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Unity. A comprehensive topic of the whole conference was discussed in plenary session "The Unity of Christendom." The Most Rev. Nathan Soderblom, Archbishop of Upsala, Sweden, himself the organizer of a Universal Conference on Life & Work (TIME, Aug. 24, 1925, et seq.) paralleling Bishop Brent's assembly on Faith & Order, reiterated the idea that all sects should be able to regard themselves and each other as chapters of a single Church.
Final Reports. Bishop Brent, President J. Ross Stevenson of Princeton Theological Seminary (Presbyterian), Professor William Adams Brown of Union Theological Seminary (Presbyterian) and Bishop James Cannon Jr., of Washington (Methodist Episcopal) were appointed, with nine Europeans, to a committee instructed to redraft the reports of the six agreement-finding committees for approval by the conference as a whole.
Dissent. Before these final reports were ready, the Most Rev. Germanos Troianos, Metropolitan of Sardis, arose to announce, gravely, politely, that he and his fellow representatives of Eastern Orthodoxy would be unable to accept the plan for unity. It was based on compromises, he said. It arrived only at "an external agreement, in letter alone."
Bishop Brent thanked Metropolitan Troianos for his frankness, reminding the delegates that they had come to find out how far they could agree, not to suppress their consciences.
Frederic C. Morehouse of Milwaukee, editor of the Living Church, led an Episcopalian reaction against the report on church unity, objecting that to outline a definite plan for a reunion of sects was beyond the conference's agreed function. Five other final reports —on the gospel, the nature of the church, the ministry, creeds and sacraments—were adopted. The sixth, on actual unity, was returned to the continuation committee for further study.
Result. What concrete things the conference accomplished cannot be known until many sects in many lands have received and acted upon the new definitions of what the Christian Church is and how it functions. Bishop Brent was re-elected chairman of the continuation committee, was presented with a gold clock.
Women. There were only seven women present. One of these, Lucy Gardiner, in honor of her sex, was appointed official timekeeper of the assembly.
During the conference, the women delegates talked among themselves about sex equality in the church. On one of the last days they-presented a petition setting forth the obvious fact that, whereas far more women than men go to church and do church work, the conduct of churches is almost entirely in the hands of men on trustee and vestry boards.