THE MENACE OF FEAR

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 29 November 1933, Page 8

THE MENACE OF FEAR

PRECARIOUS SITUATION Canon W. Thompson Elliott, vicar of Leeds', preached the annual sermon at the Cathedral of St. Peter in Genevaon the eve of the official opening of the League of Nations Assembly. The situation, lie said, was made incalculably more precarious by the fact that even now the emotional reaction against war was in direct conflict with another emotion, more subtle but hardly less powerful—and at the moment definitely more effective —namely the emotion of fear. Through years of peace which wag no peace the world had never been free from, menace, and the root of that menace was fear. Each nation was afraid that the other nations would steal a march on it. The years of murky twilight would continue till the Spirit of Jpsus broke through the barriers and was recognised and received. How were they who cared for peace to direct their energies with the surest hope that their cause would triumph? He suggested a two-fold answer. First, the ideals of peace which they were actively to proclaim must bo positively constructive ideals, and not merely the negative idea expressed in the words “no more .war.” This was where sound teaching about the work of . the League could do so much good. The mind of the public had to be educated to a conception of peace which was not only the absence of hostility but active, co-operation of free nations and peoples one with another for the good of the whole. The second tiling was that, to Christian people, their ultimate ground of hope was supernatural. When human emotions were in conflict with 0110 another, and the baser emotions seemed alarmingly strong, it was well to remember that, though 'the doors were shut for fear, nevertheless Christ came ami . stood in the midst.