“A GREAT NATIONAL INSTITUTION.”

Western Star, 26 October 1917, Page 3

“A GREAT NATIONAL INSTITUTION.”

Y.M.C.A. AND THE WAD. LORD OURZON’S TRIBUTE. “ Before the war,” said Lord Curzon recently speaking a,t the opening of a Y.M.C.A. Station Hut at Derby, “the Y.M.C.A. wa§ known as one of the most efficient charitable, philanthropic and Christian institutions that existed in this country. It appealed to the enthusiasm of a devoted body of ad--herents; and it did .good work in many spheres of public life, but with the war it has become transformed. The Y.M.C.A. has developed into a great national institution. It has become one of the most powerful assets in this country in prosecuting certain indispensable sides of the war. You can follow its work both at home and abroad. At home we- hear 'of 'it in the munition areas, on the railway stations, in the camps-^-wherever a, body of persons working in connection with the war are gathered together. Abroad, you have only to. cross tire Channel to any theatre of war to find at military bases, or behind the lines at the front institutions, tents, huts, reading rooms • and playrooms of the V.M.C.A. Nor must wo imagine for one moment that'they hide themselves in the rear. Right- up to the fighting line, in almost immediate proximity to the trenches, you will find the Y.M.C.A. You will find them if yon go to France and Flanders, where our men are fighting so valiantly at the present time; you- will find them at Salonika, -where they receive pur men as they come hack from the malarial swamps; you. will find them doing their work in Mesopotamia, and I don’t doubt but at this moment that our V.M.G.O. is instituted at Baghdad. We are executing military manoeuvres in Palestine, where at this moment our men are knocking at thegates of Gaza. Who knows before long- they may get- there, and if they do you may be quite certain that the walls of the great city will not be long opened to them before we shall hear of the Y.M.C.A. in Jerusalem. 1 may say the same thing of every other theatre of war. Suffice it to say that the Y.M.C.A. have fashioned a, girdle of mercy and loving kindness round the world in this war. It will be- a record that will stand toi their credit as long as the memory of this war exists. If, i» not merely the philanthropic work that is performed by the Y.M.C.A. that must appeal to us. I think we may say that their operat ions * cover the spiritual side of the warfare in which we- are engaged. Some of yon may be -surprised to- hear me use the word spiritual in connection with anything so dreadful as war. War is at any time a coarse and brutal thing, whether it springs, as too often in the past, from the passions of peoples or the ambitions of kings, and assuredly no war in history has been in a way more coarse and more brutal than this. Yet at the same- time, -may we not say that whilst front the point of view I am speaking of, it is the. most immoral war that has been fought, from another it isi the most moral. We are fighting for the noblest, highest, purest of causes. That is what makes this war the most moral of all wars. That is what has brought in, the United States of America.”