RATANA AND HIS WORK

Otago Witness, Issue 3518, 16 August 1921, Page 26

RATANA AND HIS WORK

COM BATING SUPERSTITION. MAORI CLERGYMAN’S TESTIMONY. That the real mission of Ratana, the Maori faith-healer, is not so much to cure the physical ills of his people as to break down the power or ancient superstitions amongst them, was explained by the Rev. Piri Munro, a young native priest of the Church of England, in an address at Christchurch (says the Sun). Another interesting statement made by Mr Munro, vviio has accompanied Ratana on all his journeys, was that the healer does not feel certain that his gift will prove permanent. Next Christmas Day, Ratana’s itinerary will end, and on that day, he believes, an indication will bo given to him. lie therefore proposes to hold a large native gathering at his home, where he and his people will await the moving of the Holy Spirit. Some strange incidents in Ratana’s career were related by Mr Munro in his address, which was given at the annual meeting of the Te Waiponnamu Association. This association exists in the interests of the Anglican Maori Girls' College in Ferry road. Ratana, said the speaker, was an ordinary Maori between 40 and 45 years of age. His life was quite uneventful until the influenza epidemic, of 1918 when the thought gripped hint that God could heal both body and soul. SIGN IN THE lIEAYENS. One afternoon, as he was sitting on his verandah, he saw a ball of cloud rise out of the sea. It came towards him over the sandhills, and just before reaching the verandah it burst. Ratana, according to his own story, then fell into a trance, and did not awake till the evening. After this he was attacked by peculiar fits, and wandered aimlessly about the fields, walking blindly into fences, bruising himself and tearing his clothes. He broke the furniture of his house, including the telephone, to pieces, and eventually his wife and relations arranged to have him taken to the Porirua Mental Hospital. Half an hour before he was to go to the train, he came to himself. Hi- was sitting, tied in a chair, and he asked his wife, who was weeping, to loose the cords. From that time he had no more fits. THE FIRST CURE. Some time after his recovery, continued Mr Munro, Ratana was sitting in a room with a number of his people when he again saw the hall of cloud. It burst and disclosed a celestial being, and Ratana thereupon received his commission to heal the bodies and minds of his people. At that time his little son, aged eight, was in a hospital, lie had undergone several operations, and the doctors, who held out little hope for him, proposed another. Ratana told his family, ‘'The boy will be operated upon by the hand of tho angels of God !” He had .the child brought home from the hospital, and the trouble was completely cured. From this time on. Ratana did nothing but treat hundreds of natives who came to him from all parts. Last Christmas, 5090 gathered at. his home near Wanganui, and up to May he was treating up to 200 a day. In that month, be was told by a celestial being that he must visit his people in the North and South Islands and the Chatham Islands. ITo must answer every invitation that came to him. CLOSE TO THE SPIRIT WORLD. To grasp the real meaning of Ratana’s work, Mi Munro explained, it was necessary to understand the spiritual environment of the Maori. In spite of the influence of European civilisation and the adoption of European customs, the Maori remained very near to the spirit world, and was strongly affected by spiritual forces such as those to which St. Paul alluded when he said, "We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against. principalities, against powers, against, the rulers of tho darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” 1 hose forces, or “maim-." were believed by tiic ordinary Maori to be the spirits of his ancestors,

and his departed relations and friends. Ratana, on the contrary, tau-ght all who came to him that these forces were evil, and came from Beelzebub and his hosts’ He told the people that they must heed such forces no longer, but believe only in the power of the Holy Trinity and the holy angels. The first invitation to Ratana came from Morrinsville, in the Waikato, where 500 people, after .hearing him, openly renounced their old faith and confessed their belief in the Trinity. It was difficult for a pakeha to realise what it meant to a Maori to declare that what he had believed to be the spirits of his ancestors were really the emiss aides of the devil. From Morrinsville. Ratana. went to Hawke’s Bay, and thence to Gisborne, and round the coast to the Bay of Plenty and to Rotorua. CULT OF “MAORI-ISM.” Explaining his own part in Ratana’s mission, Mr Munro said that when Ratana came into nis district he assisted in the work, and at Ratana s request and by permission of the Bishop of Waiapu, he had taken part in all the healer’s journeys since. He had thus had an excellent, opportunity of studying the source of Rat-ana’s power, and his method of applying it. His own task was to prepare the people for Ratana’s ministrations by addressing them—sometimes for as long as two hours at a time—and answering their questions. Personally, he was very much aware of the force’s in the spiritual world of the Maori. He had been in contact with demoniacal possession. His grandfather, who had brought him up, was one of tho last of the old-time priests, and held_ the ancient oracles. He was thus very sensitive to indications of the spirit world, but wherever Ratana worked he could not detect the slightest indications of “Maoriism”—the evil powers he had mentioned. Ratana s gift of healing was not God’s primary object in using him. That was why Ratana drew a lino of demarcation between Maori and pakeha in the use of his gift. Ho had never realised until lately, said Mr Munro, how steeped his people' were in “Maori-ism.” To the latter he attributed tho failure of Native Christian ministers to obtain iho results they hoped for. Ratana had been raised up to free his race from the grip of “Maori-ism.” Mr Munro appealed to his European hearers to continue their efforts for the betterment of their Maori brothers and sisters, and assured them that Ratana’s work was along the same lines as th eirs. Mrs Munro, who also addressed the meeting. bore out her husband’s remarks about the potency of strange spiritual forces amongst the Maoris.