An Appeal to the People in Behalf of Their Rights as Authorized Interpreters of the Bible

by Catharine Esther Beecher

These statements were repeated not long ago to a business man, an exemplary member of an orthodox church in Boston, and he expressed the same opinion. In repeated other instances that need not be enumerated, in various sections of the country, the same opinion has been expressed by intelligent and consistent members of the church, whose prejudices would naturally lead them to the most favorable view of the case.

Such impressions have not been decreased by the recent multiplied defalcations, forgeries, and other business dishonesties that have occurred in the last three years among church members and officers of religious charities in high places of trust.

To all this add the fact, that a large class of men of exemplary private life, who are spending their time, money and influence for the relief of human woes and the redress of social and political wrongs, are at the same time openly attacking the church as the chief bulwark of these wrongs, while all the delinquencies of ministers and churches are freely discussed and denounced by them before the people.

The result is, that a large portion of the most exemplary and intelligent part of the church feel themselves to be in a dubious and false position, and are [pg 321] daily querying whether professing to be a peculiar people is not doing more harm than good; and whether it would not be better that the influence of good men should rest on their unassociated individual character, and not on organizations making such high profession where the light of goodness is obscured by associated darkness.

Great doubt and skepticism, both in the church and out of it, have thus arisen also as to what real religion consists in, and as to what are the true claims of the church and its ministry.

Multitudes who would enter the church if it was regarded simply as an association of persons to support the ordinances appointed by Jesus Christ, and to aid each other in obeying his Word, turn from its present position and claims with distrust or disgust. At the same time ministers and church members, feeling these difficulties, have more and more relinquished the Augustinian theory as the basis of their organization, and are advancing to an open avowal of the common-sense ground, i.e., that the real invisible church of Christ embraces all those who acknowledge him as their Lord and Master, and make it their chief aim to understand and to obey his teachings, and that a visible church is any association of persons who organize to aid each other in this object, by sustaining a ministry and worship as they understand to be most in agreement with the teachings of Christ.

The Episcopal church, both in Great Britain and in this country, although as strictly Augustinian in its articles as any other, has taken the lead of all others in practically renouncing that system. Any man can more readily secure all the privileges of membership [pg 322] in that church without any confession of faith or public profession of a “change of nature,” than in any of the other Augustinian denominations, and this is probably one great reason of its prosperity in this country.

Any sensible man of good moral character, who should state in a respectful and candid spirit, that he could not conscientiously submit to acknowledging in any form, the rights of any man or body of men to decide for him in regard to the interpretation of the Bible; that according to his understanding of its teachings, he was bound to acknowledge Jesus Christ as his Lord and Master in all matters of faith and practice, and to associate himself with other avowed followers of Christ by some form of open acknowledgment; that as he understands the New Testament, the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper were instituted as forms of such acknowledgment and communion, and that he wished thus to connect himself with the Episcopal church without any creed, confession or acknowledgment; it is believed, that in such a case, there are few ministers and still fewer laymen who would not think it right to gratify such a desire. It is believed that there are many, also, of the highest standing for intellect, piety and position in the Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist and Congregational churches, who have so far thrown aside the system of Augustine, that they also would receive such a man to their communion on these terms.

In this state of feeling among laymen the developments of sectarianism, which, as has been shown, all relate to matters of rites and forms, resulting from the Augustinian theory, have become more and more suspicious and offensive. Especially is this the case [pg 323] in the newer States, where union and harmony among good men are most needed.

In the volume, of Common Sense Applied to Religion, page 342, statistics are introduced from the reports of three of the largest sects of this country, the Old and New school Presbyterian and the Congregational churches, showing that, owing to their sectarian divisions, nearly one third of their churches are without ministers, and nearly one half of these churches have not over fifty members, the majority of these being women, while the relative amount of ministers to churches is constantly decreasing. Not only in the large, but the smaller towns, the struggle to build churches and support ministers among the various sects, that differ only as to rites and forms, is most mournful, making a taxation both on the East and West for their support which is incredible.