The Decline of Welsh Nonconformity 6: Doctrine

As we have seen, the late nineteenth century saw a tremendous change. Darwinism in science, and new ways of reading the Bible, together with a sceptical approach in archaeology combined to create a climate in which things once certain were in doubt.

There were some, like Thomas Charles Edwards, who tried to combine these new doubts with the old certainties, hoping that, in so doing, they would preserve the central place of Christianity in the national culture. This, Jones and Sheehan both argue, did nothing but pave the way for further inroads of new ideas. Students at the theological colleges simply did not exercise the self-restraint their teachers had shown. Attempts to maintain that the theology of the Bible was essentially correct while the geography, science and history of the Bible were mistaken caused many to wonder how the unprovable assertions of the Bible could be correct when the provable ones weren’t. At the very least, religion could be discarded as having no practical relevance. In the words of a socialist writer: ‘A conception which has been discarded in the explanation of the making of the earth and the development of its inhabitants cannot be honestly retained to explain the social relations of men.’[1] In seeking to keep Christianity relevant, the theologians had undermined the foundations of the Church.

[1] Mark Starr, A Worker Looks at History (London, 1919), p.3.