ONE CHURCH FOR ALL.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 24 August 1916, Page 2

ONE CHURCH FOR ALL.

REV. LAMOND OF KAUKAPAKAPA

NOT ALONE.

NEW AND TRUE RELIGION.

TOO MANY FANCY FRILLS.

THE Lord Mayor of London, Sir Charles Wakefield, recently returned from a visit to our armies in France profoundly impressed, among other things, by the simplicity of the religious life out there.

"There is that unison among the churches working among our men which I want to see brought about at home," he said to a " Weekly Dispatch " representative. " I have made an earnest appeal to the leaders of all denominations.

" Never before has there come such a wonderful opportunity for the churches to drop all their differences, and unite in preaching a religion stripped of all that I call non-essentials. Never again, I think, will such a chance come. If they fail, I believe it will settle their fate for ever as a power for promoting the spiritual well-being of the nation. . At present I feel certain the churches have not risen to the supreme opportunity offered by this war, and I think this is mainly due to the lack of unity—the absence of common purpose, the presence of unnecessary barriers between- them, that has been the stumbling block. "When the great host composed of the finest of the manhood of the nation come back from the war, non-essentials will not interest them, and that is the spirit the churches have got to be prepared for. Out at the front, where the men are so close to death, only the simple ultimate things matter."

A WITHOUT " FRILLS." " There is need to-day for a new religion," said the Bishop of Stepney at an intercession service in Hyde Park. " A chaplain of the deaf and dumb ininstitute told me the other day that once Christianity got hold of the deaf it stuck. I think that is because these afflicted folk do not hear all the present day rubbish that is talked about religion. During the past 20 years there has grown up too many fancy religions, too many frills. If Christianity is to live in the future we must get back to the simple religion of Christ. When' the soldiers return victorious they will not want the frills. They will demand something simple, straightforward and brave. It will be no good to give them billiards diluted with religious thought!

" I am aghast to see how many this war seems not to have touched. It is a great shame that the solemnity of this awful struggle should be borne chiefly by those bereaved families who have lost sons, or husband or father.

" The whole nation will hnve to pass through the fire of this tremendous discipline It is no t j ust that \ the burdens should be felt only by the few "