South Yorkshire Times, Friday, January 1st, 1932
Swinton Anniversary.
Preaching in the Swinton Parish Church on Sunday evening, the Rev. Charles Steele, Vicar of Scunthorpe, formerly Vicar of Swinton, gave two reasons why churches ‘go down’.
“The first is that the people do not realise that the church is their own and that it does not belong to the priest,” said Mr Steele. “The church is for worship and it is the duty of the people to attend whether the priest attracts or not. It is the office of the priest that counts and not his personality.
”The second cause is that church people generally are not friendly enough to those who are not within the inner circle. If you see stranger in church, do you ever think of giving that stranger a welcome and passing him unto the priest? No, you argue that is the priest’s job. There you make a great mistake. It is a small but great work for church people to do and would do more to fellow churches than anything else. It is the most difficult to inspire church people with the idea that they must be missionaries. As a rule they leave too much to the priest and too much of his time is spent in raising money to carry on the work of the church in the parish. That is not as it should be.”
Mr Steele was preaching on the occasion of the 21st anniversary of the ordination of his son-in-law and successor as vicar of Swinton, Rev. T. G. Rogers, Mr, Rogers was ordained Deacon and priest in Swinton church and was also married there.
On Sunday morning the Bishop of Sheffield was celebrant at Choral Eucharist and also preached.