cers" a few working
men and women, whom he and others trained to act as "Church of England
evangelists" among the outcasts and criminals of the Westminster slums.
Previous experience had convinced him that the moral condition of the
lowest classes of the people called for new and aggressive action on the
part of the Church, and that this work was most effectively done by
laymen and women of the same class as those whom it was desired to
touch. "Evangelistic zeal with Church order" is the principle of the
Church Army, and it is essentially a working men's and women's mission
to working people. As the work grew, a training institution for
evangelists was started in Oxford, but soon moved (1886) to London,
where, in Bryanston Street near the Marble Arch, the headquarters of the
army are now established. Working men are trained as evangelists, and
working women as mission sisters, and are supplied to the clergy. The
men evangelists have to pass an examination by the arch-deacon of
Middlesex, and are then (since 1896) admitted by the bishop of London as
"lay evangelists in the Church"; the mission sisters must likewise pass
an examination by the diocesan inspector of schools. All Church Army
workers (of whom there are over 1800 of one kind and another) are
entirely under the control of the incumbent of the parish to which they
are sent. They never go to a parish unless invited, nor stay when asked
to go by the parish priest. Officers and sisters are paid a limited sum
for their services either by the vicar or by voluntary local
contributions. Church Army mission and colportage vans circulate
throughout the country parishes, if desired, with itinerant
evangelists, who hold simple missions, without charge, and distribute
literature. Each van missioner has a clerical "adviser." Missions are
also held in prisons and workhouses, at the invitation of the
authorities. In 1888 (before the similar work of the Salvation Army was
inaugurated) the Church Army established labour homes in London and
elsewhere, with the object of giving a "fresh start in life" to the
outcast and destitute. These homes deal with the outcast and destitute
in a plain, straightforward way. They demand that the persons should
show a desire for amendment; they subject them to firm discipline, and
give them hard work; they give them decent clothes, and strive to win
them to a Christian life. The inmates earn their board and lodging by
piece-work, for which they ar