RELIGION IN ENGLAND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23083, 8 January 1937, Page 9

RELIGION IN ENGLAND

The Archbishop of Canterbury, in a sermon at Leeds, said there were signs that Christianity was passing into a ncriod of special trials and difficulties. In one" country at least ali the force of pducatioh and of government was being exerted to destroy Christianity, and in other countries very close the idol of the State was being enthroned to the exclusion of the Gospel. Was England really Christian to-day? Thoughtful men were convinced that we were witnessing another and even wider revolution in the mental habits and outlook in the very souls of the people. The intense speed of modern life, certain prases of the popular oress, the kincma —all these things were driving human souls into restlessness. The Christian faith to-day, the Primate said, was not so much denied as merely passed by as something that no longer appealed in the high excitement of modern life. A new England was appearing to-day—an England closely concerned with the large new areas which were springing up around the great cities. Was this new England which was materialising before their eyes to be Christian? Happily the material conditions surroundiri'g this problem were infinitely more favourable than were the conditions obtaining 100 years ago Even so, ahd supposing the people in those new districts were well housed, well fed, \tfell employed, and well paid, they irlight, unless the Church disturbed herself, be only so many "white sepulchres." To supply the spiritual need of those new areas stood in the very forefront of the Church's duty to-day.