CHRISTIANITY AND WAR.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 83, 2 September 1914, Page 6

CHRISTIANITY AND WAR.

ADDRESS BY BISHOP SPROTT. A striking address on war was given by the Bishop of Wellington (Dr. Sprott) in St. Paxil's Anglican ProCathedral, Wellington, on Sunday. He quoted a remark by George Tyrrell that in our ordinsuiy lives we'do not have to choose between right and wrong, but detween courses in wJiidi right and wrong are mixed in varying proportions. People often liavo to choose between two evils. ,So it is with nations. When a situation arises in whicih war is the lesser of the two evils, it cannot be unchristian to go to war, for it is impossible to think that Christianity could insist upon the choice of the greater o'f two evils. The Bishop based lus remarks on a passage from,the prophet Micah, in which the following words occur.:—"And she shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall noil lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." The Bishop said that it was a great pity that the translators of the Bible had failed to give; the real meaning of the most striking word in the passage. Instead of 'he shall "rebuke," the true rendering was "he shall arbitrate for strong nations.'Tlere was a confident preprediction of internal arbitration made by a prophet who lived 2803 years ago. The prophet could hardly have meant ,tbat God would personally act as arbitrator, but that the spread of the spirit of justite would lead men to adopt this method of settling international disputes. The Bishop said that he believed that the time must come, sooner or later, when nations must settle their differences by an appeal to right and justice, and when the appeal to force would be no longer tolerated.