CHRISTIANITY

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 111, 6 November 1935, Page 29

CHRISTIANITY

MODERN OPPONENTS

THE SUPREME ANTAGONIST

Russian Bolshevism was far from being the only, though it was the most virulent, opponent of Christianity today, declared the Rev. H. H. Barton, M.A., in his moderatorial address to the opening of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian- Church last night.

Extreme nationalism had an entirely different' scale of values from Christianity, stated Mr. Barton. More serious still, however, was the weakening of Christianity by the insidious inroads made upon her by the forces of materialism. The supreme antagonist of Christianity today was neither Mohammedanism nor any other nonChristian religion, but secularism.

There were in our day two great inter-related factors which threatened the overthrow of the world order. The first was the thrust directed against the peace of the world, which at its worst might result in the final collapse of the League of Nations and such another great world conflagration as would mean the irremediable ruin of our civilisation. The second, almost inextricably "bound up with the first, was an economic situation of acute difficulty.

There was one fundamental fact that must impress the Christian observer. It was that there had been renewed with great vigour and point the challenge to the authority of Christ. In the past, it was true There had ever been multitudes who had rendered only lip service to the Master. Today the fundamentals of Christian morality were being assailed. The moral chaos of our generation was, perhaps, the most formidable challenge ever offered to Christian ethics, and there was no assault fiercer than that delivered against ■ the institution of permanent monogamous marriage and-the family.