THE SUNDAY SCHOOL.

Waikato Times, Volume 114, Issue 18986, 1 July 1933, Page 5

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL.

INTERESTING ADDRESS. A fairly small but enthusiastic gathering of Sunday School workers gathered at St. Paul’s Schoolroom on Thursday, when Rev. L. B. Busfleld, of Auckland, gave the first of a series of lectures by arrangement with the Waikato Sunday Schools’ Committee. Mr Busfleld took as his first subject “The Child and its Religion," and prefaced the lecture with a brief interesting survey of tlie work of the Sunday School and its varied aims and purposes from the time before the Education Act came into force in England in 1870. Mr Busfleld quoted census figures and reliable statistics to show that the number of children attending Sunday School between the ages of four and l i is dropping at the rate of half per cent per year and stressed the imperativeness of Sunday School work to be basically sound. He maintained that the children are the builders and protectors of the home: the builders of society, and the religious leaders of mankind. The speaker maintained the importance of right beginnings, ol' giving the young child a careful conception of God. First impressions remained a long time. True teaching was not a pouring out of facts. The teacher’s own attitude and personality mean a lot. The real work of religious workers is to build a lifo and the early lessons the child receives form a permanent part of his being. Finally, the most indelible mark teachers can leave is in the character of the child. They arc building for future generations and can give their pupils tlie desire to play the game, be fair to all and make them brave in adversitv. They could put into their children the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Mr Busfleld’s second lecture on the ’’Teen Aye and its Problems’’ will be gi T . til in about three weeks.