CORRESPONDENCE.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 145, 20 June 1891, Page 8

CORRESPONDENCE.

CHURCH UNION.

(To tho Editor.)

Sic, —On reading Mr T. F. Roberbeon's speech, I am inclined to exclaim, " Poor old Church of England ! What hard blows she continues to receive from those who have left her, for not watering down her creeds, which she has hold for nearly 1,900 years, to suit the rationalistic tastes of the prosenb century."

I hope Mr R.obertson will do me the favour to read bho following story : — Thero was once an old man named Father Church. He lived upon a rocic, and all around the rock lay a deadly morass, called the " Morass of Disunion and Religious Disorder." It was a deceiving morass, for parts of it looked liko firm ground, and here and there there grow on it patches of beautiful flowers.

Father Church and hia children spent their time in building a bridge of stones hewn out of tho solid rock, over which they, iv God's good time, would pass to a beautiful place called Heaven. Father Church had a great many children, some good, some bad, some indifferent. Some worked well, some badly. But Father Church was a patient old fellow. The work was hard, and he did not punish his children very severely for their faults. Bub he was a strict disciplinarian, as all good parents are, and never let a fault go by uarobuked. Among his children who grumbled at his rule were Billy Baptist, Mark Methodist, Peter Presbyterian, Sam Salvation, and a large number of others too numerous to mention. These boys good boys and anxious to geb to Heaven, bub alas ! in their conceit, they began to growl at, and kick against, bho gentle discipline of Fabher Church.

" Father," said one of them one day, "you are building the bridge all wrong. Wβ shall never get to Hoaven by it. Wβ had much better leave it and start to Heaven ■ across the morass." " My boy," said Father Church, " it is nob for you to judge. I atn building the bridga as it has always been built under the orders of the King. This creed-cement ie mixed with water drawn from the spring- of Holy YVrib. The atones are fche souls ot the faithful, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Chriit Himself being the chief corner-stone." Buiiihe mildrobuke of Father Church had no effect. One by one the conceited boya determined to get to Heaven by their own way.and nofc by the ordained way of Fathev Church. They covebed the beautilal flowers on the treacherous bog, and it M'aa not long before 263 of them bad loft the rock, and had stepped into the morass of disunion and religious disorder. At first they seemed togetalong fairly well. •'We're getting on capitally," fchey^cried. "Look what a lot of us there are." But Father Church sighed, and went on with his work. He did not 'beliave entirely m numbers. His age and experience told him too surely of the danger tlva striplings were in. He had seen many loiive the Rock for fcho bog in days gone by, nob one of whom had Tasfced until kow. And Father Church's fears wore wall founded, as the evon6 proved. , In a, little while fche disobedient boys were floundering about most pitifully. S'oine caught hold of one thing, some of another, and it it had not been sad, it would have been ludicrous, to sco poor Salvat/.on Bam clinging deaperatoly bo his big drum: Father Church in his distress oifored his children a helping hand, but they, too proud to own themselves in the wrong, rejected his oiler with scorn. At leno-th, though, beginning to sco that their strivir,o H for existence were beginning to resemble the " cut-throat competition of Mr Bei/ry and the " caricature of Christianiiy" of Mr Lewis, they said among tbemee/ves, "Let us unite ou some firm basis of non-sectarian Christianity. ' bo these, poor little fellows clung together and reached down deep into the mud to hnd ■snoh a basis; but, alas ! they could not. Nfl'y, the more th,ey clang to ono another the deeper they seeuaed to sink. In their ditirnay one suggested that Father Church should be asked fco join them, bui another answered, by some curious coincidence, in the words ot Air Robertson, "It is visionary to expect Father Church to come clown trom his high pla-e of sacerdotal pride to form, on equal grounds with other denominations, a comnreheneive Christian Church." Father Church heard the suggestion and the reply. Ho sighed for his children, and said • "'My lads, if you care to come back to me, there's my rights hand stretched out to help you. But you can'b expocb use to be so foolish as fco leave the rock on which I have stood for nearly 1,900 years, to join you in the morass. You have all been nurtured and reared on the rock. Cojne back to your old home, and we will do come mighty work together. But go on as you arepoiiignowsDdin a few years you vrill have disappeared, sunken and forgotten. Nay, even Sam's big drum will not keep him afloat for over." Now whether the boys heard the voice of their father and obeyed, or whether fchev in fcbeir belief in their own opinions, were swallewed up and consigned to oblivion, as many had been before them, i 3 a parb of the etory that remaine to be

told. It will be written soma day whan man of future centuries look back upon our own day, as we look back upon tho ages long gone by, and mark tho fate of many a secb, which haa not taken to heart) tho lesson conveyed by the Litany— "From Heresy and Schism Good Lord deliver ug." —I am, etc., Anglo-Catiiolic.