CHRISTCHURCH DIOCESAN SYNOD.

Otago Witness, Issue 2850, 28 October 1908, Page 32

CHRISTCHURCH DIOCESAN SYNOD.

THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS. CHRISTCHURCHr October 20. The Christchurdh. Diocesan Synod opened this afternoon, there being a large . attendance of clergy and laity. Bishop Julius in his synodical address ' referred to diocesan changes, the Lambeth Conference, and the supply of clergy. He dealt at length on the question "of the relation between the Church in New Zealand and the Church at Home, and went on to say : — ' ' Now. of all the provincial churches of the Anglican communion outside the British Isles, we are I the only one tied and bound hand and . foot. If the table of affinity is an integral part of the Book of Common Prayer, we cannot sanction any departure from it even if we be so minded. We can make no , change of rule in re- ! gard to" the ,liturgical use of an Athan- ! Asian Creed. We cannot authorise the use of the Revised Version of Holy ' Scripture, and if the Book of Common ' Prayer be revised by competent authoi rity without thf sanction of the English Parliament we cannot adopt it. The Bishops in^conference assembled regard a provincial church as free to deal with such matters. We have no such freedom. We are all agreed that no change must be made without grave deliberation. We are ready to adopt every reasonable precaution against rash and ! ill-considered " changes, but the fundamental, clauses of the constitution under I which we groan are not precautionary 'bulj prohibitive. We are far distant from the Old Country, and the circumstances under which we live are widely different from those which obtain there. j There ie grave and urgent need for ' greater variety and flexibility in our services. As a province,, it is within our .rights to provide a freer use of the Psalter and the Lectionary, and to remove the most obvious stumbling-blocks in the way of our people, but as the ,Church of the province of New Zealand we can do none of these things. Nor can we determine those questions for ourselves which the Lambeth Conference has deliberately thrust upon us. Of course, the Church of 50 years ago can only bind us to-day in respect of property. An application to the Parliament of this Dominion made by our General Synod, •with the consent and approval of the Diocesan Synods, will set us free at once. We have talked about it for the last 20 years. Why should we waste further time? I sincerely hope that at this or your next session you will petition the General Synod to take such steps as may be necessary to the amendment of the fundamental provisions of the constitution of the Church of this province. No constitution framed by human ingenuity can be regarded as unalterable in a living church." In the course of his address Bishop Julius, in referring to the recent Anglican Conference in London, said : — "No reports, however graphic, can convey the colour and warmth of those great services and meetings, those brotherly gatherings of men from every corner of the world, and the reports we received were neither full nor graphic, but meagre in the extreme. We did hear that someone had said that tliere were many Pagans in New Zealand, but we knew that long ago. There was little else, so we made the most of it. Why should we blame the press? The fault is ours. It would have been worth some trouble to prepare and send out news for which Churchmen in every part of the world were thirsting, and which our daily papers would have gladly conveyed to us, but we have never yet learned to use the prpss as we ought. As it is we await belated information in religious newspapers which the mass of the people neither read nor see. I do not love religious newspapers. Like religious seminaries, they provoke reaction. The tilings of Christ and His Church are at their best when they came in contact with a naughty world. The press of toI day is the world's pulpit, and with all its faults and inconsistencies the press of New Zealand is generally on the side of righteousness. It is a pulpit open to us as to others, and we must not neglect it if we would be heard of thousands who never enter a church."

The greatest rush for land in the history of Western Canada took place on Tuesday, September 1, when the new Dominion Lands Act, throwing open for settlement the odd-number sections in the districts of Regina, Mooeeiaw, Calgary, Humboldt, Battleford, and Red Deer became operative. The total area opened up i« approximately 30 million acres. Hundreds of peonle surrounded tho Land Office, and the services of mounted police were requisitioned to keep the applicants in line.