YOUTH OF TO-DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 138, 13 June 1932, Page 2

YOUTH OF TO-DAY.

LITTLE HOME INFLUENCE.

NO REAL SUBSTITUTE,

PARENTS' RESPONSIBILITY.

"The young people of to-day are sairl to be idle and irresponsible, vulgar and pleasure-loving, rebellious and too much addicted to sport, crude and hasty, without reverence or discipline. No one is going to deny that altogether, but there is a great deal that may be said and that needs to be said in the defence of the youth of to-day," said the Rev. W. Bower Black, when speaking at St. David's Presbyterian Church last evening. "The unity of the Christian home ie not what it used to be, and it is a lamentable fact that as an educational institution the home has practically ceased to function," said the preacher. "The Sunday school, the Bible class and the Y.M.C.A. are being looked upon aa substitutes for home training, which they ivero never meant to be, and which they can never be. Nothing can take the place of the home." Modern young people, eaid the preacher, were quite frank about their claim to liberty, and their refusal of restraint, but any sweeping condemnation of them was both fal.se and foolish. For the most part they were fearless and adventurous and gloriously free from snobbiehnese. They were also cool, alert and independent. If they were

selfish they wore probably no more 80 than their ciders. There were many fathers who neglected tlieir children in the interests of business —they were so eager to "get on" that they could not respond to their children's deepest needs. There were tene of thousands of young people running riot because their wills had never been disciplined. The problem of the day was not so much evil lives as uncultivated, undeveloped and undisciplined lives. Young people went out into the world to meet all its problems and temptations without ever having been shown the weapons to use against them. The young generation's enthusiasm needed direction rather than damping. It was for those who had obtained some glimpse of the eternal to show them God. That should not bo done with any air of superiority, but verv humbly and quietly.