Profile
(Continuation of Chapter 5)
The Caymanas Church upto 1839
Rev'd Sykes
Whatever had been the circumstances of the1835 hiatus in the work of the Church of England in Caymanas andeven after nearly a year's work by Deacon David Wilson, in 1837an adverse judgement on the Church's total ministry up to thattime was delivered by the Wesleyan observer James Atkins. Fromthe Church of England perspective first, what might have beenthe causes of weakness? These evidently included the following:-
(1) The Lord's Supper, the central act of worship of the wholeChurch throughout the world, may never have been held in Caymanasexcept when the Bishop visited (and there is no actual recordof it even then). David Wilson was made the Stipendiary Curateeven though he was still a Deacon and therefore unable to haveconducted Holy Communion. It has been suggested that the Rev'dThomas Sharpe also was only a Deacon.5.45 [COMMENT 42]In thatcase the devotional heart of the Church's ministry would all thetime have been entirely missing. It is also possible that Sharpewas priested after part of his ministry in the Caymanas, and thathe then held Holy Communion infrequently by today's standards.
(2) Thomas Sharpe may have felt the needto spend much of his energy in shoring up his difficult and poorlysupported position for as long as it seemed possible to him todo so, and then when he realised his position was untenable, inplanning for his removal to a living in Jamaica. He has been regardedby other writers 5.46 [COMMENT 43] as energetic and effective,but it seems that this might be at least partly due to a misunderstandingof one historical document, to be considered below.
(3) The legal and financial support forestablishing the Church in the Caymanas, on which for severalyears up to the summer of 1835 the Bishop had hoped to draw, wasillusory.
(4) The prolonged absence of any clergymanin 1835 and the first five months of 1836 is likely to have affectedvery seriously the continuity of the Church's ministry.
(5) There is little or no evidence of thequalities of spiritual depth, scriptural exposition and scholarshipwhich are the particular hallmarks of the most authentic Anglicanministerial style.
(6) Mr. Wilson's instruction of the SundaySchools and perhaps his participation in his Day School programmemay well have been effective, but they were too short-lived tohave secured the teaching ministry of the Church in the mindsand hearts of the Caymanas inhabitants.
(7) Underlying many of these causes of weaknesswas the current mode of establishment of the Church of Englandwhich, as we have seen, provided the general means of supportfor the church from the public purse wherever she existed. Manyare those who decry that mode of establishment, and indeed ithad certain serious disadvantages for a church's health. However,to put those disadvantages into perspective it is necessary firstto observe that the structure of establishment began as a resultof successful evangelisation. When a country or, indeed in theearly Christian centuries an Empire, such as the Roman Empire,was evangelised successfully to the point of adopting the ChristianFaith in the place of its existing religion, it meant not onlythat individuals were converted but that its whole legal and socialstructure was changed to accommodate the new allegiance. It wasnatural that support for the holders of office in the new imperialor national religion became legally entrenched in the structuresof the Christianised state.
The disadvantages of such a condition beginto outweigh the evident advantages when instead of the churchcontinuing to have a converting and sanctifying effect on thesurrounding culture,the human fallenness endemic to the culturebecomes strong enough to distort the humanly frail church withits own concepts. The means of support offered by the culturethen increasingly become a means of temptation to divert the churchfrom her mission in favour of upholding the support on the culture'sown terms.
In the nineteenth century, concepts of "promotion"and the "worth" of an office measured by financial criteriawere strong within the church, just as they were within the professions.After somewhat less than three years in the Caymanas, Thomas Sharpewas "promoted" to an Island Curacy in Jamaica, for whichhe was assured of a government stipend. In the 1830's there weredistinct grades of position for a clergyman. He might be a curatepaid by the SPG (like David Wilson) or by some other source, e.g.his Rector, or he might be promoted to an Island Curacy (likeSharpe after he returned to Jamaica), or he might be a Rector.These all received very different stipends. 5.47 [COMMENT 44]For a clergyman of the Jamaica Church to have wanted to stay inthe Caymanas with small and uncertain government support and noapparent prospects for "advancement" he would have neededto break free of the cultural mindset that largely controlledthe church he represented. It is no discredit to the memory ofthese first men in Holy Orders to have lived in and served theCaymanas, and to have done creditably, to observe also that theywere men of their time.
Significant observations of James Atkins,the Wesleyan observer, who seems to have arrived on or about the19th May 1837, include the following:-
"The individuals who took me on shorehad been born in slavery in the Caymanas, and I found nothingpleased them so much as to speak of Lord Sligo, who in 1834 inconsequence of their non-registration made them all free."
"They were in the state of the greatestignorance, `without God or hope in the world'."
"Almost the first person I met wasMr. David Wilson, a Gentleman in deacon's orders, and who wasjust about to return to Jamaica for ordination. Without any introductionor enquiries, he offered me his hand, and although the "Elizabeth"a small schooner was under weigh, in which he had engaged hispassage, he invited me to his house and returned with me. On ourway, we passed the Church, which I should not have recognizedas a place of worship, although surrounded by a number of graves,had he not pointed it out. I felt anxious to see the interior,but had hardly time to mention it, before I was invited in. Thebuilding is 42 ft by 24 ft and eleven in the elevation, and likeall the houses, or native huts on the island, is composed of theruffest materials. A few posts are driven a short distance intothe ground without any thing more in the shape of a foundation,it is further wattled, and plastered, on the outside, and theroof thatched in with leaves from the Palmeto tree. The benches,desk, pulpit and communion table are made of Cedar, but in a veryrude manner. There is no window and the doors are destitute ofany kind of fastening, but immense wood hinges, which move witha horrid creaking, and give an opening of about a foot on theopposite side."
COMMENT 42 E.g. in Hirst, pp. 236-9.Based on what we know to be the case with the Rev'd David Wilson,it is indeed possible that Thomas Sharpe spent at least a partof his time as the Clergyman in the Caymanas (December 1831 1834)in Deacon's orders. However, Hirst reports also (Hirst, p.241) that he was curate in three successive areas in Jamaica afterhe returned there (confirmed in respect of one area by a detailin the 1836 SPG Annual Report, see below, pp. 74 75) andit is clear that to have been there as an Island Curate he wouldhave been priested.
COMMENT 43 See Williams, p. 48.
COMMENT 44 Evans pp. 26, 28.
To be continued...