REVIVAL IN RELIGION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19470, 28 October 1926, Page 6

REVIVAL IN RELIGION.

Sir, —The views of Dr. G. H. Morrison, quoted in Tuesday's Herazd, might well be pondered by the clergy and chnrch people of New Zealand. In all revivals of religion " something is gained, never to be lost," bnt the larger revival of which many of your readers share the Moderator's expectation will have regard to "new thoughts about tho Bible and about the universe." The new revival will awaken the intellectual, spiritual and social life of the twentieth century as surely as the preaching of John Wesley awakeucd the religious consciousness of his age. 'lhe late Dr. Charles W. Eliot, Professor Emeritus of Harvard University, expressed the need of a renewed Christianity in these words: "The religious state of' Christendom to-day is in need of a genuine revival. Mankind needs to worship, needs incitements to love, reverence and duty, and a happv spiritual conception of the universe." The popular revivalist preacher proceeds from anecdote to exhortation, but rarely leads us to " a happy spiritual conception of the universe."* A revival, if it be of the right kind, is a progressive as well as an awakening movement; and so long as the Christian churches appoint to their ministry men of sound scholarship, there is no reason why revivals should be led by teachers of a lower order. It is to be hoped that our churches will rise to meet the higher needs of a new age. J.H.B.