WORRIES OF A VICAR

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21980, 15 June 1933, Page 14

WORRIES OF A VICAR

“SLANDER AND EVIL SPEAKING” In a letter to his parishioners published in the latest issue of “ All Saints’ Messenger,” the vicar of All Saints’, East St; Kilda, Melbourne (the Rev. E. H. Fernie), refers to the prevalence of slander and evil speaking in the parish. He writes:— “ I have lately made a rule for myself which I am trying hard to keep, and which I ask you to help me to keep. It is this: not to listen to any of the people who come to me with tales of the unpleasant, unkind, and malignant things which other people have said (or are supposed to have said) about me. 1 feel it is much wiser not to know them, and so I ask you not to tell me about them. If you have anything to tell me that you disapprove of, come and tel] me yourself, otherwise I hope I shall not hear about it. There are. times in this parish when I have had to listen to so much slander and evil speaking that I have become most, terribly depressed, and I know that much of what jye hear is false and only prompted by malice. We are, most of us of course, very full of faults, weaknesses, and unpleasantnesses, but we can at least try to avoid' talking about those of other people’s all the while.”