SACRED DAYS

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 130, 4 June 1931, Page 12

SACRED DAYS

CHURCH OBSERVANCE At the meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church to-day, an overture was received from the Auckland Presbytery requesting the assembly to make a recommendation with regard to the better observance of sacred days. The Rev. Ivo E. Bertram (Auckland) said that in recent years the atmosphere had changed in many ways in regard to these matters, including the observance of certain special days in the church calendar. He referred to the observance of Christmas and Good Friday. Thoso who proposed the overture in the Auckland Presbytery favoured the holding of'a service on Good Friday. Such an observance, he felt sure, would be of great value to the Presbyterian Church, and would bring it into line with sister churches. Ho moved tho adoption of the overture. ! In supporting the motion, the Rev. Dr. Gibb remarked that he was, he thought, the first Presbyterian minister in New Zealand to hold a service on Good Friday morning. Such a service was regarded as being.extremely helpful and appropriate. There was, -of course, the drawback of the paucity of attendance owing to the Easter holidays. He was of opinion that ministers should preparo the people for the service by calling attention to it and ask them to i;deny themselves in order to remove such difficulties as had hitherto existed.

Tho assembly agreed to recommend the churches to make every effort to have services held on Good Friday.