Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1943, Page 120

LE NORD
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Like most Swedish bishops he had first been a university professor
and therefore formed a natural link between the Church and the
cultural world. He especially became celebrated for his incressant
travelling abroad in order to contribute to the reconciliation of
the nations after the first Great War. Stockholm in 1925 became
the scene of an oecumenical conference with representatives of
all churches except Rome. In this way he made people realize
the peace-making possibilities of Christianity and did not least
take the sting out of much enmity against Christianity.
The cultural tradition represented by the men just mentioned,
has been of great importance for the development of public
opinion in Sweden, but it has hardly in itself created any living
Christianity. Quite independently of this current the waves of
revivalism of the i9th century passed through the country, often
under the influence of Anglo-Saxon Christianity. The most
typically Swedish representative of these popular currents was
C. O. Rosenius, active as a lay preacher in Stockholm about the
middle of the century. In contrast to the culturally coloured
Christianity he rather gave his attention to man’s sin and need
of salvation than to his greatness as God’s image, and he strongly
emphasized the necessity of a personal conversion. In his preach-
ing he preferably dwelt on the importance of the propitiation
of Christ for the forgiveness of our sins.
Although Rosenius particularly emphasized the community
of those converted and did not himself become a clergyman, he
did not feel in opposition to the established church, which is
accessible to all. The organization which comes nearest to being
spiritual heir to Rosenius, the Evangeliska Fosterlandsstiftelsen
(‘The Evangelical Fatherland Foundation’) therefore also remains
in the Church, although its followers like those of the Home Mis-
sion in Denmark frequently gather in their own chapels or mis-
sion houses. But it has a more exclusive, pietistic character than
the Home Mission and is not as loyal to the official church. Thus
it carries out foreign mission on its own without connexion with
the mission of the Church, which in contrast to the conditions in
Denmark holds an official position within the Church.
The revival in Sweden did not, however, stay within the
Church to the same extent as in Denmark. One of Rosenius’s clos-
est collaborators was P. P. Waldenström, who started a fierce
attack on the principle of the established church of admitting
everybody to the Holy Communion without requiring any per-