CONGREGATIONAL UNION

Dominion, Volume 16, Issue 149, 12 March 1923, Page 11

CONGREGATIONAL UNION

By Tblegbaph.—pbzss Association. Auckland, March 9. In his presidential address, the Rev. T. Wilson-Potts, chairman of the Congregational Union, said it was scarcely possible to avoid the recognition that with the quickening cf the social conscience politics and ethics were coining mucli nearer together. In many great questions of domestic legislation the moral issues were closely interwoven with the social and economical conditions. Problems dealing w'ith land and housing, with the relations of Capital and Labour, with the conditions of industry, were so largely questions of righteousness as well as policy that the Church could not but utter its voice. He had no intention of entering into a discussion on Socialism, but the day had gone by when they could bo content to bo ignorant of it. The State must recognise it as one of the forces to shape the politics of the future, and it was equally impossible for the Church to avoid its recognition. Tho Church must not allow its responsibility in these modern social issues to evaporate in mere pious opinion, but on the other hand it must not degenerate into mere rancorous partisanship.