A NEW ZEALAND CATHOLIC BENEFIT SOCIETY.

New Zealand Tablet, 24 July 1913, Page 45

A NEW ZEALAND CATHOLIC BENEFIT SOCIETY.

To the Editor. Sir, —On picking up your issue of July 3, I was highly amused with the letter written by your correspondent, Francis de Silva, . in ; urging "Dean Darby's formation of a New Zealand Catholic Benefit Society. Now, I happen to be (although a German) a member of the H.A.C.B. Society, and a past-president of branch No. 95, Wellington. I cannot see any reason for people of other nationalities, and New Zealanders in particular, objecting to the name. Hibernian, for to me the name Hibernian is so closely connected with religion that I fail to see that anyone should want to separate them. My object in mentioning the office I held is to show thereby, that, no matter to what nationality a man may belong, he can attain to any office in the H.A.C.B. Society.— am, etc., O. Krohn. Parade, Island Bay, July 12. To the Editor. Sir,The sudden silence of the opposition to a New Zealand Catholic Benefit Society is remarkable, to me it denotes weakness. It would appear that the opposition find this mode of action the safest way out or a difficult question. Whatever replies have been written on their side have been dictated by a very narrow spirit, and some even were of very questionable taste. Tile opposition have tried to hide the real issue by denoting tiiose in sympathy with a New Zealand Catholic Benefit Society as anti-Irish, and suggesting that at heart the move was anti-Irish. This has been done for a purpose, forsooth to throw dust in the eyes of those who would otherwise see through the lines, and having seen, would be generous enough, to speak the truth. It has certainly made it more difficult for the genuine Irishman to pick his steps, but in a little time the way will be clear. In all such discussion as the present one, it is necessary to distinguish between the opportunist and the thinker. The one seeks what is popular and proclaims it in a raucous voice; the other seeks what is bed-rock principle, and like the rock is often silent but more often solid. The one keeps his eyes fixed on the ascendancy party, the other is content to strive for truth, remembering that 'the truth will make you free.' The one fears a New Zealand Catholic Benefit Society might injure the H.A.C.B. Society, therefore let it drop. He seems to forget that the H.A.C.B. Society in New Zealand is already m a moribund condition, but prefers this state, vainly clinging to the ascendancy idea, content to die rather of slow starvation, than, like a generous and wise man, to hearken to the wants of the time, to listen to the call of the tens of thousands of our Catholic youth for a society that gives place to the ideals of their own country. Surely, there is here a rare chance for a great Irishman to rise above the dead level of his countrymen in New Zealand, to show he can grasp a great opportunity calling for a great man, and whilst he proclaims he has a heart that bleeds for the wrongs of his own native land, that great heart beats in sympathy with the aspirations of his adopted country. How comes it that the opposition is so blinded, as to see such a magnificent opportunity before them, to help the children of their adopted country—a country that has been so lavish to them who came to seek their fortunes,— as an opposition determined to oppress and reject the ideals of the native-born of this same country ? In truth they say to us: We have feasted on your bread and drunk your wine and have waxed fat on the fulness thereof, but we are Irishmen and want Irish ideals to be first in your country, but as to the ideals of the native-born we wish them to go unnoticed. Of those who have adopted our country is

there then no mind sufficiently great to rise above this sordid state of things, sufficiently strong to brush to one side the evangel of the Little Inlanders, and sufficiently generous to throw in their lot 1 with the native and help not to throw down but to lift up; not to obscure, but to elucidate those ideals of the native-born, when already so many good fruits have ripened on those ideals, and when the greatest statesman New Zealand has had, having left his own land and lived the greater part of his : life in ; our land; and filled with admiration for his adopted country, filled also with gratitude to her for her -past goodness to him, and when on his last visit to Australia; which country though separated from us by the broad ocean, yet could appreciate the greatness of .our statesman, invited him to settle in their land, to which invitation he happily and feelingly replied, 'He was going back to God's Own Country.'—l am, etc., Joseph Croke Darby, Dean of Waikato. The Deanery, St. Mary's, Hamilton, July 13, 1913. •