THE BRITISH THRONE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23326, 19 October 1937, Page 5

THE BRITISH THRONE

ABDICATION AND CORONATION THE ANGLICAN VIEWPOINT What may be regarded as the Anglican outlook on the abdication of King Edward VIII and the coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth were the utterances of Bishop Fiitchett in his presidential address to the Anglican Synod yesterday. His comments with respect to both matters were received with enthusiastic applause. _ In December last, he said, the Empire had passed through a great crisis. Much as they regretted that the necessity of the abdication should have arisen, and the reason of the necessity, as a nation they had reason for, congratulation on several grounds. The nation faced its time of great anxiety with calmness and dignity, and emerged with enhanced prestige. It was improbable that such a situation could have occurred in any other nation without resulting in political upheaval, faction, / and probably bloodshed. Throne after throne had tottered and fallen, but the throne of the British Empire at no time in history had been more secure in the hearts of the citizens of the Empire, than as occupied by King George VI. As members of a Christian communion that taught the sanctity and permanence of the marriage bond, they might well rejoice that whatever licence in the matter some of their fellow-citizens desired for themselves, the nation, as a whole, gave definite evidence that at heaft. it believed in their teaching, and was not prepared to permit a departure from it by the highest in the land. In this diocese the Mothers’ Union, which was increasing in membership and influence, was doing a valuable work in maintaining and propagating Christian ideals regarding marriage.

The Coronhtion of. King George VI / and Queen Elizabeth, he continued, was celebrated here, as elsewhere throughout the Empire, with full hearts and genuine loyalty and rejoicing. They knew that the King regarded his high estate as a great trust, and that he had the desire in his heart, and the determination in his mind, to spend himself in constant effort to promote the welfare and happiness of all over whom he had been called to reign. Great and arduous was the task that lay lefore him. It should be their earnest prayer that he be guided and strengthened by Divine grace. Not as a mere matter of form, but as a heartfelt petition should they sing, or say, “ God Save the King.”