STOCK-TAKING ON THE CAMPAIGN

New Zealand Listener, Volume 7, Issue 178, 20 November 1942, Page 4

STOCK-TAKING ON THE CAMPAIGN

**The Listener" Asks Some Questions About Christian Order

E have been conducting another inquiry; but this time on a wider scale than usual-an inquiry into the extent to which the Campaign for Christian Order has affected people. The Campaign has now reached the end of its active phase for this year (though, it is almost certain to continue in a slightly different form during 1943) and as is shown even by our own correspondence columns, it has at least aroused considerable interest. In an endeavour to present a cross-section of public opinion, our representatives have put four questions to people-as manv and as different people as we could find. We have questioned hundreds of people in many parts of the country, as far apart as Dunedin and Auckland,*and in as different circles and ways of life as possible. We wanted to find out whether the campaign upon which so many church people have built considereble hopes has touched a wider public, and whether people think that it is likely to have any noticeable effects upon society. These are the questions that we asked: 1. Have you heard of the Campaign for Christian Order? 2. How did you hear about it? By listening to the radio, by going to Church, or just from hearsay? 3. Do you know of anyone who is actually doing anything about it? 4. Do you think that the Campaign will have any effect on-the social and economic order?

VEN by asking questions of as many people as possible and in as many centres as possible we realise that we can get only an approximate idea of what people are thinking. For instance, it is plain that the Campaign has been a success on the publicity side. Nine people out of ten have at least heard of the Campaign. They heard about it in a variety of ways; by reading, by. leaflets dropped at their gates, by posters, and by listening-in to special broadcasts. Generally, it was the churchgoers who answered Question 4 in the affirmative, though there were always a few others as well. But if the organisers of the Campaign hoped to arouse the mass of the people they must be rather disappointed, though they would argue that the Campaign can only have long-term results which would not be revealed by our survey. Here are some of the comments on this last question: : One of Each A COMMUNIST, now in camp, said, "Yes, the Campaign will have an indirect effect on the social order, because the Church reaches people not otherwise touched by Socialist knowledge. By rousing the social conscience it is contributing appreciably towards the new economic order." "The Campaign will perhaps save us from Socialism," said a tram conductor, on the other hand. Sermons or Houses? A YOUNG housewife said that she thought that the Campaign offered nothing constructive, but contented itself

with "the same old vague church talk of good intentions’ and charity." And she went on, "We need to attend to the material needs of people in order to bring about a new world order. Now if the Government could build 100 new houses every month in every one of the main centres and a proportionate number in the smaller centres, we would be a long way further along the road to a new

order. State houses make good homes and good homes make good citizens." School-Teachers Differ TEACHER said: "If they carry on long enough they may have some effect on the lives of individuals-for instance, by giving better housing conditions for the poor-but they won’t be able to change the economic order. I think money is ruthless, and although it may give way an inch or two now and then, it will always be the controlling factor. I don’t think there is much carryover from church sermons to business; there are not really any ideals in the commercial world," Another gchool-teacher gave a different point of view. "I think the next move should be to set up a New Zealand Christian Fellowship on the lines of the Industrial Christian Fellowship in England to form groups composed of clergy and laymen to study the question of how,our social and economic system can be brought into’ line with Christian ideals." Rai! The State or the Individual? HE husband of the young woman who believed in State houses complained that the Campaign was just one

more social workers’ effort and that although social work was good within a small compass it was never anything more than a dribble in the ocean-the real work, he said, had always to be done by legislation. Governments, not social workers, were alone powerful enough to abolish the evils which everyone recognised and deplored. He said: "If the people’s conscience had been able to have any effect, all the evils-economic and social-would have disappeared long ago; for everyone admits that the evils are there, but everyone continues to flout the law or his own conscience." Home Guardsmen Reply AMONG those questioned was a group of Home Guardsmen at a Sunday parade in Wanganui. Most of them had heard of the Campaign through the usual sources, but:one of them commented, "It is like an advertisement for a patent medicine, and in our own opinion we are not ill and do not need any medicine." "The Campaign does not interest those who do not go to church," said another. "Anyhow, what did the Church do to help the down-and-outs in the slump? And why did bishops in England still have £10,000 a year while people were starving? It is the monied classes who support the Church as an institution and after this crisis the churches will slip back as they have done before." Churchmen and Housewife GROUP of Presbyterian churchgoers to whom the fourth question was put agreed that they thought the campaign would eventually have beneficial results socially and economically, first by developing Christian principles in a gradually increasing number of individuals, and later, as these principles became (Continued on next page)

(Continued from previous page) widely adopted, by discouraging private ownership of natural resources until those resources came more fairly into the hands of the many. One member of the group suggested that only a government could change an economic order and that therefore the Campaign could best work towards this end by sending to Parliament young men strong in the Christian faith, A housewife in a prosperous district said that in a comparatively well-to-do parish such as hers, people were apt to forget that there were parishes in which almost everyone had a struggle for existence. She said she thought the Campaign might well be successful in

awakening a general consciousness of the inequalities existing and that economic reform might come sooner as a result. Is Christianity Inconvenient? A PRESS reporter made the comment, which readers may interpret as they will: "I think that the campaign is the twin brother of the Consumers’ League. If that gets anywhere, then the Campaign will, too." One man quoted this: "The British like to be regarded as a Christian people.

They might even go so far as to practise Christianity if it could be made less in- _ convenient." "I believe that this movement, like all similar ones is bound to have a certain effect, so I would never answer in the negative," said another man. "But I find it hard to believe that the effect will be the expected one-rather the reverse. I am tempted to believe that it will show up the inadequacy of the Church in dealing with social and economic questions, and it may cause people to search for remedies for the social order which are more radical than the leaders of the church campaign would wish," : "But does* the social and economic order need changing?" was the only comment we got from a postwoman.

9p qeeteeegeesertecccnesennegecesesnneallllliccasesensseeneeee ete "What we need," said a married man about to enter camp, "is not change in the heart but change in the pocket."