Up to this time the Channel Islands had formed part of the Diocese of Coutances in Normandy,[37] an arrangement which led to much inconvenience in times of war between France and England. Queen Elizabeth put an end to this connection in the year 1568,[38] and attached the islands to the See of Winchester; but it was not until the Restoration of Charles II. that the change took full effect, and that the islands were brought entirely within the discipline of the Church of England by authority of the Bill of Uniformity.
It is well known that it was part of Queen Elizabeth’s policy to favour the Huguenot party in France; and that in times of persecution the followers of the Reformed faith always met with an hospitable reception in England. The Channel Islands, lying so close to the coast of France, and speaking the same language as was used in continental Normandy, were naturally chosen as places of refuge in times of persecution by the French Protestants, many of whom—and among them several ministers—resorted thither until more settled times enabled them to return to their own homes. The old Roman Catholic rectors of the parishes in Guernsey, who, apparently, had given a sort of half adhesion to the intermediate order of things, and had been allowed to retain possession of a portion, at least, of the emoluments of their benefices, seem to have disappeared altogether shortly after the excommunication of the Queen by Pope Pius V. in 1570.
The Governor of Guernsey, Sir Thomas Leighton, who favoured the views of the Puritan party in the Church, filled up the vacant pulpits with French refugee ministers, and probably it would have been difficult at that time to find any others.[39] The same course seems to have been followed in Jersey. These ministers very naturally preferred their own form of conducting divine worship to that of the Anglican Church, and, on the representation of the Governors of both the islands, permission was given by the Queen for the use of the Genevan form in the churches of the towns of St. Peter Port in Guernsey, and of St. Helier in Jersey. This permission was renewed by King James I. on his accession to the throne; and the natural consequence was, that not only the Presbyterian form of worship soon spread into every parish in the islands, but that the Presbyterian discipline and Church government were firmly established, and the authority of the Bishop of Winchester totally ignored. To this discipline the people of Guernsey clung with great pertinacity, and the attempts during the Great Rebellion of the Brownists and other fanatical sects to introduce their peculiar doctrines, met with little or no favour. It was not without some opposition that Episcopacy was brought in, most of the ministers refusing to conform to the new order of things, and giving up their livings in consequence.[40] The people had nothing to say in the matter: they were bound by the Act of Uniformity, but, in deference to their feelings and prejudices, certain practices were allowed to be retained, and certain others dispensed with.
No great objection could be made to a set form of prayer, for something of the kind was in use in the French Reformed Church; but the Litany of the Church of England seems to have given great offence—probably from its close resemblance to some of those used in the Romish Church—insomuch that many persons at first abstained altogether from attending the morning service; and, although in the present day no objection exists to this, or any other part of the Liturgy, it is, perhaps, owing to habits then contracted, and handed down from generation to generation, that so many, especially in the rural parishes, absent themselves from church in the forenoon. The use of the sign of the cross in baptism, in deference to the strong prejudices of the people, who seem to have looked upon it as the Mark of the Beast, was not at first insisted upon, but, in order to counteract this feeling, the thirtieth Canon “On the lawful use of the Cross in Baptism,” was inserted at the end of the Baptismal Service in the French translation of the Book of Common Prayer printed for use in the islands, and there is every reason to believe that the objection to this practice soon died out.
Probably, kneeling at the Holy Communion was received with little favour, for we find that the first introduction of this practice on the 12th of October, 1662, was thought worthy of a note in a journal kept by a parish clerk and schoolmaster of that day—Pierre Le Roy—who wisely abstained from any comment on the event. To this day appliances for kneeling are rare in many pews, and at the beginning of the nineteenth century most of the congregation remained seated during the singing of the metrical psalms, as is the practice in the Presbyterian churches in Scotland and on the Continent.
Baptismal fonts are of recent introduction, the order to put them up in all the parish churches having been given by the Bishop of Winchester (Dr. C. R. Sumner) on the occasion of his primary visitation to this portion of his diocese in September, 1829, he being the first Prelate of that See who had deigned to inspect the state of the churches in the islands since the time that they were placed under the care of an Anglican Bishop by Queen Elizabeth. Before fonts were provided, the rite of baptism was administered at the altar, the minister, standing within the rail, receiving the water at the proper moment from the clerk, who poured it into his hand from a silver ewer.
In the absence of periodical visits from a Bishop, the rite of confirmation had, of course, become a dead letter. It was administered in 1818, for the first time since the Reformation, by Dr. Fisher, Bishop of Salisbury, who had been deputed to consecrate two newly-erected churches by the then Bishop of Winchester, who was too old and infirm to undertake the duty himself. Before that time—and indeed for some considerable time later—it was customary to give notice from the pulpit, previously to the quarterly celebration of the Holy Communion, that young persons desirous of communicating for the first time should attend in the vestry on a certain day. This notice was, of course, given in the parish churches in French—the language of the great majority of the people of that time—and the word used for “vestry,” and which we have so translated, was “Consistoire.” No doubt, under the Presbyterian discipline, the examination of catechumens took place before the Consistory, composed of the minister and elders of the church.
Till a comparatively recent period the Holy Communion was only administered quarterly, and at the great festivals of Christmas, Easter, Whitsuntide and Michaelmas. A preparatory sermon was generally preached at an evening service held on the day before the communion, and on this occasion a metrical version of the Decalogue was usually sung instead of a psalm or hymn. This was a practice borrowed from the French Reformed Church, as was also that of singing the 100th Psalm while the non-communicants were leaving the church, some portions of the 103rd Psalm while the communion was being administered, and, just before the final benediction, the Song of Simeon, “Nunc Dimittis.”
Men and women communicated separately, the men first and the women afterwards,—a relic doubtless of the time when they were kept apart in the church. No one thought of leaving the rails until all who knelt at the same time had communicated, when the officiating minister dismissed them with these words:—
“Allez en paix; vivez en paix,