Anglican Adjustment

Visit a British country family one of these bright spring weekends and at teatime you are likely to see such a scene as this: on the tennis-court are the Hon. Diana and the Hon. Molly, daughters of your host Lord Wilchester, playing a stiff set of tennis with the vicar of the parish and his young curate. If there is a cathedral in the neighborhood you will probably see its dean among the guests, and drinking tea with old Lady Wilchester (who is exceedingly deaf) will be a prebendary. Lord Wilchester, who owns the vicar's living (i.e., holds appointive power over the position) watches the game. Tonight he will drink twelve whiskey & sodas with the vicar, perhaps invite him to Sunday dinner.

Familiar and well-fictionized is this picture of British clerical life. But last week the London Daily Mail intruded a note of alarm, predicted that changes in the administration of the Church of England might well revolutionize the life of every parish in England. Since there is a deficiency of some 1,100 clergymen in the Church, there must soon be redistribution of vicars and curates (their assistants) and an amalgamation of many parishes which are at present thinly populated. Some congregations might be transported by bus to and from distant churches. Some curates might be obliged to scurry here & there by motorcycle in order to care for their several flocks. And it is not inconceivable that radio-hook-ups will be instituted to provide clergy-less congregations with their services. Said the Daily Mail: "The country squire will dine alone on five Sundays out of six, for the vicar will have not one but five or six squires in his new parish, and ordinary tenants will inhabit hundreds of old English vicarages."

Though Britain's best educated youth are loath to enter the Church (average pay is -L-400 annually: $2,000), there is no actual shortage of applicants. But there is a definite lack of funds to pay for their five to seven years of training. Hence the Church of England aims to distribute its clergy more evenly throughout its 13,775 parishes.

Though many a city church whose land rent is high and whose congregation is small may be scrapped, Anglicans are not alarmed about the fate of the average country church, despite the Daily Mail's gloomy forecast. Britain's picturesque churches, mellowed with age, will doubtless remain in use, even though in some cases their congregations have dwindled from 500 to 50.

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