A MAN OF MARK IN THE CHURCH.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1541, 10 September 1912, Page 2

A MAN OF MARK IN THE CHURCH.

—: VISIT OF THE REV. J. E. WATTSDITCHFIELD. The Rev. J. E. Watts-Ditchficld, of London, who will arrive in Wellington to-day, is visiting New Zealand in the interests oi the Church of England Men's Society. He has done a.great work in his parish ol St. James-the-Less in the heart of London's lvast End district. For 15 years past he has had charge of what at the outset was written down as an impossible parish, and yet to-day it is in a most flourishing condition. Mr. Watts-Ditchfield found these difficulties in their most accentuated form. It has'several large and prosperous Sunday schools—the central one ol which has an enrolment of over 2000 scholars. In addition, a weekly Bible class is regularly attended by 500 men, and at least 20 meetings of one, or another kind are held within the parish on every uight of tho week.

Mr. Watts-Ditchfiekl is an optimist. "Tho Old Country," he sayfi, "'is anything but played out. The old Church is very mucn alive; it is gripping (lie situation and winning the men." One proof of this is that the Church of England Men's Society (founded in 1899), which has now 4219 branches in various parts of tho world, and a total membership of 119,157. Tho London "Guardian," which arrived by yesterday's English mail, containe a review of Mr. Watts-Ditchh'eld's volume oi sermons entitled "Hero and Hereafter. , ' The review states: This volume of sermons makes it easy to understand the influence which Mr. Wctts-Ditchficld exercises as'a preacher in ,the East End of London and in a far' wider 1 area. Religion, to the. preacher, is always a life rather than a theology,'though he is wise enough not to dispiso theology, and is capable of discoursing of it with sound judgment when the occasion serves. Mr. AVatts-Ditchfield would probably be taken ne a typical and much respected leader of the younger Evangelicals. Plainly, the preacher has learned much from Broad Churchmen and High Churchmen. Ho has laid llio men of his own time who live and think under contribution. Ho has retained all that is best in Evangelicalism and has lost its narrowness, He is interesting just because he is not an isolated phenomenon, but because lie exemplifies what is earning to br. the most vigorous and effective typa ol the Anglican priest. Hβ belongs to thoso men who are what they are not because they have a genius for compromise, but because they can understand their own time and are capable of learning from those who,'from whatever quarter, have something genuinely their own to contribute to tho common stock of religious experienes. Mr. Watts-Ditchfield will address a mass meeting for men in the Town Hall at i. p.m. on Sunday next.