HUMAN DERELICTS

Northern Advocate, 16 April 1932, Page 5

HUMAN DERELICTS

DOWN AND OUT MISSION. AN AUCKLAND INSTITUTION. A sombre phase of city life unsuspected by the Aucklander whose footsteps lie in pleasant ways is to be seen at the Down and Out Mission conducted by Mr and Mrs Williams in the old Central Mission Hall in Albert Street. Sombre is the manifestation and hopeless the mien of the men who assemble there, but into the gloom is brought the vital light of compassion that for an hour or two on three nights a week dispels the shadows of misery. To a pressman today Mr Williams (who is to speak at the Baptist Church tomorrow and on-Monday evening) said it was 14 years since he started the mission, and this was the worst year ever experienced both for the imbiber of needy eases coming under their notice and for the shortage of funds to meet the demands. The expenses of running the mission amount to about £IOO a year, and as no collections are taken up at the meetings and all those who attend have scarcely enough pence to pay for their next meal, it will be seen that there was no regular source of income. “I am not now tin a money-making tour,” added Mr Williams, “but if any offers of help are made I will not reject them, of course.”

Mr Williams, an earnest, and unassuming man, is a working gardener by day and a. gospel missioner by night, a life which makes heavy demands on his physical strength and health. Ho is now supposed to be on a holiday, observing complete rest, but, as he puts it himself, “since I have turned from my old wicked mode of living 1 have not been able to be still, feeling always an urge to be up and doing to help other people to a brighter existence. ”

Before he was changed by the power of the Gospel, Mr Williams confessed that he was an opium smoker, a gambler and a drunkard —indeed he was one of the worst characters in New Zealand. Shortly after he had reformed he started the Mission with his wife’s help, and he believed that it had been a real help to a large number of men. The Central Mission Hall in Albert Street, where the- mission is conducted is an old, tumble-dow/ii building that has • actually been condemned. Its furnishings are meagre and poor; benzine cases outnumber chairs in the seating accommodation, and the only luxuries arc a piano and electric light. Here on three nights a week the human derelicts of Auckland’s slums assemble to join in singing hymns, hearing the addresses and appeals of the missioner and his helpers, and, finally, perhaps, being moved to give their “testimony’’ —stories of crime and disgrace contrasted with the saving power of an all-forgiving Providence. Some strange characters drift into the mission on occasions, and Mr Williams has hosts of stories about “brands plucked from the burning.” At the present time two men he was instrumental in helping are left in charge of the mission, one being a Samoan and the other a former officebearer in another religious organisation who had slipped from grace. After the meetings each night the men are given a hearty supper and, as funds permit, bed and meal tickets. They are thus given physical ns well as spiritual sustenance, and leave witii the missioner’s manly words of encouragement to get out of the gutter ringing in their ears.