"You know," he smiled, "some Journalists have had the idea that the Oxford Group was an organiza tion, but it isn't. Tt is, as another journalist, aptly, described it, 'a verb meaning to be,' "Our primary interest 1s in the attitudes of life, If man is honest with himself and all of his relations with others, he can trust God's "leadership bring him to Truth, The important thing to understand is life, We haven't any membership, you can't Join and you can't resign, there are no officers and no dues in. the Group. You simply live divine guidance in every day ife—and discover for yourself that it works."
"Leaders in, all walks of life today vare becoming convinced that the one hope of the world at large Wes in a change of heart," said Mr. Roots. A spiritual revival must precede a trade revival, for the fundamental need throughout the world is a moral and. spiritual renaissance. The national and inter national problems of the day are at bottom merely personal problems of selfishness. and fear.
"Men themselves must change the problems are to be solved. The basic cause of economic chaos to-day Hes in the fact that people, on the whole, have put their trust terial resources rather than in the Umitless resources of God."
At this point. Mr. Roots further revealed his balance by exhibiting humour unmistakably when he com: mented, "You've probably mel some people who sing 'A mighty. fortress our God' when they mean "A mighty fortress is our bank account."
A Living Truth Rapidly he sketched a simple faith Shi which is carrying scores of believers around the world—that the Biblical \dmonition "Ask and ye shall resolve" is not an empty" promise, but living truth. It seemed, as he jeribed various individual exper nees, that, far from representing a variety fevered emotionalism sometimes associated with religious feryour. the concepts of the Group might instead be termed the rationalization of religion to practical living. Apparently, the application of "living according to the guidance of God's Holy Spirit" works a transformation in the person who lives it. It would appear that he is released from the status of a person restricted by the finite, to go about the business of "living og a personality directed an infinite power of inexhaustible strength, and can logically' trace his town growth in character and attitude towards Ife and its circumstances.
(Canada, South Africa, ana almost all over the earth was a matter of further explanation. In 1928, a group of Rhodes Scholars and' Oxford gradates comprising the first "team' went out to South Africa. The South African press first called them the "Oxtora Group"—a name which has since become almost a family phrase around the world. Mr. Roots was among the Oxford men who went 10 South Africa in 1929, when a second and larger team went into the Sold He has been in London for the past two. years, voluntarily giving "his service and all of his time on the continent and over Britain,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.