CHURCH UNION

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18499, 21 February 1930, Page 6

CHURCH UNION

CALL TO FRIENDLINESS. METHODISM AND CHURCH NEWS. (Special to the "Herald.”) WELLINGTON, February 20. “As Methodists, we still desire a eague, offensive and defensive, with jvery soldier of Jesus Christ. In ;hese terms, reference to the subject )f church union was made by the Rev. N. Scotter 8.A., the newly-elected Dresident of the New Zealand Methodist Church, when delivering his inaugjral address at the opening session of die annual conference in Wellington. ‘We all realise,” he continued, “how nuch more effective would be our witless if the Protestant Church would speak with one voice on the pressing problems of our day. We may have □ig difficulties in the great possessions if our churches and church orders, as well as in the differences of our written creeds, but in practice there ought to be more interest and sympathy mutually shown by the leaders of the churches who follow the one Lord and Master of us all.” Gratified reference was made by the president to the consummation of Presbyterian reunion in Scotland, to the approaching union of the three outstanding branches of the Methodist .Church in the Old Country, involving some 15,000 churches, and to the tentative efforts now in progress for the unifying of missionary enterprise among the Protestant Churches of South India, including the Episcopal. While recognising the difficulties in schemes of church union, all men of goodwill would rejoice in the fact that union was not only seen to be necessary for the more effective evangelisation of the world and service of the age, but that it was felt to be possible. He suggested that an impetus might meanwhile be given to the movement if the ministers of the various churches gave more evidence of their desire to get to know each other, by fraternising more freely in Ministers’ Associations, and kindred organisations. “I do not believe, however,” said Mr Scotter, “that competition or overlapping is doing so much harm as weakness of denominational loyalty.” He appealed to Methodists to be loyal to the church, and to one another, to pray for a baptism of friendship. Strangers coming in to their Christian assemblies should be made to feel that Christianity is: full of that gladness, friendliness and warm sympathy that some people professed to be able to find only in the dance-hall, or at their club or lodge. The church must seek to convince such people that no enjoyment could be so pure and strong as that of the fellowship of those who lived to promote those lofty principles that Jesus both taught and loved. Christianity was able to make their churches echo with a contagious gladness and friendship that, besides attracting young life, would infuse with a spirit of kindliness all the social contacts of church members. He urged that the way to the larger unity be prepared by cultivating harmony and kindliness in their own congregations. The church’s critics, continued the speaker, were rather given to despairingly of modern religious effort. Industrialism, they said, had produced a harsh, untidy and money-ridden world—a world which given the choice, would unhesitatingly elect to serve Mammon rather than God. . Preaching revealed a decline of evangelism and of belief in the need for conversion, and the question must be faced whether the Christian religion could survive the eclipse of the Christian church. Young people, they were told, were inclined to ignore organised religion, pending some agreement as to what it believed, and how much of the Bible it held to be true. Though, not the only sufferer from this mental and moral atmosphere, the Methodist Church, as had been said, “felt it first, and felt it worst,” by reason of the circumstances of its origin and history. Those very circumstances, however, should constrain the church to confront its difficulties, and challenge every enemy of social righteousness. Optimism was to be encouraged, but not the optimism which denied the existence of moral evil, or counted as Christian worshippers the patrons of Government Sunday excursions, or reckoned as members of the church those who neglected her ordinances. Among the difficulties they shared with their brethren in the Homeland were problems arising from the corrosive influence of certain presentations of the new psychology, inducing scepticism, the concentration of thought and desire upon temporal and material things, and the insatiable craving for excitement and amusement. “We stand for a religion of joy,” declared Mr Scotter, "but it is a joy based on reverence and morality, and the service of man.” Referring to the Bible—the greatest of all text-books and missionaries—and to religious education, as effective factors in the church’s campaign against moral evil, materialism and the secularisation of life, the speaker deplored the lack of knowledge in religion, but rejoiced that psychology was supplying the lack. No follower of John x Wesley but would confess, he said, the need for a religious education that would give a true estimate of the facts of life, both material and spiritual, and a tribute was due to the valuable work, in this direction, of the Methodist Young People’s Department, I in Kindergarten, Sunday School and Bible Class. That work could be i effectively supplemented by Methodist l parents giving the Bible its true place in the home. • Concluding his address, the president emphasised the importance of the function of the “prophet” as distinguished from the “priest,” if the church would effectively confront the problems of its life and work. In order successfully to combat those modern forces of demoralisationmaterialism, the craving for excitement, the secularising of life—which were no less a menace to Christianity than the infidel arguments, and the sword and stake which in earlier centuries assailed it, the Methodist Church must escape from the deadening influence of the merely mechanical and ceremonial;' it must sound the prophetic note, compelling men to a more vital and responsive worship, calling them to a new vision, and that authentic Christian experience which originally characterised Methodism. “If Methodism is to prosper this year in our Dominion,” concluded the speaker, “it must be evangelistic with a confidence born of prayer, and in the power of a cleansing baptism of the spirit of Christ, and the joyful fellowship of believers. Let each member of this conference seek that endowment of the Spirit of God that will make this new connexional year an epoch for Methodist progress.”