CHURCH AND YOUTH

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 90, 13 October 1933, Page 13

CHURCH AND YOUTH

NEED FOR CLOSER BOND

ARCHBISHOP'S COMMENTS (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, This Day. The relation of the Church to the youth of the community, and the strenuous efforts contemplated to forge a closer bond, were referred to by Archbishop Averill when delivering his charge to Synod. His 'comment arose from the report'of the commission appointed by him to consider the Church 's ministry to the young. "Have wo got quite the-right idea of the Sunday schools?" asked tho Archbishop. "They'tire not a substitute for home and day school training; they are intended to be supplementary to it and to afford special training for confirmation where homes and parents fail to do their' duty. ; Is it not tho duty of the Church to find some remedy for such failure? There is'no more important work that the Church can do, there is no more, important work that (the council can-do, than provide a supply of good, sound Church literature for broadcasting throughout the dio- . cese. There is no more important expenditure which the diocese can undertake than the financing of such an effort. The country is flooded with literature of a narrow sectarian kind, and even- of a dangerous and pernicious 'kind, and- it is the bounden duty of the Church to broadcast freely literature dealing with the fundamentals of the Christian faith and the principles .for which the Church of England stands. "The council has carefully considered the position of Scouts and Guides in connection with parochial organisations for the, young, and naturally is somewhat perturbed at tho practical abolition of controlled troops in New Zealand, which seems to be contrary to tho spirit and letter of tho 1933 Scout Handbook. The Church's first duty is to train hei; children in the faith and principles of the Church, and if Scouts and Guides are not helped by scouting and guiding to be loyal to thenown church it.would be far better for tho Church to adopt or create some other organisation whiqh would produeo more satisfactory results.- We aro anxious to co-operate fully with tho authorities of scouting and guiding in New Zealand so long as they are acting constitutionally, but we have a right to demand that our own children in all that appertains to religion shall continue to be under the guidance and control *of the Church. What we claim for ourselves we claim equally foT others, and the children in the open troops should always bo encouraged to attend their own churches. The question of leadership is tlve «'ux, ot the whole matter. There should be a supply of laymen and laywomen who could qualify for leadership, in both Scouts and Guides. It is unfair to expect the clergy to shoulder the whole burden. Both organisations are excellent in themselves, and continue to supply a very real need, and I hope that the authorities will encourage .the various religious bodies to form their own troops whenever and wherever possible and so remove one hindrance to the spread and consolidation ot an excellent organisation."