1 OF THE Church and the Clergy. THE OFFICIATING MINISTER, AND THE [VOL. b.] BY THE REV. W. H. PINNOCK, LL.D. OF CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, Cambridge. Author of the Analysis of Seripture History! 'Ecclesiastical History! Second Edition. CAMBRIDGE:-J. HALL & SON; LONDON-WHITTAKER AND CO., AVE MARIA LANE; OXFORD: J. H. PARKER. 1860. The Officiating Minister. 1.-AN opinion was entertained some little time ago by many of our Clergy, that the weightier and more important functions of the Clerical Office, involving the maintenance of sound Christian doctrine and the bishopric of souls,' had been much intruded upon in later years by matters of comparatively far less significance and importance; and that the time, thought, and study, necessary for the true interests of religion, had been diverted with intense zeal, and no trifling degree of bitterness, from their proper pursuit to the consideration of obscure and obsolete points of Canonical discipline, Ceremonial order, and Rubrical punctilio. This charge, not quite however to the extent here advanced, public notoriety must compel us to admit, and we may venture to trace it in a great measure to the deficiency of information possessed by the Clergy generally with respect to the Ecclesiastical and temporal Laws by which such points may often be simplified and explained, as well as to the decisions of the Ecclesiastical Courts by which numerous cases have been actually determined. At the present day also, a movement has been set on foot to abbreviate the MORNING SERVICE, and otherwise reform the LITURGY. The various points which have been propounded will, however, be discussed in due order. 2.-In the performance of the Ministerial Duties of our Church, it cannot be questioned that our grand rule of action should be the Apostolical injunction, "Let all things be done unto edifying......decently, "and in order." (1 Cor. xiv. 26. 40.). Yet this edification,' 'decency,' and 'order,' can never be effected by each individual Minister acting upon his R |