LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1114, 29 April 1911, Page 3

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

$ THE SANCTITY OF THE SABBATH. Sir, —I notice in your valuable paper recently, viz., Tin: Dominion, April -H), under tho heading id' "Sanctity of the Sabbath," an announcement made by the Wellington Ministers' Association, a; follows:—"Will you, if elected as a member of the City Council, endeavour to enforce the observance of the By-law ■it'S, relating to tho use of the Town Hall? and will you, further, assist in generally conserving the sanctity of tho Sabbath?" This application, as worded above and made by the ministers of Wellington to those candidates seeking admission to the ranks of civic authority, is a direct violation of every man's civil freedom, and an encroachment upon the rights of tho people: in the way of religion. It is also a direct attempt at a union of Church and State. What right, I ask, .Mr. Editor, has any religious body of men to sock to bring the majority of the people under tho bondage accruing from any misalliance of a union of Church and' State? The duty of the Churi'li, according to Christ, is to preach tho gospel, and that only is its sphere. What power did He over give the Church in order to make men ■sanctimonious and religious by law? When did He or His disciples ever call upon Caesar for aid? Never. Then why should the Church act thus today? Tho gospel is to be preached, not forced down men's throats by civil laws, of which the Church is the author. If these men have tho good of tho Dominion at heart, as they pretend they have, then let them attend to tho work of preaching and not of coercing. It is no part, of their duty to enforce, that which they call the Sabbath upon anyone.

Who gives them the authority? Besides, the day which they would enforce, and call upon civil aid to bolster iip. is, according to tho Bible, not the Sabbath. This assertion is easily proved, for the God of Heaven says: "That tho seventh day is the Sabbath." It was so in the days of Christ, and it is so now. Those gentlemen, even if their position wore a right one, are barking up the wrong tree. Councillors arc to be asked before election if they will enforce Sabbathkeeping upon the people, or, in other words, if they will make men religious by law. A little Sanhedrim, composed of councillors, is required to act as an inquisition to do the. work of coercing, and to ns" tho civil arm 10. a work wherein the preacher has evidently failed. These gentlemen want tho Dominion to hand its religious freedom over to their care, so that they may act through the council, as the Jesuits did through tho inouisition. The secret is. and it is an old one, viz., that tho Church wants to act through the State. The State is to be. niado the tool of the Church, an institution subservient to the pretacv. Where will this stop? At the Sabbath ? No; with a little, education bv the Church, wo would have ancient "Romanism over again.

Now, Jlr. Editor, why do these gentlemen not kpep to their sphere of operation ? • Is it because, their preaching is a failure? That their churches arc' emntv? Have tliev lost, tho nower wliieh attended Luther, Wesley. Knox, and Whitfield in their work? Tho present proposition is an attempt to grip religious liberty by the throat, and an endeavour lo strangle it, and to bring the welfare of a fr"e pooplo under the domination of tho Church. A sourions saii(!tifin."t''on is to be promoted to bo regulated by councillors, who agree, before election to sell their electorates to the Church, and to its wishes. This is the move, and we hope that it will he frustrated. .

Finally, Mr. Editor. let the minister "f religion preach tho gosnel,> and keen to his own sphere, and not intrude in' a realm where Rod, in Tlis wisdom, has pevrjr nl.iretl him. Keep tho Church and the State forever separate. —I am. etc!, J.B.