POLITICS AND ETHICS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 10 March 1923, Page 7

POLITICS AND ETHICS.

QUESTIONS OF TO-DAY

(BY TELEGRAPH—PEESS ASSOCIATION, i AUCKLAND, March 9, In his presidential' address, the Rev. T. Wilson Potts, chairman of the Congregational Union, said it was scarcely possible to, avoid recognition of; the fact tha^i with a quickening' of social conscience, politics and ethics were coming much nearer together, and in many great questions of domestic legislation ; moral issues were.' closely interwoven .with the social arid economical conditions; Problems dealing; with land and housing, with r the relations of capital and labour, and vwith conditions of industry were, so largely questions of righteousness, as well as policy, that the Church could not but utter its voice., He had no intention; of entering into a discussion on Socialism, but the day had gone by when they could be content to be ignorant of. it and set it aside with contemptuous caricature. The. State must recognise.: it as one of the forces to^ shape the; politics of the future, and it; was equally impossible for the Church to avoid its recognition. The Church must not allow its responsibilities in these modern social issues to evaporate on mere pious opinion, but, on the. other hand, it must not' degenerate into mere rancorous partisanship. •