14 OCTOBER 1922, Page 3

The Church C opened on Tuesday at Sheffield, when the

Archbishop of Yorajpreached in the Cathedral. His concern was with the present generation, which is suffering so violently from disillusionment. He said, in part : " Men want a true religion as never before—that is the hope. They do not find it in the Church—that is the trouble. To put the matter bluntly, religion attracts ; the Church repels. Let us face the fact honestly. . . To these [the younger men and women] the Church is not a witness to the truth of its Gospel, but it is in its divisions, its dullness, its unreality, an obstacle, a stone of stumbling, an offence. If, therefore, the Church is to preach the eternal Gospel to this generation not in word only, but in power, it must evangelize,itself. It must present

a new reality of living experience as its warrant to all men of the truth of its great assertion." True seekers after religion, he said, were not interested in individual salvation so much as in the salvation of the common life of man. " It is a strange —indeed solemnizing—thought that we have come to a time when sober and responsible men are asking not so much ' How can the progress of civilization be maintained 2 ' as How can its collapse be averted7' "