RELIGION & MODERNITY.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIX, Issue 5361, 7 December 1928, Page 4

RELIGION & MODERNITY.

US GLOOMY APPEAL. METHODIST WANTS A CHANGE. Consider the lilies. How they grow. They toil not, neither do they spin J yet Solcunon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Thus saitih the Scripture. Ministers of religion, especially in rural areas, certainly toil and spin, but they are clothed neither like the lilies of thq field nor like Solomon in all his glory. In nearly all either callings people dress, not according to habits of past centuries, some emanating from the mists of antiquity, but in sqme sc-r.t of harmony with the life and times of to-day. But ministers still cling to the cloth of the cJQistcr and look strangely out of harmony with their surrounding?. And for the mopt part the male laymen think it sacrilege to appear in c.hurch in anything but dark suits. The ladies — bless their hearts —certainly loqk more Chic, and present a welcome contrast to the sartorial sable colours of the men folks’ apparel in kirk. That the anachronism oil! their dress is realised by sqme of the leaders was made apparent by some remarks voiced at Walton by the Rev. W. G. Elliott, superintendent of the Methodist Conference, on the occasion of the dedication of the new Methodist Chui oh on Thursday night (says the Matamata papMfli The minister opined that the church needed some change in conformity with the times, a little more variety. Nowhere in nature did we see this sameness and drabness of garb throughout all the seasons; there was colour and infinite variety. Why should the textile of man ncjt be in accord ? Services, too, needed brightening, and perhaps shorter sermons.

Judging from the c’omments heard outside after the service, the Rev. Elliott’s remarks touched responsive chords in many minds.