"CLEAR THE DECKS."

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 309, 29 December 1915, Page 8

"CLEAR THE DECKS."

WE MUST HAVE CONSCRIPTION BISHOP JULIUS* VIEW. (By Telegraph.—Special to "Star.") CHRISTCHURCH, Tuesday. In the course of an address at the Church of England Men's Society Conference to-day, Bishop Julius said:—"We shall never carry through this war, vi my judgment, without conscription. We shall never get the funds for the war until we make the unwilling men pay up. — (hear, hear)—and pluck up courage enough to add a taxation that will make men feel that it has to come. Yet 1 should hardly like to tell you what I know, what 1 have seen, how many men there are in this country who are making money over and over again out of the war. The" Church has been overweighted; she has almost forgotten that she was meant for more than for people to look at, and admire her antiquities. The word has come that she must clear decks. Local animosities and party strife are disappearing. It really doesn't matter twopence whether a man is High or Low or Broad Church, if he is rolling up his coat sleeves and doing his Master's work. The Church must clear her decks to get rid of a lot of rubbish. We have been content with a laxity of discipline, with the result that there are an enormous number of people who call themselves onlookers who ought not to be there. The Church of the country is coming to this: Every man must be a soldier or a sailor, and a good thing, too; and every baptised member of the Church must be a worker—(hear, hear) —a real soldier or a sailor, or let him put his name down lon the census paper as an unbeliever. (Hear, hear.) The curse of the Church' ,is the number of men and women who use, to the utmost, the privileges of the I Church, but are not inclined to give I service. We must clear tlie decks of these. I don't want to drown them, I though one or two might be drowned | [ with advantage. We want to enlist them, and say to them, ' Look here, you have I no more business in the Church as a' looker-on; have yoi: any business in the State or country as a man willing to j let other people fight for you.' (Hear, hear.) I hope that is clear." *: