-president is one of the men whom Dr.
Newman took into the Madison Avenue congregation and made a trustee of
the church property. Dr. Newman is one of the last of the classical
pulpit orators. His style is stately, his presence majestic. Pure taste
and high ideals characterize his thought. His noble person, his rich,
smooth voice, and the elevation of his thought conspire to make him
admired and reverenced in the pulpit. His ardent friends have called
him “the Chrysostom of his age.” Not unnaturally, he has expected the
highest places in Methodism. Neither Webster nor Clay became President
of the United States—and John P. Newman did not become a bishop. Some
difficulties arose respecting a place for him in New York three years
ago, he having then finished his term as pastor of the Central Methodist
Church. After a year of decorous waiting, he accepted the call to the
Madison Avenue Church. There are controversies about sundry minor
matters; but after painfully laboring through the documents, we find two
clear facts: 1st. From the start Dr. Newman has clung to the idea of
remaining a Methodist while becoming a Congregationalist; 2d, there is
an abundant lack of proof that in this policy he has deceived any one
or done any other act which is inconsistent with the character which
he displays in the pulpit. A single sentence in his address before the
council was out of place; but, even it, from his point of view, had great
provocation. To the onlooking public, perhaps to Dr. Newman also, it
was a surprise to see the editor of the _Christian Advocate_ furnishing
material for use against Dr. Newman. This new party to the controversy
presents the Methodists as semi-officially engaged in the effort to crowd
Dr. Newman from his attitude as holding positions in two denominations.
The justification of the editor of the _Christian Advocate_ can not rest
on any special pleading; it must rest on the ground that Dr. Newman’s
claim is a bad one in church moralities. If this be true, then his
Methodist antagonist has discharged a disagreeable duty and “meddled” for
a dignified purpose.
The church quarrel did not originate in the new position of Dr. Newman,
but the conflict having begun, this new position was made the point of
attack by what is called the “Anti-Newman party.” It was the weak place
because Dr. Newman had taken a new departure. The quarrel came out of the
incompatibility of temper and interest developed between the old and the
new elements in the church and congregation. Some of the old men left;
the new were then more numerous and powerful than the old. The latter saw
themselves gradually retiring to back seats, while the new men filled the
front seats. They precipitated a conflict to secure themselves against
the consequences of Dr. Newman’s abundant success. In the wisdom of this
world, the new element put off paying the large debt; but they preferred
to be certain that they would be left in peaceable possession after
paying the debt.
The council has “advised” that Dr. Newman is in an untenable position—is
not the permanent pastor. The advice is probably according to precedent.
But it was not according to precedent that Dr. Hepworth left the
Unitarians, and Dr. Davis the Methodists, to become pastor of that
church. And for forty years there has been an increasing interflow
between denominations. Half a score of ex-Methodists, including some
of the ablest pastors in the city, are preaching in churches of
other denominations. Ministers and members pass and repass between
denominations. All this would have looked strange forty years ago.
Perhaps Dr. Newman’s new idea may not look strange forty years hence.
The advice of the council has probably only changed the form of the
conflict which does not depend on Dr. Newman, but on the antagonism of
the old and new elements in the congregation. We should like to see Dr.
Newman’s theory thoroughly tested, and Congregationalism is liberal
enough to afford the desired test. Methodism, as a whole, has no reason
for jealousy of Dr. Newman’s success in the Madison Avenue Church. His
success and good fame reflect honor on all Methodist preachers. We may
come to realize that if a man is “worthy of confidence and fellowship by
virtue of his responsible connection with some other body of Christian
churches”—words quoted by the late council—he may safely “be counted a
minister of the Congregational,” or any other “order.”