SERMON BY BISHOP NELIGAN.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2363, 2 December 1908, Page 6

SERMON BY BISHOP NELIGAN.

THE MOTIVE OF IMPERIALISM

Preaching at the. harvest festival oi the old parish church, Chiswick, on October 10 (when the thank-offerings were devoted to the Auckland diocese) the J3ishop of Auckland asked what was the great motive that would secure the British Empire its best traditions? What would keep together the nation called the British Empire? Other Empires as great as the British Empire-had fallen when they neglected their religion. A Vila L did the Anglican communion stand for? The answer was: The Anglican Communion stood in the permanent and 'unique position of seeking for the liberation of the national life, through its sanctification —it never -stood tor the enslavement of the national lrie. Was the Christian faith to be die bond that would keep the British Empire together? The Bishop then referred to the Roman Empire , and the Grecian Empire and to their schemes,jpi colonisation. In the British colonies to-day they had nations producing their own types and characteristics. The Greek colonies prospered so long as they practised their religion and worshipped God. But they became luxurious, and then they began to think exactly the same >as the people in England and in the young empires. They paid too much attention to money and began to think religion was unnecessary. The man who told them religion was incredible was not nearly so hopeless to deal witn as the man who was self-complacent; and self-conceited as a result of prosperity . So long as Greece kept to her religion she kept to her high ideals. The end of Spanish colonisation c-ame when religion enslaved the national them look., said the Bishop, at what was going on in Australia, Canada, South' Africa, New Zealand—the youngest of nations. What was being done to elevate the national lire. Above all things, let them, be themselves, with their own characteristics, their own communion, lifted up to' their faith in .Christianity, and by that they would Ift up their national life. So long as the British Empire remembered the House of God, the motive of Imperialism would be all rhdit the impulse to patriotism always’pure. But if they -forgot that and forgot what Christian Imperialism meant, then the British Empne would have, to go. There could only be one bond—lmperialism. It was now in the dirt —they had to take it out, clean it of the dirty finger-marks, and from the dirt and grime of lilootten gains by men waving Hie. ell ion Jack and avowing patriotism while they were lining their pockets. They had' too much lmperalism without "the adjective Christian.