page 88

Christan Union.

As the College year has nearly passed we may attempt to estimate the outward success of our work. The inner and more lasting effects we hope will defy measurement.

The fortnightly meetings have been fairly well attended and all the addresses have proved very interesting. It is a pity that more college students do not attend these meetings since the addresses are both instructive and helpful. We feel that at college, as nowhere else, students have an opportunity of studying the religious problems of the day in a manner specially suited to student needs. The Union has been fortunate in having addresses from many of Wellington's leading clergymen and most advanced thinkers.

As regards Bible study, the number of students who at first attended Study Circles was very large. Later, owing to the departure of men for camp and to the approach of examinations, these numbers decreased. Throughout the year, however, the problem has been, as ever, the great time difficulty. We cannot but feel that this is a problem which students of V.U.C. will, sooner or later, be called upon to face fairly and squarely. Present conditions make it the almost inevitable tendency of the student, in striving, quite rightly, we hold, to fulfill the claims of his material life, to crush out all consideration of the claims of the spiritual.

During the past three months we have been fortunate in having two visits from Mr. Wisewould, general secretary for the A.S.C.M. His first visit was a brief one but we made this an opportunity of introducing him to the students. During his official visit later in the year Mr. Wise would visited all the men's Study Circles and addressed a large number of students at the Wellington Training College.

Following the example of other Australian Universities our union with the assistance of the Wellington Provincial Council of the S.M., arranged a meeting of supporters and friends of the S.M. at Victoria College on Saturday, August 19th. Addresses were given by Dr. Sprott, Bishop of Wellington, Miss Birch, Secretary of the Y.W.C.A. and Mr. Wisewould.

Early in the second term, some of the officers of the page 89 men's branch of the Union held a small retreat at Makara and we cannot over-estimate the strengthening and deepening results of a few days so spent.

Like all other College bodies, the Christian Union is feeling the far-reaching effects of the war. It daily grows more evident that the chief work of the Union for some time to come will be the forging of strong communication links between the past and future. The obvious way to do this is for the leaders of the movement to concentrate their efforts on the freshmen of each year and even on the higher forms of secondary schools.