NOTES OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 51, 23 November 1928, Page 10

NOTES OF THE DAY

Deploring the’, drift from the churches, the Rev. W. J. Elliott, addressing the Auckland Methodist , Synod, "claimed that, tile need of a revival was urgent. Undoubtedly ' there are many counterattractions to church attendance nowadays, and this should have the effect of stimulating preachers to greater effort if they wish to retain the attendance of their congregations. Where a preacher of ability speaks he is usually sure of an audience. Many people are quite willing to go to church provided there is something to go for. It is not so easy, however, to discover exactly what is wanted. It has been suggested that the deficiency lies more in pulpit ability and understanding of the everyday problems of life. A little more attention given to discover what the thoughtful layman is concerned in might provide a sound basis for sermons of greater appeal and wider appreciation.

Right into the mists of history we can trace complaints about the goings-on of the Modern Miss. For some reason the very fact that every woman has been, or ought to have been, a Modern Miss at some time or other is forgotten when she hands out blame and head-shakes to her daughters. Probably even the stone-age matrons, whose past was every whit as modern as their daughters, pessimistically shook their unshingled heads over the way the world was going in this respect. Certainly we have only to read between the lines of ancient history to discover just the same pessimism amongst the matrons of ancient Egypt, early Rome, and Greece. Even in Victorian days, when everyone lived in a frame incrustated with hoary respectability, mothers and parsons held up their hands in astonishment at the forward hussies, now known as the Modern Miss. The tiniest twinkle of the eye at a swaggering beardspattered fellow of twenty-four meant a day’s penitence in her room in those severe Victorian days. To-day we shake our heads just as our forbears did, and wonder where it will all end; but for some reason neither matron, parson, nor the world at large shakes its head at the modern man. He has never had heads shaken at him since the world began. Yet it may be that he deserves it more.

Glancing through the after-election issue of the official organ of the Labour-Socialist Party one gathers that it holds the view that the United Party has reaped where Mr. Holland and his followers have sown. The United Party, it remarks in effect, has profited by the dissatisfaction created by Labour propaganda. There is some truth in this. But what the Labour-Socialist Party fails to recognise is that, while its attacks on the Government may have and did help the United Party, it requires something more than destructive criticism to win the confidence of the electors. The election showed clearly enough that the great bulk of the people do not approve the extremes of policy and method of the LabourSocialist. Party; otherwise the votes for the two parties opposed to Socialistic extremes would not have been so overwhelmingly greater than the Labour-Socialist vote. The position reached as between the three main parties in the new Parliament would appear to be causing Mr. Holland’s party some embarrassment. All is plain sailing apparently up to the time that the Labour-Socialists join with Sir Joseph Ward, to vote the Government out. Then, to quote the Labour-Socialist journal, “an intricate and perplexing situation will arise when Sir Joseph Ward takes the Treasury benches.” It is suggested that Mr. Holland’s best policy might be to permit Sir Joseph Ward to carry.on, but the final advice of the Labour-Socialist jouinal.is not to be impetuous, but to adopt the Asquithian policy of watt and see. I his, in the circumstances, may be regarded as very safe counsel.