JULY CELEBRATIONS.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 2695, 13 July 1923, Page 4

JULY CELEBRATIONS.

I A large and enthusiastic company of the members of the local Orange Lodge, L.0.L., No. 18, and Lady Carson, No. 34, and their friends gathered last night in the Zcalandia Hall. The occasion was the celebration of July 12, the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne, and the Prince of Orange’s stalwart defence of Protestanism. Worshipful Master Bro. Hepworth presided. The address of the evening was given by the Rev. Miltourn Stewart, who took as his subject the Protestant Reformation. The speaker, in stressing the tremendous social, political and religious gain the Reformation had brought the British race, deplored the apathy and indifference shown by the average Protestant in such vital matters. The three centuries prior to the Reformation in the middle of which Wickliffe lived, was probably the darkest period in the history of Christianity, It was an age, in which Romanism reigned supreme and conditions were so bad that in the speaker’s opinion, had St. Paul risen from the dead he would have said Christianity was non-existent. Tracing through the centuries the work done by the great reformers Wickliffe, Luther and Knox, in bringing about a reformation in religion and in consequence, in social and political life also, he urged upon the gathering the need of studying the Bible which Wickliffe had first put into the common tongue; the need of cherishing to the full the privileges so hardly won, and the urgent necessity of every ! member of the Orange Order practising closely the high ideals embodied in its qualifications. A first-class programme of musical and elocutionary items were contributed to by Mrs McJarrow (Marion), the Misses Ferguson, N. Killick, Taylor, Flatt, M. Milier, M. Raeburn, and Messrs G. Houston and Polkinghorne. A splendid exhibition of an Old English dance was given by little Miss Tullett and partner, and also a Russian dance was most efficiently performed by the former. Mrs Q. Thompson was the accompanist. The proceedings terminated with supper and the National Anthem.