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"To this end, I propose that . . . the reunited Church shall provide at its inception for the consecration of all its bishops by bishops and presbyters both in the apostolic succession and out of it from all over the world, from all Christian churches which would authorize or permit them to take part." ¶ The new church must confess belief in the Trinity and must administer the "two sacraments instituted by Christ"—the Eucharist and baptism. "It will not be necessary, I trust, for a precise doctrinal agreement to be reached about the mode of operation of the sacraments."
On the side of the "reformation"' tradition, Blake suggested that: ¶"The reunited Church must accept the principle of continuing reformation under the Word of God by the guidance of the Holy Spirit ... If the catholic must insist on taking the sacraments more seriously than some protestants have sometimes done, so protestants in the reunited Church must insist on catholics' fully accepting the reformation principle that God has revealed and can reveal Himself and His will more and more fully through the Holy Scriptures.'' ¶ The government of the new church must be democratic rather than hierarchical, recognizing that "all Christians are Christ's ministers, even though some in the church are separated and ordained to the ministry of word and sacrament." ¶ In order to recapture the brotherhood and sense of fellowship that should exist in the church between its members and its ministers, "let us make certain that the more status a member or minister has, the more simple be his dress and attitude . . . 'My brother' is a better form of Christian address than 'your grace.' ' ¶ "Finally, the reunited Church must find the way to include within its catholicity (and because of it) a wide diversity of theological formulation of the faith and a variety of worship and liturgy."
"The major stumbling block to union." said Dr. Blake last week, "is the problem of ordination. The Episcopalians cherish their apostolic succession as essential—they believe that every bishop is linked all the way back to Peter by the hands placed on his head in ordination. They insist on the laying on of hands. But some Congregationalists and Presbyterians who would be made into bishops in the new church are inclined to say 'Nobody's going to lay a hand on me.' And there are Methodist bishops who would balk at another ordination ceremony on the ground that it makes their present ordination seem invalid."
Among Presbyterians themselves, Blake thinks the main obstacle to union is reluctance to have bishops. As for the Congregationalist members of the United Church of Christ, the greatest difficulty will come in becoming a church rather than a loose association of autonomous congregations. Among Methodists, says Blake, the problem is "mathematics—sheer size. The Methodist-Episcopalian reunion talks, which have been going on officially for 13 years, are laboring under the difficulty that the Methodists outnumber the Episcopalians 3 to 1. But in the four-church merger I have proposed, it wouldn't be like that."