CHRISTIAN UNITY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23885, 12 August 1939, Page 4

CHRISTIAN UNITY

. APPEAL BY DR ANGUS '• • «Essential Christianity.” By S. Angus (Angus and Robertson). 6s. Some four or five years ago Professor Angus was involved in a virulent case involving charges of, seriously heretical teaching. The man who is interested in theology to-day will Quite naturally open his volume, “Essential Christianity.” with mixed feelings. He need not, on the one hand, be full of hope that Dr Angus' is going to pull down what he may regard as the Temple of Traditional Belief about the ears of its votaries, nor, if he be of a different cast of thought, need he be afraid that his cherished views are going to be dragged in the dust of the street The earnest Christian aims to use as his own the words of St Paul: “ I know Him whom I have believed. The final evidence for the truth of one’s own religious life is found in what one has found true in experience, and what is aimed at is the reproduction in one’s own life and in that of others of the moral values found In the life and teaching of Christ To put it in other words, the Christian’s aim for the world as well as for himself is Christ-likeness. It is just this unity of aim among Christians which is the theme of Professor Angus in this book. And this objective demands constant reassertion. Thus while we nave nothing particularly fresh in foe treatment given us here, we do have the plea that the naore frankly this one-ness is recognised the better chance there is that goodwill may overcome our differences , m creedal expression as well as in ecclesiastical forms. Where the intelligent reader will find positive difficulty is in the method of overcoming differences which Dr Angus advocates. Even here the proposals are not new Others have urged that Christianity may well be lifted from its historical creedal basis, and its institutional forms discounted. So far. this road has Proved quite impracticable, and there are many who believe that it will always prove to be such. But when Cnnstians in many countries confront a hostile civil Power a book which insists upon the profound unity existing behind our divisions is entitled to respect. It may do something to bring nearer the open union which all unns, tians of goodwill must desire.