THE CHURCH AND THE LIQUOR TRAFFIO.

Evening Post, Volume LIII, Issue 114, 15 May 1897, Page 2

THE CHURCH AND THE LIQUOR TRAFFIO.

If there be two institutions on this earth that ought to be bitterly opposed to eaoh other, ihey are the Church of the living God and tho liquor traffic. With consecrated energy and enthusiasm the Church should wage a war of extermination against everything that degrades and destroys the people. Nothing causes more sin and impurity, moreiniquity and downright devilry, than drink. This is patent to all, and to none more so than to the Church. And yet we find an almost inoredible state of matters — the Church actually in league with the blighting traffic, and one of its most esteemed patrons. The stuff denounced in the Churoh's Guide Book as " the cruel venom of asps," "a mocker, a deceiver," is, in the majority of its congregations, placed on the Lord's Table. Thoße who get rich through the destruction of their fellows are honoured with high office in the Churoh. Even yet, minL-tera make obeisance to this fetish when entering ou their ministry, and that though many of their brethren are cruolly slain by it. What in all this but treason to the Church's Head ? By what occult means has all this been brought about ? By "bribery and corruption. The answer may be blunt, but it is terribly and sadly true. The love of gold, the fear of reduced collections, explains, but can never justify, the culpable action of the Church. One of the most important and urgent duties of the hour is the education of the Church. It holds the key of the .situation. Many are being lured to their destruction through the sanction and support given by the Churoh to the drink traffic. Not a few would never have entered "the trade" if tho Church, instead of smiling, frowned. The Legislature will never outlaw what tho Church makes respectable and with blind fatuity describes as one of God's creatures. Church members whom the truth has made free have a heavy responsibility if they remain passive tinder existing circumstances. They should give no peace until war is declared, and then true peace will abide, because purity has been secured. — Scottish Good Templar.