The Triple Tradition - Chapter 3 -- By: Ross Howlett McLaren

Journal: Emmaus Journal
Volume: EMJ 05:2 (Winter 1996)
Article: The Triple Tradition - Chapter 3
Author: Ross Howlett McLaren


The Triple Tradition - Chapter 3

Ross Howlett McLaren1

The Origin and Development of the Open Brethren in North America

The Interfacing Process Continues

The Shattering of the Grant Party: The 1920s

Questions about the Glantons

A dozen years after Paul J. Loizeaux and Samuel Ridout led the Grants into inter-communion with the Glantons, questions began to be raised as to whether or not the Glantons had sufficiently rejected the teaching of the Raven Party they had separated from. At a conference for Grant Brethren in Guelph, Ontario in July, 1921, the issue was discussed.2 On July 4, 1921, A. E. Booth, B. C. Greenman, Christopher Knapp, F. B. Tomkinson, John Bloore and others posted a letter to the Glantons in London, England in care of Harold P. Barker from the Guelph Conference. The Grant Brethren were replied to in October by F. B. Hole, A. J. Pollock and others from the Glantons. They assured them they did not agree with Raven’s teaching and they hoped the questions would be

put to rest.3

They were not. In July, 1923, a conference of Grant Brethren in Elizabeth, New Jersey was still debating the issue. The problem had been compounded by the fact that the Stuarts in Great Britain and New Zealand with whom the Grant Brethren fellowshipped were not in agreement with the Grants to include the Glantons in their circle of fellowship. The Grants had failed to take counsel with the Stuarts before they had made overtures to the Glantons. The Grant Brethren, not wanting to see a break in their relations with the Stuarts, issued a letter which said in part: “It has been a great sorrow to know that the gatherings in Great Britain and New Zealand have not felt clear fully to acquiesce, due possibly to failure on our part to inform them and to counsel with them.”4 The Grants, while attempting to save face, were admitting they had acted independently. The problem of the Stuart-Grant-Glanton relationship continued through the 1920s.

Constructive Measures among the Grants

The Grant party, however, was still attempting to be constructive. Ridout and seventeen Grant supporters were still reaching out in 1925 to the Exclusive Brethren who had rejected their leader back in 1884, again confessing F. W. Grant’s actions as rash. The European Exclusives responded to them saying, “One must always come back to the point where one left the right path.” They did, however, commend them. “We observe, with thankfulness, in your letter, yo...

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