The Dominion. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1916. A GREAT OPPORTUNITY

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2873, 11 September 1916, Page 4

The Dominion. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1916. A GREAT OPPORTUNITY

The need for "thinking ChristianJy" was insisted upon with much force by the Anglican Bishop of Wellington (Dn. Sprott) in the courso of a thought-provoking address given in St. Paul's ProCathedral yesterday morning. Tho Bishop is hopeful that tho Christian Church will play a leading part in connection with that general reconstruction of things for which the war is clearing the way. Great changes are undoubtedly coming. Indeed, some of them are' already in progress. It is,no exaggeration to say that the present generation is witnessing the creation of a new world. The Bishop is anxious that it should not merely, bo a new world, but also a better world, and he thinks that the Church- is confronted with a magnificent opportunity of achieving the purpose for wiiicn it exists—the unification of manGovernments may create the machinery of international arbitration and set up an international police system to. restrain the lawlessness of recalcitrant nations, but they'cannofc generate the . moral power without which success 'cannot be hoped for. The Bishop carries conviction when he declares that none of the proposed substitutes for war can succeed unless it is backed up by a highly moralised international public opinion. But how is this high standard of international morality to be created • and maintained 1 It is not unreasonable, to expect that the Christian Church should do -much more than it has done in the past to cultivate the spirit, of fellowship among tho nations. Itas in essence and idea an international society whose members are bound by the same moral law. But unfortunately the Church itself is divided, and how can a divided church hope to unify mankind? The war has fastened the attention of tho leaders of Christian thought upon the absolute necessity of a united Christendom. It has deepened the conviction that the existing "disunion and division are the negation and stultification of the Church's mission." It is encoura'ging to find that ecclesiastical bar.riers are being broken down by the war. In an address recently delivered at Cambridge University, Professor Bonngy remarked that on the battlefield and in the hospital ward, at times of danger and in the face of death, the differences which have sundered Christians begin to look small in comparison with the matters on which they agree. Will the lessons now being learned at the front be forgotten when peace offers the opportunity of putting them in practice at home? Dr. Estlin Carpenter, a distinguished Unitarian, bears testimony to the great work which is being done for the soldiers by the clergy of all denominations, but ho is emphatic in the opinion that the appeal for unity must'not be ignored. "It would be voiced in every department of the national life,' and nothing could .remain unaffected by it." . . ■ • '

Never in the history of the world was there such need of great leadership, both in Church and State, as at the present time. The possibilities of progress—social, political, and religious—are almost ■ too big to be adequately expressed in words. "After tho war, and out of it"—to quote from a letter from the trenches—"a prophet .and a poet will arise to say what everyone feels and leaves unsaid for fear the touch qf words too weak should turn tho gold to slag." Some people declare thatthc war has proved that Christianity has failed. Others contend, that Christianity has nover really been tried. It is a significant fact that two menoccupying such widely separated points of view as Mb. Bernard Shaw and the Rev. R. J. Campbell should agree that the hope of the future lies in giving- a fantrial to the precepts of the Gospel. Mb. Campbell holds that it is not Christianity that has failed, but tho dreams of a materialistic civilisation, which have been tested and found wanting and aro now destroying thomsolvcs. s Mr. Shaw declares thai tho bankruptcy of all other systems has been demonstrated, and men aro being forced to see that they must believe in Christianity enough to try_it in politics. He points out that tho Founder of Christianity states that if we behave in a certain manner certain results will follow. The world has not behaved in that manner, and the results have therefore not fol<

lowed;-but, as Me. Shaw remarks, that is scarcely a reason why, we should say that Christianity is a failure. Much that Mr. Shaw has to say on this subject is erratic, perverse, and even preposterous, but his "conversion" may reasonably be regarded as" one of many indications of tho change which tho war is making in the trend of thought as far as our moral outlook is concerned. Mr. Chamberlain taught us to think imperially, and imperial thought has now found expression in imperial action. Our treaties and understandings with Russia and France, and Japan, and other nations is teaching us t'o think internationally. Bishop Sprott is strongly of opinion that if the Christian Church is to succeed in accomplishing its great moralising of international relationships, Christian people must go a step further and learn to think Ohristianly—that is to think in terms of their membership of an international society to which has been committed the 'task of unifying mankind. Tho full of the ideal of perfect international fellowship is a very long way off, but if this war results in the complete overthrow of tho brutal and aggressivo militarism by means of which Germany hoped to enslave the world, a great step will have been mado;in the direction of that permanent international harmony for which so many good men are striving, and the generations to come will see "earth happier than before." ■ ' / •