John Dunmore Lang - Lang and The Claims of The Church of England

Lang and The Claims of The Church of England

Lang found the Presbyterian Scots to be a small minority, dominated by an Anglican administration and outnumbered by the Irish Catholics. There was no Presbyterian church in the colony and he commenced building one before he had applied to the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Thomas Brisbane, to provide public funds for it. Governor Brisbane refused. Lang had laid the foundation stone for the Scots Church on 1 July 1824, and it was completed with significant debt by William and Andrew Lang and opened 16 July 1826, with a Trust Deed that tied it to the Church of Scotland. Lang visited Britain during 1824-25, where he successfully lobbied the Secretary for the Colonies, Lord Bathurst, to recognise the legal status of the Church of Scotland to the extent that he was allowed a stipend of £300 per annum (current equivalent: £20,660). During this visit, he was made a Doctor of Divinity by Glasgow University, and recruited Rev. John McGarvie for ministry at Portland Head.

Lang resisted the claim to exclusive State recognition and support by the Church of England involved in the establishment of the Clergy and School Lands Corporation in 1826, and it was suspended in 1829 and abolished in 1833. Also in 1826, he claimed the right to perform marriages by virtue of a British Act of 1818, relating to the Diocese of Calcutta which protected Church of Scotland ministers there, and thus broke the Church of England monopoly, with New South Wales then being part of that diocese. The Church Act of 1836 gave State-aid to the Church of England, the Church of Scotland and the Roman Catholic Church on the same basis. The Methodists were added in 1839.