THE CHURCH

Southland Times, Issue 19894, 12 June 1926, Page 12

THE CHURCH

GENERAL NEWS AND NOTES. FROM PULPIT AND PEW. Dr. Raven, canon of Liverpool, has been appointed Hulsean Lecturer at Cambridge. He will deliver four lectures at the end of the year, on the subject of the relation of biology and psychology to the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. A letter to the Guardian gives this information: “The desire of a great many Wesleyans to retain the Prayer Book Service at Holy Communion- is one of the chief difficulties in the way of the proposed union of the Wesleyans with the other Methodist societies.” Addressing a meeting of ministers at Sheffield, Dr Coward stated he attributed much of* the failure of the pulpit to the delivery of sermons, which, though quite good, lost, because of faulty delivery. The voice, he said, played a great part in the service. If ministers were drowsy, and droned their sermons, folks would sleep. Prebendary Carlile has resigned the living of St. Mary-at-Hill, a benefice he has held since 1891. In point of length of service, he is the senior incumbent of the city of London. Prebendary Carlile, who is in his eightieth year feels that this will allow him to give more of his remaining time and strength to 'the work of the Church Army. The Prayer Book Revision Measure will not be submitted to Parliament until it has been approved by the Convocations of the two Provinces. If that approval be given, the measure at once becomes the law of the Church, and it will be a matter of absolute indifference to Catholics whether Parliament accepts it or rejects it. —Church Times. The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper will be dispensed at First Church to-morrow morning, and again following the evening service. Mr Robinson particularly invites the attendance of men at the evening service when he will continue the discussion begun last Sunday and will give reasons why, in his judgment, men should go to church. The bright, helpful sendees at Elies road continue to attract good attendances, in addition to the earnest Evangelical presentation of truth, that is so much appreciated by the congregation. The singing by the choir of Gospel Solos and Choruses are a great attraction. Everybody receives a hearty welcome and all seats and hymnbooks are free. On the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of Central Congregational Church, Brooklyn, Dr. Cadman Parkes was presented with £5OOO. He also received congratulatory messages from President Coolidge, and Sir Esme Howard, British ambassador. Dr Cadman was born in Wellington, Shropshire 62 years ago. He received a stipend of £2400 per annum. The services in the Leet street Methodist Church to-morrow evening will be of a musical character. The choir will sing “O Gladsome Light,” and a duet will be given by Dr. and Mrs Stanley Brown. Solos will be sung by Mrs J. T. Macdonald and Mr S. Anderson., The Rev. A. Mcßean will conduct the service, and the subject of his address will be, “Church Unity, as seen in the Hymn Books.” An American millionaire, according to a statement made by Aldermann Howell Mabbott, of Penzance, offered to buy the rock near Lands End, on which John Wesley is said to have sat when he wrote “Lol on a narrow neck of land. ‘Twixt two unbounded .seas I stand.” “He was told,” said the Aiderman, “that not all the wealth in America, could purchase, and take away that historic rock.” The meetings at the Salvation Army Citadel to-morrow are to be conducted by Ensign Sherson, the energetic secretary for Young People’s Work in Otago and Southland. The Ensign, prior to taking up the present position, had several years’ experience as a corps officer, then was for a considerable time on the staff of the Training College. All who attend the Army’s meetings to-morrow are assured of a happy, profitable tune. Bowdoin College, Maine, has conferred an honorary M.A. degree on Mrs Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne. She is Superioress of the Dominican Community of. the Third Order, and Directress of its- Charitable Home, and is known in her own religious community as Mother Mary Alphonsa. The lady has especially devoted herself of late years to the relief of destitute women afflicted with cancer, for whose benefit she has founded two charitable institutions in New York. The Bishop of Manchester, at a recent meeting, emphasised the duty of the Church directly to associate itself with the housing problem, and so to influence public opinion that the well-to-do will be ready, and, indeed, eager to accept such an increase in their rates and taxes as will ensure decent homes for their less happily placed brothers and sisters. At the same meeting, Miss Margaret Bondfield stated that in our modern society it is often through rates and taxes that we bear one another’s burdens. A meeting of members and friends of the Ohai Methodist Church was held on Monday evening in the Ohai Hall. The Rev. H. Dyson presided 'over a good attendance. One of the matters for consideration was the question of the new church. A section has been secured and it was decided to proceed immediately with the building scheme. A number of donations are now in hand and a bazaar is to be held about September or early in October and it is expected that the building will be erected and opened about December. The Rev. G. A. Studdart Kennedy, M.C., preaching on “A New Spirit of Industry,” at the Church of St Edmunds, King and Martyr, Lombard street, said: “The curse that has fallen on modern life is that men go out to work that has no meaning. It is all divorced from worship; it is cut off from God. It is done for money, done for a wage, and purposeless work that men dp not see the meaning of, do not see. any glory in, becomes an utter weariness. So they pass from purposeless work to purposeless play, and the pursuit of pleasures and life becomes an endless running away from boredom.” Dr F. W. Norwood, preaching at Great George Street Church, Liverpool, said Jesus was the most disruptive and disturbing Person the world had ever seen. He was the world’s greatest revolutionary, the symbol of social unrest. We were all worried to-day by the world’s unrest, and we had great cause to be worried. Was the world so perfect that there ought to be no disturbance? Were the scales of justice held so evenly that no one need complain? The Master was the author and inspirer of justice, fairplay and tolerance. The weariness of men concerning abstract dogma was but the outer fringe of the challenge which was making it impossible to refuse to study the impingement of His Gospel upon everyday life. A very successful congregational social was held in the Nightcaps Methodist Church last Friday. There was a large number of members and friends present and a most enjoyable evening was spent. The Rev. H. Dyson presided and outlined some of the activities of the future. Messrs P. Grant and D. Sinclair also spoke and referred to the healthy state of the church at present and the good prospects that lay ahead. The evening was interspersed with musical items, games, competitions, etc. Many of the games and competitions were quite new to the district and were participated in with enthusiasm and the evening passed too quickly. During the evening, refreshments were handed round by the ladies, and the singing of the Doxology brought a very happy evening to a close. In a sermon preached by the Rev. Charles H. Newland, at Trinity Wesleyan Church, Clacton-on-Sea, he pleaded for fairer teaching of young people. He said: <c We make too much of the simile that it is easy to go downhill. We tell our young people '

how easy it is to do wrong, and how hard it is to do good. I say the time is long overdue for us to “drop this kind of teaching forever, and do not let us prejudice our young people’s minds against the absolute fairness of the great race of life. There is no story of anyone gji ig down hill in the Bible. It is not the teaching of Jesus. It is anti-Biblical.” Later in the sermon Mr Newland said: “I deny that goodness and virtue, and purity and truth, and honesty are handicapped by our perpetually climbing up hill, and that God’s children are given a natural tendency at the very beginning of their pilgrimage to slide down hill.”