DRIFTING TOWARD ROME

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Aug 23, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 34.

DRIFTING TOWARD ROME.

No PROTESTANT ever went over to Rome at one deliberate bound. There was a time when Judas would have spurned the idea of betraying Christ. So it is gradual departure from the faith, a following of the wisdom of the world, the traditions of men, that carry Protestants over to Rome. When Dr. Briggs first became a recognized theological teacher in the Presbyterian Church he would not have said, as he says to-day, that "a more thorough study of the Bible has shown that the Reformers were, all of them, greatly mistaken in their interpretations."

He had to drift a long way toward Rome—drift clear out of Presbyterianism and a good way into High Church Episcopalianism—before he was ready to take that stand.

But he has reached that point; and it is but a logical inference that, if the Reformers were all wrong, Rome was all right. In a recent article in the North American Review Dr. Briggs refers very hopefully to a prospective reformation by the Catholic Church throughout the world, that will erelong prove to be "the greatest revival and reformation known to history."

There is one utterance in his article, however, which contains a considerable degree of truth, at least with reference to a very great number of professed Protestants. He says: "The common doctrine of the present Protestant theologians would not be recognized by any of the Reformers. The dogmatic differences with Rome either no longer really exist, or are in different forms, and concerned with different questions."

Surely a man holding such views, and others equally partial to Rome, will not long see the propriety or expediency of nominally maintaining the imaginary line between High Church Episcopalianism and Romanism. The great revival that Dr. Briggs sees arising on the theological horizon will no doubt be enlivened by the song, from professed Protestant ranks, We are coming, father Pius, three hundred million strong.