SALVATION ARMY

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16923, 11 April 1929, Page 4

SALVATION ARMY

CENTENARY SERVICE TRIBUTES TO FOUNDER (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, last night. To-night the hig Town Hall was crowded from the organ loft to the back wall and the galleries, on the occasion of the celebration of the centenary of tli* birth of General William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army. The Mayor, Mr. G. A. Troup, presided, and there Was also present the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon ;Sir Joseph Ward. A united prayer giving thanks to Almighty God “for the gift of thy servant William Booth, whom Thou didst give to this poor and needy world” was recited aloud by all present. “With great daring and courage Thou didst endow him,” ran the prayer, “and didst call him out to raise this army and to gather this force for the salvation of the world. May his life and labors inspire ns and may we also follow Thee as he followed Thee throughout all our days.” The Mayor said that General Booth laid down his plan of operations on a world wide basis and scale, and so great, was his faith that it gave him the needed audacity to press into all countries. He had the vision of the seer. The world was truly his, because he conquered it.. It belonged to him more than it belonged to any other living man. Mr. Troup said he noted with pride that the army headquarters were still in the land of its birth. He regarded William Booth as a great international institution. He was a great humanitarian who had established land and industrial colonies, banks, insurance companies, printing and publishing works, and many other trading concerns, hospitals, hostels, homes, training institutions, and emigration bureaus. These were all auxiliaries to his mission to seek and save the fallen and the outcast. Mr. Troup also paid a tribute to Mrs. Catherine Booth, wife of the founder.

Sir Joseph Ward, reviewed in detail the life of William Booth, and reviewed the work in New Zealand from its inception here in April 1883. “The army,” lie concluded, “has obeyed the Divine instructions to go out into- the highways and hvways and has carried the Gospel to almost evei-v country. T hope the army will continue its work for centuries to come, and that if will ever he inspired and guided by the influence and ideals of its famous founder, William Booth.” . . . Mrs. Commissioner Hay. Commissioner Hav, and others also spoke.