"RED" CHARGES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 142, 17 June 1940, Page 6

"RED" CHARGES.

MINISTER'S DENIAL.

CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND.

DR. 3. G. INKSTER'S VIEWS.

Criticism of remarks credited to him in New Zealand had caused him considerable pain, eaid Dr. J. G. Inkstor, 8.A., formerly of Knox Presbyterian Church, Toronto, who passed through Auckland to-day on hie return from Australia to Canada. Dr. Inketer denied the remarks that had been attributed to him.

Dr. Inkster waa reported from Sydney to have said that New Zealand Presbyterians were touched seriously with modernism, and that sometimes it seemed that Marx was replacing the Bible; also that Wellington University wae half-filled with Communists.

Stating that his vie we of fundamentalism apparently wero not in accordance with those held by some of the Presbyterian clergy in the Dominion, Dr. Inkster referred to the wonderful reception he had had from the people of the Dominion. It had been said that he had not been in the Dominion long enough to speak with authority, but actually he had been in New Zealand for eight months and had occupied the pulpit of the most important Presbyterian church in Wellington for six months. He had travelled throughout the Dominion, had

preached in Wellington, Christchurch. and Duuedin, and had delivered 180 addresses, many of which were published. "The people, especially in Wellington, know what my views are, particularly in view of the fact that I have addressed large public gatherings in that city," ho said. "I am sorry to see the criticism that was levelled at me by various interests. I thought that it ■ was unfair, especially as I had received such kindness., hospitality and , appreciation from New Zealanders, almost without exception." Referring to the alleged etatemente to which exception had been taken in New Zealand, Dr. Inkster asserted that he had never said that Karl Marx's "Das Kapital" was replacing the Bible in New Zealand, and that Victoria University was full of Communists.

"As far a<3 the latter allegation is concerned, I merely quoted what was the opinion expressed to me !by a lecturer at the university that half the students were tinted with Communistic ideas," he added, "and that I gave some credence to this. To this I would make the addenda that according to a well known writer in the "British Weekly," who is the principal of the Theological College at Oxford, half the young students in Great Britain were touched with communism."

Concluding, Dr. Inkster said that Wβ remark regarding modernism was that "in Canada many of our young Ministers are touched with modernism."