"TREMENDOUS FIGHT BY THE PEOPLE OF HINDMARSH"

THE BROMPTON CHURCH TROUBLE.

ITS REVIVAL PROBABLE

REMARKABLE LETTER BY THE REV. A. MORRIS

The Rev. Albert Morris, Methodist minister at Brompton, has handed us the following copy of a letter he has received from the Rev. John Watts, dated May 2 :-

"My Dear Brother – I beg to notify you that a special synod of Adelaide North district will be held at Pirrie street on Thursday, May 16, 10 a.m. Business-Matters pertaining to the Hindmarsh circuit. Your presence is urgently required. – John Watts, chairman of the district."

To this Mr. Morris replied on May 6: -

"I beg to notify you, in reply to yours of the 2nd, that I have no more time or nerve energy to waste on special synods or other investigations. The last year has been one of incessant torment. I  have answered  trifling charges of heresy, insubordination, & etc. They have all gone the same way, for nothing detrimental to my standing can be produced. In the last enquiry (about which so much fuss was made), instead of punishing the minister who caused all the trouble and who was proven guilty of the most reprehensible conduct, and after long and desperate deliberations, you merely reinstated me. No word of disapproval was spoken to the one who plotted all the mischief – rather were favors shown to him, as if to compensate him for his failure to remove me under the shadow of suspicion. Now another ghost has been unearthed. The way is clear – take what action you like and justify yourselves if you can, as you will be expected before the bar of public conscience. I can trust men and women of the rank and file; they have an instinctive love of justice. Instead of chasing me ion this shameful fashion, would it not be better for our leaders to devise some bold policy to cope with the tragic questions of our dark days ahead? Many ernest people hitherto loyal  to Methodism are thoroughly convinced that Conference is fiddling while the Church is burning. In the day of Jesus the Church had come to stand for religeousness rather than righteousness, and was an organised misrepresentation of God, and now there is more than a tendency to exalt man-made laws (many  of which are a century out of date) above God's unchangeable laws of justice and righteousness. "By our law." Said the Pharisees, "Jesus must die." But by the law of God He ought to have lived. What is wrong? The two churches under my pastoral care, namely Brompton and West Hindmarsh, are united. We have had no trouble, apart from the trouble thrust upon us by the action of the Conference, which decision you yourselves have reversed, as the outcome of a tremendous fight put up by the people of Hindmarsh, not for me so much as for justice. Your overbearing attitude has made large numbers of men and women hitherto devoted to Methodism and loyal to the Conference turn upon you with fierce indignation. Again they say, "If you have anything against Mr Morris that disqualifies him for the ministry of the Church, out with it, or for heaven'' sake drop the persecution.""With that I heartily concur."

The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA ) Wednesday 8 May 1918, page 6