THE AGE OF JAZZ

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19830, 3 May 1927, Page 7

THE AGE OF JAZZ

IS IT PASSING? VIEWS OF THE VATICAN ROME, April M. The deathknell of the jazz age has sounded, Vatican officials believe. They put this interpretation on reports from ecclesiastical observers throughout the •world to the effect that the tide has definitely turned against the wave of immorality which followed in the wake of the World War. No part of the globe has failed to i feel the effects of this reaction from the post-war period according to the Vatican’s information. They point out that not only is Christendom affected, but that Turkey has taken steps against immoral dances and Japan against the social evil. In rejoicing over the changed conditions, which are attributed partly to what is characterised as the Pope’s “true crusade against all forms of immorality,Vaucan officials do not ga Iso far as to proclaim a victory nor even to tho point of believing that the morals of the individual have improved. But there is no doubt, a spokesman for the Holy See asserts, that “al] Gov- ! ernments, confronted with a general collapse of standards and wholesale confusion of ideas, are occupying themselves more and more with the task of checking immorality and seeking to destroy or at least limit its cause.” The Conte della Torre, who usually speaks for the Pope, remarks that * ( the sight was terrifying when the people whose eyes had gradually returned to normal focus saw the moral pit into which they had fallen a*ter the war.” In consequence, the so-called modern ideas are in retreat all along the line. Hungary, Italy, Germany, Belgium and Czechoslovakia have taken official steps against immorality posing as art. The United States, England and Canada are showing signs of awakening to the danger of immorality on the stage, while Italy, Spain and other Mediterranear countries are co-operating with the Church in defence or the traditional ideas of sanctity of the family. Advocates of birth control and easy divorces, after temporary successes, now are rapidly losing ground. Dress fashions and dance vogues, having , reached the stage of absurdity, now are 1 turning back toward sanity and decorum. I The so-called Bohemian colonies in the larger capitals, such as Paris, Ber- • lin and London, which mushroomed into rank florescence immediately after the war, now are in t state of descrepitude. ■ After drawing this picture, the Vati--1 can officials declare that its most im« - portant phase is the voluntary abandonment, by young women and women, of the wnr-time psychology of wildness in favour of sober, serious productive activity