Parish work

“ There is no man more out of place, and who takes longer to fit into his place, than the worthy young clergyman who has been ordained to a town curacy, kept for four or five years at all the routine work of a large town parish, worked and admirably organized as—thank God!—most large town parishes are, and who, at eight or nine and twenty, is dropped down suddenly into a small village, and told that there he is to live and die. ”

“ They want a work that is worth while. Many churches are languishing for a job which they may apprehend and accept—for something large [Pg 44] enough and difficult enough to challenge their powers and kindle their enthusiasm. And when a proposition is made to them that seems sane and sensible, when they can have confidence in their leaders, they are generally ready to fall in line and to march forward with firm and steady tread. That was the case with this particular church, and they have stood behind the work of the Larger Parish from the first in solid phalanx. ”

“ The Church services, which used to be everything, are now only a part of the parish work. The clergy are at once servants of the altar, preachers, teachers, almoners, leaders in all kinds of societies and clubs, and providers of amusements and recreation. The people look on, hold out their hands, receive, at first indifferently—but presently, one by one, awaken to a new sense. As they receive they cannot choose but to discover that these ladies have given up their luxurious homes and the life of ease in order to work among them. ”

“ The church which has this vision, which recognizes this obligation and seeks to discharge it, will find some way of doing it. The work within the towns and villages is often great and difficult. Many churches have failed to reach all the people within the sound of their church-bell, and there is much work at their very doors that they have not yet accomplished. Shall they reach out and extend their parish threefold, and multiply their duties and obligations many times? ”

“ There are the parish vestry, the parish infirmary, the parish surgeon, the parish officers, the parish beadle. Excellent institutions, and gentle, kind-hearted men. The woman dies—she is buried by the parish. The children have no protector—they are taken care of by the parish. The man first neglects, and afterwards cannot obtain, work—he is relieved by the parish ”

“ The work is a growth, and is still in the process of development. We are all the while finding something more to do for the people, and larger possibilities of service are opening up before us continually. But it may be said to have passed beyond the experimental stage. Nobody looks upon it any longer as simply an experiment. It is a practical plan in successful operation. The church has come to have a well-defined policy. The people have accepted the idea of the Larger Parish and are coöperating heartily in carrying it out. ”

“ From the long list of voluntary subscriptions, it appears that all were eager to have a part in the work of building up their church—a church which should be a credit to Bodmin. All sorts and conditions of men and women are entered as contributors on the roll of parishioners, more than 460 in number. Servants appear as well as masters and mistresses, sons and daughters as well as their fathers and mothers.
The same sort of story is told in every set of parish accounts that we possess—a story of popular devotion to the material fabric of the parish church. ”

“ The spiritual duties of the parish were sometimes served by one of the community in holy orders, or by a cleric attached to the house; sometimes by a stipendiary priest who was paid according to private agreement, and dismissed at pleasure.
A short experience showed that the monks told off to take charge of these appropriate parishes did not generally make very efficient parish priests—how, indeed, should they? The pastoral work of a parish requires other qualities, ideas, sympathies, than those which are proper to the cloister. ”

“ They will go back to their own ways. Yet they are a splendid people to work with,—a delightful people. I have many real friends among them. The parish is slowly improving. We have paid off the mortgage, and are now putting an addition on the church. The men have erected the frame, and when the ladies of the parish finish planting, they will put the plaster on the walls. ”

“ Persons receiving parish pay presently become idle alledging that the parish is bound to maintain them, and that in case they should work it would only favour the parish, from whom they say they shall have no thanks. ”

“ When you have a parish of your own, or assist another man in his parish, you will have a big work to do among the boys and young men, and how do you think it will affect them to hear that you have pulled stroke in your boat, or played for the ’Varsity in football or cricket? ”

“ The Academy has been maintained very largely by the gifts and sacrifices of the people of the community, and is an important factor of the work that is being wrought out in “The Larger Parish.”
The people of this community are unusually homogeneous. There are no Roman Catholics, few foreigners, and no colored people. They are hardworking and industrious, none of them possessing large wealth, and none of them being very poor. ”

“ Would not the Larger Parish idea as set forth in this story furnish a good working plan for such a movement?
No man can have very much enthusiasm in a task that does not challenge all his powers and bring them into action—neither can a church. With the village churches it is a case of self-preservation as well as outreaching service. They must do this work or die. They will not long survive the spiritual declension of the country. The country and the village stand or fall together. ”

“ Parish House.—By reason of the growing activities of the American Church, it is found necessary to have some building other than the church where the active and sometimes secular work of the Parish can be carried on, a place where societies, guilds, schools, etc., can have their own proper "workshop." ”

“ The reaction against over-restoration is now happily setting in, but a word of caution is also necessary lest that cry should be adopted as the cloak of a lazy indifferentism, or be used as an excuse for regarding the parish church as a local museum illustrative of byegone times, to be carefully dusted and nothing more. Where much new work, or any considerable extent of refitting, seem absolutely necessary, it is best to hasten slowly, and to do a little well rather than to aim at a speedy general effect. ”

“ Nor should attention be [47] only directed to manor-houses. All old domestic work is worth chronicling, so rapidly is it disappearing both in town and country; and the annalist of a parish should not be above transcribing all the initials and dates so frequently seen on lintel stones. As a rule, every house or cottage, not obviously modern, that has stone buttresses, a moulded wall-plate or string-course, or bevelled stone mullions to the windows, is worthy of careful examination. ”

“ An Every Member Canvass for home and foreign missions is carried on throughout the whole parish. Each year a letter is prepared, giving briefly the progress of the work for the year past and setting forth its present condition. ”

“ These letters are sent by mail to nearly all the families in the parish, with small collection envelopes for the different members of the household, with the request that they bring the offerings to their accustomed places of worship. The children as well as the older people are encouraged to bring in their offerings, and we have found this an effective way of cultivating in them the spirit of benevolence. There is much gain in leading them to feel that they have a part in the work. ”

“ They were the men especially trusted by the parish for the common benefits of the church, and therefore were the most like persons to move their severall townships to contribute every one something towards the accomplishment of so charitable a work, and not doubting that their good examples in their contributions would be a strong motive to excite others. ”

“ It has often been noticed how far better the work of redeeming the interior of our churches from that state of dirt and neglect that had degraded some at least below the level of the very barns upon the glebe, has been carried out where money has come in slowly, and at intervals, rather than where some munificent patron has readily found the funds to enter upon a big contract. ”

“ The last named work hereinafter cited as Hale, Churchwardens' Prec.
[22] For numerous examples of excommunication for non-appearance, see Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 29 ff. Under the heading of each parish we see "aegrotat" or "excusatur," or "nullo modo" (sc. comparuit) placed after the name of each person cited to attend from that parish. Incumbents, wardens and sidemen were almost always in attendance. Schoolmasters usually so when there were such. ”

“ Instantly the whole village awoke to intense excitement. Women dropped their work by the fireside; old men put away their long-stemmed pipes and leaped like young braves to the doors of the lodges; while in the fields young girls stood straight to listen. Again came the cry, but nearer now and as of many voices. From every lodge by the side of the river and on the hill came pouring the red-skinned villagers, their straight, black hair glistening in the sunlight. From the fields of corn and squashes and out from among the bean-vines came lithe maidens and sturdy Indian women ”

“ After a few years we added to our work another large district, containing 5,000 poor, called St Matthew s, Walton Street, and embracing part of the Parish of St Saviour s, Upper Chelsea. There, during seventeen years, we have
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witnessed a wonderful growth of organisation and work among the roughest poor. My people spend altogether including remuneration to clergy ^1,700 a year on these two districts alone, and completely carry out the Church organisation which is deemed necessary. We have about sixty district visitors, Bible nurses and lay mis sionaries. ”

“ Whatever the origin, it is certain that long before the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries the parish church had practically come to be the property of the parishioners generally in a very definite manner, and, with certain exceptions, to which reference will presently be made, upon the inhabitants of a parochial district as a corporation lay the duty of repairing and rebuilding the fabric, of beautifying the edifice, of maintaining the services, and of seeing generally to its well-being. ”

“ Every scrap of paper of past generations, showing the inner working of parochial life, possesses some interest of its own; and future generations will thank us for their preservation. Moreover, a careful arrangement of parish papers often meets with more immediate reward. We have ourselves found missing portions of 16th century registers, highly interesting deeds as early as the 14th century, royal proclamations and special forms of prayer, temp. Elizabeth and James I., in parochial litter put aside as valueless. ”

“ Although it was not till well into the sixteenth century that any successful attempt was made to impose by law upon the parishioners, as such, any purely secular duty, such as the care of local roads and bridges, or the repair of ditches, dykes, and sluices, the people’s wardens had long before this assumed the superintendence of all the common parochial amusements, and in some instances of works, such as brewing and baking, etc., undertaken for the common benefit or profit. ”

“ The provision of parish books and of a vestry room or parochial office, parish chest, and the holding or management of parish property not being property relating to affairs of the Church or held for an Ecclesiastical charity, are also in rural parishes transferred to the Parish Council. ”

“ Any account of parish life in mediæval England must include much more than might at first sight be supposed. To imagine that the story of the parson and his church could adequately represent the story of the parish, even with all that the one had to do for his people and all that in the other was contained and done, is somewhat like thinking that the biographies of kings and nobles and the chronicle of their battles and achievements would tell properly the story of a people or a country. ”

“ As the church was from the earliest times the centre of the parish, and the priest the head of his flock and the chief person—the parson—of the district, it is natural to look for the first indications of all parochial life in the church itself. From the cradle to the grave, as it has often been said, through the clergy, religion extended its care to every soul, and exerted its influence over man, woman, and child in every parochial district, mainly by means of the Church services and the administration of the Christian Sacraments. ”

“ To the authors of the History of English Law their existence is due to the natural outcome of the responsibility placed upon the people. “If the parishioners are compelled to provide precious books, robes, vessels, etc., they will naturally desire to have their say about the custody of these articles; parsons have been known to sell the church plate.”
In the fifteenth century the churchwardens were chosen annually in a parish meeting at which, no doubt, the rector or vicar would have presided; all adult members of the parish having a voice in the election. ”

“ The parochial history of the towns is very obscure. The facts point to the conclusion that the origin of parishes here was the same as in the country. There the lord of an estate built a church and provided a maintenance for a priest to minister to his family and dependents; and the priest’s spiritual authority was conterminous with the area of his patron’s civil jurisdiction; i.e. the estates were the parishes. The ancient towns, it is found, were frequently divided between several principal proprietors, who had rights of jurisdiction over their own land and the people living on it. ”