CHURCH UNION.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 444, 31 December 1908, Page 2

CHURCH UNION.

Bishop Waijjs, who returned to Wellington on Tuesday from the Lambeth Conference, during the comse of an interview with a Dominion reporter in reference to church union, expressed himself as very hopeful of union being effected between the Anglican and Presbyterian bodies, though he does not think that it will be to - morrow. H2 considers the resolutions of the Lambeth Conference on this subject a considerable step in advance and states that there is among the English bishops a unanimous eagerness for union with the Presbyterian Church if it can be ieifected honestly by both parlies. Iheiewas not merely a willingness expressed to consider the question of union, but a very strong longing on the part of all the bishops to remove any hindrances that exist. The Anglicans could not give up things that were vital, and there were some things which the Presbyterians could not surrender, but a great change in sentiment has takejapl» D^:, " , rSp years ago we used to say ‘ If union is to come it must be done mi this way.’ Now they say Cohere must be union; it.’ >r ' v / I

" declared that hs had always been a close student of religion ; that he had studied and translated the two thousand texts of Buddhism ; and that he found the great humane principles of religion in Buddhism and Christianity alike. He further told,me that he always Visited in the spirit of a pilgrim the centres on shrines of religious tradition ; that he had sought relics of Marlin Luther at Eisenach; and that, oil a recent visit to Spain, he found in a fenonastery near Toledo much the lame spirit of devout silence that pad struck him in the lamaseries of Tibet. I askediKang Yu Wei, who had studied ihe Gospels profoundly, what seems to him the most striking quality in the character ot Jesus. .He answered, somewhat to my surprise, as we generally lay the emphasis elsewhere, that what ajppealed to him most in the personality of Jesus, was his courage—the manliness which could so quietly and dauntlessly face the hatred of so many cf his fellow countrymen, the fierce enmity of the powerful Pharisees, and, above all, the certainty of death, and 6f the outward failure of his mission ; the courage which undertook a work so constructive, the valour which could make, and could ask for others, such large sacrifices. The positive attitude of authority and power, maintained by one who was, outwardly, a homeless wanderer, seemed to Kang Yu Wei the dominant note in the character of Jesus. His courage stood first; next to courage came his love. Aud Kang Yu Wei seemed deeply impressed by the fact that the love of Jesus, profound, abundant, and all-embracing as it was, was yet wholly free from weakness and ssntiraentalism ; could, indeed, be terribly stern on occasion, as when He scourged the money-changers from the Temple. Kdug Yu Wei recognised that a large part in the development of Western history, of the modern Stale witli its ideas of civil rights, of individual liberty, of humanity, is to be attributed to- the personality and teaching of Jesus, and this quite independently of our view of His spiritual standing. Jesus is the greatest single factor in the development of the Western world. He insists that the existence of God aud the immortality of the soul are cardinal doctrines of the Confuciau system. I was struck by the curious resemblance of this belief to that expressed by Goethe, who also held that not all souls are equally immortal; that fufl immortality is the: prize and crown of heroic endeavour, of noble virtue, of undatinted selfsacrifice.”