RELIGIOUS WORLD.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 103, 3 May 1930, Page 2 (Supplement)

RELIGIOUS WORLD.

PRESENT-DAY OUTLOOK. "REST ORER OF PATHS TO DWELL IN." ANZAC DAY'S CHALLENGE. r The following is from a sermon by the itev. H. K. Archdall, headmaster of King's College, preached in the college chapel on Anzac Day:— "And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places; thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations, and thou shalt be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in!' Thus did the propnet of the exile address the people of Judah exiled in Babylon. "By the waters of Babylon (as one of their poets wrote) they sat down and wept when they remembered Zion. The bitterness of thdir experience helped them to see the majesty of God, and to Itnow that suffering nobly borne has a Cleansing and strengthening power. They became filled with a spiritualised patriotism, love for their country, with service of God, which kept them intact for 500 years. Thus when Cyrus, King of Persia, with the help of the Medes and the Scythians, hurled the Babylonian Empire to its ruin in 538 8.C., they were ready for the great task of building once again their old home, being allowed J>y Cyrus to return to the land of Judah. "Their task was set for them in the Words of my text. It was a three-fold task: To set up a foundation that would last, to repair a breach in the wall of Jerusalem' and in the history of their nation, and to build a road along which future generations might walk. ""You will see the application of the ktory to our own circumstances in these post-war years, as we think of our responsibilities on Anzac Day. We, too, have had men given for our life, and we are met here because we wish to remember that fact, and because we wish to rescue the suffering and the sacrifice from being.a mere tragic incident.and to make it the birthplace of an impulse of moral and spiritual patriotism. We do not wish for a peace which is a slumber of the soul, and we-spurn as unworthy all movements and tendencies which, in our- age, answer the tragedy of the war by thoughtless selfishness and paganised society. ' As With "Nations So With Men. vp £ across some fine words of Dr. ifeok!i : , r.i O.o'ord, written in 1916, which ift-ic- worth quoting. 'There is a peace >.C Osd th-at rVisseth understanding; there §» '& -M'rifc* «?f God that passeth under-, elar;jto less. Religion is the privy jto the secret of both, but has no hold on either until the other is within grasp. [Apart from the peace of God, the strife of God has neither motive nor end — lapart from the strife, peace is a mere slumber of the soul. Fatally defective is the view of religion which regards it as Bolely concerned with the possession and enjoyment of peace. It has taken a false measure both of the facts of the world and the nature of the soul 1 . Equally defective and not less fatal is the opposite view—that the Lord is a man of war. (Both are one-sided and corrupting.' Dr..,, Jacks went on to say: ''The non-resistance saying 3 of Christ jtoni out of' the context of a life ;which resisted evil to the uttermost [would be meaningless. The religion of peace cannot hold its ground unless it is 1 prepared when occasion arises to'transform itself into the religion of strife. [The peace of God which passeth understanding summons the partner in the ieducation of the soul—the strife of God which passeth understanding."' Programme of Our Needs. "So wrote Dr. Jack 3 in the midst of the jgrcafc straggle and his paradoxes sting Bind wake us up. "We look around us .sometimes and ■wonder whether we are able to- show in peace time the sense of unity, the selfless power of service to a common end, knd the patience of the war years. A Icertain amount of effervescence after a "big upheaval is inevitable, but it is Jelearly time that we began to garner jßome of the honourable impulses of the war. They died for a better, world,, and jthey are not going to be disappointed, (and our text gives us a programme of lour main needs. "The tree that bears fruits is the one ihat has hidden roots, and it is. true tof individuals, as. well as of nations. The malaise of modern life is largely idue to the fact that it is trying _to forget that its' roots lie in the religion 'of Judea,. the thought of- Greece,, and .the sense of law and order of Rome'. The idea of a secularised society is destroying respect for those values in human life which are the very cement of social life. Democracy, which is tmly possible on the basis of keen idealism, and a spiritual valuation of. life, will surely succumb to a- shallow materialism. We need! to think very earnestly about this question of foundations. Know How to Live. ' "What the world needs is to know low to live go gaily along the paths of life and duty. A road speaks of inter-connection with other places and people. It breaks down the spirit of insularity and the weakness in each of us is the tendency to cut ourselves off from others, to get behind our wall, and allow our sympathies to die out. The biggest part of education is to learri that freedom comes and joy in so far as you learn to get outside yourself, and rise to newnesi; of life by serving the common weal in whatever circle of life.you find yourself. "The true patriot is the one who is 'also the true internationalist. We should love our nation in order that she may become a beautiful stone in the temple of humanity. As we look, back along 'the road of the past, we can see the noblest "things in our national tradition are tl"«M elements, which we have been able to give for the common welfare. That i,s why the League of Nations b so important a road needing to be built." Mr Salvador de Madarfaga, lecturer, author, and chief of the disarmament section of the League of w » recent article in the "New York Hemkl Tribune," says that pacifist enthusiasm 5s wast'.'<i on war books. \*ar is not, he says, "to be cured by making people, dwell on the horror of it, but by turning their minds away from it altogether. We do not want war books; not even books 1 about how to disarm or how to make peace, and ensure its continuation. We want books on how to live tdgylher in a constructive, healthy, ami co-operative ■ way."