BISHOP ON GAMBLING

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 July 1941, Page 2

BISHOP ON GAMBLING

TASK BEFORE CHURCH. ’ WELLINGTON, July 15. Reference to recourse to gambling in raising patriotic funds, was made by the Bishop of Wellington, addressthe Diocesan Synod, which opened' to-day. x „ “My experience in the past lew months makes me stronger than ever in my conviction that one of the great objectives to which the Churches must address themselves, is.the elimination of the gambling spirit from the hearts of our people,” he declared. “Isn’t the real romance of money to be found far more truly in the widow’s mite, or in the breaking ol the alabaster box of ointment very precious, than in a bottle of whisky won in a raffle?” Speaking of the Church’s leadership, he said it must set itself to win the world around it back to God. ro the Church, wds committed the immense responsibility of maintaining in a world, in danger of losing them, the imperishable truths, which through its means, God had planted in the souls of men. The Church must witness bravelv, and constantly to the great ideal of nature and destiny, which the world would never have known, but for life and death of the Lord. When war conditions ceased to exist, the Church’s .voice, on behalf of the human soul, must be heard above all competing voices. “Meanwhile, it is ,lho duly and glory of every Christian to seek from unseen strength for reJusing at any cost, to allow the State to determine what was good, and wnat was evil, or to dominate its citizens by man-made formulas.” —P.A.