NOT YET A NATION

Press, Volume LXXX, Issue 24152, 11 January 1944, Page 2

NOT YET A NATION

BISHOP’S OPINION OF AUSTRALIA “BORROWED OLD WORLD PATTERNS” From Our Own Correspondent SYDNEY, January 7. ‘‘We cannot build a nation simply by inflating Sydney and Melbourne,” said Bishop D. Burgmann, of Goulburn, New South Wales, in the current issue of his parish magazine. “We must occupy the whole continent, especially at strategic points, efficiently and fully, Australia has not yet arrived at nationhood —it is only a nation in the making. “We live on borrowed Old World patterns and they do not convince us. Our women dare not fashion an Australian hat, and it is notorious that neither our women nor men have yet given birth to a satisfying Australian song. . , ■ “Until we have the equivalent of ’ThereTl Always be an England’ dr ‘Deep in the Heart of Texas’ we are not a nation with any depth of soul. “In our Prime Minister (Mr Curtin) we found the leader that the occasion demanded—he has become a trusted leader,” continued Bishop Burgmann. “It is an extremely difficult role to maintain, because Australia is not yet a nation. Recently I have travelled and spoken with many people, from Brisbane to Perth. Our distances are enormous. The whole atmosphere of the west, social and political, is different from the east. Political tensions are not nearly so great, and interests are very localised."