Adelaide churchmen stoke 19th Century intellectual debate, trying to reconcile science and scriptures
Anglican bishop Augustus Short addressed the Adelaide Philosophical Society (later the Royal Society of South Australia) in 1869 on “the proper relations of physical science to revealed religion".
Pencil drawing by George Richmond, 1847, courtesy State Library of South Australia
Adelaide’s Dissenting headmaster John Lorenzo Young and four colleagues formed the Adelaide Philosophical Society (later the Royal Society of South Australia) at his home in 1853.
The society became a forum for discussing the growing 19th Century issue of reconciling science (especially Darwinian) with faith beliefs.
Anglican bishop Augustus’s Short’s 1869 paper to the society addressed “the proper relations of physical science to revealed religion”. On this topic, ministers James Jefferis (Congregational) and John Davidson (Presbyterian) stretched theology radically further than they would dare with their congregations.
In 1860, nonconformist former premier and chief justice Richard Hanson was voted out as society president after he upset Bible Society members with his views on law in nature in relation to scripture.
But Short, Jefferis, Davidson and Hanson were among those who led the way to founding Adelaide University in 1876 out of the Union College supported by Baptists, Congregationalists, Presbyterians and Methodists.
South Australia made excellent imports to its private education system, including George Farr at Anglican St Peter’s College and the dissenter John Lorenzo Young with his Adelaide Educational Institution.
The Unitarians brought out minister John Crawford Woods from England. His intellectual preaching sustained the church for 34 years.
Anglican bishop John Harmer in 1895-1905 also looked to grow his ministry by recruiting English clergymen for the diocese. Twenty-seven of them were graduates of Oxford or Cambridge.