Beginnings

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

by James David Salmond, O.B.E., M.A., PH.D., formerly Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand, Dunedin.

Beginnings

The history of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand began with the arrival at Port Nicholson, Wellington, on 20 February 1840, of the Rev. John Macfarlane of the Established Church of Scotland. Macfarlane officiated at the opening of the first Scots Church (now St. Andrew's) in New Zealand on Sunday, 7 January 1844. When the effects of the disruption of the Scottish Church (1843) began to be felt in the Antipodes, a petition was drawn up in 1851 by a group of Scots in Wellington and forwarded to the Free Church of Scotland asking that an ordained minister of that church be secured. The prayer of the petition was granted and in 1853 the Rev. John Moir arrived in Wellington to be the minister of the second Presbyterian Church (now St. John's).

In the South Island the history of the Presbyterian Church began with the Scottish Free Church Lay Association which played an important part in the founding of the Otago settlement. The religious interest of the forties, stimulated by the disruption crisis, gave its inspiration to the colonising project, the lay body working closely in conjunction with the Church to bring it to fruition. Together they transplanted to the new land a branch of the Free Church of Scotland along with its rich social and cultural soil. In November 1847 two ships – the Philip Laing and the John Wickliffe – set sail for New Zealand with the first group of Free Church settlers. The “Moses” of the settlers was Captain William Cargill and the “Aaron” the Rev. Thomas Burns, a nephew of Robert Burns, the Scottish poet. With them there also came a schoolmaster, James Blackie. The manner in which the Free Church settlers, right from the inception of the Otago settlement, made provision for church and school indicated how deeply imbued they were with the ideals of religion and education.

In Auckland the first Presbyterian service was held in 1842, but it was the Scottish disruption that stimulated the Presbyterians settled there to form a congregation and to request Dr Thomas Chalmers, the leader of the Free Church, to select for them a minister. The outcome was the sending out of the Rev. G. A. Panton and the opening of St. Andrew's Church in 1849. Panton's ministry was very brief and he was succeeded by the Rev. David Bruce who became a leader in church extension work throughout the North Island.

In 1851 a group of Gaelic-speaking Highlanders under the leadership of a 74-year-old patriarch, the Rev. Norman McLeod, came to New Zealand in ships built with their own hands after a sojourn in Nova Scotia, and settled at Waipu in Northland. The descendants of these settlers have played an important part in the upbuilding of the Presbyterian Church in the northern part of New Zealand.

Organised Presbyterian work in Hawke's Bay began in 1859 with the founding of St. Paul's Church, Napier, under the ministry of the Rev. Peter Barclay, and in 1860 in Taranaki with the settlement in New Plymouth of the Rev. John Thom.

Among the first settlers in Canterbury were five Scottish families, but it was not until 1854 that the Presbyterians there requested the Colonial Committee of the Free Church of Scotland to secure a minister for them. In response to this request the Rev. Charles Fraser came in 1857 as the first minister of St. Andrew's Church, Christchurch.

The Presbyterian settlers of Nelson were at first ministered to by the Rev. John Macfarlane, but in 1849 the Rev. T. D. Nicholson came to be the first minister of Trinity Church, Nelson. In 1857 Nicholson moved into Marlborough and was instrumental in erecting a church at Renwicktown, the first church of any denomination in the district.

The founding of the Presbyterian Church on the romantic West Coast was assisted by the visits of the Rev. Charles Fraser, of Christchurch, who prepared the way for the settlement at Hokitika in 1867 of the Rev. John Gow.

South of the Waitaki, with the steady extension of settlement, it was realised that the Rev. Thomas Burns could not carry the burden of ministering to the Otago settlers alone. In 1854 the Rev. William Will and the Rev. William Bannerman arrived in Otago to assist him and so made possible the constitution of the presbytery of Otago, the first presbytery in New Zealand.

Southland was part of the parish of the Rev. William Bannerman until 1860, when the Rev. A. H. Stobo was settled in Invercargill as the first minister of First Church.

Expansion

The period between 1860 and 1890 in the North Island was a time of slow progress due largely to Maori troubles and bad communications. During these years the Church followed the settlers into the developing farm districts of the Waikato and Taranaki, at the same time endeavouring to keep pace with growing urban populations.

In 1862 the first General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church north of the Waitaki (the Northern Church) was constituted. In the South Island in Canterbury the Church continued to extend, particularly in South Canterbury where the Rev. George Barclay gave leadership both in church and in public life. In Otago, 1860 to 1890 were the years of the gold rushes with a resulting increase in population and consequent strain on all the resources of the Church. New parishes were established on the goldfields and in the developing rural areas of Clutha, Mataura, North Otago, and Southland, the pioneer of Church extension being the Rev. D. M. Stuart, the first minister of Knox Church, Dunedin.

Consolidation

In 1861 the first step towards the consolidation of Presbyterianism throughout New Zealand was taken by Auckland presbytery when the Rev. David Bruce was instructed to write to the other presbyteries and to the “scattered brethren” suggesting that a conference be held with a view to forming a church which would embrace all New Zealand. The presbytery of Otago agreed and the result was a Unity Conference in Dunedin in November 1861. This conference agreed on a basis of union for submission to a convocation of the Church to be held in Auckland in 1862. The convocation was duly held and, after making some alterations to the basis of union, it constituted itself the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. But the presbytery of Otago refused to recognise the union and in 1866 the Synod of Otago and Southland (Southern Church) was constituted. The failure of the union movement of the sixties meant that the union of the Northern and Southern Churches was postponed until 1901 when, under the leadership of Dr James Gibb, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand was brought into being. Since the union, the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand has grown in influence and in membership. A feature of this growth has been rapid development in the North Island but much slower growth in the South. One result of the change in population balance has been that the median line of Presbyterianism in New Zealand has moved progressively northwards.

The 1964 Assembly statistics give the following figures concerning the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand:

  • 24 presbyteries (the Maori synod having presbyterial powers).

  • 446 parishes.

  • 806 church buildings.

  • 566,174 persons under pastoral care.

  • 90,542 communicants.

  • 73,695 Sunday school scholars.

  • 20,427 Bible class members.

  • A gross revenue of £1,639,056.

Missionary Outreach

The missionary concern of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand has always been an important aspect of its life. In the matter of missionary work among the Maori people the Presbyterian Church was late in the field, and when it did begin, its activities coincided with a difficult period in Maori-Pakeha relations. The first Presbyterian missionary to the Maoris was the Rev. James Duncan, a minister of the Reformed Church of Scotland. In 1843 he began work in the Manawatu district but, while he laboured faithfully, no results of his work remain in the form of stable Maori congregations. Constructive work began with the appointment of H. J. Fletcher to the Taupo district in 1889, followed by the opening of further work in the Urewera and King Country. In 1905 the Turakina Maori Girls' School was established, the first of a number of schools and hostels which the Presbyterian Church has established for the welfare of the Maori people. Outstanding Presbyterian workers among the Maoris have been the Very Rev. J. G. Laughton and a number of dedicated women. Significant developments in recent years in Maori work have been the constitution in 1952 of the Maori Synod, the establishment at Whakatane of a Maori Theological College, and the extension of work to city areas where large numbers of Maoris are now living.

The New Hebrides was the first overseas mission field of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. In 1868 the Rev. William Watt went to the islands as the representative of the Northern Church and in 1869 the Rev. Peter Milne followed as the representative of the Southern Church. The mission has developed into the self-governing Presbyterian Church of the New Hebrides.

The second field was in South China (Canton Villages). The work in this field grew out of the contacts made by the Rev. Alexander Don with Chinese gold diggers in Central Otago. Don's friendly ministrations resulted in the opening of the closed villages of Canton to the Rev. George McNeur, the first of a notable band of missionaries who represented the New Zealand Church in South China for well-nigh half a century until the tides of communism made it necessary for them, in the interests of the Chinese Church, to withdraw. A few of the South China missionaries continued to serve in the British colony of Hong Kong.

The third field was opened in the Punjab, India, in 1909, when Dr W. J. Porteous began medical work in Jagadhri. This mission, which includes evangelistic and educational activities as well as medical, is now part of the United Church of North India.

Further extension of the missionary outreach of the New Zealand Church occurred in 1957 when the General Assembly decided to assist the Church of West Java by providing two missionaries (a minister and a doctor) and in 1959 when a decision was made to cooperate with the London Missionary Society in Papua (New Guinea).

Theological Education

In the early years of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand the settlers depended on the churches of the United Kingdom (particularly Scotland) to provide them with ministers, but before long the necessity of training a New Zealand ministry was recognised. In 1876 a Theological Hall (the first professor being the Rev. William Salmond) was established in Dunedin followed in 1909 by the erection of Knox College (the first master being the Rev. William Hewitson). In addition to providing classroom and library accommodation for the Theological Hall, Knox College furnishes residential quarters and tutorial assistance for university students of all faculties and denominations. In 1903 Deaconess College (for many years known as the Presbyterian Women's Training Institute) was established in Dunedin for the training of women workers for service in New Zealand and overseas.

Social Service

Organised social service work under the auspices of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand was begun in 1907 with the formation of a Presbyterian Social Service Association and the establishment of an orphanage. Later associations were formed in other centres. While P.S.S.A. work was at first connected largely with the carrying on of orphanages and of work among juvenile offenders in the Law Courts, since 1918, when Ross Home for the aged was opened in Dunedin, 20 similar homes (some with hospitals attached) have been established throughout New Zealand.

Education

Presbyterians in New Zealand have displayed their Church's traditional concern for education. In the seventies of last century they gave strong support to the establishment of a National System of Public Education, though the exclusion of religious teaching from public schools has had three reactions among Presbyterians – the establishment under Presbyterian auspices of several schools; support of Bible-in-Schools Leagues in their efforts to have the Bible restored to the curriculum of the schools; and support of the New Zealand Council for Christian Education in its efforts to use existing facilities under the Nelson system of voluntary religious instruction, first developed in 1897 in the province of Nelson on the initiative of a Presbyterian minister, the Rev. J. H. McKenzie.

Presbyterians in Otago played a significant part in the founding of the University of Otago (1870), the first University in New Zealand, and in the establishment of residential halls for university students.

In its own work of Christian education the Presbyterian Church has sought to develop its Sunday school and Bible class work on sound educational lines and has endeavoured to learn from the experience of churches overseas. Inspired by the Christian youth movements of the latter part of the nineteenth century, the New Zealand Presbyterian Bible Class Movement, mainly led by lay people, has made a distinctive contribution to Christian work among young people, both in New Zealand and in Australia.

Public Affairs

Since the early days of New Zealand the Presbyterian Church has displayed an interest in public affairs. Presbyterians have taken a strong stand in the matter of temperance and many have been advocates of total abstinence, 6 o'clock closing of hotel bars, and of total prohibition of the licensed liquor traffic. They have been strongly opposed to the secularising of Sunday and the extension of facilities for gambling. While protesting against social evils, they have not been lacking in positive social concern. In the early days of Otago when an attempt was made to lengthen the hours of labour of the labouring man, the Rev. Thomas Burns stood firm for the principle of the eight-hours' day. When the sweating evil arose in the depression years of the eighties of last century, it was the Rev. Rutherford Waddell, of St. Andrew's Church, Dunedin, and the first president of the Tailoresses' Union of New Zealand, who led a crusade against it. On several occasions during periods of industrial unrest and trade recessions, the General Assembly of the Church has advocated far-reaching social reforms, and in recent years has displayed much interest in the part New Zealand should play in the Community of Nations and particularly in the affairs of South-East Asia.

The denominational paper is the Outlook.

by James David Salmond, O.B.E., M.A., PH.D., formerly Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand, Dunedin.

  • The History of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand, Elder, J. R., (1940).

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH 22-Apr-09 James David Salmond, O.B.E., M.A., PH.D., formerly Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand, Dunedin.