Letters to a Sister (28 page)

Do you hear ‘The Way of Life'?
²⁷⁵
It seems rather bitty and silly to me. I like more sequence. I was a little disappointed in John Huxtable last week. He wasn't bad; but I heard him preach such a very good and unusual sermon one evening in the King's Weigh House, and these morning talks are rather commonplace compared with that. I went to the Weigh House on Sunday morning for their communion service. It is very nice, and very like ours, but we sit in our places, tho' sometimes we go up to the rail, which I much prefer. Fr Harris on Sunday evening answered my pulpit question about intercommunion; he explained the Church rules about the need for confirmation, and endorsed them, which I suppose officers of the Church must, in public. But he didn't really answer about our going to dissenting churches. However, I go and like it, tho' not really so much as our sung Masses. I suppose what some Anglicans would say is that something happens to the bread and wine when consecrated
by a priest ordained by bishops which doesn't happen when not. I wish we knew the earliest history of the development of this view. There is no evidence of it in St Paul's references to the service. I expect it was thought of pretty early, to enhance the position of the clergy.

Very much love….

E.R.M.

Soon after this Rose had a fall and broke her right wrist and femur. For two weeks she was in Charing Cross Hospital, then University College Hospital. Towards the end of April she was home again.

30 April, [195S]

Dearest Jeanie,

… Today I went to the Orthopaedic
²⁷⁶
for arm and hand treatment, by radio
[sic]
heat, and massage and exercises, and also a little leg treatment. The therapist had heard from Mr Trevor
²⁷⁷
that I had mended quickly, and she thought the same herself. She said I should do hand and wrist exercises, and use my hand, as it has got v. stiff and swollen, so I use it much more freely now. She says there is no danger of it coming unstuck. Tomorrow my help comes, so between us we shall get the flat much cleaner. Yesterday I had a nice god-daughter
²⁷⁸
to tea, and she did a lot of washing up. She is an interesting girl, and interested also in religion, and can discuss it quite intelligently. Like many of her age she reads a lot of C. S. Lewis.

Did you hear ‘Lift up your Hearts' this morning? I didn't agree that Christians tend to be alike. St Francis, whom he
²⁷⁹
referred to, was extremely different from Savonarola, or St Bernard, or St Jerome. And I don't suppose the old lady who spent 60 years lying in bed talking cheerfully and knitting (she ought to have got up long ago I expect) was like the enterprising girl who went as a missionary to India. I liked the Royal Academy dinner speeches last night, especially Kenneth Clark's and the President's.
²⁸⁰

V. much love.

E.R.M.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 10 May, 1958

Dearest Jeanie,

… Yes, Dummelow
²⁸¹
is very orthodox; a brother of Mother Selina
²⁸²
would be likely to be, I suppose. Gore's commentary
²⁸³
is more critical, but I expect even that sticks up for the credibility of the 4th Gospel on the whole. I will look up what it says about it. You might look what D. says about Mary Magdalene. I find this is often a test of whether a critic has examined the Gospel allusions to her and [those] to the ‘woman who was a sinner' and came in to the supper and who was, they said, unknown to Christ; or whether they have accepted a Church tradition (started by Gregory the Great) without evidence. Gore says there is no evidence that she was a sinner; ‘seven devils' usually means fits or mania in the Bible. If critics repeat this tradition without question, it
usually means that they will accept others, more important, without question either. I don't know what the best recent commentary is, or what is the latest view about the 4th Gospel….

I went to St Paul's [Cathedral] this afternoon to see the new high altar, which is very splendid, the canopy all gold and decoration and angels and a tall Christ standing at the top, and gold leaves scrolling round the pillars.
²⁸⁴
A woman who had come up from Lancashire to see it was almost in tears of admiration. Her mother had told her it wasn't worth the fare, but ‘I've seen something better than I've ever seen in my life!' she said. She had never seen St Paul's before. I also saw the 2 new National Gallery pictures.
²⁸⁵
The Reni is n.g., but the Poussin is attractive, the Israelites dancing round the gold calf in touching joy, and Moses coming down the mountain to them looking furious and just about to break the Tables. It was rather a shame, they had taken so much trouble and it was a beautiful creature and they liked it so much.

Did you listen to
The Square Search
the other evening?
²⁸⁶
I thought it odd that a quite decent & kindly pilot should condone the cold-blooded attempted murder by another pilot of three men because he thought one of them had been getting off with his wife. All the good pilot said was, what a lot he must have been through. I should have reported him and got him sacked as a dangerous criminal. He had also deliberately wrecked two expensive planes.

V. much love.

E.R.M.

17 May, 1958

Dearest Jeanie,

... I went the other night to the Layman's Trust meeting at the Albert Hall, described as a Christian Social Challenge.
²⁸⁷
The speakers were all good, Fr Huddleston and Manuela Sykes the best I thought. Fr H. saw me in the audience and came at the end to chat; he said he tried to come and see me in hospital, but went to Charing X after I had left it, what a pity. Tomorrow the new C. R. Superior
²⁸⁸
is preaching at St Paul's, Knightsbridge, I think I shall go there. Today there were May processions from various churches about the streets, in honour of Mary, who balanced rather unsteadily on her perch.
²⁸⁹
I should have been glad to see her topple, but couldn't throw any thing, as police were near. They (not the police but the processors) were singing Hail Mary as they walked, very monotonously. A pity no Protestant Truth champions turned up. There will be some more processions tomorrow. The Layman Trust speakers, with their emphasis on social justice and mercy, were much better representatives of Christianity. I liked the ‘Lift up your Hearts' this week. What a lot of things the speaker
²⁹⁰
had done….

I see that the Kirk is getting very restive about the idea that they should have bishops, and Anglican elders. It does seem silly, when all that is needed is intercommunion, without any attempt to get a similar church. I like to see bishops in church very much; the Bp of Kensington turned up at G. Chapel the other morning to confirm someone and took the 8.15
mass after it, and to see his golden mitre and crozier added great dignity to the service….

Very much love.

E.R.M.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 27 May, [1958]

Dearest Jeanie,

The buses still out, and probably no hope of [a] meeting this week.
²⁹¹
They
are
selfish & mean; and now trying to stop the coaches by calling out the petrol tankers. Well, no doubt they will have their reward. I hope you had a nice Whitsun. I drove to Sussex on Sunday and spent the afternoon with John Lehmann, who has a cottage & a wood & a small lake. I came home in comparative quiet, because of Whit Monday next day. It was my first long drive since my fall, and my hand survived it quite well, tho' ached rather. Everyone seems to be breaking their femurs just now, it seems an epidemic; I visited someone in hospital with it yesterday.
²⁹²
... I hope she will get better… quickly; she is coming on my cruise.
²⁹³
So is Lady Diana Cooper….

The Times
is having a correspondence about intercommunion, the first few days of which I enclose (mixed up with one about the Kirk, by mistake apparently).
²⁹⁴
I will send later letters as they come up. Anglican opinion seems sharply divided. I rather like the last letter.
²⁹⁵
I imagine the masses see
no reason at all why we shouldn't all communicate together, or indeed with Rome, as an English woman tried to do in a Spanish church not long ago, but her acquaintances and husband told her to sit down at once. Besides believing it to be right and Christian, I also feel that it would be a pity for (say) the C. of E. & the Kirk to try and adopt one another's organizations, as neither would feel so happy that way. Much better be as different as we like, and allow intercommunion with all Christians. I certainly don't want elders, and they don't want bishops. I feel that kind of approach to a similar organization might lead to minimising Anglican ritual and ornament, which I shouldn't at all like, and perhaps making the Scotch use our P.B. more, which
they
wouldn't like….

What
is
De Gaulle up to? How is he able to ‘take over the government' like that, in the face of its present members?
²⁹⁶
How odd the French are, politically. I'm sure he will do a lot of harm, and may bring about civil war. If so, which side would G.B. support, for I can't imagine we should keep neutral. Nor America either. Nor Russia. ‘Massive support' would roll in for all sides, and I dare say an H-bomb would go off.

Very much love.

E.R.M.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 31 May, 1958

Dearest Jeanie,

Thank you for your letter & enclosures…. French affairs seem to be settling down under de Gaulle, but I expect there will be a lot of trouble and violence in Algeria and Tunisia. People just back from Paris say it is very quiet, and the French
shrug it away as unimportant, but are probably ashamed of it. I sent you some more intercommunion letters yesterday. Public opinion is certainly for it, and the cons are having a rough handling.
²⁹⁷
It looks as if the Kirk would turn down the Report; they are stiffening against episcopacy.
²⁹⁸
Much better drop the whole thing, and just throw down the communion barriers where they exist. I can't imagine why the Kirk should have bishops. It would split it in two, as most of them would never accept them; George MacLeod would, but it is thought he would rather like to be one….

Did you see that Bishop Morris, the head of the ‘English Church in South Africa', protested to the Archbishop about asking Makarios to Lambeth
²⁹⁹
?... I hope Makarios won't come as there would certainly be unpleasantness; he might be attacked, and General Spears says he will get him arrested and imprisoned for murder.
³⁰⁰
In any case he might be mobbed & shouted at & stoned, as the Czars used to be when they came over after atrocities at home.
³⁰¹

How very silly we are; some people here have now formed a ‘Committee for the defence of French democracy'. I wonder what they plan to do to defend it….

I wonder if
The Observer
tomorrow will correspond any
further about hell fire.
³⁰²
A rather futile subject, as every one really knows that the Biblical writers thought of real fire and that we don't any more.... Now I've just heard ‘Lighten our Darkness' on the wireless,
³⁰³
but turned it off when he talked about ‘the good book' and ‘folk'. I wish people wouldn't talk like that about religion, it debases it rather and will do it no good with listeners, who are becoming more intelligent. Did you hear the 3rd Programme talk on the Church? I thought [it] interesting.
³⁰⁴

How vulgar and spiteful these R.C. propagandists are about the C. of E. I'm glad we don't talk like that to the Press about them, though we do privately to one another. I think all that happened to the Church Enquiry Bureau was that they thought of starting one and decided not to after all, as they didn't think there would be enough demand.
³⁰⁵
I expect they were right; very few people would write and ask about the C. of E., which most people think they know quite enough about already, whereas very many are curious about Rome, and (in this country) great numbers are attracted by it, because it is strange to them and romantic. Lots, when they get to know it, don't like it much and don't join, or soon leave. But there is a much more admiring feeling about it here than in R.C. countries, where the majority belong, but complain of it. There have been several attacks on it lately, in Irish and French books by lapsed R.C.s who didn't like their education in Jesuit schools. I imagine that when the C. of E. quite disintegrates, its former members will mostly either become agnostic or R.C. and the fight will be ‘between irreligion & Catholicism', as the R.C.s say it is now. I doubt
if dissent will ever be powerful again. The Scotch Church Assembly says the Romans treat people like infants, the Anglicans like adolescents, and they themselves like civilized adults; hence they won't be ruled by bishops.
³⁰⁶
I like bishops, their golden mitres shine so finely, and their croziers. We had Bishop Hamilton
³⁰⁷
this morning at St Paul's [Knightsbridge]; he used once to be vicar there. He preached well, about the division between Christians and non-Christians, if they ever came to be sorted out, which I agree with him is whether they believe that Christ was in any sense God or not. He is a thoughtful bish., but rather slow perhaps; he is reputed the best-looker on the Bench….

Very much love.

E.R.M.

20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.1 12 June, [1958]

Dearest Jeanie,

... I sent you a card from Stonehenge, where I spent an hour on the downs in sunshine looking at the stones.
³⁰⁸
Then my companion took over the driving and drove me home, which was restful, as I don't like to drive for so long with my present hand, tho' it doesn't damage it really. I am driving to Cambridge tomorrow for the night, but that is a much shorter way. The Conference
³⁰⁹
should be interesting, as some good speakers are there.