WHY GO TO CHURCH?

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 122, 25 May 1935, Page 2 (Supplement)

WHY GO TO CHURCH?

THREE IMPORTANT REASONS.

In a broadcast address, Mr. Bcverlcy jSTicholls, the well-known British writer, expressed interesting thoughts on church jjoing. He spoke a3 follows: — I shall probably be told that this suggestion which I am about to make is foolish, or boring, or in bad taste, or something like that, but all the same, I am going to make it.. For my suggestion is that instead of spending to-morrow morning reading the newspaper, you should do something quite extraordinary, something really odd and original—in other words, that you should go to church. There are three reasons for doing so. The first reason why you should go to church is for the good of your brain. Not for the good of your soul. The second reason why I suggest that you should go to church is for the good of your body—or perhaps I should say, your nerves. The churches are the only place left where it is possible for a man, not only to hear himself speak, but to hear himself breathe. And the third reason I am going to give you for going to church is that it will make you better citizens. It will give you a standard of values, which will help you to know how to vote and ■how to judge current' affairs. Well, I have doubtless enraged an even larger number of people than usual. But I hope that any animosity you may feel for me will not deter you from trying —just for an hour—the experiment of listening, once again, to the service which eo many of us, for so many years, have neglected, the service of the English Church. For in it you will hear words which, whether you believe them or not, cannot fail to comfort you with their infinite beauty, cannot fail to make you hope that in this troubled world, where so many of us are groping in the dark, there may, after all, be some guiding purpose. Soniß reason why we should ask with the Psalmist, "Whither shall I go then from my spirit, or whither shall I flee then from thy presence? If I take the ■wings of the morning, and remain in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there also shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me."