WOMEN. JOIN IN.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 104, 4 May 1922, Page 2

WOMEN. JOIN IN.

MAD SCRAMBLE FOR WEALTH. WHILE HOME IJTE DECAYS. CHILDREN'S SOULS IN PERIL. MR. CI'TTEX TAINTS SAD PICTURE. A very telling address was given to the member* of the Anglican General 'Synod yesterday afternoon 'by "Mr. E. C. ■ Cutten, S.M., who together with Mr. H. Stebbing waited on the Synod as a deputation to advocate 'the claims of the i Young Citizens' League to support and encouragement. Mr. Cutten said he wanted to do three things, firet to draw attention to the serious state of the community at "the preeont time: second to convince the Synod that the only way to tackle the problem was character education; and third show the nature of the Young Citizens' League, which supplied a practical method of meeting the case. Everyone, he said, must be struck by the very frequent accounts of cases of dishonesty and impurity of life, but it shoukl be remembered tha.t the cases which came 'before the public through the newspapers were a mere indication of the real state of things. The actual state of things implied a terrible state! of inefficiency from an industrial point of view and a terrible etate of affairs from a spiritual point of view. The posi-i tion was so serious, in fact, that our communities were all endangered.

The stability of a country, continued Mr. Cutten, depended on the stability of the public opinion of the great- majority of the inhabitants. A community was not kept in a state of stability by an army or by the police. The actual position was that the community was kept stable by the great majority of people of reasonable opinion. Down below there was a large undesirable element, continually increasing in while the majority on whom -the stability of the community depended was always decreasing. Then there was an intermediate party between the two, indifferent to everything. A MAD SCRAMBLE. ' : Aβ a matter of fact the position in our New Zealand communities was deplorably serious, and that was the outcome of the materialism of the age. People had coise to the conclusion that anything could be obtained by materia] ends. Life to-day was a mad scramble after wealth which gave people material tilings. And that material outlook meat forget fulness of God. The education system in force, said Mr. Cutten, did not touch on the spiritual side; it only touched the material and intellectual sides. The Boy Scout movement had been organised and organised until instead of being a movement it had become an organisation with so many regulations U> follow that there was no time left in I which to do the Teal work the movement ota.rted out to do. In religion there was the same tendency. To-day religion was with some people a meje matter of form. True religion was a matter of the heart only, but in the churches there was often a ioreretfulness of the aim and an adoration of the means.

' EFFECT OX WOMEN". ,* In calling attention to explained Mr. Cutten, he only wanted to indicate the extraordinary materialism of the age. The most eerious way in which this wave of materialism had affected us was to be seen in the effect on the women. The women had made a great struggle for their rights, for freedom of action ami for culture, but those were all material things. At any rate they were not spiritual. The result was that the women too. just as well as the men, were now 'taking part in the mad scramble for wealth, luxury and pleasure. As an illustration of h-.s point Mr. Cutten mentioned that an Auckland ■bookseller told him that, every time there was ehown a particularly sexual film nt the picture theatres, if it was adapted from a. book, there would be a demand for that book, and 90 per cent of those who inquired for it wer women and girls. And the same thing applied to all boot? of that character.

Tn the Court there was wJiat was called "Agony Day,"' on which disputes between husband and wife were heard. Last Friday in Auckland there were two magistrates engaged at this work all flay long and another magistrate for part of the day. and even then all the work was not finished. ''Dont you see/ asked Mr. Cutten, "the terrible state of things that implies;-' Then again a wellknown criminal lawyer in Auckland had told the magistrates that the cases which gave the legal profession the most trouble nowadays were sexual oases That implied a state of the community that was more terrible than people understood. WOMEN'S WORK. And what was the ultimate effect of all this materialism on women? Our women were so busy with the work that they made for themselves, and with all the other things they took up, that they Irad no time to do the work God. had given them. We should realise that ths moral progress of humanity depended on our women. Every man, woma.ii and child was the outcome of a woman's training. That fact was continually 'being lost sight of. And what was happening in the community-' Children were not wanted, and when th ej ' fame along they werp not cared for. They were looked upon as little nuisances.

In the worst homes of the lower strata the training of the children was thrown on the school teachers who fortunately for Xβ w Zealand, were a! wonderful cla&s of men and women. Then a little further up in the social scale one. would find that the responsibility for th,t> training of the children was thrown on the teacher in the Sundiv schools. The real education of the Child was between the age* of one and ten. the time when the character was really formed, and the children were trained not by precept, 'but by example "by influence, and by the atmosphere that was created around them. There wa« no other place than the home :n which they could get tiie real training that would form their characters. And the *ad part of it all was tihat the home to-day did not exist. All the other troubles followed that one fault. THROUGH THE CHILDREN. There wa.s only one way to meet the present trorbles "of the world .continred Mr. Cutten, and that was by the education of the young. Mr. Cutten went on to explain the working of the Young Citizen's League, which, he said, provided a. practical way of influencing the young people both through its dubs and its jonrnal which entered the homes. Mint, the League offered was not eoual to the Bible in schools, hut the Young Citizen's League was breaking the ground.

He asked the Synod for its support) and he wanted the members to recognise that any change that would take place in the present day conditions must come about through the young people. Hβ ■wanted the Synod to recognise all young people's institutions, and the great thing was to try and get control of the girls so that when they became mothers a change for the 'better would be seen in the next generation. (Applause.) The Primate (Bishop Julius'i thanked the deputation for attending, and assured them that there was no subject tliat more occupied the thoughts of and gave more anxiety to the members of the Synod than the present condition of the children, and the questions touching the improvement of the present state of affairs. The Synod members were very thankful for *>ny institution that recognised the present evils and was striving to remedy them. On that account the Synod welcomed the delegates, and was thankful to hear what they were doing. They were all at one in trying to bring about a better state of things in the country, especially among the children, and wherever there was anyone working for that end, especially such a society as the League, the Synod would lend its hearty support.