CHRISTIAN REUNION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20605, 2 July 1930, Page 11

CHRISTIAN REUNION.

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. SCHEME FROM SOUTH INDIA. [BY TELEGtIAPII. —rRESS ASSOCIATION*.] WELLINGTON, Tuesday. The second session of tho 25th synod of the IJioceso of Wellington was opened this afternoon. Dr.. T. H. Sprott, Bishop of Wellington, presided. The opening next Saturday of the Lambeth Conference was referred to by Dr. Sprott, in his presidential address. He said: "The conference is an assemblage of bishops of our communion throughout the world. Being a purely voluntary assemblage, it possesses no legislative powers. Nevertheless, its moral authority is great. It is, in fact, the only method at present available for ascertaining even roughly the general mind of tho Church on questions of common interest.

' " Willi regard to one all-important subject, the subject of Christian reunion, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that tho Church may find itself at the cross roads. Since 1887 the Lambeth Conference has taken a leading part in advocating the reunion of Christendom. For the first time there will come before this conference a definite and concrete scheme of union, into which our dioceses in South India are prepared to enter with certain non-episcopal communions, which carry on missionary work in tho same region." Dr. Sprott detailed the scheme for reunion in South India and the bearing such a scheme would have on tho question of reunion in Christendom as a whole. His observations, he pointed out, were his own personal opinions and should not bo regarded as an authoritative statement of the position of tho Church of this Province.

In concluding his address, ho remarked that tho old Established Churches, notwithstanding the weakness they suffered from division, might bo content to wait for cataclysms, but could small missionary communities afford to wait?

" In a world of secularised paganism," ho said, " will.tliey be content to wait? What if they come to feci that waiting for cataclysms may for them mean extinction? Ido >jot beliovo that they will wait."