Henry HOWARD

HOWARD, HENRY (b. Melbourne, Vic, 21 Jan 1859; d. London, England, 29 June 1933). Methodist minister.

Howard was converted at the age of 17 and soon after became a local (lay) preacher. In 1880 he was accepted as a candidate for the Wesleyan Methodist ministry and given a year's training at Queen's College, Melbourne. He began his ministry at Warragul, followed by appointments to six Vic circuits.

In 1902 Howard was appointed to the Pirie St church in Adelaide, the 'cathedral' church of Methodism in the state. By this time he had acquired the reputation of being 'a preacher of great acceptance and power'. At Pirie St he drew a crowd of up to a thousand on Sunday evenings. He was an expository preacher, always using a text as the starting point of his sermons, and quoting often from the classics of English literature. When the Chapman-Alexander mission was held in Adelaide in 1909 Howard was at first reluctant to give his support but he was won over by the missioners. He was chairman of the executive committee for the second mission in 1912.

During World War One Howard was an ardent supporter of the imperial cause and had no hesitation in encouraging enlistment and also appealing for a YES vote in the conscription referenda. After nineteen years at Pirie St he went to England in 1921 and became minister of the Wesleyan church in Hampstead. Invited in 1926 to become the preacher at the famous Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York, Howard resigned from the Methodist ministry and became a Presbyterian.

Howard published thirteen volumes of sermons between 1907 and 1933. He is best described as a liberal evangelical, Biblical in his preaching yet open to insights drawn from science and literature. He was president of the SA Conference of the Methodist Church in 1913.

H Howard, The Raiment of the Soul (London, nd); A D Hunt, This Side of Heaven: A History of Methodism in South Australia (Adelaide, 1985)

Publications: British national service versus German conscription, [Adelaide: National Referendum Council?, 191-?]; The summits of the soul, (London: Epworth, 1922); The conning-tower of the soul, (London: Charles H. Kelly, 1912); The defeat of fear and other studies, (N.Y.: Fleming H. Revell, 1931), etc.

ARNOLD D HUNT