PATIENTS ENJOY SUNDAY SINGING.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19154, 21 August 1930, Page 15

PATIENTS ENJOY SUNDAY SINGING.

MO COMPLAINTS MADE AT CHRISTCHURCH HOSPITAL There are no complaints from the Christchurch Hospital concerning religious services and singing. In Auckland the Hospital Board have been forced by strong protests to go into the matter of people representing various denominations entering the. wards and “ singing dismal hymns and. distributing religious tracts of a crude nature.” There are -three religious features at the Christchurch Public Hospital. First, there . isthe chapel, at which patients who are able and desirous may attend Services.' There is then the broadcasting of • services. The patients may listen >in to broadcast services if they are so disposed, and the use of earphones and not loud speakers means that none of the others, are -disturbed. The other factor is/the visits on a Sunday evening,of a choir from thp Young People’s Society of the St Andrew’s Church. ( The choir sings in ; the edrridors, and ' never enters the wards, so, that the singing does not disturb those who have no desire for it. Most of the patients appreciate the singing. , No Complaints. “We have had no complaints, and the singing of hymns -in the corridors has been going on for a few years now,” said the Rev J. Lawson Robinson, minister- of St Andrew’s Church. “If the hymns had been annoying or distasteful we should have certainly heard of it. We never enter the wards, and the use of tracts, crude or otherwise, is not part of our work. On several occasions we have had word that, "the patients enjoy the hymns. They are the hymns which we sing in church, and though they are not specially chosen for the hospital, I am satisfied that they are not dismal. We are so close to the hospital that we regard it as part of the parish, and we always do anything we can for the patients. We should, however, certainly, not force anything upon then'll”' “ Would Miss It.” Patients who, were interviewed in the Hospital' this mbrning expressed surprise that there should have been any complaint. All who were seen were patients who had been in the Hospital for lengthy periods, and they said that they enjoyed the singing. “ They sing pretty cheerful things, without any Sankey stuff,” said one patient, “ and they don’t come sufficiently close to annoy anyone who wants to Test.” The singing brok'e the monotony of the long day, he said, and the patients appreciated the kind thought which lay behind it. “ There are no ‘ dismal hymns,’ and no one bothers us with tracts.”