COLONIAL CHURCH CHRONICLE, Missionary Journal, AND FOREIGN ECCLESIASTICAL REPORTER. 1871. "Christianity is to be considered as a trust deposited with us in behalf JOHN & CHARLES MOZLEY. 6, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON. 1871. THE COLONIAL CHURCH CHRONICLE, Missionary Journal, AND FOREIGN ECCLESIASTICAL REPORTER. JANUARY, 1871. THE RECENT CONSECRATIONS OF AFRICAN BISHOPS. ST. ANDREW's Day, 1870, was rendered memorable in the annals of the modern African Church by the consecration of new Bishops for Sierra Leone, Mauritius, and Bloemfontein. The places where these new prelates received the Apostolic commission were unusual. Westminster, from whose national sanctuary so many Fathers have been sent forth into our Colonies and Missions "in all lands," was for once forsaken ;-in the case of the two former, for the twin foundation of St. Paul's; in that of the third, for a cathedral which is one of the most recent tokens of the gradual revival of our Communion in Scotland. We shall not inquire into the reason for the first of these departures from venerable precedent; but the difficulty which necessitated the second, as shown in the correspondence we have published between the English Arch-Primate and the South African Metropolitan, is of a nature which demands our incessant agitation till effectual measures have been taken to preclude the possibility of its ever being raised again. The sister-Church across the Tweed has profited, however, by the present occurrence of this difficulty. "Disestablishment" is shown to have brought her, with all its tremendous losses, some substantial gains; she has now helped to fulfil for Africa the same office as formerly for America, and has taught both enemies and friends to set a juster value on the fact of her distinct existence. |