"JERICO" PLANNED IN HEART OF CAPITAL CITY

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXVII, Issue 15059, 20 August 1949, Page 6

"JERICO" PLANNED IN HEART OF CAPITAL CITY

Campaign For Spiritual Reclamation Hundreds Of Unshepherded People Concerned at the lack of religious atmosphere in their district, members of four Protestant churches in the heart of Wellington will launch a campaign for the spiritual reclamation of the Thorndon area next month. The four churches, Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Congregational, find that regular worshippers come from outside the parish boundaries, that few from the centre of the Dominion capital ever set foot in a church. The human and organisational centre of New Zealand, is the district around Parliament Buildings, a sauare mile covering Government offices and national headquarters of all types of businesses and organisations. Unlike the famous "square mile" of the City of London, says "The Outlook," official journal of the Presbyterian Church, Thorndon is not deserted at night and in the weekends; its hillside fringe and Thorndon flat teem with flats and boarding-houses. Some 9000 people live in the district, but few are believed to be connected with churches. The congregation's responsibility for evangelism was urged in a recent sermon by the Rev. J. S. Somerville, Presbyterian minister, who outlined a "plan of operations" for the campaign, timed to start halfway through September. Team Visits Forty or 50 young people, working in teams of two or three, will go out each night, from Monday to Thursday making initial contacts by calling at homes in Thorndon, carrying suitable literature and information cards. Their information wi 1 be collated at headquarters and follow-up visits made by teams from the churches required. Key organisation of the campaign will be the Student Christian Movement, which will make the initial survey. A central committee will comprise representatives from S.C.M. and the four parishes, and local committees will take over local duties. Concerted action had been necessarv to take the Jericho of the Old Testament, said Mr Somerville in an address. Thorndon was a modern Jericho, containing many hundreds of unshepherded people, many groping for faith, many without a spiritual home. "Unshepherded people are the easiest prev to the false doctrines current today," he said. "We must not merely life up our hands in holy horror at Communism, for example. We have to do something about it. And I suggest that our all-out effort under God to attack this area is doing something to show that we believe our faith is better, better by far."