EARLY CHURCH SERVICES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20892, 5 December 1929, Page 6

EARLY CHURCH SERVICES.

A PRESBYTERIAN VIEWPOINT. CANON JAMES TAKEN "TO TASK. / (Special to Daily Times.) ! ' AUCKLAND, December 4. As convener of the Public Questions ; Committee of the Auckland Presbytery, ! the Rev. W. Lawson Marsh, of Devon- | port, made a reply to the published rej marks of Canon Percival James in answer to the criticism of his proposal I to start a Sunday morning service I specially for sportsmen.!' Canon James’s ; retorts were directed particularly to . comments on the scheme made by the Rev. D. C. Herron, of St. David’s, on Sunday evening. “ Canon Percival James deserves at least credit for discovering a new field : for missionary work,” said Mr Marsh. “ Among Sunday sportsmen he finds ■ some of tho very best and most service- : able of our fellow citizens and very proj perly he wants to win them into the , fellowship of the church for the fuller service of the Kingdom of God, He proposes, therefore, to arrange a service of a minimum duration to leave these most serviceable people free in the meantime to spend the rest of the day in sport. , He says they would be happier for it, though apparently he is not sure they would be the better. Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird. Does Canon James really believe that those who at present have no interest in the fellowship of tire church compared with their interest in sport are likely*to lend themselves to any scheme calculated to win them, into the fuller service of the Kingdom of God? If so I shall have to concede ■what I have long tried to disbelieve, that the canon’s zeal is not according to knowledge. We love him for his ingenuous charm, hut are forced to conclude that he is, after all, an ecclesiastical Peter Pan. All the same his hitter reply to recent criticism savours more of panic than Peter. He speaks as though it were an .outrage to criticise so well-intentioned missionary efforts, but the canon forgets that others besides sportsmen have a conscience about Sunday, and if his plans seem to such not only utterly futile but dangerous, because they would tend to lead out of tho fellowship of the church many who are at present in it, surely' they have a right to say.so. It is puerile to characterise .the Rev. Mr Herron’s measured and most relevent examination as a gratuitous attack or denunciation, of some person or persons not present (could Canon James have been present in any case?). If Canon James had made his experiment quietly instead of blazoning it abroad along, with some very unfortunate remarks about the hardships of having to attend an 11 o’clock service, no one would have made public criticism, but the publicity given raised the whole question of Sunday services and put all those who do not agree with the cahon Into a very false position. To try to meet the necessities of modern life is . a duty binding on all of us, but it is one thing to provide an extra service and quite another to suggest that the primary duty and the privilege of Sunday can be dispensed with in half an hour. Without in the least intending it, the canon has really sold the pass to our common enemy. To reduce religious observance to the minimum in order that the rest of the day may be given to what fs, after all, an extra indulgence in sport, simply mocks the whole spirit of the faith we profess. “The canon shelves what he calls the difficulty question of Sunday recreation, but it is vital to the whole argument. In effect ho condones Sunday sport by a special service to -bless those who indulge In it. Now, while we frankly do not uphold. Sabbatarianism, we do believe that observance of Sunday is the strategic position in the struggle between the spiritual and the secular views of life. If man is nothing more than a complex machine,, then tho' Bolshevists are right and we should get rid of everything that smacks of principled and ideals. What does truth, however, or chastity matter if we end in a hole at the cemetery? But if we believe that man is spiritual with an immense possibility for good and evil—and up to date all life confirms that view—then, as Mr Herron rightly said, we are standing at the parting of the ways. Sunday is the only real opportunity for the vast majority to possess their souls at all. Without some cessation of the daily' round of interests, without some time free to give to the inner life of the spirit and our families and others, life becomes hard and selfish. It will not become less hard or selfish by a hurried observance of religious rites as a sort of preliminary to the real business of Jhe day on the golf links. Wo regard the canon's, proposal with dismay, because by implication it insults the claims of the human spirit no less than it denies the Lordship of Him whose day it is ■upremely. “ New Zealanders least of all can complain of the lack of opportunity for sport with summer time facilities and Saturday practically a sports day. It is ridiculous to pretend that we do not pay more than due homage to the physical needs. The greatest need of this age is not to be met with potted piety on Sunday morning followed by a repetition of Saturday’s physical exercises. Only a frank and glad recognition of the claims that God and humanity make on our heart, mind, soul, and strength can save cur land from the vulgarity of secularism and the loss of all that makes us great. The unworthy personalities introduced and the strictures on Mr Herron’s scholarship are really apart from the controversy, and I can safely leave them to the good sense of the public.” “AN ANGRY MAN.” MR HERRON DECLINES TO REPLY, (Special to Daily Times.) AUCKLAND, December 4. An invitation to comment on the reply ef Canon Percival James to his criticism of the proposal to introduce at St. Paul’s Pro-Cathedral, Wellington, an extra early service for the benefit of sportsmen, who would be permitted to attend in sporting Bttirc, was declined by the Rev. D. C. Herron, minister of St. David’s Presbyterian Church, Auckland. “ Some of Canon James’s remarks are very, very unfair, bnt he is an angry man, and I am not going to continue a squabble with him," said Mr Herron.