Welsh Journals

language. Other problems are not overlooked. The decline in ordinands is highlighted; the failure of ecumenical progress is. noted; and the steady flow of Welsh priests into English dioceses is commented upon with a wistful sadness. But there the analysis ends. The historian has carried out his task with painstaking care and no doubt would rather leave to others, suggestions for the future. But I came away from the book with. a sense of unease. Here is a history of the Church in Wales which is fine as far as it goes but there is so much more to be told. There's hardly a mention of women in the Church; no reference to music, none to poetry and. the only passion seems to be the narrow indoor passion of ecclesiast- ical committees. If you want a sweep-of -hi story picture, this is it but there's at least one other book waiting to be written: of the human warmth of the Church in Wales; of genuine human failure, of depression and also of joy and even of a local articulate Welsh theology. Over here in England, it is R S Thomas who is the voice of the Church in Wales a haunting, windswept, clean-boned voice which combines a sense of the living relationship between God and landscape which those of us in suburban England frequently long for. It may be that in a second volume the vital gifts of the Church in Wales will be revealed. D T W Price has given us a first-rate tour across the surface of the Church. That part of the landscape is now well mapped but the next task is to reveal the depths. I, for one, look forward to the sequel. Christopher Herbert Archdeacon of Dorking John S Peart-Binns, Edwin Morris, Archbishop of Wales, Gomer Press, Llandysul. 1990. ix + 206pp. illus. ISBN 0 86383 636 4. £ 12.95. Those seeking some insight into the character of Alfred Edwin Morris will find it in the early chapters of this the latest episcopal biography written by John Peart-Binns. The grimness of his home town of Lye in the Black Country, where he was born in 1894, the stern discipline of his father, the goldsmith and jeweller Alfred Morris, and later his own experiences in World War I all left indelible marks upon the character of the future archbishop. When Peart-Binns characterises these formative years as "a mixture of routine and duty against a background of work and discipline" he is adequately describing Morris's life even half a