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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 9:44:07 GMT -5
The fact the FM was not a church in itself but a "mission" working in conjunction with the traditional churches would suggest the Union Meetings were in fact multi-denominational as you suggest, What. Maybe the FM organised some? I don't know. However, they would have been involved to some degree and it would seem likely that it was through his FM involvement that Irvine had much of his experience with them ? I think there are some testimonies on record from the early workers that they were not starting anything new. This works both for the belief in the Shores of Gallilee beginnings and merely copying existing practices at the turn of the 20th century. Yes they were very conservative and basic. I think we have to be careful with the thought that FM worked "in conjunction with the traditional churches". That makes it sound like they were an evangelistic movement working on behalf of the churches and it doesn't sound like they were. The established churches themselves (that is, the Church of Scotland) were going through upheaval, and churchgoers in general were highly receptive to travelling evangelists like Dwight L. Moody. It would take more study to see what tensions might have been at play between orthodoxy and the Awakening, and what differences in ideas, theology and practice various evangelists may have been presenting. Perhaps Faith Mission trod a fine line to bring the newness of the Gospel to people, and still not step on the established churches' toes. The established churches were likely waning as a spiritual force as anything established seems to become over time. I'm guessing at this to quite an extent, and further reading and study is bound to sharpen my perception of events. What I do know is that from 1850 to 1900 there was a huge revivalist wave in Scotland, esp when you read of the hundreds of missionaries/ workers going overseas, the revival meetings with thousands of people, the prayer meetings, the parades with hymn singing. And, important to be said, this was all outside of the aegis of the church of Scotland/ Presbyterian churches. Note the little comment about John McNeill (made by Pattison) that he was both inside and outside the Presbyterian Church. That says to me that there was work going on "within the Presbyterian church" and more broadly non-denominational work. So within the revivalist movement you would naturally have a mix of sentiments for and against the Establishment, and no doubt much against. I have a feeling that the FM dwindled in numbers and strength because they tried to walk the middle line. In the breif FM history I read, you stop hearing about the FM Prayer Union meetings after a time. Whereas the workers survived because they created an identity apart from the established churches.
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Post by StAnne on Feb 8, 2012 9:53:23 GMT -5
You've made reference to the strong possibility of Holiness lineage several times lately. What is your take on the pedigree of the Holiness church? I was just looking at a chart that shows Orthodox/Catholic to Anglican to Methodist to Holiness. Is that as you believe it to be? (oops- sort of cross-posted - I had started my post and then went looking at charts) Interestingly, in this book there is a picture of all the Faith Mission pilgrims as of 1892, standing in four rows like a worker picture, and at their feet is a banner that says "holiness to the Lord". The Holiness Movement is simply the idea that you are redeemed when you are born again in Christ, but you are not sanctified at that point; you are not yet holy. Some denominations within the Holiness Movement speak of a second rebirth when you are sanctified, but I believe that with the friends you spend your life working toward being sanctified. This idea was quite common in Methodist circles of the late 19th century. Irvine was steeped in it, because he attended Keswick Convention which is seen as a center of the Holiness Movement. Anyway, the pedigree is actually from the Moravian Church which dates back to 1457. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, but who was actually an Anglican, was the first to spread the Holiness doctrine widely in his sermons and later his book titled "Christian Perfection". "Christian Perfection" is the same idea as Holiness, that you are "born again" once but then become perfected in Christ over time. I have read Wesley's book, but his distinction between perfected Christians who don't sin, but do make mistakes, versus unperfected Christians who aren't quite there yet, is quite a fine one. But the essential idea of spiritual progress throughout life is a compelling one, all the same. So, this is from wiki - It was on the voyage to the colonies that the Wesleys first came into contact with Moravian settlers. Wesley was influenced by their deep faith and spirituality rooted in pietism. At one point in the voyage a storm came up and broke the mast off the ship. While the English panicked, the Moravians calmly sang hymns and prayed. This experience led Wesley to believe that the Moravians possessed an inner strength which he lacked.[8] The deeply personal religion that the Moravian pietists practised heavily influenced Wesley's theology of Methodism.[9] And then the Moravian church was an offshoot of Catholicism, but almost a pre-Reformation one. However, some people believe the Moravian church, I'll quote wiki, "is reputed to have received the Apostolic Succession through the Waldensian Church, but the historicity of this is disputed." I personally doubt that, but most ideas in Christianity, like that of Holiness, have very deep roots. Yes. I now remember you writing of the Moravian church lately. I didn't see any reference to the Moravian church on the chart I looked at. I'll look some more when I get a chance. Interesting information you've provided. Right now I'm having difficulty imagining how the lines of Moravian, Holiness, and Waldensian (disputed, you say) might merge, but I will follow your developments. Of course I find it interesting that their roots are all closely Catholic-connected. Yes, I did see that the Pentecostal and Nazarene are directly off of the Holiness. I knew that Pentecostal and Holiness were closely related and I knew that Nazarene was a Methodist offshoot, but I didn't know that Holiness was a Methodist offshoot. So you are thinking you may find some 2x2 links via the Methodist-Moravian-Holiness line? I'm not certain I have those in the right order of development ... (I see I've asked before making it thru all of the posts on pg 1 ... I'll keep reading)
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2012 10:52:46 GMT -5
I understand that the Faith Mission brought people to Christ through their gospel preaching then directed them to the traditional churches as they had no established church of their own. In this way I see them working alongside the traditional churches, but to what extent I do not know.
The workers attempted the same thing to start with, but since they ultimately came to reject all that the Christian churches stood for they had to form their converts into a fellowship around themselves.
Whereas the Faith Mission workers sent their converts to organised churches, the workers started their own unorganised church for their own converts. The result is the workers had no support mechanism in place to offer proper pastoral care etc, relying only on themselves to assume roles and responsibilities their lifestyle was totally unsuited for.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 11:06:37 GMT -5
Interestingly, in this book there is a picture of all the Faith Mission pilgrims as of 1892, standing in four rows like a worker picture, and at their feet is a banner that says "holiness to the Lord". The Holiness Movement is simply the idea that you are redeemed when you are born again in Christ, but you are not sanctified at that point; you are not yet holy. Some denominations within the Holiness Movement speak of a second rebirth when you are sanctified, but I believe that with the friends you spend your life working toward being sanctified. This idea was quite common in Methodist circles of the late 19th century. Irvine was steeped in it, because he attended Keswick Convention which is seen as a center of the Holiness Movement. Anyway, the pedigree is actually from the Moravian Church which dates back to 1457. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, but who was actually an Anglican, was the first to spread the Holiness doctrine widely in his sermons and later his book titled "Christian Perfection". "Christian Perfection" is the same idea as Holiness, that you are "born again" once but then become perfected in Christ over time. I have read Wesley's book, but his distinction between perfected Christians who don't sin, but do make mistakes, versus unperfected Christians who aren't quite there yet, is quite a fine one. But the essential idea of spiritual progress throughout life is a compelling one, all the same. So, this is from wiki - It was on the voyage to the colonies that the Wesleys first came into contact with Moravian settlers. Wesley was influenced by their deep faith and spirituality rooted in pietism. At one point in the voyage a storm came up and broke the mast off the ship. While the English panicked, the Moravians calmly sang hymns and prayed. This experience led Wesley to believe that the Moravians possessed an inner strength which he lacked.[8] The deeply personal religion that the Moravian pietists practised heavily influenced Wesley's theology of Methodism.[9] And then the Moravian church was an offshoot of Catholicism, but almost a pre-Reformation one. However, some people believe the Moravian church, I'll quote wiki, "is reputed to have received the Apostolic Succession through the Waldensian Church, but the historicity of this is disputed." I personally doubt that, but most ideas in Christianity, like that of Holiness, have very deep roots. Yes. I now remember you writing of the Moravian church lately. I didn't see any reference to the Moravian church on the chart I looked at. I'll look some more when I get a chance. Interesting information you've provided. Right now I'm having difficulty imagining how the lines of Moravian, Holiness, and Waldensian (disputed, you say) might merge, but I will follow your developments. Of course I find it interesting that their roots are all closely Catholic-connected. Yes, I did see that the Pentecostal and Nazarene are directly off of the Holiness. I knew that Pentecostal and Holiness were closely related and I knew that Nazarene was a Methodist offshoot, but I didn't know that Holiness was a Methodist offshoot. So you are thinking you may find some 2x2 links via the Methodist-Moravian-Holiness line? I'm not certain I have those in the right order of development ... (I see I've asked before making it thru all of the posts on pg 1 ... I'll keep reading)I don't see things progressing in an A -> B -> C format. It's really much more complex. But one way to think of it is that there was an Awakening in the mid 19th Century in Scotland, Ireland, Canada, the US and even Germany that had similar characteristics and across which there was a world-wide exchange of ideas and fervour. "Holiness" doctrine was just one input and component of the Awakening period (lasting perhaps 50 years). And then the friends and workers were one of many results from the Awakening period especially that part that was influenced by Holiness doctrine. (Note - the historical literature speaks of a First, Second, Third Great Awakening, but I find the numbering is not consistent so just call it Awakening.) There is no question though that the Holiness doctrine came from John Wesley's book on Christian Perfection, that it was a major feature of early Methodism, and that Wesley began thinking about the doctrine after his experience with the Moravian church. That part is all historically verifiable.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 11:19:43 GMT -5
I understand that the Faith Mission brought people to Christ through their gospel preaching then directed them to the traditional churches as they had no established church of their own. In this way I see them working alongside the traditional churches, but to what extent I do not know. The workers attempted the same thing to start with, but since they ultimately came to reject all that the Christian churches stood for they had to form their converts into a fellowship around themselves. Whereas the Faith Mission workers sent their converts to organised churches, the workers started their own unorganised church for their own converts. The result is the workers had no support mechanism in place to offer proper pastoral care etc, relying only on themselves to assume roles and responsibilities their lifestyle was totally unsuited for. I didn't really get that idea. In that time in Scotland almost every one was a Christian of some stripe, but there was a great deal of fractiousness between the various branches of Presbyterian and the Church of Scotland. I don't have a clear sense of how Faith Mission messaged people, but it doesn't seem to me that they were evangelists fishing for the established churches. That would be the way one would view Billy Graham and the like. For one thing, why establish Prayer Union meetings if you could just send people to the local church. And they had over a hundred of these meetings established in a few short years. I don't think they worked in their own interest against the churches either. The way the history book presents it, they took the evangelistic fervour of Dwight L. Moody, who travelled the world preaching to large crowds in big cities, to the small towns and rural areas of Scotland. Another insight on this, is the foreboding that Whittaker, the Methodist superintendent, had about Irvine coming in to his area to preach. And remember that at the time Irvine was an FM pilgrim. So I suspect that clergy would be a bit mindful of evangelistic preachers esp if they were charismatic. (And FM were often hindered by agitators who threw rocks and eggs, but I suspect that came more from the public house side of things.)
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 11:33:17 GMT -5
An indication of the wariness with which evangelists were received in the 18th century is indicated by this passage on Moody's reception in England. It was during their first meetings in England, that a rumor was circulated throughout the British Isles, that Mr. Moody and Mr. Sankey were frauds of the rankest order, and that they had no standing whatever in America, and particularly in Chicago, from whence they hailed. Mr. Moody did not pay much attention to this at first, but it began to be so widely circulated that it appeared as if the consequences might be serious. So he cabled to his friends in America, and the ministers of Chicago endorsed him in the following resolutions: ...
Realize that Moody was then drawing crowds of 10,000 and up in England. And he was a mainstream evangelist, yet obviously was viewed as a threat to some individuals.
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Post by CherieKropp on Feb 8, 2012 11:33:45 GMT -5
I think you're missing something...the Faith Mission purpose is given in a booklet titled "The Faith Mission Aims and Principles" written by their founder, J.G. Govan:
"THE FAITH MISSION was instituted in October, 1886, for the evangelization, specially, of villages, country districts, and small towns in Scotland, but open to extend further, either in this country or elsewhere, as God might lead."
These rural districts were often without preachers/churches. This is where the FM focused their missions...they did not "fish" for converts from various churches.
And after gaining some converts, they would then set up Prayer Unions in these areas that might not be large enough for a churches...people of various denominations gathered together once a week for spiritual edification.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 11:44:23 GMT -5
I think you're missing something...the Faith Mission purpose is given in a booklet titled "The Faith Mission Aims and Principles" written by their founder, J.G. Govan: "THE FAITH MISSION was instituted in October, 1886, for the evangelization, specially, of villages, country districts, and small towns in Scotland, but open to extend further, either in this country or elsewhere, as God might lead." These rural districts were often without preachers/churches. This is where the FM focused their missions...they did not "fish" for converts from various churches. And after gaining some converts, they would then set up Prayer Unions in these areas that might not be large enough for a churches...people of various denominations gathered together once a week for spiritual edification. I did read of how they went to some very small outlying islands where there were no churches. But I consider the whole issue of the reception of the Faith Mission an open question, on which my thoughts are speculative. First, I did not say FM were fishing for converts from existing churches. It's very clear that they were not, and would not, be doing that. They weren't heterodox, for certain. What I said is that they were not fishing for converts on behalf of the existing churches. These evangelists of the time were breathing new life into the old forms of Christianity. They were bound to meet resistance in some quarters, as did the workers. And within the Faith Mission there were bound to be those who endorsed existing churches, or viewed them with antipathy or even hostility, as Irvine came to do. The FM pilgrims were untrained, zealous rural people. They weren't the smart, trained, conservative, securely paid ministers that headed the parishes and presbyteries. When you look at it that way, the "worker movement" was only waiting to happen.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2012 12:10:59 GMT -5
I think you're missing something...the Faith Mission purpose is given in a booklet titled "The Faith Mission Aims and Principles" written by their founder, J.G. Govan: "THE FAITH MISSION was instituted in October, 1886, for the evangelization, specially, of villages, country districts, and small towns in Scotland, but open to extend further, either in this country or elsewhere, as God might lead." These rural districts were often without preachers/churches. This is where the FM focused their missions...they did not "fish" for converts from various churches. And after gaining some converts, they would then set up Prayer Unions in these areas that might not be large enough for a churches...people of various denominations gathered together once a week for spiritual edification. Cherie, I'm assuming that wherever it was possible/convemient FM converts were directed to their local churches? In reality the F&W's movement appears to be Faith Mission Mk II?
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 12:41:45 GMT -5
I think you're missing something...the Faith Mission purpose is given in a booklet titled "The Faith Mission Aims and Principles" written by their founder, J.G. Govan: "THE FAITH MISSION was instituted in October, 1886, for the evangelization, specially, of villages, country districts, and small towns in Scotland, but open to extend further, either in this country or elsewhere, as God might lead." These rural districts were often without preachers/churches. This is where the FM focused their missions...they did not "fish" for converts from various churches. And after gaining some converts, they would then set up Prayer Unions in these areas that might not be large enough for a churches...people of various denominations gathered together once a week for spiritual edification. Cherie, I'm assuming that wherever it was possible/convemient FM converts were directed to their local churches? In reality the F&W's movement appears to be Faith Mission Mk II? Upon consideration of Cherie's point, I suspect that the Faith Mission was more closely aligned with non-conformist churches (i.e. churches other than Church of England/ Scotland or Catholic) so they went into rural areas where non-conformist churches had little representation. (Towns did tend to form along congregational lines; that was true in rural Canada.) Thus it is neither correct to say that they generally sent people to existing churches, unless there was a non-conformist church in the area, or to say that they avoided them. No doubt they avoided sending converts to the Catholic church, and likely the Church of Scotland. In any case, that would explain how some workers within the FM would have opportunity to create their own constituency of followers, as then happened in southern Ireland.
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Post by CherieKropp on Feb 8, 2012 13:16:47 GMT -5
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Post by CherieKropp on Feb 8, 2012 13:22:52 GMT -5
ram asked:
FM Pilgrims were evangelists - missionaries - not a church. They didn't baptist or serve communion. To participate in these ordinances, their converts would have to attend/be directed to go to a Protestant church. FM set up weekly Prayer Unions wherever there were enough converts. I believe they exist today. I used to subscribe to the FM monthly magazine.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2012 13:41:45 GMT -5
ram asked: FM Pilgrims were evangelists - missionaries - not a church. They didn't baptist or serve communion. To participate in these ordinances, their converts would have to attend/be directed to go to a Protestant church. FM set up weekly Prayer Unions wherever there were enough converts. I believe they exist today. I used to subscribe to the FM monthly magazine. Thanks Cherie. That is close to my understanding. I wasn't sure about the up to date position with Prayer Union Meetings though.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:05:47 GMT -5
Well after the period we would be concerned with - 1886 until Irvine left in 1901. But it would be worth a double check of my facts, for the period when Govan began the Faith Mission.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:20:43 GMT -5
ram asked: FM Pilgrims were evangelists - missionaries - not a church. They didn't baptist or serve communion. To participate in these ordinances, their converts would have to attend/be directed to go to a Protestant church. FM set up weekly Prayer Unions wherever there were enough converts. I believe they exist today. I used to subscribe to the FM monthly magazine. I definitely agree that FM was not a church or denomination but a missionary movement. It makes sense that they would go where there wasn't any Presbyterian or Methodist church, but not only so. For example, Long, as a Methodist colporteur in that part of Ireland, had heard of Irvine's reputation as a preacher, and urged Whitaker to invite him to his area. As it was, Whitaker, the Methodist superintendent of that area, decided to send Irvine to a part of his district where the Methodists had not had much success. Not much risk in doing that. Seems like Whitaker didn't need a charismatic Faith Mission evangelist raining on his parade. I'm sure it wouldn't be difficult to find more evidence of resentment and friction between established preachers and itinerant evangelists, preceding the formation of the workers as a separate movement, considering that even the eminent Dwight L. Moody ran into some flak.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:24:09 GMT -5
Or Faith Mission with some guts. IOW, there was a need and they met it. Faith Mission didn't seize the opportunity and slid into obscurity.
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Post by irvinegrey on Feb 8, 2012 14:24:38 GMT -5
Here is another interesting point. Follow the money. Faith Mission workers had to send all their donations to head office after deducting for personal expenses. I suspect that if those donations stopped coming might cause concern, otherwise not so much. So perhaps Irvine did keep forwarding donations as long as he was on the Payroll. I can't see it working any other way, but this is all conjecture on my part. I read on wiki that Irvine "planned his new movement" while on the FM payroll for three years. I'm not sure that we can really say he was playing both sides of the fence like that, and the wiki writer (of that sentence) seems to be highly prejudicial in his comments. Although I have always thought that the friends began around 1896 or 1897, perhaps the break from FM did not really occur until 1901. Another interesting thing that Pattison notes is that the FM was open to other clergy to preach at their conventions. This apparently irked Irvine to quite an extent. This is not so malevolent as it might seem. The FM movement was bring new life and new hope to the Scottish and Irish rural areas. It was in spirit a significant break from the dying established forms within the Church of Scotland. (And even the established churches were being revitalized from within; I noted that Pattison describes Rev. John McNeill as "a leading light (evangelistic) belonging to, but not confined to, the Presbyterian body in Scotland".) So at that time no doubt there was a reaction against the established forms and methods, if not against the churches themselves. There is little doubt that Irvine spent a few years building up a base for his work while still on the payroll of the FM. His cycle tour of Scotland with a number of others who became workers in Irvine's new movement is evidence of this. The Secret Sect documents this very well. Gifts and freewill offerings given to FM pilgrims were forwarded to head office since the Pilgrims received a montly allowance from central funds. We must recognise that the FM is not a denomination but is an evagelistic outreach movement whose pilgrims has always worked closely in conjunction with the clergy in whatever they mission. As to the clergyy preaching at FM conventions, this was always the case and still is. Irvine in the early days was very happy to use the services of the Reverend George Grubb to speak at his meetings. Grubb, an Irishman was also a speaker at the Keswick convention. While the book of the late Colin Peckham is good, a book closer to the source is Spirit of Revival, an accurate history and closer to the source since the author Isobel R Govan is a daughter of the founder J G Govan.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:30:15 GMT -5
It would be interesting to see the sources on which you base this statement. We are interested here in the period from 1886 when Govan began the Faith Mission until Irvine left in 1901. Remember that Irvine resented the presence of clergy at the FM convention, so it's not so clear that FM always worked closely with clergy in the field or were welcomed with open arms.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:36:07 GMT -5
Interesting. So are you accusing Irvine of acting dishonourably? Working both sides of the fence: Faith Mission and also indulging his own ambition?
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Post by irvinegrey on Feb 8, 2012 14:41:24 GMT -5
Cherie, I'm assuming that wherever it was possible/convemient FM converts were directed to their local churches? In reality the F&W's movement appears to be Faith Mission Mk II? Upon consideration of Cherie's point, I suspect that the Faith Mission was more closely aligned with non-conformist churches (i.e. churches other than Church of England/ Scotland or Catholic) so they went into rural areas where non-conformist churches had little representation. (Towns did tend to form along congregational lines; that was true in rural Canada.) Thus it is neither correct to say that they generally sent people to existing churches, unless there was a non-conformist church in the area, or to say that they avoided them. No doubt they avoided sending converts to the Catholic church, and likely the Church of Scotland. In any case, that would explain how some workers within the FM would have opportunity to create their own constituency of followers, as then happened in southern Ireland. The FM works well in conjuuntion with most of the Protestant churches and usually encouraged those who were converted in their meetings to continue attending the church they had previously attended with the exception of the Roman Catholic church which they would not regard as Christian (Sorry St Anne). On the other hand there are those clergy who would not have been very sympathetic to the FM's evangelistic activities. At the time Irvine started the movement they were holding missions in mainly Methodist churches and at that time Methodist ministers were strongly evangelical. The Church of Ireland is Anglican and the Church of Scotland Presbyterian. For example, the Church of Ireland minister who moved to Australia in 1936, T C Hammond would have been very supportive of the FM.
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Post by irvinegrey on Feb 8, 2012 14:43:36 GMT -5
I understand that the Faith Mission brought people to Christ through their gospel preaching then directed them to the traditional churches as they had no established church of their own. In this way I see them working alongside the traditional churches, but to what extent I do not know. The workers attempted the same thing to start with, but since they ultimately came to reject all that the Christian churches stood for they had to form their converts into a fellowship around themselves. Whereas the Faith Mission workers sent their converts to organised churches, the workers started their own unorganised church for their own converts. The result is the workers had no support mechanism in place to offer proper pastoral care etc, relying only on themselves to assume roles and responsibilities their lifestyle was totally unsuited for. Ram a very concise and accurate summation!
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Post by irvinegrey on Feb 8, 2012 14:46:01 GMT -5
Interesting. So are you accusing Irvine of acting dishonourably? Working both sides of the fence: Faith Mission and also indulging his own ambition? I will let you draw your own conclusion. You will have to wait until I complete my research before you get mine! Only a few months to wait.
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 14:56:30 GMT -5
Interesting. So are you accusing Irvine of acting dishonourably? Working both sides of the fence: Faith Mission and also indulging his own ambition? I will let you draw your own conclusion. You will have to wait until I complete my research before you get mine! Only a few months to wait. My conclusion is that you are so accusing. But perhaps it was merited, I don't know at this point.
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Post by StAnne on Feb 8, 2012 14:59:37 GMT -5
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 15:10:11 GMT -5
Upon consideration of Cherie's point, I suspect that the Faith Mission was more closely aligned with non-conformist churches (i.e. churches other than Church of England/ Scotland or Catholic) so they went into rural areas where non-conformist churches had little representation. (Towns did tend to form along congregational lines; that was true in rural Canada.) Thus it is neither correct to say that they generally sent people to existing churches, unless there was a non-conformist church in the area, or to say that they avoided them. No doubt they avoided sending converts to the Catholic church, and likely the Church of Scotland. In any case, that would explain how some workers within the FM would have opportunity to create their own constituency of followers, as then happened in southern Ireland. The FM works well in conjuuntion with most of the Protestant churches and usually encouraged those who were converted in their meetings to continue attending the church they had previously attended with the exception of the Roman Catholic church which they would not regard as Christian (Sorry St Anne). On the other hand there are those clergy who would not have been very sympathetic to the FM's evangelistic activities. At the time Irvine started the movement they were holding missions in mainly Methodist churches and at that time Methodist ministers were strongly evangelical. The Church of Ireland is Anglican and the Church of Scotland Presbyterian. For example, the Church of Ireland minister who moved to Australia in 1936, T C Hammond would have been very supportive of the FM. I've noticed the picture gets more complicated when you start to look at the FM preachers in relation to the various churches of the day. When it comes to the Church of Scotland, there actually existed these denominations - Free Church of Scotland Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) United Free Church of Scotland Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland Associated Presbyterian Churches I didn't know that Presbyterian equals Church of Scotland, but that would makes sense. We know that Methodists were evangelistic themselves so their "official" support makes sense, despite specific evidence to the contrary. I'm not sure that the FM in 1936 provides us with an accurate picture of how things stood in 1895. FM no doubt softened up over time; one gets that feeling from the history. What hangs in the balance here is understanding the motivations of Irvine during the period of time 1896 to 1901. Some would have him to be a glory-seeking megalomaniac whose every action betrayed malevolence, and at the other end of the scale, apologists for the f&w would see his actions as benevolent and responsive to the needs of his rural Christian constituency, who jumped at the chance to leave the oppressive established churches for the liberty of the gospel. The truth is somewhere in the middle, and as close inspection of the actual history as possible will tell the tale.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2012 15:10:38 GMT -5
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Post by What Hat on Feb 8, 2012 15:14:28 GMT -5
I didn't find much there of use to the current question. However, Cherie's links above, to Bright Words, and so on, are of interest.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 8, 2012 15:19:03 GMT -5
I didn't find much there of use to the current question. However, Cherie's links above, to Bright Words, and so on, are of interest. I appreciate that What. I was thinking of general interest for the uninformed. However, I do not think the FM has slid into obscurity.
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