CHURCH AND YOUTH

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 54, Issue 2, 13 October 1933, Page 3

CHURCH AND YOUTH

CLOSER BOND NECESSARY.

SCOUT AND GUIDE MOVEMENT.

(Per Press Association). AUCKLAND, October 12

The relation of the Church to the youth of the community, and the strenuous efforts contemplated to forge a closer bond, were referred to by Archbishop Averill, when delivering his charge to the Diocesan Synod. His comment arose from the report of a commission appointed by him to consider the Church's ministry to the young. "Have we got quite the right idea or Sunday schools?" asked the archbishop. "They are not a substitute for home and day school training. They are intended to be supplementary to it and to afford special training, for cOnfirimv tion. "Where homes and parents fail to do their duty is it not the duty of the Church to find some remedy for such failure? There is,,no more important work that the Church can do? There is no more important work that the council can do, than provide a supply of good sound Church literature for broadcasting throughout the diocese. There is no more important expenditure which the diocese can undertake than the financing of such an effort. The country is flooded with literature of a narrow sectarian kind, and even of a dangerous and pernicious kind, and it is the bounden duty of the Church to broadcast freely literature dealing with the fundamentals of the Christian faith .and the principles for which the Church of England stands. Contrary to Spirit and Letter. "The council has carefully considered the position of Scouts and Guides in connection with parochial organisations for the young, and naturally is somewhat perturbed at the practical abolition of contrplled troops in New Zealand, which seems to be contrary to the spirit and letter of the 1933 Scout .Handbook. The Church's first duty is to train her children in the faith and.principles of the Church, and if Scouts and Guides arc not helped by scouting and guiding to be loyal to their own Church it would be fatbetter for the Church to adopt or create some other organisation which would produce more satisfactory results. We are anxious to co-operate fully Avith the authorities of scouting and guiding in New Zealand so long as they are acting constitutionally, but wo "have the right to demand that our own children in all that appertains to religion shall continue to be under the guidance and control of tlie Church. What wc claim for ourselves we claim equally for others, and children in open troops should always be encouraged to attend their own churches. Leadership Needed. "The question of leadership is the crux of the whole matter. There should be a supply of laymen and lay women, who could qualify for leadership in both Scouts and Guides, it "is unfair to expect the clergy to shoulder the whole burden. Both organisations are excellent in themselves, and continue to supply a very real need, and I hope that the authorities will encourage the various religious bodies to form their own troops whenever and wherever possible, and. so remove one hindrance to the spread and consolidation of an excellent.organisation,

A DUNEDIN COMMENT DUNFJDIN, October 12. A* report on work among boys in the Church presented to the Anglican 'Synod! stated: "The Scout system is excellent, but under the circumstances the background is not such as the Church can support unless the troop is a church troop under an excellent scoutmaster who is loyal to the Church. "As long as the Scouts are run on undenominational lines, the background cannot be such as the Church can support. The Scout system as run in New Zealand is not quite according to the mind of the founder which was that boys should be taught to-be loyal to their own respective churches and not be involved in a merry mix-up.