Unity Move
At the General Synod of the Church of England approval was given to a covenant plan for linking together the Church of England, the Churches of Christ, the Methodist Church, the Moravian Church and the United Reform Church. A report in the Scotsman states that “within the covenant the churches would welcome one another’s members at Holy Communion and accept one another’s ministries.” The report also states that “there would be a common ordinal — Service book and baptism, confirmation and reception of members would be by agreed rites. This new covenant plan aims at paving the way towards church unity. Whether it will indeed do so only time can tell. In the past the intransigence of the Church of England in its adherence to apostolic succession and non-recognition of a ministry not episcopally ordained, usually brought the unity process to an end. It is doubtful if this attempt at unity will fare any better. Even if it did succeed it will not add anything of real benefit to the religious scene in England as many, if not all, of these bodies have moved far away from “the faith once delivered to the saints.” What England, like Scotland, needs is a day of the Lord’s power in which sinners would be turned from the deadness of a formal religion to a living faith in a living Saviour.
Euthanasia
In the amoral society of today it is not surprising to find a group advocating the practice of suicide or aided suicide for the elderly. Euthanasia, as it is euphemistically called, could have no place in a truly civilised society and therefore we should expect it to have no place in present day society. However, when we enquire into the real nature of present day society and particularly its departure from Scripturally based moral principles, we are faced with the fact that human society at present is becoming increasingly uncivilised. Attitudes, once known only to heathen societies, are now being adopted by what were until recently civilised communities. The removal of unwanted unborn infants by abortion, an act once rightly regarded with repugnance and horror, is now looked favourably on as an act of compassion towards the mother or child or both. So, too, with euthanasia. The hastening of the end of the elderly and chronically sick, which once exposed the perpetrator of this crime to the full penalty of the law, is now being regarded in a more favourable light and the person who has done the deed excused.
Men today will glory in the “humanity” of those who act in this way, but let us have no doubt about this matter — the day is coming when these things will be looked on in a very different light and those who have advocated these enormities and those who have done these deeds will receive the due sentence for their crimes at the bar of a Tribunal from which there is no appeal.