CONGREGATIONAL UNION.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16155, 8 March 1918, Page 9

CONGREGATIONAL UNION.

YESTERDAY'S SESSION

Yesterday's proceedings in connexion with the meeting of the Congregational •Union oppned with a devotional service conducted by the Rev. Harry Johnson.

At 11.30 a.m. the Rev. AV. M. Grant (retiring chairman) briefly .introduced, tho Itev. A. Hodge (Napier), and inducted film in .the oitoce of chairman for 1918. After roll call, the following sessional officers were appointed:—Minute secretary, Rev. G. Heighway; corresponding secretary, Rev. F. de Lisle; roll secretary, Rev. C. L. Carr. The Revs. AV. M. Grant, A. M. Aspland, F. Warner, and H. Johnson, were appointed a Reference Committee. All the male members of the Council were constituted the Financial Committee, with Messrs Fowlds', Mit- • clioll, Lewis, Bevan, Smeeton, McGill, j Congreve, Wade, and Meadowcroft, as ! a sub-committee. '

The Rev. H. C. George (Devonport) late of South Australia, was received and welcomed into the Union. .

Two missionaries of the L.M.S., on furlough—Miss Jean Begg (jSamoa).and the Rev. G. H: Eastman (Rarotonga), were elected personal members of the Union. \

The Rev. A. E. Hunt (secretary), read , the thirty-fifth annual report of the Union, which, was adopted. It referred to the deaths of many helpers in the Church, and to ministerial changes. Military work had been steadily carried on during the year, and its value and necessity could not be, too strongly emphasised. Owing to the financial strain caused by the war, it had been decided to hold in abeyance the "work of the Church Extension Fund. It now stood at about £1500, the whole of which had been" invested in the new war loan inscribed stock at 4£ per cent. Miss Martha Metcalf, an old and valued member of the Courtenay place Church, Wellington, begueathed the residue of her estate to the Church, extension scheme, and the sura of £503 was paid over. Through the generos-' ity of two friends, Mrs S. "Wilson, of Auckland, and Gaptain I>. A. Ewen, of "Wellington, the executive was able to grant a war bonus to all ministers whose stipends were under £200, bringing the stipends up to that sum. The reports of the Auckland and Wellington District Committees were read by the Rev. C. L. Carr and Mr A. M. Lewis, respectively, the latter making mention of the great magnanimity of Mrs Williams. It was decided to adjourn the morning business sessions at 12.45. In tlio afternoon a spirited discussion followed the reading by Mr F. Meadowcroft of a paper, entitled, "The Pulpit and the Masses," in which he vainly discussed the failure of the Church in some of her duties, and the remedy for the^evil. The Rev. A. Hodge (Napier) delivered an address from the chair in the evening, on "The Church in the War and in the New World." Ho affirmed that in August. 1911, a new world was born, and was now approaching its fourth birthday, and the Church would, in spit© of all criticism, do more to shape the destinies of the nations in their struggle towards true freedom and righteousness than any other organisation on earth, for even secularists were confessing their unwillingness to fa«» the problems of reconstruction without Christianity. "The Church," said the speaker, "is in the war as the salt is in the sea, fighting all impurity, and preserving the wholesomeness of a great ocean of humanity—fighting 'not with more flesh and blood, but with the despotisms, the empires, the forces that control and govern this dark world—the spiritual hosts of evil arrayed against us. in the heavenly warfare.'"