RELIGIOUS WORLD

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 165, 14 July 1928, Page 2 (Supplement)

RELIGIOUS WORLD

PRESENT-DAY OUTLOOK.

(Contributed.) THE MAORI BISH3P. APPOINTMENT WILL SOON BE MADE. A very interesting article on the BLsnopric of Aotearoa appears in the "Waiapu Church Gazette." The writer says:— The ta.-k set before tlie Maori bishop is going to be a very difficult one. It is very fortunate for him that he will bo attached to our Bishop of Waiapu, who has had the interests of the Maori people so much at heart, and who will do all that is possible to help him. Will all the other bishops be as helpful and as sympathetic? A great deal is going to depend upon their attitude. After all, this new proposal is only a t: sginning, and may not be the final solution of our Maori problem. But we have to make a beginning somewhere and somehow. One very hopeful feature is the wholehearted way in which the scheme has been accepted by the Madri people themselves. Already the work of the church is receiving fresh inspiration, and new hopes are being created all over this diocese. The fresh Enthusiasm augurs well for the success of tho scheme. Maoris Grateful. At three different Maori standing committee meetings held in the archdeaconries of Tauranga, Waiapu and Hawke's Bay, resolutions were unanimously carried conveying the thanks of the Maori people to General Synod for passing the statute for the episcopal supervision of tho Maori race. Further resolutions were carried thanking the Bishop of Waiapu for his wholehearted support of the desire of the Maori people for a bishop of their own race, and to Archdeacon H. Williams for his able leadership in piloting the bill,through General Synod, and for his constant and valued assistance in putting the scheme upon a sound foundation. Another resolution was also carried conveying the thanks of the Maori people to the trustees of the H. and W. Williams Memorial Trust, for their generous offer of £ for £ subsidy up to £500 on moneys collected by the Maori people toward the stipend of the Maori bishop. When Will Nomination be Made? Many people are wondering when the nomination of the Maori bishop will be made, and when and where the consecration will take place. No nomination can be made until section 3 of the bill is complied with. It reads as follows: "No nomination shall be made of a person to be Bishop of Aotearoa until provision shall have been made to the satisfaction of a majority of the bishops in the North Island, for a stipend of | not less than £500 per annum, a suitable residence and reasonable travelling allowance." Maori Finances. The Maoris feel that having put up a fight, for three years for a Maori as bishop, and General Synod having granted their request, it is now np to them to provide the stipend for their bishop. Consequently they are preparing to shoulder the whole burden, and are not making any appeal for financial help from the pakehas toward the bishop's stipend. It is not a case of the Maori being too proud, of of having money to burn (far from it), but they { ■want to play the game as becometh j gentlemen! Sir Apirana Ngata and his Ngati Porou and East Coast tribes have generously come forward and asked that they be allowed to shoulder the financial burden for this year ending March 31,! 1929, and so give the other tribes plenty of time to organise their finances for next year. Our diocesan office in Napier has received the sum of £330 from the Hast Coast and £50 from Lary Carroll. With the subsidy from tho Williams Memorial Trust, this gives us a total of £760 for the eight months remaining of this financial year. In addition to above, Sir Apirana, on behalf of Ngati Porou and the East Coast tribes, has guaranteed the sum of £300 per annum for the next five years. The Arawa tribe of Rotorua have also sent in legal documents guaranteeing the sum of £250 per annum for five years. So on the 'face of it the financial arrangements appear to be sound and accept* able. Consequently the nomination should be made fairly soon. The bishops usually meet in August in Wellington, and it .is just possible that the consecration may take? place about the time of their meeting. Place for Consecration. The place where the consecration service is to be held is in the prerogative of the Archbishop. His convenience has to be studied. But the Maoris feel that as this bishop is for the Maori people, the consecration should be held either at a suitable Maori centre, or a centre that can be easily reached by a large number of the Maori people. The Maoris have passed resolutions suggesting either Paihia, in the Bay of Islands, where the gospel message was first preached and where the first missionaries had their home, or Tikitiki, on the East Coast, in honour of the* Ngati Porou and especially Sir Apirana Ngata; Rotorua, as the geographical centre of the North Island and fairly easy to reach; or Te Aute College, the neutral inarae of all the Maori tribes, and the home of the late Archdeacon Samuel Williams, the founder of the Williams Memorial Trust that has done so much to help the work of the Maori Mission.

Materialism as a theory is dead; no one really holds it now; but materialism in practice ia very much* alive. In fact, I should say that, there never was a time in the history of our civilisation when men were so absorbed in the contemplation of the things of sense, or so satisfied therewith, to the virtual exclusion of all interest in the things of tihe spirit. They do nofcjrant to look on the other side of the curtain or to know anything about what is there. — The Rev. Dr. R. J. CSampbeH. The United Evangelical Church of China was instituted at Shanghai towards the end of 1927. At tM confer-

ence, ninety-four Chine** delegates were present, representing sixteen denominations. They voted in favour of dissolving former ecclesiastical eennections.and tomi* a Church of Clurt for China. new church claims to include a tt«w*nd eoagregatlons in eixteen prohie • 1«00 missionaries workaasa. All foreigners will be A