CHRIST OR CHAOS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 23 February 1933, Page 4

CHRIST OR CHAOS

THE WORLD’S CHOICE STATEMENT BY ARCHBISHOP AVERILL (By Telegraph—Press Association) AUCKLAND, 21st February. ‘ The world is face to face to-day with a great choice. That choice is Christ or chaos; I can see nothing between,” said Archbishop Averill, Anglican Primate of New Zealand, in an address to the Methodist Conference today, when heading a deputation to the conference from the New Zealand Bible-in-Schools League. The Archbishop said that the Christian Church had a solution of the world’s grave problems in its message of God’s fatherhood and man’s brotherhood as revealed in Jesus Christ, yet the Bible, which contained this message, was shut out of their system of primary education. “The world situation to-day, with its forces antagonistic to religion: the practical bankruptcy of civilisation; wars and rumours of wars; the problem of disarmament, and the terrible problem of unemployment all constitute a challenge to the forces of Christendom,” continued the Archbishop. The weakness of the League of Nations in the face of the recent grave international difficulties was not an inherent weakness, he said; it was due to a lack of moral support of the Christian churches. The Bible-in-Schools League aimed to create among the children in the schools an atmosphere and spirit which would help to make a better and happier world. The Rev. A. N. Scotter, replying to the deputation on behalf of the conference, assured the Archbishop that Methodists were cordially in sympathy with the aims of the league to make the Bible better known not only in the schools but even in the church.