ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 98, 27 April 1922, Page 4

ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE.

The dedication of the new buildings at St. John's College marks another stage in the history of an institution that is, perhaps, more closely linked with the early days of the province than any other institution existing to-day. The old library, the old hall, and the kitchen with the date 1946 on its fireplace, stand side by side with the new brick buildings. The college will now be able to extend its work and become a centre for the student life of the church. The Acting-Primat*, the Bishop of Ohrietehurch, who performed the dedication ceremony, dwelt on the many difficulties with which the college had had to contend in the past, but he hoped these difficulties would now be things of the past, and that the college would attract men from our own Dominion to the work of the Churoh. It is interesting to find a bishop of stich long experience expressing hi* conviction that men from our own land, acquainted with its needs and conditions, would make the best clergy. The trouble in the past. he said, had been the provision of adequate means for taeir training, and this difficulty would now be to a large extent overcome by the extensive additions made to St. John's. He hoped also that the college might he made a place to which all clergy could go from time to time to get fresh seed with which to sow the fields. Such places are wanted if the churches are to do their work efficiently. It is not easy for the average minister of religion, crowded as his life is with the multitudinous details of parish life, to keep in touch with modern thought and scholarship. Yet :t is demanded of him that he should do so. At centres of learning like St. John's the scholarly and intellectual life of the churches could be fostered and preserved, and this would ultimately mean a cain to the whole community. St. John's 13 rich in tradition: it is also rich in hopes and prospects for the future.