CHURCH ADMITS DEFEAT.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 17 June 1927, Page 7

CHURCH ADMITS DEFEAT.

LUGUBRIOUS ATTITUDE. GAMBLING, SURF, CINEMA. Adelaide, known far and wide as the Citv of Churches, has been given credit for" a sanctity it does not possess it the deliberations of the tenth assembly of the Congregational Union of Australia can be taken as an indication. Thev asserted, for instance, that Sunday'tennis, motoring, and surfing were rapidly creating a Continental Sabbath all over Australia, but more especially in Adelaide. . , New Zealand and Y\ est Australian delegates reported to the convention that tlic game of “House” was rife m their areas . The 'Tasmanian delegate complained that a certain was so strongly entrenched in that State that the curse was impossible to eradicate. From the Queensland delegate also came a complaint regarding the popularity of a certain consultation run f cm Brisbane; creating and fostering the gambling spirit all over Australia. Victoria's complaints concerned gambling, the cinema, unemployment, and deficient children. The New South Wales Committee reported on the prevalence of crime. Sabbath desecration, the art union menace, the drink problem, curse ol the wine bar. the alarming increase m divorce cases, and the ethics of mdustrial life. . , As an instance of the state- of ae"■••aelation to which. N©w South Wales had descended, Rev. A. E. AVest pointed out that in New South AN ales the arrests totalled 152 a day, including Sunday. .. The" Registrar of Divorce, he said, reported that the number of cases had grown to 1720 in 1926—an increase of 450 per cent, in the past nine years. Art unions sanctioned by the Goveminent had fcecoine a scandal. Sunday tennis, motoring merely for pleasure. and surfing were- rapidly creating a Continental Sabbath. ■-'till further light on Australia s degradation was shed by another speaker, who said that there had been an increase in drinking amongst woitfen, particularly in wine bars. ‘Prohibition has had a setback throughout the Commonwealth remarked Rev. L. C. Parkin. “We have not had the support from outside, or the enthusiasm from inside, to enable the Churches to mstko any advance at p resent.* *