THE LIVING WAGE

New Zealand Tablet, 23 April 1914, Page 26

THE LIVING WAGE

Father Bernard Vaughan, S.J., in opening a course of Lenten lectures in St. Francis Xavier’s Church, Upper Gardiner street, Dublin, said it was eleven years since he gave his last course of Lenten conferences in that church. It was too long, he felt,, to have been away. . He had returned at the invitation of their distinguished rector, not so much because they had need of him, as he of them. He wanted to return to those loved fires divine, from which had been enkindled those innumerable burning hearts in the United States, where for eighteen months he had been admiring the enthusiasm with which the nations of the earth had rallied to the Stars and Stripes* to the Cross and the, tiara. He had now returned to Ireland, that at the fire of Irish hearts he might warm both his hands, and return to his native shore inspired with’ Celtic Enthusiasm for Christ and His Divine interests. v Ireland was passing through a critical stage in the story of her eventful life, and it behoved her children now, as never before, to get closer and closer to the Divine Master, that from His lips they might get confirmed those lessons that had that morning been impressed upon them by the joint Pastoral of the Irish Episcopate. He had read with interest that statesmanlike letter of their chief pastors, and he sincerely urged that congregation to study well those Words of wise advice that had been drawn out for their consideration by those who had their higher interests at heart. Never, said the preacher, let Ireland forget that the first charge on any industry must be a living wage to the producers and distributors of it; let Ireland never forget that, after labor and capital were duly remunerated, there was nothing better for employer and employee than some scheme of profit-sharing for all concerned in the industries of the country; let her ever remember that both Capital and Labor , had the right of self-defence in any attack made upon 'their legitimate interests; and let her never cease to 'bear in mind that Conciliation Boards ought, in this twentieth century, to take the place of strikes and Syndicalism, which usually left behind them scenes of havoc, misery and starvation, Ireland’s capital was now emerging from scenes and situations • which," he hoped and felt sure, could never recur. He hoped that in the near future strained relations between capital and labor would cease, that the housing problem would be solved, and that the many thousand houses to be erected in their city, so highly favored by nature, would be let at ’a rent not beyond the reach of the unskilled hand laborer, who, if he had the duty to live, had also the right to a decent shelter, and to-, A Wage on Which He. Could Support Life in v . 'Decency, if not frugality. All through the Sundays of Lent he was going to Unfold to his hearers the. table-talk of Jesus Christ in His character as Guests r and Host. He had chosen those subjects for his lectures because ha

felt that for a nation inspired by the true faith there was so fhuch need to-day to get close to the Person of Jesus Christ, and learn from His lips how to bear life's chequered burden as true sous and daughters of that patriarch and prophet, and father and friend, St. Patrick.