THE BIBLE-IN-SCHOOLS MOVEMENT.

Evening Star, Issue 15480, 30 April 1914, Page 9

THE BIBLE-IN-SCHOOLS MOVEMENT.

TO THE EDITOB. Sir, —In the attack on the Bikle-in-schocls movement in your issue of the 25th inst. you make several statements that call for comment.

In the firet place, you find a "type of elafitic morals" presented by the Bible in State Schools League, and you also find a parallel to the league's ways in the "Heathen Chinee" described by Bret Harte. If you pilloried an individual in your leading columns, and asked your readers to see in him a " type of elastic morals," probably certain "legal • events might follow. It is commonly held, how-* ever, that a statement that is a calumny when applied to an individual is not a calumny when applied to an association made up of individuals. This probably is New Zealand law. But according to your cable news of yesterday's date it is not the law elsewhere, as the ecclesiastic that declared in so many words that a body of Freemasons was a " type of elastic morals" came under the lash of the law of his country, and lias had to pay the penalty. You* say, also, th-.t by the Bible in schools is meant "the right of the Church to send her professional representatives into the school to split the boys and girls into sections," and inferentially you ask yctu" readers to believe that the" name is a fraud and a hypocrisy. The Bible in State Schools League means what its designation save it should mean. It means (1) Bible lessons as part of "the school curriculum, guarded by a conscience clause. It thus means the" Bible in schools, and not the Bible out of schools. (2) It means that ministers should have the right to teach the children of their own religious kith and kin. It gives equal rights to all. It does not mean that a minister, say a Unitarian minister, should have the right to enter the school under a time concession I and teach Augiicans, Presbyterians, and I Methodists his own faith. The Bible in | State Schools League are deadly opposed I to the right of entry that opens the door for pro*elytism, or for a right of entry that favors one man and shuts out other men. You say, further, " that the newspapers, with barely an exception," are antagonistic to the league. Is such a statement in accordance with fact? I have reason for saying that the ' New Zealand Herald' of Auckland, the 'Dominion' of Wellington, and the 'Press' of Christchurch are among the leading papers of our land, and they have all declared for the platform of the Bible in State Schools League. Outside the big centres, .papers like the Nelson ' Mail,' the Wanganui * Chronicle,' and the Manawatu ' Daily Times' accept the platform of the league. Your statement about your contemporaries, in the circumstances, luoks like a violation of the Ninth Commandment. I enclose for your information .1 copy of an article of the ' Prees' of September 4, 1913, which begins thus: When the most steadfast and most skilful of die opponents of the Bible in State schools movement is driven into the last ditch, and ie deprived of every weapon excepting abiase, the friends of, the movement can -feel that they are well on the road to success. v With this quotation I put a period to this letter. —I am, etc., Bobekt Wood. . April 29 «