The Sun MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1928. AN INSULT TO COURAGE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 449, 3 September 1928, Page 8

The Sun MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1928. AN INSULT TO COURAGE

IT appears to be the silly season for zealous Christians, whose * love of sensation exceeds their appreciation of the power of spiritual dignity. No sooner had the noise of Auckland’s experience of the mockery of a stunt parade of mourning for its sins passed into the silence of things best forgotten than Christchurch had thrust upon it the humiliation of seeing and hearing its leading administrative citizen ungraciously sneer at the intrepidity of world-famous Australian airmen. The blindness of egocentric bigotry is always a grievous thing, more to be pitied than chastised, but when it betrays its stumbling victim into the error of insulting- the courage of brave men, it merely assumes the form of hn unpardonable weakness, calling for severe castigation. In the dual role of Mayor of Christchurch and clergyman, the Rev. J. K. Archer condemned the intention of SquadronLeader C. E. Kingsford Smith and his comrades to leave New South Wales on Saturday evening on their pioneering flight across the Tasman Sea thus, all going well, arriving at Christchurch on Sunday afternoon, and declared, in barbed opinion: “So far as I can see there is no need for it. The flyers have been hanging around Australia for a number of weeks.” It was not to he expected that a representative citizen suffering the sort of blindness already referred to would see very fax - , but not even the most godless man at the street corner would have been unchristian enough to charge Smith and Ulm with loafing. The Rev. J. K. Archer apparently had not visualised the notable flight of the Southern Cross from Melbourne to Perth and hack to Richmond, New South Wales, during the period the gallant adventurers were “hanging around Australia for a number of weeks.” It has to be noted that, in supporting the protest of the Christchurch Ministers’ Association against a change in the airmen’s plans, involving prospective arrival in Canterbury yesterday, Mr. Archer expressed his belief in hyperbolic language that the arrival of the flyers on Sunday would be an insult to the Christian community. He said so plainly as an of Christian principles. Then as a further practice of those high principles he adopted the pre-Christian doctrine of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth and gave insult for insult. In his distorted vision the great airmen had been loafers: they had been hanging around Australia for a numbei’ of weeks. If the Rev. J. K. Archer has at heart the Christian principles of a gentleman he will withdraw his sneering comment on the reasons for delay in starting the flight of the Southern Cross—a sneer which- wa„s such an insult to courage as made ordinary Christians shudder with disgust. It is the plain duty of responsible churchmen to do everything possible for keeping Sunday safe for sinners, and Heaven knows there is much need of safeguards in this country; hut zealousness should he free of anything that savours of hypocrisy. The public will have noticed that the churchmen of Christchurch deplored the prospective arrival of the Southern Cross on Sunday, but apparently they would not have objected at all to their arrival on Monday, since the programme of reception had been designed to benefit the Unemployment Fund. Had the original plans of the airmen been carried out triumphantly, the guardians of Christian principles would have overlooked or generously forgiven the fact that, in order to arrive early this afternoon, the flyers-- would have had to insult the Christian community in Australia by leaving on Sunday evening. Must it be inferred that so long as the flyers did not interfere with church attendances, they” could fly on Sunday, if conditions favoured Sunday flight? All that need be said about Mr. Archer’s gratuitous insult to the courage of Australia’s airmen is this: If cities, as with countries and their governments, get the Mayoi’s they deserve, Christchurch has been punished severely for its sins.