Welcome to this Spring 2015 issue of The New Age along with the hope that you will enjoy reading it. One thing in this issue is a fuller coverage than usual of Society reports, which leads me to think that one of the uses of a periodical like The New Age is to help people stay in closer touch with each other.

The New Age has been produced for well over 100 years, with 3 or 4 issues each year. That is not bad going, and due to the care of some I think that we have an almost complete set, but not quite. That’s still to be checked out.

I want to play devil’s advocate. You can get The New Age in a printed copy and you can also get it online. The online version is available at thenewage.net.au and it is very attractive, colourful and contemporary.

I am sure that some people like to read it online and do that, but I also think that online newspapers and magazines tend to get filed for later rather than read through. But heavens, I could be wrong and it may only be me filing another church newsletter that’s been beamed to me.

I travel by train very regularly, and this year I have been struck by the visibly higher number of people sitting in the train reading an actual book. Now, I make a point of looking who is reading. Sure, there are the kindle readers and a lot of people on their phones, and that’s fine. But without being corny, a book seems like a personal friend. It has a smell, a familiarity, a real identity and you are the browser leafing through it.

I wonder if the trend of everything online – tremendous though that is, and saving the planet of course – may lead towards a reduction in our individual contact with actual information – in our case, revelation, truth, understanding, and our own developing relationship with the Lord. I would really appreciate some of you readers giving some feedback on this – for or against – so that we can handle it well.