Establishment of Diocesan Church Societies and Movement Toward a Diocesan Synod

In 1833 the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, which funded much of the overseas work of the Church of England, ﬁrst ran into trouble obtaining its annual grant from the British Government. This was normale the single largest source of revenue for the Society. In order to aid the S.P.G. a Royal Letter was granted in 1835 providing some ﬁnancial relief. This continued triennially for nearly 20 years.

One direct result of the uncertainty of continuing ﬁnancial support from the British Government was the formation of church societies in the Provinces (colonies) of New Brunswick (1836), Nova Scotia (1837), and Prince Edward Island (1840). The organizational structure of the societies combined all ﬁnancial activities and operations of the church in each Province under a single treasurer.

The Diocesan Church Society of P.E.l. had its beginnings on July 14th, 1840 speciﬁcally to work in conjunction with the S.P.G. and the S.P.C.K. (Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge):

to promote an intelligent acquaintance with the evangelical doctrines and apostolic order of the Church of England and to promote the increase of a charitable attachment to her doctrines, her ritual and her ministry on the part of those professing to be her children.l

Two subsequent events eroded the position and power of the Church of England on Prince Edward Island. The ﬁrst was the struggle for Responsible Government which ended in the concession of Representative Government in 1851 and the granting of ‘universal suffrage’ to the eligible portion of the Island population in 1853. This threw open the Executive and Legislative Councils to the non-denominational voting voice of the franchised element of the Island. The second deve10pment was the passage of a ‘Free Education Act’ in 1851 which began the decline of the dominance of the Church of England over the ﬁeld of education in the Province.

At the time that Hibbert Binney was consecrated as Bishop of Nova

19. "The Church of England in Prince Edward Island." Past and Present of Prince Edward Island. Warburton & MacKinnon (eds) article by Percy Pope, p. 268.