THE CHURCH AND SOCIALISM.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 68, 29 June 1910, Page 6

THE CHURCH AND SOCIALISM.

To the Editor. Sir, —Your article on the above, in the issue of June '25, raises the question, How has the Church lost the grasp of the masses? It all means that the faith of the masses is growing weaker. It is quite certain that all kinds of enjoyment in this life have enormously increased. The motor car, the living machine, thq various toys for eye and ear—all wideij, the gap 'between rich and poor. Thu. former decides to make his paradise here,, as the other is hypothetical. The rich becomes the tempter of the poor. Tlv> veneration for the saint lias ceased—{ mean the ones who are. really trying to live according to New Testament precepts. Still the churches of the jnore ancient denominations leavp tho prefix "saint" before the name. "Iniquity ftbounds," and the Church heads pander to it and respect the class who, we read, have less chance of reaching the Kingdom of Heaven than a earner lias of pas'sing through the eye of a noodle, J hf the edition of the Bible of ISSI the sentence, Miltthew fl-11, reads: ''Give us tin's c'iv our daily bread." The American committee eilgflSed in translating protested that- it "should be: "Give us our bread for "tie coming day." The manna would not Keep a day except) it was the Sabbath day. What would happen if people put their all into a common fund such as in Acts 4-32? It certainly would not do without bolstering the divine law by civil laws, nor was it different in any age of the Bi'ble. The books of Leviticus and Deuteronomv followed Exodus, 20. The whole Church is like an old boiler full of leaks, so that it is impossible to keep steam up. Undoubtedly, if a higher standard is desired, the Church leaders are the ones to begin at. Venerate and make preachers of the poor, rich in faith (James, 2). It was so in the New Testament, and the passage, "Sicufc erat in , principio" (as it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be") has become a mere mockery. I am perfectly aware that the temptations of this world exist (as S't. Matthews describes, Matthew, 3-12, as a fan for separating chaff from grain), and no way exists 'by which we can easily change Nature's decrees. The curse (Genesis, 3) can only be removed by reality that never yet was reached, not even by the Israelites, but we read the ones really trying to reaching a higher life will succeed individually. (Matthew. 11-11).—I am, etc., MANNA.

SIR CHARLES BOWEN. 'To the Editor. Sir, —I was pleased to read your subleader re Sir Chas. Bowen. For forty years I have lived a close neighbor with him, and can vouch that your words are richly deserved by Sir Charles. For GO years" he has labored in Canterbury for New Zealand's.good, and still he is in harness. The following quotation from his preface to "Poems," published by him in 1861, and written at the time of the Crimean War, show the spirit of the man as a colonist: —"The following lines were written under the full conviction that' in England's colonies, if properly governed—or rather properly let alone —she will eventually find her real strength. The time is fast approaching when our Mother Country will reap the fruits of the far-seeing enenrv which as .peopled the waste places of the earth, whilst other nations have expended their strength in laving waste the civilised hemisphere.' How prophetic is the last stanza of his poem. "The Battle of the Free": "Where her warriors are fighting, as the bravest only have "For the birthplaces of Freedom and the liberties of man, "Then New Zealand shall be there "In the van. "Young New Zealand shall be there." "To share in their triumph, or their blood-stained grave." "Oh, England! bear thee proudly "In the direst need of war, "For thy sons—the sons of Freedom—"Are sailing from afar. "They are coming! They are coming! "To surround the banner of the island of the sea "And to fight in the Battle of the Free." ; I —I am, etc., F.W.S.