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A Denominationally Unique Phenomenon?

Posted under Miscellanea at .
Tags:history, Barcelona, books

I’m in the midst of sorting some books with a view to rationalising their shelving, and have come across one I bought, probably in the late 1990s, possibly at the secondhand book shop in Broadford, probably in a hurry. The Ancient Church Orders by Arthur John MacLean (Cambridge University Press, 1910). As I recall, the text was not what I had expected and of little interest, but I remember none of the detail — in part because of a distraction it contained. Its previous owner had left within the most remarkable bookmark I have ever encountered.

MacLean, The Ancient Church Orders

At some point in its life, probably when new, the book had been owned by one Reverend H.S. Sard (CoE), initially at Cuddesdon College,[1] and later at Upper Norwood, London, England. I doubt I am the first owner since; several decades may have elapsed in between. Rev. Sard had in 1942 (probably December) received [2] a letter from someone whom (it indicates) he had assisted financially towards what appears to have been a form of missionary endeavour in Barcelona. I had no idea that Anglican missionaries went to the Continent in the early 20th Century, even if — as seems likely in this instance — they went of their own accord. In fact I cannot say whether the writer was in any sense representative of contemporary Anglicans or their missionaries — or perhaps not an Anglican at all, but a denominationally unique phenomenon, though with some Anglican friends?

Rev. Sard’s Bookmark

I assume Rev. Sard read it, and I cannot presume to guess his feelings regarding either the letter or the missionary — though this was one of a series of communications, so probably he was familiar with the style. He then returned it to its envelope and appears to have used it thereafter as a bookmark. (A habit which, as its later discoverer, I must heartily commend.) The picture shows where it appears to have spent time stuck out of a book at one end and become sun-scorched and perhaps a little smoke-stained. [3]

hbm’s envelope, open, with letter

I am about as far from an expert on 20th Century Anglican — or other Christian — or in fact any religion’s — missionaries as it is possible to be, but so far as I know this is the only surviving record of HIS BARCELONA MESSENGER. (Transcription below.) I would be interested to hear about any other records or memories which do still exist.

1942.  LEICESTER-BARCELONA OPEN-AIR TESTIMONY.(Since May,1922.)
                     (Not a Society. A woman alone. Gal.II,20.)
 TO DISCIPLES OF OUR LORD JESUS WHO PRAY & READ GOD'S WORD.
 Esteemed Friends,
      On the 11th of November was yet again renewed the prayer
 to our Lord & the assurance from HIM that next Armistice date
 will find me praying & praising again in the place HE has ap-
 pointed for me & using more freely than ever the language that
 because of this arrangement of HIS has become to me sacred: my
 freest & most strongly inspired prayer-&-worship is still in
 Spanish.  My heart beats true to those whose language it is.
 Those who love HIM elsewhere can fearlessly co-operate with
 me in this going back for the last time to Barcelona.
      Very remarkable has been the isolation resulting from the
 coming to England by mistake. My heart has never left the Medi
 terranean city that our Lord so graciously gave me as my last
 earthly commission,- just to simply live there with HIM, occu-
 pying HIS flat & using HIS piano while the songs HE gives me
 steadily increase & other hearts are helped to follow & obey
 HIM.
      The idleness & waste of my being here instead of where my
 Lord has appointed is a serious loss.  HE alone has the right
 to say where HIS disciples are to live.  HE alone is to be the
 HEAD of whatever house or houses they inhabit.  Sharing with
 the world that ignores HIM is from every standpoint unprofitabl
 ble.  "His citizens hated Him & sent a message after Him, say-
 ing, We will not have this Man to reign over us" was a picture
 our Lord presented of the attitude to himself we are familiar
 with to-day,- so familiar that disciples/prefer not to be
 reminded of it.(Luke XIX,14.)          /scarcely notice it &/
      "Every idle word (or unworking word) that men (or women)
 shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of
 judgment"(Matt.XII,36.): "This is the work of God, that ye
 believe on HIM Whom HE hath sent".(John VI,29.)
      Believing on HIM I understand to be,- doing exactly what
 HE says, not what I think,- & doing it continuously, in the
 part of earth that HE has appointed & in the environment where
 HE needs me to be.  The appointing in s case like mine goes
 back a very long way, chapter after chapter of international
 training is shown,- beginning @ 25 years of age with inter-
 national teaching engagements.
      The home age has now been reached, & it is of vital import
 portance that as soon as possible I quit the gipsy office and
 re-establish simple real testimony to HIM, MY LIVING SAVIOUR,
 in the city HE has opened to me, using instead of wasting the
 3 languages HE has so graciously given me in which to read HIS
 WORD & praise HIM in a way helpful to others. John XIV,13,14.

      The "Tuesday afternoon" about which in NOVEMBER II LETTER
I said,"I'm watching to see" has already proved to be one more
added to the long list of vain attempts to ehlp & useless in-
vitations.  Even the second week the over-busy neighbour-disci-
 ple, ministering to sick & sorrowing, failed to keep her word
 of promise of a few minutes regular prayer with me over His
 Word.  How consistently & persistently the UNFAILING GUIDE
 shows the path to the one who, set free by the blood HE shed
 for her & for all on the Cross, simply follows HIM!  "If...any
 will serve ME, let him (or her) follow ME; & where I am, there
 shall also MY servant be (here on earth:  afterward is but a
 continuation & increase of what has begun on earth)."  At my
 present age, fellow-disciples who want to understand what I
 say or write about HIS leading can only obtain information
 about it by the inner past, which, speaking generally, has been
 different from their own.  This is why they could get something
 fresh through the Barcelona messenger if they wanted it.
      Scarcity of paper forbids continuance:  please excuse.
 Two sweet remembrances crossed last Letter.
NOVEMBER A/C:-                                       £.  s.  d.
 7th From our Lord thro' His est.serv.in Walton-on-
                   Thames, sweet letter, and.......  0. 10.  0.
 7th  "    "   " thro' His est.serv.in Beaconsfield,
                       warm scarf, oranges, and....  0. 10.  0.
 13th "    "   " " His est.serv.in Scotland,sweetly
                   encouraging letter & stamps.....  0.  0.  8.
 19th "    "   " " His est.serv. in South Norwood..  0.  4.  0.
 
 With very warmly grateful regards & continuous prayer,
   Indebtedly & gratefully yours in our glorious Lord Jesus,
                                     HIS BARCELONA MESSENGER.
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Miss A.M.Jones, 123,Central Hill,UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON,S.E. 19.)
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
 
PLEASE DO NOT SEND GREETING CARDS TO OUR LORD'S MESSENGER. SHE
DOES NOT VALUE THEM, AND GREATLY PREFERS A LETTER ONLY.

The letter was evidently produced in multiple copies, and this is a carbon-copy; probably the oldest example of carbon-copy I’ve seen, and it’s interesting to note how well it’s survived. Even kept in reasonable storage, some later copy techniques don’t do so well. It seems a little faded but might not have been very clear to begin with. And the wartime paper has clearly aged, especially where it and the envelope protruded from their books.

Clearly, in this edition at least, there is very little detail of the writer’s proposed activities, other than playing piano and singing. Presumably open-air testimony involves something like ranting on street corners, but it’s not clear that she was up to that any more. Her intentions are unclear, past simply returning to Barcelona — and in 1942 travelling there would have been nearly impossible, a likely source of her apparent frustration, though not one she mentions. [4] Wartime conditions persisted well past the next Armistice Day, and another after it. Divine assurances notwithstanding, she may never have left England again.

I find the literary and typographical style quite interesting. I’m not certain if I’d ever encountered the phrase the home age before, and certainly not the gipsy office. For something written (now) eighty years ago, it seems unexpectedly modern in its use of a headline followed by what I guess we can only call a mission statement. But perhaps even for the time it is a little archaic in some respects. Obviously, limited by the use of a typewriter, resulting in spacing and punctuation oddities, some of which I haven’t seen before. But which might have been more familiar to readers at the time . . . and some of which may be more familiar to social media readers today.

Somehow, I can imagine Miss Jones as a prolific user of social media, had she lived a century later. This letter may tell us something about the things which persist in human behaviour, and have only become easier since we moved on from typewriters and carbon paper. There’s a part of me which even thinks it gives a different sort of insight into broader conditions at the time, so may be of some historical value. And there’s another which thinks — and I wonder whether Rev. Sard, or even the people of Barcelona, might agree — that perhaps we could all do with an occasional MESSENGER, or someone similar, in our lives somewhere. Worth a few shillings?


Appendix: Transcription

(With corrections and consistent spacing.)

1942.  LEICESTER-BARCELONA OPEN-AIR TESTIMONY. (Since May, 1922.)
                       (Not a Society. A woman alone. Gal.II,20.)
TO DISCIPLES OF OUR LORD JESUS WHO PRAY & READ GOD'S WORD.
Esteemed Friends,
      On the 11th of November was yet again renewed the prayer
to our Lord & the assurance from HIM that next Armistice date
will find me praying & praising again in the place HE has ap-
pointed for me & using more freely than ever the language that
because of this arrangement of HIS has become to me sacred: my
freest & most strongly inspired prayer-&-worship is still in
Spanish.  My heart beats true to those whose language it is.
Those who love HIM elsewhere can fearlessly co-operate with
me in this going back for the last time to Barcelona.
      Very remarkable has been the isolation resulting from the
coming to England by mistake.  My heart has never left the Medi-
terranean city that our Lord so graciously gave me as my last
earthly commission,- just to simply live there with HIM, occu-
pying HIS flat & using HIS piano while the songs HE gives me
steadily increase & other hearts are helped to follow & obey
HIM.
      The idleness & waste of my being here instead of where my
Lord has appointed is a serious loss.  HE alone has the right
to say where HIS disciples are to live.  HE alone is to be the
HEAD of whatever house or houses they inhabit.  Sharing with
the world that ignores HIM is from every standpoint unprofita-
ble.  "His citizens hated Him & sent a message after Him, say-
ing, We will not have this Man to reign over us" was a picture
our Lord presented of the attitude to himself we are familiar
with to-day,- so familiar that disciples scarcely notice it &
prefer not to be reminded of it.  (Luke XIX,14.)
      "Every idle word (or unworking word) that men (or women)
shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of
judgment" (Matt. XII,36.):  "This is the work of God, that ye
believe on HIM Whom HE hath sent".  (John VI,29.)
      Believing on HIM I understand to be,- doing exactly what
HE says, not what I think,- & doing it continuously, in the
part of earth that HE has appointed & in the environment where
HE needs me to be.  The appointing in a case like mine goes
back a very long way, chapter after chapter of international
training is shown,- beginning @ 25 years of age with inter-
national teaching engagements.
      The home age has now been reached, & it is of vital im-
portance that as soon as possible I quit the gipsy office and
re-establish simple real testimony to HIM, MY LIVING SAVIOUR,
in the city HE has opened to me, using instead of wasting the
3 languages HE has so graciously given me in which to read HIS
WORD & praise HIM in a way helpful to others.  John XIV,13,14.

      The "Tuesday afternoon" about which in NOVEMBER II LETTER
I said, "I'm watching to see" has already proved to be one more
added to the long list of vain attempts to help & useless in-
vitations.  Even the second week the over-busy neighbour-disci-
ple, ministering to sick & sorrowing, failed to keep her word
of promise of a few minutes regular prayer with me over His
Word.  How consistently & persistently the UNFAILING GUIDE
shows the path to the one who, set free by the blood HE shed
for her & for all on the Cross, simply follows HIM!  "If ... any
will serve ME, let him (or her) follow ME; & where I am, there
shall also MY servant be (here on earth:  afterward is but a
continuation & increase of what has begun on earth)."  At my
present age, fellow-disciples who want to understand what I
say or write about HIS leading can only obtain information
about it by the inner past, which, speaking generally, has been
different from their own.  This is why they could get something
fresh through the Barcelona messenger if they wanted it.
      Scarcity of paper forbids continuance:  please excuse.
Two sweet remembrances crossed last Letter.
NOVEMBER A/C:-                                        £.  s.  d.
7th From our Lord thro' His est. serv. in Walton-on-
                  Thames, sweet letter, and.........  0. 10.  0.
7th  "    "   " thro' His est. serv. in Beaconsfield,
                      warm scarf, oranges, and......  0. 10.  0.
13th "    "   " " His est. serv. in Scotland, sweetly
                  encouraging letter & stamps.......  0.  0.  8.
19th "    "   " " His est. serv. in South Norwood...  0.  4.  0.
With very warmly grateful regards & continuous prayer,
  Indebtedly & gratefully yours in our glorious Lord Jesus,
                                   HIS BARCELONA MESSENGER.
Miss A.M. Jones, 123, Central Hill, UPPER NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E. 19.)
PLEASE DO NOT SEND GREETING CARDS TO OUR LORD'S MESSENGER.
SHE DOES NOT VALUE THEM, AND GREATLY PREFERS A LETTER ONLY.

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Notes

  1. A Church of England training establishment, apparently.  
  2. By hand — there is no stamp or postmark, and does not even appear to have been sealed, though the envelope was pre-gummed; but the writer appears to have lived locally.  
  3. It probably spent some of its time in other books, as there is staining in this volume which does not match the envelope size.  
  4. Not that her readers would have been unaware of it. Similarly, I have spent the last several years mostly not referencing the Fascist tyranny in Russia and current war in Ukraine in my writing, though they get in the way of my interest in Soviet-era synthesisers. We’re both of us writing about things on a very different scale of significance. Still, to take my own lesson, I’ll just mention it here.  

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