The Gift Endures: A New History of the Waiapu Diocese, edited by John Bluck (Napier: The Diocese of Waiapu, 2009).

This handsome and well-produced book charts the triumphs and crises of the diocese from its first beginnings to the present day. In fact, it delves back beyond the formal establishment of the diocese in 1859 to the work of missionaries and Maori teachers in the area before that as they laid the foundations for the diocese.

It is fifty years since the publication of the centennial history of the diocese by Watson Rosevear, Waiapu: The Story of a Diocese. Much has happened since then, and ways of looking at the past have also changed. So it was appropriate for the new history to cover the entire period from a different perspective.

This is an inviting book to dip into as well as to read fully. There are numerous illustrations of people, places and events to highlight the story, and useful section headings make it easy to see where the story is going. From time to time use is made of boxes to present a little side story that fits with the overall account.

Some of these are real gems culled from contemporary accounts, such as John Thornton’s vigorous defence in 1906 of the academic education he offered to Maori at Te Aute when the government wanted the school to concentrate on farm skills (p. 92), or Bishop Herbert Williams’s thoughts on changing life-styles written in 1931, when telephones, electric light, cars and movies were novelties (p. 118).

The substance of the book is divided into eleven chapters, eight following the chronological story of the diocese, then three on specific aspects of diocesan life: Women, Youth Ministry and Social Services. For the first six chapters the history parallels the one written by Watson Rosevear. This is neither a repeat nor a revisionist account. It is more a case of different ways of writing history. In the custom of the day, Rosevear’s history was more institutional and concerned with bishops, clergy and officials.

The new history throws its net more widely with local stories and people at many points. The two accounts complement each other.

As might be expected, a dominating theme throughout this history is the interaction between Maori and Pakeha. The diocese and the church at large, and those interested in New Zealand history generally owe a debt of gratitude to Stephen Donald, the author of chapters two to four. He has undertaken some detailed and meticulous research into that interaction in the East Cape region and his chapters are not to be missed for the insights he offers into the complex relationships that existed through the period of the wars of the 1860s (chapter 2) and the bishoprics of Edward Stuart (chapter 3) and Leonard Williams (chapter 4). Stephen Donald was also responsible for the extensive and useful time-line at the back of the book.

The bi-cultural nature of the diocese is never far from centre stage. Because the bishop of Aotearoa was suffragan bishop of Waiapu, this is to be expected. It is a good account of the developments of the bishopric from suggestions that a Maori should be made bishop of Waiapu when William Williams resigned in 1876, following a stroke, through to the emergence of our present three tikanga church. In chapter eight there is a moving account of a much more important aspect of this, the mutual relations of Maori and Pakeha in the East Cape area since the establishment of the revised constitution. Are there hints here of where the future of our church might yet go?

It is inevitable that there is a degree of inward looking history in the book; this is a history of the diocese. However, the final chapter is a fascinating account by Jim Greenaway of the social work undertaken in the diocese, read against the backdrop of changing government policies and the context of New Zealand society in general. Here we can see clearly a church seeking to respond to human need in an often confusing and constantly shifting situation.

As with all collections of work done by multiple authors there is some unevenness, but the Diocese of Waiapu is to be congratulated on this production. In order to know where you want to go to, you need to know where you have come from. The people of the diocese will benefit from this account of their story so far, and the wider church and community will find many useful insights and wisdom as well.