THANKSGIVING SERVICE.

Hutt News, Volume 1, Issue 14, 30 August 1928, Page 8

THANKSGIVING SERVICE.

MAYOR & COUNCILLORS ATTEND PARISH CHURCH. To commemorate the signing of ilie Kellog Peace Pact, the Mayor and Guuiic'llors, together with representatives of other local bodies; attended the morning service of St. James's Church 'ast Sunday. The preacher was the Rev. J. Blackbume, who took as his text Isiah'll and, 4: "They shall beat their swords into plough sheares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift rp sword against Nation, neither shall they learn war any more."

The speaker referred to the fact that on the following day, representatives of the various nations would assemble in Paris to sign the Peace Fact, and drew the attention of the congregation. to the suitability of the occasion as a subject both for prayer and of thanksgiving. The event is a step towards the goal of universal peace, and the most impressi/e declaration yet made that the nations will maintain peace.

Possibly the most potent force for peace in the world (said the speaker), is the League ,of Nations. War, he continued, is wrong, both from a humanitarian and a moral point of view. The nf-xt war will be much more horrible Viid cause more atrocities than the last. From a moral standpoint, war is a crime, a bar to progress, and in the light of Christianity, nothing but an evil. The time foretold by the prophet can never come until the churches support wholeheartedly the League of Nations, which itself exisit to support the principle that international disputes should be settled by arbitration and not by the sword. The preacher touched on the good that the League has already done, on its work in reducing economic waste and crime, and concluded a most able address by#an clo--4.W- pmuwMmtion to- smv