CHRISTIAN ORDER.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 63, Issue 169, 29 April 1943, Page 2

CHRISTIAN ORDER.

THE PRESBYTERY CONFERENCE.

The Presbytery conference on Christian Order completed its session yesterday. In the morning, after devotions conducted by the. Rev. W. H. Carroll (Hinds), the subject of the relations between Church and State was opened up by the Rev. J. M. Bates, of Rangiora. He described the essential function that each had to perform in society, and said that one of the important aspects of the campaign had to do with the task of seeing that neither Church nor State went oustide its own legitimate province. In these days of emergency regulations, and in the future when a planned society would likely be one of the objects of Government policy in most countries, it was important that people should have a right understanding of the proper relations that should exist between the two, so that the dangers and mistakes of the past might be avoided.

The afternoon session was devoted to a consideration of women’s work in the campaign. Proposals for encouraging women to study and'discuss together aspects of life that particularly concern them were examined, and it was decided that as far as possible study groups should be set up to help parents and others to see what the Christian faith involves for home life and other related matters.

In the evening the Moderator (the Rev. J. S. Murray) summed up the findings of the conference. He laid stress on the importance of seeing the campaign, not as something which was being superimposed on the life of the Church, but as an expression of the new conception of her task which has come to the Church # in the light of present world conditions. It was supremely an endeavour on the part of Christian people to help the.people - of New Zealand»to discover in the Christian faith the one true basis for their individual lives, and for the whole life of civilisation, and to take such practical steps as would bring real religion to hear on every aspect of human experience. The Rev. R. W. Brown (Tinwald) brought the conference to a close with a period of devotion.