A Key to the Knowledge of Church History Part 18

[Sidenote: Irish missionary work in England and elsewhere.] Nor were their missionary labours confined to England: they shared in the toils and honours of the conversion of Germany, and are believed to have penetrated as far as Iceland and Greenland. [Sidenote: Unjustifiable conduct of England.] The aid given by Irish ecclesiastics in preserving the religious liberty of the Church of England was ill requited in the twelfth century, when the English, having taken possession of Ireland, forced the Irish Church to abandon her distinctive Liturgy by a decree pa.s.sed at the synod of Cashel, A.D. 1173. The state of anarchy and restless discontent into which {152} Ireland was thrown by the presence of English invaders, had a very unfavourable effect on the Church of the country, as had also the appointment of Englishmen to Irish bishoprics, and the consequent non-residence of the Bishops. It is curious that the influence of English conquerors should have tended to extend Roman authority in Ireland, much as the policy of Norman conquerors produced the same effect in England. Before the Reformation, the state of the Irish Church had become thoroughly unsatisfactory, and was felt to be so by many of the Irish themselves.

Section 3. _The Church of Scotland._

[Sidenote: St. Columba.]

The country of the Southern Picts, christianized by St. Ninian (see p.

76), having fallen into the hands of the heathen Anglo-Saxons, something like a fresh evangelization became necessary; and this was accomplished by the labours of St. Columba and his successors, who, having crossed over from Ireland (first about A.D. 560) for the purpose of preaching to the Northern tribes of Scotland, extended their mission southward. [Sidenote: Irish or Scotch missionaries in England.] The monastery of Iona, or Icolmkill, was for some time inhabited by Irish missionaries, and became the chief source of missionary labour not only in Scotland, but also in the North of England, the Scotch or Irish missionaries using all the weight of their influence to uphold the independence of the National Church against the Roman tendencies of St.

Augustine and his successors. St. Aidan (died A.D. 651), Bishop of Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, and the head of the mission for the conversion of the Saxon kingdom of Mercia, was a monk of Iona. His diocese included {153} Yorks.h.i.+re, and extended to Scotland; and, in consequence of this, the Archbishops of York long laid claim to exercise metropolitan authority over the whole of North Britain.

Roman influence gradually made itself felt in Scotland, in great measure through the monastic system, which received a great impetus under David I. (A.D. 1124-A.D. 1153). [Sidenote: Longings for reformation.] The constant wars with England, and the confusion and bloodshed they entailed, had a very unfavourable effect on the prosperity and spiritual activity of the Church of Scotland, so that from Scotland, no less than from England and Ireland, there arose that cry for a return to older and purer ways, which ended in the Reformation.

[1] The native Clergy seem to have laboured chiefly in the north, where they were aided by Scotch and Irish missionaries. St. Aidan, Bishop of Lindisfarne, or Holy Island (who died A.D. 651), may be mentioned as a successful agent in the conversion of Northumbria and Mercia.

[2] This dispute between St. Anselm and the English king was another form of the long strife between the Popes and the Emperors of the West, which is known as the War of Invest.i.tures.

[3] Many of the Bishops, at this time, were foreigners, who lived away from their sees, and did not even understand the native language of their flocks. The Kings of England and the Bishops of Rome seem to have equally abused their powers of patronage in this respect.