MacTutor
Ernest William Barnes
Times obituary
THE CHRISTIAN FAITH AND SCIENCE
The Right Rev. Ernest William Barnes, D.D., formerly Bishop of Birmingham, died yesterday at his home in Sussex at the age of 79.
He was born in Birmingham on April 1, 1874. His father was John Starkie Barnes. He received his early education locally before entering King Edward's School, from which he won a mathematical scholarship, in 1893, to College, Cambridge. In the Mathematical Tripos, part 1, 1896, he was bracketed second wrangler with two other Trinity men, and he was placed in the first division of part II in 1897. He won the first Smith's Prize in 1898, and his election to a fellowship of Trinity followed, naturally, in the same year, and the College was to be his home until 1915. In 1906 he gained his doctorate of science and in 1909 was made a Fellow of the Royal Society. His first office in college was that of mathematical lecturer (1902), and in the same year he was ordained deacon by the Bishop of London. He succeeded to a tutorship in 1908 and was a wise and careful guide to his pupils.
He was steadily making a name for himself as an outspoken preacher, courageous in tackling controversial subjects, and in 1915 Asquith, having a strong liking for academic attainments, even when they were mathematical, nominated him to the Mastership of the Temple. Barnes was not happy about the war which had broken out in the previous year and, being a man quite devoid of fear, would sometimes express sentiments which made the more patriotic Benchers furious. It said much for the new Master that he retained his personal popularity, but in 1918 there were Templars who, when their pacifist Master was chosen—by Lloyd George, of all men—for the canonry of Westminster.
CHALLENGING SERMONS
There Barnes put in some very useful work, helping Bishop Ryle with the finances of the Abbey and with the useful work of the Westminster Spiritual Aid Society. His sermons remained as challenging as ever. This outstanding pulpit influence, coupled with utterances of a more elaborate and technical kind at conferences of "Modern Churchmen" at Oxford or Cambridge, soon gave Barnes an assured position among the men who counted in the world of religious intellect. Then in the summer of 1924 Ramsay MacDonald was faced with his first (and only) episcopal vacancy, caused by the breakdown in health of Dr. Russell Wakefield.
Bishop of Birmingham. MacDonald naturally desired that his first nomination should be of a specifically "Labour" character, and his friends were ready with the choice which he should obviously make. The announcement was made on August 1, 1924, and the new bishop was soon in deep difficulties. Throughout the whole of his episcopate he gave himself unreservedly to controversy on behalf of truth as he saw it, and believing as he did that the cause was of much more importance than the individual, he often showed a lack of consideration for his opponents.
Inheriting a diocese which had gotten out of hand on ritual matters (Barnes described it as a "bear garden"), he proceeded to root out the custom of perpetual reservation, which was plainly illegal. The score or so of clergy who refused to obey his rulings became known as rebels, and the controversy continued throughout his episcopate, only diminishing the death or removal from the fold of the recalcitrants. But the letter of the law, which in this instance he so strongly upheld, was treated by him with scant respect on other occasions. For example, on one occasion he refused to institute an incumbent, even when ordered to do so by Mr. Justice Bennett in the Chancery Division.
SEARCH FOR UNITY
A happier and more fruitful side of his episcopate was shown in the close relations he established with the Free Churches, and he stretched institutional religion to its utmost limits in his search for the underlying unity of the Spirit. In the same way, believing that in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female, he encouraged the ministry of women beyond the limits allowed elsewhere in the Church of England.
He had no particular gift for preaching of pastoral sermons, and his confirmation addresses were often occupied with subjects who seemed extraneous But he proved himself an able and conscientious administrator of diocesan affairs—the appeal for "one hundred thousand guineas" in 1935 was carried through with complete success, leading to the building of 13 new churches and six church halls. Had he possessed a larger understanding of the psychology of the clergy and allowed his natural goodness of heart to modify the severity of his logical judgments, he could have achieved even more.
His extreme pacifism dduring the 1939-45 War, which prevented him from attending a National Day of Prayer or associating himself with any kind of club for war workers, reduced his civic contacts very considerably, and the sombre addresses he delivered during that period gave little encouragement to clergy or laity. He was concerned only to witness his pacifism, with which his whole spiritual experience was bound up.
It will always remain a matter of controversy whether his extremely able and independent mind should ever have been harnessed to episcopal tasks. On the one hand, it gave the modernist movement which he represented a chance to justify itself within the institutional life of the Church of England; on the other hand, it brought a mind scientifically trained but alien to many types of spiritual experience into control of a mechanism requiring delicate and sympathetic treatment. It cannot be said that the experiment was wholly successful.
BOOK CONDEMNED
Much that he wrote became automatically sensational and controversial because of the fact that it was written by a bishop. This does not apply to his Gifford Lectures on "Scientific Theory and Religion," delivered in 1933, which were a notable contribution to the subject, but it applies very definitely to his book The Rise of Christianity, published in 1947. This book, as coming from a bishop, raised serious questions for the Church, though it provided little that was new for the attention of the scholar In the autumn of the same year the book was publicly condemned by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, speaking in their respective Convocations, as seriously minimizing the essential doctrines of the Church of England.
Barnes, however, was not by his previous history or temperament the man to submit meekly his own judgment to that of anyone else, or to care much about the embarrassment he might cause anyone by his actions. He was convinced that he had a mission to free Christianity from its accretions and to present it in such a way that it might be acceptable to young people trained in a scientific age. He returned from Convocation with no thought of resignation in his head. He resigned the bishopric in May last year because of ill health.
No memoir of this remarkable man would be complete without some reference to his charm and courtesy as a host in his own house. Many who had formed quite a different idea of the bishop from his public utterances were completely disarmed on closer acquaintance by the gracious atmosphere of Bishop's Croft, to which the presence of his wife -- Adelaide, daughter of the historian, Adolphus Ward -- contributed an equal share.
THE CHRISTIAN FAITH AND SCIENCE
The Right Rev. Ernest William Barnes, D.D., formerly Bishop of Birmingham, died yesterday at his home in Sussex at the age of 79.
He was born in Birmingham on April 1, 1874. His father was John Starkie Barnes. He received his early education locally before entering King Edward's School, from which he won a mathematical scholarship, in 1893, to College, Cambridge. In the Mathematical Tripos, part 1, 1896, he was bracketed second wrangler with two other Trinity men, and he was placed in the first division of part II in 1897. He won the first Smith's Prize in 1898, and his election to a fellowship of Trinity followed, naturally, in the same year, and the College was to be his home until 1915. In 1906 he gained his doctorate of science and in 1909 was made a Fellow of the Royal Society. His first office in college was that of mathematical lecturer (1902), and in the same year he was ordained deacon by the Bishop of London. He succeeded to a tutorship in 1908 and was a wise and careful guide to his pupils.
He was steadily making a name for himself as an outspoken preacher, courageous in tackling controversial subjects, and in 1915 Asquith, having a strong liking for academic attainments, even when they were mathematical, nominated him to the Mastership of the Temple. Barnes was not happy about the war which had broken out in the previous year and, being a man quite devoid of fear, would sometimes express sentiments which made the more patriotic Benchers furious. It said much for the new Master that he retained his personal popularity, but in 1918 there were Templars who, when their pacifist Master was chosen—by Lloyd George, of all men—for the canonry of Westminster.
CHALLENGING SERMONS
There Barnes put in some very useful work, helping Bishop Ryle with the finances of the Abbey and with the useful work of the Westminster Spiritual Aid Society. His sermons remained as challenging as ever. This outstanding pulpit influence, coupled with utterances of a more elaborate and technical kind at conferences of "Modern Churchmen" at Oxford or Cambridge, soon gave Barnes an assured position among the men who counted in the world of religious intellect. Then in the summer of 1924 Ramsay MacDonald was faced with his first (and only) episcopal vacancy, caused by the breakdown in health of Dr. Russell Wakefield.
Bishop of Birmingham. MacDonald naturally desired that his first nomination should be of a specifically "Labour" character, and his friends were ready with the choice which he should obviously make. The announcement was made on August 1, 1924, and the new bishop was soon in deep difficulties. Throughout the whole of his episcopate he gave himself unreservedly to controversy on behalf of truth as he saw it, and believing as he did that the cause was of much more importance than the individual, he often showed a lack of consideration for his opponents.
Inheriting a diocese which had gotten out of hand on ritual matters (Barnes described it as a "bear garden"), he proceeded to root out the custom of perpetual reservation, which was plainly illegal. The score or so of clergy who refused to obey his rulings became known as rebels, and the controversy continued throughout his episcopate, only diminishing the death or removal from the fold of the recalcitrants. But the letter of the law, which in this instance he so strongly upheld, was treated by him with scant respect on other occasions. For example, on one occasion he refused to institute an incumbent, even when ordered to do so by Mr. Justice Bennett in the Chancery Division.
SEARCH FOR UNITY
A happier and more fruitful side of his episcopate was shown in the close relations he established with the Free Churches, and he stretched institutional religion to its utmost limits in his search for the underlying unity of the Spirit. In the same way, believing that in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female, he encouraged the ministry of women beyond the limits allowed elsewhere in the Church of England.
He had no particular gift for preaching of pastoral sermons, and his confirmation addresses were often occupied with subjects who seemed extraneous But he proved himself an able and conscientious administrator of diocesan affairs—the appeal for "one hundred thousand guineas" in 1935 was carried through with complete success, leading to the building of 13 new churches and six church halls. Had he possessed a larger understanding of the psychology of the clergy and allowed his natural goodness of heart to modify the severity of his logical judgments, he could have achieved even more.
His extreme pacifism dduring the 1939-45 War, which prevented him from attending a National Day of Prayer or associating himself with any kind of club for war workers, reduced his civic contacts very considerably, and the sombre addresses he delivered during that period gave little encouragement to clergy or laity. He was concerned only to witness his pacifism, with which his whole spiritual experience was bound up.
It will always remain a matter of controversy whether his extremely able and independent mind should ever have been harnessed to episcopal tasks. On the one hand, it gave the modernist movement which he represented a chance to justify itself within the institutional life of the Church of England; on the other hand, it brought a mind scientifically trained but alien to many types of spiritual experience into control of a mechanism requiring delicate and sympathetic treatment. It cannot be said that the experiment was wholly successful.
BOOK CONDEMNED
Much that he wrote became automatically sensational and controversial because of the fact that it was written by a bishop. This does not apply to his Gifford Lectures on "Scientific Theory and Religion," delivered in 1933, which were a notable contribution to the subject, but it applies very definitely to his book The Rise of Christianity, published in 1947. This book, as coming from a bishop, raised serious questions for the Church, though it provided little that was new for the attention of the scholar In the autumn of the same year the book was publicly condemned by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, speaking in their respective Convocations, as seriously minimizing the essential doctrines of the Church of England.
Barnes, however, was not by his previous history or temperament the man to submit meekly his own judgment to that of anyone else, or to care much about the embarrassment he might cause anyone by his actions. He was convinced that he had a mission to free Christianity from its accretions and to present it in such a way that it might be acceptable to young people trained in a scientific age. He returned from Convocation with no thought of resignation in his head. He resigned the bishopric in May last year because of ill health.
No memoir of this remarkable man would be complete without some reference to his charm and courtesy as a host in his own house. Many who had formed quite a different idea of the bishop from his public utterances were completely disarmed on closer acquaintance by the gracious atmosphere of Bishop's Croft, to which the presence of his wife -- Adelaide, daughter of the historian, Adolphus Ward -- contributed an equal share.
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