THEOSOPHICAL CONVENTION

Dominion, Volume 15, Issue 80, 28 December 1921, Page 9

THEOSOPHICAL CONVENTION

GENERAL SECRETARY SURVEYS THE OUTLOOK.

The twenty-sixth convention of the New Zealand section of the Theosophical Society opened in Wellington yesterday at the society’s rooms, Marion Street. Delegates representing the various lodges were present, also visitors from all parts of New Zealand. The general secretary, Mr. J. R. Thomson, in his annual report gave the number of members in New Zealand as 1385. Steady progress, he said, was being made, and many lodges were now in buildings of their own. The Theosophical Society had been inaugurated to stem the tide of materialism. Without religious idealism, philosophy, art, and industry suffered. The glow of idealism stimulated tho mind, purified the emotions, and stimulated the body to activity. It was tho orgy of materialism in. Europe that led' to the recent Great War. New Zealand had a great future before it. It had all the possibilities of producing artists, poets, and singers, and of developing a less mechanical form of civilisation than America and Europe. “We are following too closely the inherited customs'of our fathers in regard to food, clothing,- and housing,’’ the secretary continued. “There can be no effective work done cither for God or man except with a healthy mind in a healthy body.’’ He foresaw a great development of outdoor schooling for the children and beyond the necessary minimum of the three "R’s,” a more individual vocational training of each child in ac anco with the bent of its nature. Wo have the reputation of being one of the greatest eaters of meat, and with that wo are the most subject to cancer. Alcohol must be abolished as a beverage if we intend to Tear a sound and healthy race. We must cultivate the love of mil country, but without parochialism. Especially should we abolish the tendency now apparent to be slightly hostile to our great brother nation of Australia. If we quarrel, how can we hope for any comity of nations? The selfish person is a back number. The world moves towards co-operation, and the spirit of competition must go.’ Referring to the activities of the year. Mr Thomson said that one of the national lecturers was at the present time lecturing for the Scottish section wh-.e Mr Banks was fully occupied 'by the various lodges throughout New Zealand. During the year visits had been paid bv Dr Wedgwood and' Miss. Oppenheimer of London, both of whom had rendered valuable assistance to the work in New Zealand. Kindred movements, such as the Educational Trust the New Zealand' and India League the Round Table and Lotus Circle, and Order * Star in the East, were making their appeal to the various types and temperaments. inspired by the same spiritual impulse, pledged to the service of humanity, parts of the same world-wide movement whose self-conscious centre was the Theosophical Society.