“STANDING DISGRACE"

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 528, 28 November 1928, Page 6

“STANDING DISGRACE"

MINISTERS’ ALLOWANCES GENERAL ASSEMBLY SESSION “The retiring allowance to ministers is a standing disgrace, and some of them are below the poverty line," said the Rev. L. H. Hunt to the Presbyterian General Assembly yesterday. The quarter-million fund committee reported that after making inquiry and giving consideration to present conditions it decided to postpone making definite arrangements for the raising of the quarter-million fund. Mr. Hunt expressed disappointment that the idea of the fund had not been taken up more widely by the Church. The Presbyterians of the Dominion were well able to put this fund on a solid basis. The Rev. Dr. Gibb said he had characterised the setting up of this committee for so large a fund as absolutely preposterous. If they aimed at £IOO,OOO by direct giving he Delieved it was possible that they might get it. It was decided to reappoint the committee, with power to continue its work. “EPOCH-MAKING YEAR” The Foreign Missions Committee reported: “The year 192 S will stand as one of the epoch-making years in the history of the missionary movement of the Christian Church and it will be associated in memory with the name of the holy city Jerusalem. To-day the Churches in both East and West have been stirred and great things are now possible.” The Rev. G. H. Jupp (Anderson’s Bay), referring to the death of Mrs. R. S. Allan, of Dunedin, said no other woman in the Church had been so keen and eager in all the work of the Church. A clause expressing gratitude for the meeting of the International Missionary Council at Jerusalem last Easter was moved by the Rev. D. C. Herron, of St. David’s, who was one of the Dominion’s two delegates at the conference. One of the conclusions of the conference was that they could not continue to give their children a purely materialistic education and expect them to have a spiritual outlook on life. It was agreed to ask Mr. Herron to arrange to spend a month in deputation work in the principal centres, especially among students, spreading the message of the conference. A resolution directing the Foreign Mission Committee to watch carefully developments in the control of the New Hebrides, was moved by the Rev. W. V. Milne. The assembly decided to hold its next sessions in March, 1930, in Dunedin. An invitation from the Wanganui Presbytery to hold the assembly at Wanganui was deferred for consideration at Dunedin.