INVERCARGILL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIV, Issue 2, 10 January 1901, Page 29

INVERCARGILL.

(From our own correspondent).

Midnight Masses were celebrated on Christmas Day at the Bluff and at Rakahuka. The Bluff choir, aided by the Messrs. MoOrath from Inveroargill, gave a finished rendering, guaranteed by the supervision and singing of Mrs. Murphy, of Weber's Mass in G. At 9 o'clock the Very Rev. Dean Burke oelebrated the second Masa at Bluff and the Eev. Father Hearn did so for a large congregation of communicants at St. Joseph's, Invercargill, going afterwards to the Waikiwi Church for 10.30 Mass. At the Missa Cantata at St. Mary's the Very Rev. Dean Burke preached on the rehabilitation of the fallen human race through the Incarnation. He pointed out the effects of the fall on the will and reason and at seen in the moral and physical miseries of life. He illustrated his points from history and experience, from the aberrations of philosophic systems, from idolatrous cults and defective social and political organisations. He then pointed out the remedies brought by Jesus Christ, Who has alleviated even the physical miseries of life Mid indirectly softened the old sentence, ' In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread.' He illustrated his statements by marking the immense barriers whioh separate non-Christian from Christian peoples, even those Christian peoples who possess only a fragmentary Christianity. He showed how the human mind, enlightened by true principles, has become more orderly in its operations, more penetrating and acute ; how social institutions based on justice and Christianity surpass those based on arbitrary capricious power and violence, how the recognition of a universal brotherhood amongst men has oontributed towards the interchange of ideas, inventions, etc. ; how family life has been reconstructed on a basis of purity and union % how the Christian virtues promote the strength and vitality of the race and how consequently the Christian nations make such progress in the useful arts, in the sciences, and in industrial fife. On January 1 a Mista Cantata was snng at St. Mary's, at midnight together with the Te DeumwaA. Veni Creator, A crowded congregation attended.