Obrazy na stronie
PDF
ePub

To the President of the Convention of the Diocese of Maryland:

REVEREND AND DEAR BROTHER,-Being, in the wise Providence of GOD, disqualified by bodily indisposition from meeting my brethren of the Convention in person, I have placed my Address in the hands of one of the members, (the Rev.-Mr. Lyman) who has kindly undertaken to read it for me, if he has the permission of the Convention to that effect. The Address is now, therefore, at the disposal of the Convention, to be body, if it shall think fit so to order, whenever it shall be pleased to call for it.

Very faithfully and truly,

heard by that

your friend and brother,

WILLIAM ROLLINSON WHITTINGHAM,

BALTIMORE, May 30, 1849.

Bishop of Maryland.

The Committee appointed by the last Convention to compile and publish the Constitution and Canons of the Church in this Diocese, submitted the following report, with accompanying resolutions.

The Committee appointed by the last Convention to compile and publish the Constitution and Canons of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States, and those of the Diocese of Maryland, together with the Laws of the State of Maryland relative to the Church, and such other documents as they may judge interesting to churchmen and proper for insertion, report, that the work has been printed, and that copies of it can be obtained by members of the Convention.

The Committee offers the following resolutions:

1st. Resolved, That the price of the work be fixed at fifty cents, with a deduction of 25 per cent to Book-sellers.

2d. Resolved, That the bill of Joseph Robinson for printing and binding 1000 copies, and being $316.10, be authorised to be paid.

The resolutions were, on motion, adopted.

On motion, Resolved, That the treasurer be authorized to sell so much of the six per cent City Stock, belonging to the Convention, as will pay the bill of Joseph Robinson for publishing and binding the new edition of the Canons.

Resolved, That the treasurer be authorized to receive the proceeds of the books sold, and invest the same.

On motion, Resolved, That clergymen present, not members, and candidates for orders, be invited to attend the sessions of the Convention.

Agreeably to the suggestion in the communication of the Bishop, the Rev. Mr. Lyman was requested to read the Bishop's Address.

The Address was then read as follows:

Brethren of the Clergy and Laity:

With thankfulness for the good hand of God upon us through the year that has passed, there is again mingled, at our yearly re-assemblage, the smart of bereavement by the loss of an elder brother of our band. The Rev. Charles C. Austin, who for nearly thirty years had served his MASTER in this portion of the vineyard, and with the unusual felicity of having been for a large part of that time the Rector of the parish in charge of which he died, was taken from us after a brief illness in January last. His modest unobtrusiveness made him inconspicuous in our diocesan concerns; but those who have had the happiness to meet with him in more close relations know how amiable and open a temper and how warm and pure a heart that quiet demeanor served to conceal from the general view. With little encouragement in a parish greatly weakened by removals and the ordinary casualties of life, our departed brother had steadily and unmurmuringly worked on, satisfied if he pleased HIM whom he strove to serve, and when his LORD'S summons came, it found him in a faithful servant's attitude, with girded loins and burning light.

In other respects too, the Diocese has sustained losses: no less than sixteen of its clergy having removed by letters of dismission, to other Dioceses, within the year; while the additions, both by removal and ordination, only amount to the same number. So that altogether, we have a list of one less than at the last Convention.

Of those who have removed, the Rev. Henry H. Bean, the Rev. Dwight E. Lyman, and the Rev. Thomas W. Winchester,

have gone to Pennsylvania; the Rev. Alfred Holmead, the Rev. Henry S. Keppler, and the Rev. Carter Page to Virginia; the Rev. James Abercrombie, and the Rev. Joshua Sweet, to Wisconsin; the Rev. Francis Peck, to Rhode Island; the Rev. William P. C. Johnson, to Mississippi; the Rev. William H. Rees, to Connecticut; the Rev. Benjamin Franklin, to New Jersey ; the Rev. Enoch Bayley and the Rev. James W. Hoskins, to Delaware; and the Rev. Robert H. Clarkson, to Illinois.

The accessions have been, from the Diocese of Virginia, the Rev. Thomas B. Flower, and the Rev. William Hodges; from Ohio, the Rev. Richard S. Killin; from Alabama, the Rev. Francis M. Baker; from South Carolina, the Rev. Nicholas P. Tillinghast; from Mississippi, the Rev. James W. Hoskins, who has since again left us; from New York, the Rev. Samuel C. Davis and the Rev. Jacob B. Morss; from Rhode Island, the Rev. Owen P. Thackara; from New Jersey, the Rev. William W. Lord; and from Pennsylvania, the Rev. Asa S. Colton.

By ordination, the Rev. Joseph C. Passmore, the Rev. Robert H. Clarkson, (who has since left us,) the Rev. Alexander D. Jones, the Rev. Samuel R. Sargeant, and the Rev. James K. Stewart, have been added to the list of clergy.

The whole number is now one hundred and eighteen; including the bishop, one hundred and ten presbyters, and seven deacons. Of these seventy-eight are rectors of parishes; sir assistant ministers; two presidents of colleges; eleven professors and instructors in incorporated colleges and academies; fourteen principals or teachers of unincorporated schools; one chaplain in the United States Navy; and no less than eight disabled from ministerial duty by disease; of those having parochial charge or doing missionary duty, eighteen support themselves wholly or in part by the business of instruction.

The changes of the year have been very numerous; in no year of my episcopate has that fertile source of uneasiness occasioned me more anxiety and distress. An unusually large pro

3

portion has been the result of ill-health requiring a change of residence, or the relinquishment of the duties of the ministry. Deficiency of support has been the occasion of many. A pro

spect of a more inviting field of labor elsewhere, of a few.

It has been my unpleasant lot reluctantly to listen to complaints both of clergy and of laity, accusing each the other of instrumentality in promoting the increase of this great, this crying evil. Undoubtedly there may be faults on both sides; and in more than one instance, I have not been able wholly to coincide in judgment with the brother who has thought it right to leave a united and attached parish or congregation where he was evidently doing good, for the experiment of a new connexion. But in far the larger proportion of cases the fault is imputable to the people. Want of consideration, if nothing worse, makes them neglectful of provision for the merest necessary wants (to say nothing of comforts) of their minister and his family, unpunctual in the payment of the little they have promised, and unthoughtful of the many reasons why it should be increased, and the many ways in which it might be. How can a clergyman be expected to take up his abode for permanence, where beggary or dishonest debt are the only condition he has in prospect? Let parishes make better provision than scanty, fluctuating, annual subscriptions, grudgingly made, and grumblingly collected, if they desire to be free from the evils they now suffer by frequent changes, and their inevitable consequence, frequent, sometimes long, and always desolating vacancies.

Some of those vacancies, too, are occasioned or prolonged by the sinful fastidiousness, or equally sinful remissness, of the people. Clergymen in all respects of irreproachable character and good pretensions,-men, in the judgment of such as are better qualified to pass upon the question than ninety-nine-hundreths of those who arrogate the decision to themselves, abundantly able to show themselves workmen that need not to be ashamed-ar coldly or contemptuously rejected by vacant parishes whose

closed churches are tenanted by the bat and spider, for months and years together. These things ought not so to be. No spiritual blessing is to be looked for by those who voluntarily incur the privation of the word of promise and means of grace.

The changes of the year have been as follows: the vacancy occasioned in St. Thomas's Parish, Baltimore county, by the death of the rector in January last, has just been supplied by the acceptance of an invitation to the charge by the Rev. Jacob B. Morss, late of the diocese of New York, but resident for some months past in Baltimore, whither he came with a view to missionary duty, at the time thought feasible, but afterwards reluctantly relinquished, on more thorough inspection of the ground.

The Rev. Henry H. Bean, having accepted an invitation to Pennsylvania, resigned the rectorship of Christ Church, Washington, which has been filled by the Rev. William Hodges, late of the diocese of Virginia.

The Rev. Richard H. Phillips has relinquished the charge of the Landon Female Seminary, at Urbana, Frederick county, and the assistant ministership of Zion Parish, and removed to the diocese of Virginia. The Rev. Mr. Peterkin, rector of the parish, has succeeded Mr. Phillips in the Principalship of the Institute, which he is conducting with his usual energy and with good

success.

The Church of the Redemption in Baltimore, is, I have reason to believe, extinct as a corporation. The Rev. Mr. Piggott, the late rector, has been acting, during the year, as associate minister in charge of St. James's (First African) Church in Baltimore.

The Rev. Henry S. Keppler, having accepted a call to Virginia, resigned the rectorship of Holy Trinity Parish, Prince George county, in which he was succeeded by the Rev. Owen P. Thackara, late of the diocese of Rhode Island.

The Rev. James Abercrombie has resigned the rectorship of Trinity Parish, Charles county, and removed to the diocese of Wisconsin. He has been succeeded by the Rev. Meyer Lewin,

« PoprzedniaDalej »