SPIRITUAL CULTURE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 348, 8 May 1928, Page 13

SPIRITUAL CULTURE

* PLEA TO THE PRESS THE REV. A. THORNHILL’S LECTURE “Thirty years ago I was a journalist earning my living with my pen,” said the Rev. Albert Thornhill, M.A.. at the Unitarian Church on Sunday. “I can well remember the late Dr. Hargrave asking at that time, when I was studying for the ministry, why I was leaving a profession in which I could speak to thousands daily for one in which I could only speak to those who cared to listen. “I replied: ‘While I have newr written a line I did not conscientiously believe, there are many thousands of lines I would have written had I not known they would not appear in print, because they clashed with the interests dominating the paper with which I was connected/ ” Conditions in that respect had not improved to-day, in his opinion. The plea made by the Rev. Thornhill was that newspapers should devote more space to spiritual culture. By that he meant not only religious aspirations, but culture in all its wider aspects. Human life, in this direction, he thought, was almost unrepresented in the columns of the j Press. The public was for the main* part ignorant of many lines of culture with which it should be acquainted. The charge was usually made that the clergy should enlighten the people, and Mr. Thornhill admitted failure. They had been “digging in.” impelled by the conviction that the old dogmas were impregnable and essential for I salvation, and he held it was the duty |of the newspapers to fill the gap. i Figures quoted by Bishop Barnes ! showed that 80 per cent, of the popu- ; lation had little direct interest In j organised religion and they depended i almost entirely on the daily Press for i their spiritual outlook.