Trailer Bishop

One of the youngest and ablest Episcopal bishops in the U. S. is Rt. Rev. Henry Wise Hobson, 45, of southern Ohio. A handsome, strapping man (6 ft. 4 in., 200 lb.), he was crew manager and Skull & Bones man at Yale (Class of 1914), won a Distinguished Service Cross for "extraordinary heroism" as a major in the World War, was chosen Bishop Coadjutor of southern Ohio in 1930 after holding an assistant rectorship in Waterbury, Conn., a rectorship in Worcester, Mass. In Cincinnati, his episcopal residence, Bishop Hobson joins in civic movements, collects paintings, holds services in small, old St. Paul's Cathedral, which the growth of the city has left stranded, faced by an ugly parking lot, in a poor section. A leader among "broad" and liberal Episcopal churchmen, busy Bishop Hobson occupies himself with the state of his Church as a whole by heading a "Forward Movement" to deepen its spiritual life. Last week he announced his plan to do something in particular about the 23,000 Episcopalians of southern, Ohio.

Nerve centre of a diocese is its cathedral, and in the view of many a bishop the finer the cathedral the greater the diocese. Last week, addressing the annual convention of his diocese in Columbus, Bishop Hobson paid his respects to the life of such cathedrals as those in Manhattan and Washington, then continued: "It just happens that the situation in southern Ohio is somewhat different, and perhaps you have a rather strange bishop. . . . If someone came to me today with the offer--'Here's a million--or five million--dollars for your Cathedral,' I would have to reply, 'No thank you.' If you are thinking of a building I wouldn't know where to put it, and after I had it I wouldn't know what to do with it." So, instead of asking the convention to build Cincinnati a new cathedral, as had often been suggested during the past decade, Bishop Hobson chose instead to request a trailer. Explained he:

"What is a Cathedral? It's a chair! That is what the word means. Chairs are like carpets. Most of them are rather settled in one place, but they don't have to be. ... What I want is a chair-- a Cathedra--which is not fastened down in one church in one city, but which can travel around to every parish and mission in the diocese. Such a chair is rather useless if it merely provides a place for the bishop to sit. It must be surrounded with other essentials and other people. An altar for worship, books for study; things of beauty to inspire; tools for work; pictures of society, the world, and the Church to challenge. These elements . . . can make a Cathedral which will be of real use to the diocese provided it is able to go to the people who need it most. It can go if we put it on wheels."

The convention voted its "hearty consent" to Bishop Hobson's plan, which he had worked out to the extent of having a trailer designed to cost between $5,000 and $10,000. To be called "St. Paul's Wayside Cathedral" and bear the motto "In Journeyings Often," the streamlined trailer will be 22 ft. long, 7 1/2 ft. high accommodating 24 worshipers. Its sides will contain stained-glass windows, show the diocesan seal and a cross. In the wood-paneled interior will be an altar, the bishop's "Cathedra," space for vestments, pictures, books, maps showing the work of the Church's departments of missions, social service, evangelism, religious education, publicity. The "Cathedral" will possibly contain an organ. As excited as a man planning a fishing trip, Bishop Hobson has already mapped out his first jaunt among his diocese's 78 parishes and missions, to begin as soon as the "Cathedral" can be built. Because old St. Paul's in Cincinnati is not pulling its weight, it will be razed, the land sold or leased.

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