WORLD OF UNREST

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 419, 30 July 1928, Page 14

WORLD OF UNREST

CALL FOR MISSIONARY SPIRIT

CHRISTIAN STUDENT WORK

The Student Christian Movement is one of the most potent forces for international goodwill and constructive Christian thinking in. the world of to-day.

In these words the Rev. A. W. McMillan made an appeal at a meeting yesterday afternoon in connection with the day of universal praver on behalf of the 'World’s Student Christian Federation. “We are confronted by unprecedented unrest in the world,” said Mr. McMillan. “Superstitions are disappearing before the advance of the white man’s science. Agnosticism and materialism are pushing aside ancient religions. Old tribal customs are being dropped by the new youth • who wants joy-rides, a gramophone and a vote. Many hundreds of daily newspapers are acting as a ferment. The world is fast losing its way. “Christian missions are hopelessly inadequate to meet the urgent situation. The present force of 29,000' Protestant missionaries and their 150,000 helpers in various lands can be likened to our ‘Old Contemptibles,’ efficient, but insufficient. The growth of the Kingdom of Jesus is far from being proportionate to the phenomenal spread of enlightening and disturbing ideas. “The Church, especially through organisations like the Student Christian Movement must so fill young men and women with a seriousness of purpose and a wider sense of mission that overseas appointments will be sought by such as will go, primarily not to make money, or ‘to have a good time,* but to live out the Christ-spirit. Christian character is universally respected among all races, not the least by those great Asiatic peoples where feverish nationalism is most vehemently protesting against imperialism. “Let the Student Christian Movement flood the world with missionaryhearted men and women, who will, in their trade or professions, be strictly conscientious, execute justice, conquer racial antipathies by Christian friendliness and courtesy, live moral and temperate lives, and show a proper regard for God and the sanctities of religion. The political value of such men and women to the Empire in the next 50 years will be incalculable. The test would be severe, but such lives would be well worth living. The world must be inoculated with Christian ideals —and that right quickly!” #