Thought Before Union

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31187, 11 October 1966, Page 3

Thought Before Union

(N.Z. Press Association) NAPIER, October 10. Anglicans did not desire a quick church union achieved through half-digested overtures, the Primate of New Zealand (the most Rev. N. A. Lesser) told the Waiapu Synod in Napier today.

The deep theological questions must be faced squarely, he said. “For if we, or others, give way to weak and unreasoning compromise, the resultant church would be inadequate for its task and sooner or later, probably sooner, it would disintegrate and the last state would be worse than the first,” he said. A truly informed opinion

in the rank-and-file of church members was essential to a true assessment of what lay ahead.

Archbishop Lesser said he did not wish to anticipate discussion on the subject of church unity or the motion inviting assent to the permissive experimental use of the Liturgy or the Eucharist. There would be many who did not wish for any change in the Liturgy. “For myself,” he said, "I would be quite content for the present service to have only one alteration made in it, and for that to be the suggestion made in 1928 by one of like mind to myself, namely, that the word ‘or this’ after the first PostCommunion prayer be changed to ‘and.’

“I know that this would not satisfy a large body of thinking opinion, for there are very many who devoutly be-

lieve the proposed liturgy, enriched by experimental use, will lead to a fuller offering of meaningful worship.”