Throughout the 19th century and well into the early 20th, social life in many communities revolved around the church. This often included sporting clubs, and the origin of modern football leagues derives directly from English clergymen arranging matches for their working class parishioners. Women were later included in these arrangements, with church ladies' hockey and cricket clubs flourishing all over the South Australia in the first years of the 20th century - reflecting also the emancipation of women and a sharp rise in their involvement in leisure physical activity. However, in 1902 a ping-pong tournament arranged as a fund-raising event for the Congregational Church at Victor Harbor was the impetus for a scathing attack from the local correspondent for the Southern Argus newspaper:

Games and churches are so mixed up nowadays that it is hard to say where one begins and the other ends. We have everything now but the bookmaker, and I suppose he will come along in good time.

Newland Memorial Congregational Church (Victor Harbor, S. Aust.)