John Dunmore Lang - Lang and The Presbyterian Church

Lang and The Presbyterian Church

The Presbytery of New South Wales (which then included what is now Victoria and Queensland) was formed on 14 December 1832, despite the intemperate habits of two of the ministers, and the opposition of John McGarvie, who had turned out to be a Scottish Moderate. This Presbytery ordained a minister for Launceston and in turn the Presbytery of Van Diemen's Land was constituted on 6 November 1835 by Lang and two others.

The Presbytery in New South Wales had a number of unsuitable ministers. Lang determined on a further visit to Britain in 1836, securing about 20 men from the Church of Scotland and from the Synod of Ulster. Lang had a pre-arranged plan to set up a rival church court to the Presbytery. When he returned in 1837 he found that an Act to regulate the temporal affairs of the Presbytery had been secured from the Government, the terms of which made the Presbytery the only legal representative of the Church of Scotland in the colony. The Presbytery Moderator's certificate was necessary for payment of stipends under the Church Act. Lang thereupon represented the Temporalities Act as 'monstrous and disgraceful in the highest degree' and having the effect of forcing him and his supporters out. This was complete fabrication, but Lang and five of the new recruits joined in constituting a Synod on 11 December 1837. Lang placed men in the same localities as Presbytery ministers to draw off adherents and drive out the drunkards. A full-blown schism operated until union was effected in 1840.

The Presbytery expelled Lang for schism on 18 January 1838. Lang used The Colonist to spread contention. As James Forbes put it, 'week after week he poured forth vollies of abuse against the Presbytery, unequalled for satanic bitterness and vulgar scurrility, by the worst of the London Sunday papers.' Lang was on a further trip to Britain and America 1839-41, and in his absence terms of union were agreed and the union consummated on 5 October 1840 under the name 'Synod of Australia in connection with the Established Church of Scotland.' The Basis did not give the Church of Scotland any legislative or judicial jurisdiction, but the Synod was committed to the same doctrinal basis as the Church of Scotland. Presbyteries were created subject to the Synod. Lang was admitted on his return in March 1841.

In 1840 Lang published a substantial volume entitled Religion and Education in America in which he advocated support of churches by voluntary givings rather than the State, and went so far as to advocate no connection between Church and State. This conflicted with the official views of the Church of Scotland as set out in the Confession of Faith, which can be summarised thus: (1) Church and State are distinct and separate institutions, both being accountable to the Lord Jesus Christ who has received all authority in heaven and earth from the Father; (2) the mutually helpful relationship between Church and State does not imply subordination of one to the other in its own sphere; and, in particular, the civil authorities have no jurisdiction or authoritative control in the spiritual affairs of Christ's Church. (3) In maintaining these Scriptural principles, and the ideal of a united Christian Church in a Christian nation, the Church does not regard the involvement of the State in matters concerning religion as ipso facto contrary to liberty of conscience. Rather, she rejects intolerance or persecution as methods of advancing the kingdom of God, and recognises the individual's liberty of conscience and the right of private judgement.

Lang's views brought opposition from many including some who had previously supported him. Lang's repute had already declined in Scotland. When he was censured for allowing to preach in Scot's Church a Congregational minister who had been rejected by the Synod, he reacted negatively. On 6 February 1842 he told his congregation that he would go to New Zealand and be supported by voluntary givings. In an extraordinary blast of invective, and alluding to the narrative of Joshua 6:20ff, he said that the Australian church could not prosper until she renounced with indignant scorn the Babylonish garment of an infidel establishment of religion and abandoned the wedge of gold that corrupted all who touched it. At length he consented to remain when the bulk of the 500 adults in his congregation agreed to sever all connection with the Synod and with the State. On 8 October 1842 the Synod deposed Lang for slander - calling the Synod a synagogue of Satan particularly displeased the brethren - divisive courses and contumacy by an 8-4 vote. Ultimately, on 9 September 1851, the Presbytery of Irvine in Scotland declared Lang no longer a minister of the Church of Scotland, but did not tell Lang what was afoot nor give him an opportunity to defend himself.

Lang tried with minimal success to start a new body. In July 1846 he set off again for Britain returning in March 1850. He and two other ministers set up the Synod of New South Wales (the second of this name) on 3 April 1850, although the minutes term it The Australian Presbyterian Church. During its life of some 14 years, 31 ministers were connected with it at one time or another, including 8 of the 20 brought out by Lang in 1850. It was very loose in approach. Some have regarded it as an attempt to establish a comprehensive evangelical Protestant body, but it appears more an attempt by Lang to maintain a useful power base and maintain his own ego. There were four ministers (including Lang) connected with it when it in November 1864.

Lang was out of the mainstream from 1842, but his political influence was such that he had to be accommodated if union of the three Presbyterian streams was to be achieved. The original Synod of Australia did not wish to recognise Lang, despite having to recall the deposition in 1863 (which was done by a majority of one vote), following Lang securing the reversal of the Presbytery of Irvine's sentence in 1861. Lang's Synod lost its identity by being merged on 15 November 1864 with the majority of the Presbyterian Church of Eastern Australia, to form a General Synod which then merged with the original Synod of Australia to form the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales on 8 September 1865 with 47 ministers. In 1872 he was chosen Moderator of the Assembly but used his speech to seriously criticise his brethren for not choosing him earlier. There wasn't too much mellowing as he grew older.

As a churchman Lang was wilful, egotistical, not respectable (twice jailed for libel). He 'preached more of the Gospel than he practised', someone quipped. From the Presbyterian viewpoint Lang is therefore something of an ambiguous figure. James Forbes, writing in 1846 about the 1837 period, stated: '...it has ever appeared to us one of the most mysterious permissions of Divine Providence, that the founding of an infant church in an infant colony should have fallen into such hands.'