NAPIER.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 23, 5 June 1902, Page 5

NAPIER.

A representative committee, including the Rev. Fathers Goggan, McNamara, and Bell, has been formed in Napier, for the purpose of providing a hall for the Catholic Young j^en's Association. The committee has issued a circular asking for assistance in their good work, and from which we take the following extracts :—: — 'The young New Zealander, by those competent to judge, is considered a whole man specimen of a many-nationed stock. His manliness and bravery are a theme of univerpal praise. These qualities prove that he posse c ses the grit of which true manhood is made. But his very love of sport and outdoor games is, by some, laid at his door as a great fault. These Solons would have him more moral and more anxious to attain the nobler aspirations of life. Every social worker for the uplifting of his fellow beings, strives but to place the opportunity of attaining this moral growth and intellectual development within the reach of the masses. The world-history of man attests that the environments mar or make the character of beings This is particularly true of the stages of juvenesence and ripening manhood. In very few places, however, in New Zealand has the youth even the remotest means of evolving the innate and higher potentialities that make the perfect man. Why blame him and decry him, then, for failings that are the direct outcome of the lack of social equipment for life 1 Thousands of homes in the Colony are small — the environments staid — hence the young man must spend his leisure hours either abroad or in those places of amusements where the allurements are, in pome instances, often stronger than youth and youthful passions can withstand. Give these young men, then, a hall where they can have their physical culture exercises, games, library, debating room, musical evening 6, and a place of meeting other than the lighted thoroughfares of our cities. ' The object is worthy of your earnest consideration — it is none other than the betterment of your own sons, and consequently the best protection both of woman's lily virtue and the unsullied honor of your escutcheon. To attain this the Catholic young men of Napier met lately at the request of their priests. At that meeting it was resolved to purchase a piece of land in the centre of Napier and erect thereon a hall. This work has the hearty approval of both hiß Grace Archbishop Redwood, S.M., D D., and the Very Rev. Bean Grogan, S.M. But a few weeks have elapsed and already the collectors, appointed at above meeting have over £200 in hand. Every Bection of the community has generously helped. If parochialism is to be the limit of well-doing, we know that we have no right to bring our wants under your notice. We, furthermore, are aware that in return for your liberal help — sincere thanks, in antioipation, for same — we have no recompense to offer pave in promising to do our best to help you. some day, in a similar work. Your reward, we trust in God, will be the knowledge that you have helped to better here the moral, social, and intellectual development of the young New Zealander,'