ST. ANDREW SOCIETY

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 55, 29 November 1937, Page 6

ST. ANDREW SOCIETY

Annual Church Service

The’St. Andrew Society of ’Wellington held its annual church service last night at St. Andrew’s Church, The Terrace, the pipers parading at the post office. The musical portion of the service took the form of psalms and paraphrases. The Old Testament lesson, Psalm 121, was read by Mr. McDermott and the New Testament lesson, Hebrews xi, 32, to xii, 7, by Mr. J. B. Thomsen.

Speaking on "Scotland’s Early Covenants and Covenanters,” the Rev. Brian Kilroy traced the origin of the term "covenant,” which he said was a legacy of religious and secular history. It was a common form of bond in every aspect of Scottish life. The first was made in 1557, when certain lords of the congregation, among them Argyle, Erskine and Morton, pledged themselves to the support of the Protestant faith. The King’s Confession of 1581 was in its turn embodied in the great National Covenant of February, 1638, signed in Greyfriars Church, Edinburgh. It was the outcome of a violent objection to the attempt by Charles I to impose the English litany.

In 1843 came the Solemn League and Covenant, an endeavour to impose the covenant on England as the price of help in tlie civil war. Lack of wisdom was shown, said the preacher, in this attempt to impose their views on another people.

The covenant was fundamentally of religious value, he concluded, pledging the loyalty of the individual or group to the Kingdom of Christ. It left a memory of loyalty and obedience, a passion for freedom and the rights of conscience.