A HOLY CRUSADE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXI, Issue 97, 24 March 1941, Page 6

A HOLY CRUSADE

BRITAIN'S PART IN WAR.

ANSWER TO OBJECTORS.

That force was neither good nor evil in itself; it was the use of force that made it so, was a contention advanced by Rev. J. Hubbard, when preaching in St. Andrew's _ Presbyterian Church, last evening, in a reference to Christianity and warfare, in which he spoke of certain elements in the Dominion who thought it wrong to fight for anything. "Once more our King has asked the nation to bow in prayer that God will save for us the foundations of our faith," Mr Hubbard said. "It is nothing less than this for which we fight. Never was there a holier crusade. We fight against the attempt to overthrow the Christian civilisation of the world. There are still, it. may be, strange voices heard in our midst. There are some who think it wrong to fight for anything, even to hurt a ravening wolf'as it leaps to' devour you. We know that some in this country are not free from the delusion that there is something in Christainity which condemns force as an evil thing. It is the most abject nonsense. Force is neither good nor evil in itself; it is the use of force that makes it so. The idea that Christ would allow evil to overrun the world rather than use force to destroy it is the invention of an ill-balanced mind. "Are we to be asked to believe that Christ would stand idly by looking on while all that He taught us was flouted and all that He scorned was exalted? Are we to believe that He would ask His followers to bow. down to heathendom coming on armed against a peaceful nation?. The truth is that force in itself is a very proper thing and not an evil. Law and justice are based upon it. The League of Nations failed because it had no force behind it. Force is the instrument of authority, the foundation of civilisation. "Again and again the need of force was recognised by Christ Himself," Mr Hubbard added. "When He came into the temple and found men defiling it He drove them out. Now the nation in which we have built up freedom, in which all men can worship and seek the King of God, is threatened by evil things. The enemy of Christianity creeps in to ovcnvhelm us, to overthrow the liberties we hold in trust for future ages. Who are we to say that the sanctity of the Temple of Freedom would have been a less compelling trust to Christ than the sanctity of the Temple of Jerusalem?"