ANZAC DAY SERVICES

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24959, 21 August 1946, Page 6

ANZAC DAY SERVICES

REPLY TO BISHOP LYONS STATEMENT BY ORANGE LODGE (P.A.) WELLINGTON, August 20. The following statement was issued to-night by the legislative committee of the Grand Orange Lodge of New Zealand:—

“The statement issued to the press by the Most Rev. P. F. Lyons, Roman ' Catholic Bishop of Christchurch, puts; the position of the Roman Catholic j Church very clearly in regard to the 1 question of united services on Anzac i Day. I “The Bisfiop says: ‘When men enlist; for military service they are not penalised for their religious beliefs. I They live together, fight together, and | if necessary died together’; but,” adds i the statement, “the Bishop might have added: ‘We will not permit them to worship together.’ “The statement issued by the National Council of Churches made it clear that so far as all the other churches were concerned there was no difficulty of conscience in these united services. It remained, therefore, for the Roman Catholic Church' to raise objection to these services on the grounds that Roman Catholics are debarred by their own religious tenets from participating in the conjoined religious service. It is not, therefore, as Bishop Lyons illogically suggests, a question of considering the rights of Roman Catholics, who have held their own particular religious services, as stated by his Lordship, on Anzac Day, but they deny the right of 80 per cent, of returned men to hold a united service. ~ j . “The only argument adduced in Australia, Canada. South Africa, and New Zealand against a united religious observance on Anzac Day is that of Roman Catholic intolerance to any other form of religious worship. To submit to this demand by the Roman Catholic Church is for the Returned Services’ Association to allow the rights of the vast majority of its members to be subjected to the Roman Catholic doctrine of exclusiveness. It cannot be urged that in this the Returned Services* Association would preserve ‘equal rights for all, special privileges to none.* ”