The Manawatu Herald. TUESDAY, JANUARY 16, 1917. MILITANT SELFISHNESS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1662, 16 January 1917, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. TUESDAY, JANUARY 16, 1917. MILITANT SELFISHNESS.

IN the eour.se of a lecture delivered in Wellington the other evening by Professor McKenzie, the speaker discussed the irrationality of what generally goes by the name of Socialism in Labour, or so-called Labour circles. He remarked that class-consciousness in any class — ecclesiastical, educational, industrial, or other —invariably tended to militant selfishness. 'What was urgently wanted was a God-consci-ousness and' i). humanity-consci-ousness. This could be secured only by due recognition of the Fatherhood of God, and of the brotherhood of man. The religion of Jesus stood for nothing more or less than that. We were tired (lie observed) of hearing what Catholicism and Protestantism had done for the world —but what we wanted to know was what they were going to do, or could do for us in the future. We should (and so should the Churches) bury the dead past respectfully and reverently, and work heiirt within and God o’erhead for the future. The hope of the Churches being of real service in the regeneration of society was contingent on their reducing their bewildering and logic-chopping theology to the two cardinal dogmas — the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Jesus stood for these —and these alone. Let Catholics, Protestants, and all who would learn of Jesus .go and do likewise. The matter could be left at that.