THE RELIGIOUS WORLD.

Evening Star, Issue 13031, 15 August 1908, Page 4

THE RELIGIOUS WORLD.

NEW ZEALAND'S DANGER. The Bishop of Auckland preached on June 28 in the beautiful old Norman 'Church in the Temple to a congregation which filled every seat and overflowed into the aisles. Once again his theme was the jieed for religion as the only lasting bond of Empire. "A man comes back," he said, " after five or six years' absence from London, viewing things perhaps in not quite the same way. as he did. I come back with this absolute conviction : that, there is only one thing that will keep this Empire together, and that is' a common faith. I have been in the fairest country i in the Empire, stocked with the best people that ever left England's shores, and ; I say without hesitation that the danger in front of that country is secularism, and the danger in front of the British Empire'is secularism. The day you give up religion in your schools, in your Inns of Court, in all the public expressions of your national life, you will sound the deafh knell of the British Empire. You , cannot keep the British Empire together on any terms except the common Bentiment that issnes out of a common faith." He had seen the result of secularism, and he came back to England and said what he had said in New Zealand, and would go on saying, that yon could not express national life in terms of weights and measures ; you could only express national life when you gave it a spiritual expression. The men who did the most permanent work wore the men who thought. The that lived was the idea. As one standing at the very outside of the circle of the -British Empire, hs would say to the men who think in England : " If you can do anything in your day and generation to preserve the spiritual expression of your national life, to preserve the religion of the British Empire, you twill do a far greater thing than if you spend your time waving Union Jacks. In the name of God, for the sake of this wondrous Empire, keep that Empire Christian, and keep it Christian through keening England, the Mother of Nations Christian, and serving God." ROMAN CATHOLICISM. Enlightened Christians in the Protestant Churches have always seen much in the Roman Church to call forth their love and veneration. They have gladly allowed that Church to be a Church of Jesus Christ. Perhaps it is better that we should quote from eminent and representative authorities. Dr R. W. Dale, in his address from the Chair of the Congregational Union, said : "The ignorant contempt with which, not very long ago, it was the custom of English Protestants to sneak of the theology of the Roman Church and of the intellectual power of these who submit to her claims is passing. How it could ever been forgotten that she had the undivided control of the highest European thought for centuries, and that since the Reformation she has had the allegiance, not merely of blind enthusiasts and impassioned saints, but of the brightest genius and the wealthiest learning, the keenest logical acuteness, incomparable sagacity, and the loftiest eloquence is unintelligible. And no one who has any acquaintance with the writings of that stately succession of scholars and theologians who have gradually built up the,-vast and wonderful structure of Romish belief will ever dream that the mere diffusion of education, or a general increase of intellectual activity, will render hearty faith in the creed' of the Church of Rome impossible."—' British Weekly.' CHURCH AMUSEMENTS. The object of the Church was not to niake provision for amusements to unite its members, raid Mr Ward Riding, of Colne, at a conference in Lancaster of the Independent Methodist denomination. Was the pursuit of sport and pleasure conducive to the welfare of the Church? he asked. Some people indulged in thunderous condemnation of those who indulged in cards, but looked upon chess quite differently. To his mind there need be no such differentiation. A horse race was just as right or wrong as a foot race. A. football match was quite as innocent as lawn tennis or siolf. A dance, as such, was quite as innocent as a merrv-KO-ronnd. ITis complaint was that the work of the Church did not receive its fair share of attention. Many artificial methods were resorted to to build up the Church—billiards, smoke rooms, and concerts beinf introduced—but such attempts would fail' because the province of the Church was to unite members for worship. It was a sijrn of spiritual death when a church had to resort to billiards, whist, drives, concerts, and to keep up tho semblance of life. If time permitted, after men had discharged their duty to the Church, thev might go and play football, cricket, and other games. Unless the Church had the primary place it, sank to the level of the club. GLEANINGS. An influential committee has been fomicd to erect a memorial in Westminster Abb*>y foJohn Bunyan. It was hoped that room might have It-en found on tho Abbev walls for a bust or medallion of the author of 'The Pilgrim's Prjjsrress.' Owing to limit;.t;ons of epace, however, this "is impos".ble, but the Dean of Westminster hns promised a window in the noTth transept over the statue of Chatham. The window will be filhd with st-lined glass, and will illustrate pictoriallv a number of scenes in 'Tho Pilgrim's Proar.-ss.' The Vicar of Staplefield. Sussex, is experiencing the truth of the saving " Sussex people won't be driven." Disliking his action, the parishioners refuse to attend church on Sundays, and the sacred edifice, once filled to the doors, musters on Sunday evenings a congregation which can he numbered on the firigers of one hand. The church finances are suffering it. consequence. The vicar nas for his warden a lady, and the result of her calling a meeting to decide how to remedv the state of affairs was met with a resolution calling upon the vicar to resign.

Dr Aked. formerly of Liverpool, has had a-Tcgular field day at New York in a cermon on the ijreat dnnrcr of "corrupt politic?" debauching and d : shonoring America. The corruption and plunder in American politics Dr Aked likened to the trampling of a forei.gr. foe. lie referred to "cities run by thieves." but he did not say whether NewYoTk, Philadelphia, or San Francisco was in his mind. Local polities, he raid, should be rescued from the degradation into which they had fallen, and it should be our constant object to make political effort something more than wire-pulling, log-rolling, and corruption. The woman question finds its way everywhere. To the Swedenborgian Conference, which met at Southpovt (Eng.), a lady was sent as delegate by the Liverpool Church, but when she depired to the roll the guardians of that document declined to allow her to do «:o until authorised by the Conference. The president, on being appealed to, held that_ as there was no precedent for the admission of a woman as delegate, ho must decide that the word "person" in the section of the constitution applicable to the Case meant a male person only. _ Some dissatisfaction was expressed at this decision which certain "persons," both male and female, thought to be rather hard on tlie English language as well as on the excluded " person." At the recent Pan-Ancliean Congress, in section F, the Prayer Book war, dijcu sed. The Rev. Daniel Addhon (Massachusetts), in the course of a paper, wid he thought there ought to be an enrichment of the 'irurgy. They had already much material to draw upon, and in the life of Bi- hop Westcott there were private services left which would ho of great vr, 3 to them as well as other beautiful collects and material left by other saintly bishops and priests. .He believed that the Church should take a lead in this matter. The Bishop of Zanzibar said the Prayer Book was not a suitable handbook for people emerging out of heathen* in. The Psalter ought to be modified in the sense that they should be allowed to make selections. Other changes would also be desirable.