EAST BELT METHODIST CHURCH.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11580, 11 May 1903, Page 5

EAST BELT METHODIST CHURCH.

The Rev. C. H. Laws preached on the subject to a large congregation at the East Belt Methodist Church last night, basing his remarks on Hebrews x., verse 2(5— " Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the custom of some is." He said no one could doubt that there is an enormous non-Church-going class of people in the ccmmunity, and the problem was cue sufficient to tax the inventiveness of the Christian. Church. The problem was one that had to be faced, but not in the manner of the eminent Scots divine, who, on encountering a difficult passage, had! remarked—" Brethren, this is a great spiritual difficulty. We will look it straight in the face and pass on." To turn a blind eye to the problem would be to prepare a day of great humiliation for the Christian Church. Dealing with the reason for the non-attendance of men at Church, the preacher pointed out that the atmosphere in which men lived nowadays was one of unrest. The foundation of religion had been laid bare by ruthless criticism, and modern ethical science had somewhat rudely shaken some of the maxima that our forefathers considered unshakeable. The brilliant discoveries ot science were available in cheap books, and were the topics of ordinary conversation. There were, however, some fixed points that had not been shaken —God remained, and duty abided, and Christ was unshakeoble. There was no use denying the fact that men to-dny were born into a world almost intoxicated with its prowess in wresting secrets from nature, and to a world which was a little careless of problems that could not be solved by material tctfs. This atmosphere of doubt and unrest which affected thoughtful men also affected thousands and thousands who could not be so described, and many who had read a few cheap infidel tracts thought they knew enough to doubt the reality of religious truth, but they did not know enough to doubt the reality of a good many infidel arguments. These delighted in taking the first chapter of Genesis as a hunting ground and in telling others that Darwin "and Huxley had exploded the statements made in'that chapter. But they had not done so; they had explained it and put it in a new light, and shown it not to be modern science. Thty had never dWroved the first verse of the chapter— i 'in the beginning God created." Men I Wgan to read the Bible at the wrong place —it was n mistake to read it from the beginnini'. They should besin with the New Testament, aild rv.id the Old Testament after gat ins right with Christ. Another Teason he thought for the non-attendance of men at church was the idea that was prevalent that a great deal of this twentieth conturv religion was unreal and conventional. A visitor to church would see worshippers looking about them during prayer, and thought- that if these profe*edlv religious r»:ople knew what prayer wis. they would be absolutely humble before God. Or the man in the pulpit happened to preach on the making of the world in six small days of twenty-four hours such, or on Balaam's oes speaking, or enunciating a doctrine of hell, horrible and repulsive. Then, after the service, the visitor mingling with the crowd found that instead of talking of the sermon they talked about tiie weather, business, or passing event*. Nevertheless the visitor in stigmatising religion as unreal and conventional, was too sweeping in his generalisation, j There were, however, duirebes that would refuse membership to Christ if he came as j a._noor__M_ l .-aad_lhe_e ..„__*- C_r_tia_sJ

who were not much better than the scribes and Pharisees. Those who made use ot this argument did so chiefly to cover up their own iniquities and their non-desire to attend church. The btrang-cst delusion he had met with iii connection with the matter was the contention that religion was unmanly. This was based on the fact that usually more women than men were wen at church. Men did not realise that the Ideal Christian life and the ideal manly life were one and the same tiling. Was Christ unmanly?—lie the standard of religion. He (the preacher) though* that there was nothing so nobk* or manly ;ia the brave tilings done by (Jurist. If the deeds He did had not been put in the Gospel but had appealed in the newspaper, people would say that he who did them was a noble type of manhood and heroism. Another reason for the non-attendance of mon at church was that the Church rubbed them up the wrong way. They did not want to hear ser-uioiis that bid bare the.:r hearts to thomselves. Church was an uncomfortable place tor those leading bad or indifferent lives. Concluding, the preacher announced, that- in connection with the subject, it had been decided to hold evangelistic services every Sunday evening during June, and that during July special services for men only wou'.d be held a fur the ordinary evening services. With regard to the latter, an attempt would be made to arrange for speakers who would attract, men. ST. MICHAELS CHURCH. Incidentally Canon Averill alluded to the subject at St. Michael's Church last evening, in tho course of a sermon on "Death in the light of evolution." The preacher stated that evolution of man's body had been going on since the remotest ages, and it .seemed probable that evolution of man's spirit and mind must continue until the mo.st distant future. It was the duty of man now as far as possible to develop this side of his nature, and the man who did not realise that necessity was left out of the forward movement of creation, instead of being one of the progressives he was a moral deformity. The fact- that so many men did not go to church, which was an instrument for spiritual development, only testified to the large number of moral deformities.