{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_12290/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_12290","id":"gutenberg_12290","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12290","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Religion/Spirituality","Church"],"text":"Transcriber's Note: Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end\n                    of the book.\n\n\n\n\n\nThe Church and Modern Life\n\nBy\n\nWashington Gladden\n\n1908\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPreface\n\n\n\n\"The time is come,\" said a New Testament prophet, \"for judgment to begin\nat the house of God.\" Perhaps that time ought never to pass, but if, in\nany measure, the criticism of the church has of late been suspended, it\nis certainly reopened now, in good earnest. Nor is this criticism\nconfined to outsiders; the church is forced to listen in these days to\ncaustic censures from those who speak from within the fold.\n\nThat such self-criticism is needed these chapters will not deny. That\nthe church is passing through a critical period must be conceded. But\nthe way of life is not obscure, and it seems almost absurd to indulge\nthe fear that the church, which has been providentially guided through\nso many centuries, will fail to find it.\n\nThese pages have been written in the firm belief that the Christian\nchurch has its great work still before it, and that it only needs to\nfree itself from its entanglements and gird itself for its testimony to\nbecome the light of the world. Something of what it needs to do to make\nready for this great future, this little book tries to show.\n\nThrough all this study the thought has constantly returned to the young\nmen and women to whom the future of the church is committed; and while\nthe book is most likely first to fall into the hands of their pastors\nand teachers, the author hopes that ways will be found of conveying its\nmessage to those by whom, in the end, its truth will be made effective.\n\nW. G.\n\n\nFirst Congregational Church,\nColumbus, Ohio, December 17, 1907.\n\n\n\n\nContents\n\n   I. The Roots of Religion\n  II. Our Religion and Other Religions\n III. The Social Side of Religion\n  IV. The Business of the Church\n   V. Is the Church Decadent?\n  VI. The Coming Reformation\n VII. Social Redemption\nVIII. The New Evangelism\n  IX. The New Leadership\n\n\n\n\nThe Church and Modern Life\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nThe Roots of Religion\n\n\n\nThe church with which we are to deal in the pages which follow is the\nChristian church in the United States, comprising the entire body of\nChristian disciples who are organized into religious societies, and are\nengaged in Christian work and worship.\n\nThis church is not all included in one organization; it is made up of\nmany different sects and denominations, some of which have very little\nfellowship with the rest. Among these groups are some who claim that\ntheir particular organizations are the true and only churches; that the\nothers have no right to the name. Such is the claim of the Roman\nCatholic church and of the High Church Episcopalians. Their use of the\nword church would confine it to those of their own communions. Others\nwould apply the term more broadly to all who _profess and call_\nthemselves Christians, and who are united in promoting the teachings\nand principles of the Christian religion.\n\nThe church, as thus defined, has no uniform and authoritative creed, and\nno ruling officers or assemblies who have a right to speak for it; it is\ndifficult, therefore, to make any definite statements about it. It is\npossible, nevertheless, to think of all these variously organized groups\nof people as belonging to one body. In some very important matters they\nare united. They all believe in one God, the Father Almighty; they all\nbear the name of Christ; they all acknowledge him as Lord and Leader;\nthey all accept the Bible as containing the truth which they profess to\nteach. The things in which they agree are, indeed, far more important\nthan the things in which they differ, and it is our custom often to\nspeak of this entire body of Christian disciples as \"the church,\"\nforgetting their differences and emphasizing their essential unity. This\nis the meaning which will be given to \"the church\" in these discussions.\n\nThe church is concerned with religion. As the interest of the state is\npolitics, of the bank finance, of the school education, so the interest\nof the church is religion. Religion organizes the church, and the\nchurch promotes religion.\n\nReligion is a fact of the first magnitude. We sometimes hear ministers\ncomplaining that the people do not give it so much attention as they\nought, but we shall find it true in all countries and in all the\ncenturies that it is one of the main interests of human life. There are\nfew subjects, probably there is no other subject, to which the human\nrace has given so much thought as to the subject of religion. The\ngreatest buildings which have been erected on this planet were for the\nservice of religion; more books have been written about it than about\nany other theme; a large part of the world's art has had a religious\nimpulse; many, alas! of the most destructive wars of history have been\nprompted by it; it has laid the foundations of great nations, our own\namong them, and has given form and direction to every great civilization\nunder the sun.\n\nIt is not a churchman, or a theologian, it is Mr. John Fiske, one of the\nforemost scientific investigators, who has said of religion: \"None can\ndeny that it is the largest and most ubiquitous fact connected with the\nexistence of mankind upon the earth.\"[1]\n\nAbout the size of the fact there is no disputing, but how shall we\nexplain it? Where did it come from?\n\nThe scientific people have puzzled their heads not a little over the\nquestion where the life on this planet came from. They cannot make up\ntheir minds to say that it came from non-living matter; and some of them\nhave ventured a guess that the first germs might have been brought by a\nmeteorite from some distant planet. That, however, only pushes the\nmystery one step further back: how did it come to be on that distant\nplanet?\n\nThe origin of religion has furnished a similar puzzle to these\ninvestigators. There are those among them who assume that religion is an\ninvention of crafty men who find it a means of obtaining ascendency over\ntheir fellows. That it is all imposture--the product of priestcraft--is\nthe theory of some small philosophers. Such being the case, they expect\nthat the progress of knowledge will cause it to disappear.\n\nTo others it seems probable that religious ideas may have originated in\nthe phenomena of dreams. In the visions of the night those who have\npassed out of life reappear; this gives room for the belief that they\nare still in existence, and suggests that there may be another world\nwhose inhabitants exert an important influence over the affairs of this\nworld. According to this ghost theory, religion is all an illusion.\n\nSuch crude explanations are, however, not much credited in these days by\nthoughtful men. It is easy to see that the foundations of religion are\ndeeply laid in human nature. Aristotle told a great truth, many\ncenturies ago, when he said that man is a political animal. That is to\nsay, there is a political instinct in him which causes him to organize\npolitical societies and make laws; he is a state builder in the same way\nthat the beaver is a dam builder, or the oriole is a nest builder, or\nthe bee is a comb builder.\n\nWith equal truth we may say that man is a religious animal. The impulse\nthat causes him to worship, to trust, to pray, is as much a part of his\nconstitution as is the homing instinct of the pigeon. This natural\ninstinct is, however, reinforced by the operation of his reason. Feeling\nis deeper than thought; we are moved by many impulses before we frame\nany theories. But the normal human being sooner or later begins to try\nto explain things; his reason begins to work upon the objects that he\nsees and the feelings that he experiences. And it is not long before\nsomething like what Charbonnel describes must take place in every human\nsoul:--\n\n\"Every man has within him a sense of utter dependence. His mind is\nirresistibly preoccupied by the idea of a Power, lost in the immensity\nof time and space, which, from the depths of some dark mystery, governs\nthe world. This power, at first, seems to him to manifest itself in the\nphenomena of nature, whose grandeur surpasses the power or even the\ncomprehension of mankind.\"[2]\n\nToward this unknown power, or powers, his thought reaches out, and he\nbegins to try to explain it or them. He forms all kinds of crude and\nfantastic theories about these invisible forces. At first he is apt to\nthink that there are a great many of them; it is long before he clearly\nunderstands that there can be but One Supreme. The moral quality of the\nbeing or beings whom he thus conceives is not clearly discerned by him;\nhe is apt to think them fickle, jealous, revengeful, and cruel; most\noften he ascribes to them his own frailties and passions.\n\nIn some such way as this, then, religion begins. It is the response of\nthe human nature to impressions made upon the mind and heart of man by\nthe universe in which he lives. These impressions are not illusions,\nthey are realities. All men experience them. Something is here in the\nworld about us which appeals to our feelings and awakens our intellects.\nBeing made as we are, we cannot escape this influence. It awes us, it\nfills us with wonder and fear and desire.\n\nThen we try to explain it to ourselves, and in the beginning we frame a\ngreat many very imperfect explanations. Sometimes we imagine that this\npower is located in some tree or rock or river; sometimes it is an\nanimal; sometimes it is supposed to exist in invisible spirits or\ndemons; sometimes the sky or the ocean represents it, or one of the\nelements, like fire, is conceived to be its manifestation; sometimes the\ngreater planets are the objects of reverence; sometimes imaginary\ndeities are conceived and images of wood or stone are carved by which\ntheir attributes are symbolized.\n\nThese religious conceptions of the primitive races seem to us, now, as\nwe look back upon them from the larger light of the present day, to be\ngrotesque and unworthy; we wonder that men could ever have entertained\nsuch notions of deity, and we are sometimes inclined, because of these\ncrudities, to dismiss the whole subject of religion as but a farrago of\nsuperstitions. But these imperfect conceptions do not discredit\nreligion; they are rather witnesses to its reality. You might as well\nsay that the speculations and experiments of the old alchemists prove\nthat there is no truth in chemistry; or that the guesses of the\nastrologers throw doubt on the science of astronomy. The alchemists and\nthe astrologers were searching blindly for truth which they did not\nfind, but the truth was there; the fetish worshipers and the magicians\nand the idolaters were also, as Paul said, seeking after the unknown\nGod. But they were not mistaken in the principal object of their search;\nwhat they sought was there, and the pathetic story of the long quest for\nGod is a proof of the truth of Paul's saying, that God has made men and\nplaced them in the world \"that they should seek God, if haply they might\nfeel after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.\"\nIt was not a delusion, it was a tremendous reality that they were\ndealing with. The fact that they but dimly conceived it does not lessen\nthe greatness of the reality.\n\nNot many intelligent thinkers in these days doubt the reality and the\npermanence of religion. Herbert Spencer did not profess to be a\nChristian believer; by many persons he was supposed to be an enemy of\nthe Christian religion; yet no man has more strongly asserted the\npermanency and indestructibility of religion. As to the notion that\nreligions are the product of human craft and selfishness, he says: \"A\ncandid examination of the evidence quite negatives the doctrine\nmaintained by some that creeds are priestly inventions.\"[3] And again:\n\"An unbiased consideration of its general aspects forces us to conclude\nthat religion, everywhere present as a weft running through the warp of\nhuman history, expresses some eternal fact.\"[4] And again: \"In Religion\nlet us recognize the high merit that from the beginning it has dimly\ndiscerned the ultimate verity and has never ceased to insist upon it....\nFor its essentially valid belief, Religion has constantly done battle.\nGross as were the disguises under which it at first espoused this\nbelief, and cherishing this belief, though it still is, under\ndisfiguring vestments, it has never ceased to maintain and defend it. It\nhas everywhere established and propagated one or other modification of\nthe doctrine that all things are manifestations of a power that\ntranscends our knowledge.\"[5]\n\nThat religion is, in John Fiske's strong phrase, an \"everlasting\nreality\" is a fact which few respectable thinkers in these days would\nventure to call in question. But, as we have seen, this reality takes\nupon itself a great variety of forms. Looking over the world to-day, we\ndiscover many kinds of religion. Religious ideas, religious rites and\nceremonies, religious customs and practices, as we gather them up and\ncompare them, constitute a variegated collection.\n\nProfessor William James has a thick volume entitled \"The Varieties of\nReligious Experience,\" in which he brings together a vast array of the\ndocuments which describe the religious feelings and impulses of persons\nin all lands and all ages. It is not a study of creeds or philosophies\nof religion, it is a study of personal religious experiences; of the\nfears, hopes, desires, contritions, joys, and aspirations of men and\nwomen of all lands and ages, as they have been dealing with the fact of\nreligion.\n\nNot only do we find many different kinds of religion existing side by\nside upon this planet; we also find that each of these types has been\nundergoing constant changes in the course of the centuries. To trace the\nreligious development of any people from the earliest period to the\npresent day is a most instructive study.\n\nTake our own religion. Christianity is not an independent form of faith.\nIts roots run down into the Hebrew religion, whose record is in the Old\nTestament; and the Hebrew religion grew out of the old Semitic faiths,\nand these again sprang from the ancient Babylonian religions or grew\nalongside of them. So we are compelled to go far back for the origin of\nmany of our own religious ideas. Jesus did not claim to be the Founder\nof a new religion; he claimed only to bring a better interpretation of\nthe religion of his people. He said that he came not to destroy but to\nfulfill the law and the prophets. The New Testament religion is a\ndevelopment of the Old Testament religion. It is a wonderful growth.\nWhen we go hack to the old monuments and the old documents and trace the\nprogress of religious beliefs and practices from the earliest days to\nour own, we learn many things which are well worth knowing.\n\nThe central fact of religious progress is improvement in the conception\nof the character of God. As the ages go by, men gradually come to think\nbetter thoughts about God. Little by little the old crude and savage\nnotions of deity drop out of their minds, and they learn to think of him\nas just and faithful and kind.\n\nThe Bible shows us many signs of this progress. The earlier stories\nabout God give him a far different character from that which appears in\nthe later prophets. It was believed by the earlier Hebrews that God\ndesired to have them put to death all the inhabitants of the land of\nCanaan when they took possession of it; and when they put to the sword\nnot only the armed men of the land, but the women and the little\nchildren, they supposed that they were obeying the command of God. They\nlearned better than that, after a while.\n\nWhen Abraham started with Isaac for Mount Moriah, he undoubtedly\nthought that he should please God by putting to death his own\nwell-beloved son; but before he had done the dreadful deed the\nrevelation came to him that that was a terrible mistake; he saw that God\nwas not pleased by human sacrifices. That was a great day in the history\nof religion. Because of that experience, Abraham was able to make his\ndescendants believe the truth that had been given to him, and from that\ntime onward human sacrifices probably ceased among the Hebrews. A long\nstep had been taken toward the purification of the idea of God of one of\nits most degrading elements.\n\nThis superstition lingered long in other faiths; probably it survived\namong our own ancestors after Abraham's day. Tennyson's poem, \"The\nVictim,\" is a vivid picture of human sacrifice among the Teutonic\npeoples:--\n\n    \"A plague upon the people fell,\n      A famine after laid them low;\n    Then thorpe and byre arose in fire,\n      For on them brake the sudden foe;\n    So thick they died the people cried,\n      'The Gods are moved against the land.'\n    The priest in horror about his altar\n      To Thor and Odin lifted a hand:\n        'Help us from famine\n        And plague and strife!\n        What would you have of us?\n        Human life?\n        Were it our nearest,\n        Were it our dearest,--Answer,\n        O answer!--\n        We give you his life.'\"\n\nThe Gods seemed to say that the victim must be either the king's wife or\nthe king's child; which it should be, was the terrible question that the\nking had to answer. The choice seemed to have fallen on the child, but\nthe wife would not have it that he was the king's dearest, and she\nrushed to her own immolation. The poem reflects the common notion of\nthose dark days, that the angry Gods could only be propitiated by the\nslaughter of those whom men loved the best. From this horrible idea the\nJewish people were delivered by the insight of their great ancestor.\n\nDark notions about God still lingered among them, however, and the Old\nTestament record shows us how they slowly disappeared. Moses and Samuel\nwere good men for their time, but the God whom they worshiped was a very\ndifferent being from the God of Hosea or of the later Isaiah.\n\nThis development of the idea of God has been going on in modern times.\nIt is not long since devout men were in the habit of saying that God's\ndispleasure with the wickedness of cities was exhibited in the scourges\nof cholera and scarlet fever in which multitudes of little children were\nthe victims. Not two hundred years ago the great majority of our Puritan\nancestors were believing in a God who, for the sin of Adam, was sending\nmillions of infants, every year, to the regions of darkness and despair.\nThe God of Cotton Mather or of Edward Payson could hardly have lived in\nthe same heaven with the God of Dwight Moody or Phillips Brooks.\n\nThe changes which have been taking place in our ideas about God have\nbeen mainly in the direction of a purified ethical conception of his\ncharacter. We have been learning to believe, more and more, in the\njustice, the righteousness, the goodness of God. In the oldest times men\nthought him cruel and revengeful; then they began to regard him as\nwillful and arbitrary--his justice was his determination to have his own\nway; his sovereignty was his egoistic purpose to do everything for his\nown glory. We have gradually grown away from all that, and are able now\nto believe what Abraham believed, that the Judge of all the earth will\ndo right.\n\nIn the presence of a God who, I am assured, is a being of perfect\nrighteousness, who never blames any one for what he cannot help, who\nnever expects of any one more than he has the power to render, who means\nthat I shall know that his treatment of me is in perfect accord with my\nown deepest intuition of truth and fairness and honor, I can stand up\nand be a man. My faith will not be the cringing submission of a slave to\nan absolute despot, but the willing and joyful acceptance by a free man\nof righteous authority.\n\nNow it is certain that the belief of the Christian church respecting the\ncharacter of God has been steadily changing, in this direction, through\nthe Christian centuries. Enlightened Christians have been coming to\nbelieve, more and more, in a good God; and by a good God I mean not\nmerely a good-natured God, but a just God, a true God, a fair God, a\nrighteous God. The growth of this conviction has been purging theology\nof many crude and revolting dogmas.\n\nIt is a great deliverance which is wrought out for us when we are set\nfree, in our religious thinking, from the bondage of unmoral\nconceptions, and are encouraged to believe that God is good. It is a\ngreat blessing to have a God to worship whom we can thoroughly respect.\nA tremendous strain is put upon the moral nature when men are required,\nby traditional influences, to pay adoration and homage to a being whose\nconduct, as it is represented to them, is, in some important respects,\nconduct which they cannot approve. All the religions, through the\nimperfection of human thought, have put that burden on their worshipers.\n\nChristianity has been struggling, through all the centuries, to free\nitself from unworthy conceptions of the character of its Deity, and each\nsucceeding re-statement of its doctrines removes some stain which our\ndim vision and halting logic had left upon his name.\n\nWhat, now, has caused these changes to take place in men's thoughts\nabout God? What influences have been at work to clarify their ideas of\nthe unknown Reality?\n\nFrom three principal sources have come the streams of light by which our\nreligious conceptions have been purified.\n\nThe first of these is the natural world round about us. We are immersed\nin Nature; it touches us on every side; it addresses us through all our\nsenses; it speaks to us every day with a thousand voices. Nature is the\ngreat teacher of the human race. She knows everything; she waits to\nimpart her love to all who will receive it; she is very patient; her\nlessons are not forced upon unwilling pupils, but whosoever will may\ncome and take of her treasure. Longfellow said of the childhood of\nAgassiz, that--\n\n    \"Nature, the old nurse, took\n      The child upon her knee,\n    Saying: 'Here is a story-book\n      Thy Father has written for thee.\n\n    \"'Come, wander with me,' she said,\n      'Into regions yet untrod;\n    And read what is still unread\n      In the manuscripts of God.'\"\n\nIt is not the child Agassiz alone whom Nature thus invited; to the whole\nhuman race, in its childhood, its adolescence, its maturity, she has\nalways been saying the same thing. She has been seeking, through all the\nages, to disclose to us all the mysteries of this marvelous universe. We\nhave been slow learners; it took her a great many centuries to get the\nsimplest truths lodged in the human mind. The cave-dweller, the savage\nin his teepee, were able to receive but little of what she had to give.\nYet before their eyes, every day, she spread all her wonders; with\ninfinite patience she waited for the unfolding of their powers. All the\nmarvels of steam, of electricity, of the camera, of the telescope, the\nmicroscope, the spectroscope, the Roentgen rays,--all the facts and\nforces with which science deals were there, in the hand of Mother\nNature, waiting to be imparted to her child from the day when he first\nstood upright and faced the stars.\n\nSlowly he has been led on into a larger understanding of this wonderful\nuniverse. And what has he learned under this tuition? What are some of\nthe great truths which have gradually impressed themselves upon his\nmind?\n\nHe has been made sure, for one thing, that this is a universe; that all\nits forces are coherent; that the same laws are in operation in every\npart of it. The principles of mathematics are everywhere applicable;\ngravitation controls all the worlds and every particle of matter in\nevery one of them, and the spectroscope assures us that the same\nchemical elements which constitute our world are found in the farthest\nstar. \"On every hand,\" says Walker, \"we are assured that the guiding\nprinciple of Science is that of the uniformity of nature.\"\n\nIt has also come to be understood that nature is all intelligible.\nEverything can be explained. This is the fundamental assumption of\nscience. Many things have not yet been explained, but there is an\nexplanation for everything; of that every thinker feels perfectly sure.\n\"Fifty years ago,\" says Sir John Lubbock, \"the Book of Nature was like\nsome richly illuminated missal, written in an unknown tongue; of the\ntrue meaning little was known to us; indeed we scarcely realized that\nthere was a meaning to decipher. Now glimpses of the truth are gradually\nrevealing themselves; we perceive that there is a reason--and in many\ncases we know what that reason is--for every difference in form, in\nsize, and in color, for every bone and feather, almost for every\nhair.\"[6]\n\nThis is the latest word of the latest philosophy; there is a reason for\neverything. As Romanes says, Nature is instinct with reason; \"tap her\nwhere you will, reason oozes out at every pore.\"\n\nIf all things are rational and intelligible, then all things must be\nthe product of a rational Intelligence. That conclusion seems\ninevitable.\n\nBut we can go further than this. It is not merely true that we can find\nin the world about us the signs of an Intelligence like our own, it is\nalso true that our own intelligence has been developed by the revelation\nto us of this Intelligence in the world about us. \"If,\" says Walker,\n\"human reason is but 'the reflection in us of the universe outside of\nus,' then, clearly, the Reason was there, expressed in the universe,\nbefore it possibly could be reflected in us. It is _our relation to the\nUniverse that makes us rational_.\" And again, \"Apart from the Reason\nexpressed in the Universe around him, man could never have become the\nrational being that he is.\"[7]\n\nThis, then, is the first great reason why our religion has gradually\nbecome more rational. The rationality of the universe constantly\npresented to our thought has developed a rationality in our thoughts\nabout the universe. The mind, like the dyer's hand, is subdued to what\nit works in. The response of primitive man to the pressure of Nature\nupon him was a response of wonder and awe and fear; his religion was\ninstructive, emotional; but through the long tuition of the ages, the\nold nurse has taught him how to use his reason; and he now finds unity\nwhere he once found strife, and order and law where once confusion and\nchaos reigned. His religion has become rational.\n\nBut what do we mean when we say that man's great teacher has been\nNature? Nature, as we have seen, is instinct with Reason, and the Reason\nwhich is revealed in Nature is only another name for God. It is the\nimmanent God, the Eternal Reason, who has been patiently disclosing\nhimself to us in the world round about us, and thus cleansing our minds\nfrom the crude and superstitious conceptions with which in our ignorance\nand fear we had invested him.\n\nThe second of the sources from which the influences have come for the\npurification of religion is humanity itself.\n\nWe are told, in the Book of Genesis, that man is made in the image of\nGod; and the doctrine of the Fatherhood of God, on which the entire\nteaching of Jesus rests, is but a stronger statement of the same truth.\nIt is true that we find human nature, as yet, for the most part, in\nvery crude conditions; its divine qualities are not clearly seen. It\ndoes not yet appear what we shall be. But we have learned, in our\nevolutionary studies, that no living thing ought to be judged in the\nearlier stages of its development; we must wait to see the perfected\ntype before we can make up our minds about it. The eaglet just hatched\ndoes not give us the right idea of the eagle, nor does the infant in his\nswaddling clothes reveal to us the man. So it is with species and races;\nif they are undergoing a process of development, we must wait for the\nlater stages of the process before we judge. The apple is not the crab,\nbut the Northern Spy; the horse is not the mustang, but the Percheron or\nthe German roadster. In estimating any living thing, you take into\nconsideration its possibilities of development; the ideal to which it\nmay attain must always be in sight.\n\nIn the same way when we think of man, we do not take the Patagonian as\nthe type, but the best specimens of European or American manhood.\n\nIf, then, we are taught to believe that man is a child of God, we should\nbe compelled to believe that it is the most perfectly developed man who\nmost resembles God. We have some conception of the ideal man. Our\nconceptions are not always correct, but they are constantly improved, as\nwe strive to realize them. And in the ideal man we see reflected the\ncharacter of God. We are sure that a perfect humanity would give us the\nbest revelation we could have of divinity. If we could see a perfect\nman, we could learn from him more about God than from any other source.\n\nMost of us believe that a perfect Man appeared in this world nineteen\nhundred years ago; and the best that we know about God we have learned\nfrom him. More has been done by his life and teachings to purify\nreligion of its crudities and superstitions than by all other agencies.\nThe worst of the crudities and superstitions that still linger in our\nown religion are due to the fact that the people who bear his name only\nin part accept his teachings and very imperfectly follow his example. If\nwe could all believe what he has told us and do what he has bidden us,\nour religion would soon be cleansed from its worst defilements.\n\nThe manifestation of the life of God in Jesus Christ we call The\nIncarnation; and it was a manifestation so much more perfect than any\nother that the world has seen, that we do well to put the definite\narticle before the word. Yet it is a mistake to overlook the fact that\nGod dwells in every good man, and manifests himself through him. And\nwhenever, in any character, the great qualities of truth and justice and\npurity and courage and honor and kindness are exhibited, we see some\nreflection of the character of God.\n\nIn many a home the father and the mother, by their faithfulness and\nkindness and self-sacrifice, make it easy for the children to believe in\na good God; and in every community brave and true and saintly men and\nwomen are revealing to us high qualities which we cannot help\ninterpreting as divine. We cannot imagine that God is less just or fair\nor kind than these men and women are; they lift up our ideals of\ngoodness, and they compel us to think better thoughts of him in whom all\nour ideals are united.\n\nThus it is that our humanity, as glorified by the Word made flesh, and\nas lifted up and sanctified by the lives of good men and women, has been\na great teacher of pure religion. We have learned what to think about\nGod and how to worship him aright by what he has shown us in the living\nepistles of his goodness and grace which he has sent into the world,\nand, above all, in that \"strong Son of God\" whom we call our Master.\n\nThe other source from which the influences have come by which religion\nhas been purified, is that divine Spirit who is always in the world, and\nalways waiting upon the threshold of every man's thought, and in the\nsub-conscious depths of every man's feeling, to enlighten our\nunderstanding and purify our desires. To every man he gives all that he\ncan receive of light and power. To many his gifts are but meagre,\nbecause their capacities are small and their receptivity is limited; but\nthere are always in the world open minds and docile tempers, to whom he\nimparts his larger gifts. Thus we have the order of prophets and\ninspired men, whose words are full of light and leading. In the Bible we\nhave a record of the messages given by such men to the world. In that\nteaching, rightly interpreted, there is great power to correct the\nerrors and cleanse away the delusions and superstitions which are apt to\ngather about our religion. We cannot estimate too highly the work that\nhas been done by these sacred writings in purifying our conception of\nGod.\n\nIt is possible, however, to treat this book in a manner so hard and\nliteralistic that it shall become a hindrance rather than a help to the\nbetter knowledge of God. The one fact that it brings vividly before us\nis that fact of progress in religious knowledge which we are now\nconsidering. It shows us how men have gone steadily forward, under the\nleadership of the divine Spirit, leaving old conceptions behind them,\nand rising to larger and larger understanding of divine things. Any\ntreatment of the Book which fails to recognize this fact--which puts all\nparts of the Bible on the same level of spiritual value and\nauthority--simply ignores the central truth of the Bible and perverts\nits whole meaning.\n\nThe truth which we need to emphasize in our use of the Bible is the\ntruth that the same Spirit who gave the men of the olden time their\nmessage is with us, to help us to the right understanding of it, and to\ngive us the message for our time. Nor is his illumination confined to\nany guild or rank of believers; the day foretold by the prophet has\nsurely come, when the Spirit is poured upon all flesh, and the prophetic\ngift may be received by all the pure in heart.\n\nThe one glorious fact of our religion--a fact but dimly realized as yet\nby the church--is the constant presence in the world of the Spirit of\nTruth. If there is anything at all in religion, this divine Spirit is\nready to be the Counselor, Comforter, and Guide of every human soul. And\nwe cannot doubt that the steadily enlarging conception of the character\nof God is due to his gracious ministry.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSuch, then, are the sources from which have come that better knowledge\nof God which makes the religion of our time to differ from the religion\nof past generations. And it will be seen that these three sources are\nbut one. It is the divine Reason and Love himself who has been revealing\nhimself to us in the unity and order of nature, in the enlarging life of\nhumanity, in the inspired insights and convictions of devout believers.\nWhat we are looking upon is that continuing revelation of God to the\nworld which has been in progress from the beginning, and which will\nnever cease until the world is full of the knowledge of God as the sea\nis full of water.\n\nWith this great and growing revelation the church is intrusted. Its\nbusiness in the world is to take this truth about God, this new truth,\nthis larger and fairer truth, which God himself, in the creation and\nthrough the incarnation and by the Indwelling Spirit, has been clearing\nup and lifting into the light, and fill modern life full of it. This is\nthe truth which modern life needs. Religion is a permanent fact, but its\nforms change with advancing knowledge. There are forms of truth which\nare suited to the needs of modern life. God himself is always at work\npreparing the truth for present needs. It is the function of the church\nto understand this truth, and make it known in every generation.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nOur Religion and Other Religions\n\n\n\nOur religion is the Christian religion. This is the form of faith which\nthe church in our country is organized to promote. Ours is a Christian\ncountry.\n\nThis is not by virtue of any legal establishment of Christianity, for\none of the glories of our civilization is that first amendment to our\nnational constitution, which declares that \"Congress shall make no law\nrespecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise\nthereof.\" Buddhists, Hindus, Mohammedans, Parsees, Jews, are just as\nfree to exercise their respective forms of religion in this country as\nare the Christians. The government neither forbids nor fosters any kind\nof faith.\n\nOurs is a Christian country because nearly all the people of the country\nare, by birth and by choice, identified with the Christian faith.\n\nStill it is true that the freedom extended by our constitution to other\nforms of faith has been claimed by some of their adherents, and we have\nin the United States a goodly number of groups representing\nnon-Christian creeds. Of these the Jews constitute much the largest\nnumber, there being, perhaps, six or seven hundred Jewish congregations\nin all parts of the country. There are also sixty or seventy Chinese\ntemples, a few groups of Parsees and Mohammedans, a few hundred\ncompanies of Spiritualists, and a few scores of societies of Ethical\nCulture and Free Religion. All told there are not, probably, among the\neighty millions of our people, more than a million and a half who are\nnot either traditionally or nominally Christians.\n\nOur contact with the Orient, on our western frontier, is likely,\nhowever, to bring us into close relations, in the near future, with\nother ancient forms of faith. The Christian church in modern life will\nbe compelled to meet questions raised by the presence of Buddhists and\nConfucians and Mohammedans, and to prove its superiority to these\nreligions. The study of comparative religion has had hitherto purely an\nacademic interest for most of us; in the present century it is likely to\nbecome for millions a practical question. Many a young man and young\nwoman will be forced to ask: \"Why is the religion of my fathers a better\nreligion than that of my Hindu associate or my Japanese classmate?\" The\nanswer, if wisely given, may be entirely satisfactory, but the question\nmust not be treated as absurd or irrelevant. In the face of the great\ncompetitions into which it must enter, our religion must be ready to\ngive an intelligent account of itself.\n\nOne of the first questions to be asked when we take up this inquiry is,\nWhat is the attitude of our religion toward the other religions? Perhaps\nit is better to put the question in a concrete form and ask, What is the\nattitude of the Christian people toward the people of other religions?\n\nThe answer to this question may not be as prompt and confident as we\ncould wish. Many, people who profess and call themselves Christians are\nnot so broad-minded or so generous hearted as they ought to be, and they\nare inclined to be partisans in religion as well as in art or politics;\nthey think that all the truth and all the goodness are in the\ninstitutions with which they are allied, and that all the rest are of\nthe evil one. But such people are not good representatives of\nChristianity. They never learned any such judgment from him whom they\ncall their Master. And we may safely claim that those who have the mind\nof Christ are tolerant and generous toward those whose opinions or whose\nreligious practices differ from their own. They do not forget that their\nMaster treated with the greatest sympathy men and women whose faiths\ngreatly differed from his own; that some of those who received his\nstrongest testimonies to the greatness of their faith, like the Roman\ncenturion and the Canaanitish woman, were pagans; that one of his most\nintimate and gracious conversations on the deep things of the Spirit was\nwith a Samaritan woman, and that his representative hero of practical\nreligion was a Samaritan man whose genuine goodness he placed in sharp\ncontrast with the heathen selfishness of the priest and the Levite of\nhis own faith. No Christian ever learned to be a bigot by sitting at the\nfeet of Jesus Christ. And I think we may justly claim that those who\nhave entered into the spirit of the Christian religion are always\ngenerous in their attitude toward those who worship by other forms of\nfaith.\n\nThey cannot forget that all these people whose creeds and rites differ\nso greatly from their own are children of our Father, and that they can\nbe no less dear to him than we are; and it is therefore hardly possible\nfor them to imagine that he can have left them without some revelation\nof saving truth. They approach, therefore, the religious beliefs of\nother peoples with open minds, expecting to find in them elements of\ntruth, and desiring to put themselves into sympathetic and cordial\nrelations with those whose opinions differ from their own.\n\nAs has been said, not all those who are known as Christians have this\ntolerant temper, because there are many who are known as Christians who\nhave but dim notions of what it means to be a Christian. It was once the\nprevailing assumption that all religions were divided into two classes,\nthe true and the false; that ours was the true religion and all the\nothers were false religions. That the heathen were the enemies of God\nwas the common belief, and it was a grave heresy to insinuate that any\nof them could be saved without renouncing their false religions and\naccepting the true religion. This was the basis upon which the work of\nforeign missions was long conducted, and there are still many who bear\nthe Christian name who have not yet reached any other conception.\n\nBut the church in modern life is learning to see this whole matter in a\ndifferent light. Our best modern missionaries decline to take this\nattitude in dealing with men of other religions. They do not regard the\nheathen as outside the pale of the divine compassion; they seek for\npoints of sympathy between their own beliefs and those of the people to\nwhom they are sent. From no other sources have come stronger testimonies\nto the sympathy of religions. We must not, these veteran missionaries\ninsist, assume that our religion is the only true religion, while all\nthe others are false religions. We may well assume that all human forms\nof faith are more or less imperfect--our own as well as theirs, and\ninvite them to a candid comparison of the differing systems. If our own\nis really superior, if it meets universal human needs more perfectly, we\nought not to fear such a candid comparison. But we must be ready to see\nand approve the good that is theirs, if we wish them to accept the good\nthat is ours.\n\nThis is not admitting that there is no difference--that one religion is\nas good as another; we should stultify ourselves by making any such\nadmission. But it is a willingness to recognize truth and goodness\neverywhere, and to rejoice in them. And we must show that we are not\nafraid to take from the many truth which has been revealed to them more\nclearly than to us. If we believe in the universal fatherhood and the\nomnipresence of the Holy Spirit, we must expect to find, in every form\nof faith, some elements that our Christianity needs. In fact\nChristianity, through all its history, has been appropriating truth\nwhich it has found in the systems with which it has come in contact, and\nit is one of the glories of Christianity that it has the power to do\nthis.\n\nA great Christian scholar has just published a book entitled \"The Growth\nof Christianity,\" in which he shows how this has been done. He finds\nthat \"just as Jewish morality was ennobled and beautified by the\nteaching of Christ and yet made an essential element of that teaching,\nso the philosophy of Greece, the mysticism of Asia, and the civic\nvirtues of Rome were taken up by the Christian religion, which, while\nremaining Christian, was modified by their influence. This process\ncannot fairly be called degeneration, but growth, such growth and\ndevelopment as is the privilege of every truly living institution.\"[8]\n\nIt is true, as one critic suggests, that in taking in these foreign\nelements Christianity not only made some important gains, but also\nsuffered some serious losses. Greek philosophy and Asian mysticism and\nRoman legalism are responsible for certain perversions of Christianity,\nas well as for enlargement of its content. We have great need to be\ncareful in these assimilations; some kinds of food are rich but not\neasily digested. But it is, as I have said, a chief glory of\nChristianity that it possesses this assimilative power. It is the\nnatural fruit of faith in the divine fatherhood. We ought to be able to\nbelieve that God has some revelations to make to us through our brethren\nin other lands, as well as to them through us. It is the possession of\nthis power which fits Christianity to be the universal religion.\n\nIt has already given some striking proofs of the possession of this\npower. We have had, once, upon this planet, a great Parliament of\nReligions, in which the representatives of all the great faiths now\nexisting in the world were gathered together for comparison of beliefs\nand experiences. It was, perhaps, the most important religious gathering\nwhich has ever assembled. The presiding officer, in his opening address,\nthus described its import:--\n\n\"If this congress shall faithfully execute the duties with which it has\nbeen charged, it will become a joy of the whole earth and stand in human\nhistory like a new Mount Zion crowned with glory and making the actual\nbeginning of a new epoch of brotherhood and peace.\n\n\"In this congress the word 'religion' means the love and worship of God\nand the love and service of man. We believe the Scripture 'Of a truth\nGod is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that feareth God\nand worketh righteousness is accepted of him.' We come together in\nmutual confidence and respect, without the least surrender or compromise\nof anything which we respectively believe to be truth or duty, with the\nhope that mutual acquaintance and a free and sincere interchange of\nviews on the great questions of eternal life and human conduct will be\nmutually beneficial.\n\n\"The religious faiths of the world have most seriously misunderstood\nand misjudged each other, from the use of words in meanings radically\ndifferent from those which they were intended to bear, and from a\ndisregard of the distinctions between appearances and facts, between\nsigns and symbols and the things signified and represented. Such errors\nit is hoped that this congress will do much to correct and to render\nhereafter impossible.\"\n\nSuch was the purpose of this parliament, such the spirit which prompted\nthe calling of it, and found utterance in its conferences. It was surely\na notable and beautiful thing for, the adherents of these dissimilar\nfaiths, whose ordinary attitude toward one another has always been\nsuspicious and oppugnant, to come together in this friendly way, seeking\na better understanding, and emphasizing the things that make for unity.\nAnd whose was this parliament? Which religion was it that conceived of\nit, and made provision for it, and set in motion the influences that\ndrew these hostile bands into harmony? It was the Christian religion\nwhich gave us this great endeavor after unity. And it is highly\nimprobable that such a movement would have originated in any other than\na Christian country, or among the followers of any other Leader than the\nMan of Nazareth. It was the natural thing for the disciples of Jesus to\ndo; and while many men of the other faiths yielded to this gracious\ninfluence, and were thus brought under the power of the bond that unites\nour common humanity, it is not likely that any of them would have taken\nthe initiative in such an undertaking.\n\nWe may hope that this is not the last parliament of religions; that in\nthe days before us such manifestations of the unity of the race will not\nbe uncommon. And we are sure that the leaders of all such endeavors will\nbe found among the followers of the Prince of Peace.\n\nHere, then, we find one clear answer to the question with which we\nstarted. The Christian confessor who is confronted with the question\n\"What reason have you for thinking that the religion of your fathers is\nbetter than any other form of faith?\" may answer, first, \"It is better\nbecause it cares more for the unity of the race than any other religion\ncares; because it believes more strongly in the essential brotherhood of\nall worshipers; because it teaches a larger charity for men of\ndiffering beliefs, and more perfectly realizes the sympathy of\nreligions. It is far from being all that it ought to be, on this side of\nits development; many of its adherents are still full of bigotry and\nintolerance and Pharisaic conceit; but these are contrary to its\nplainest teachings, and all its progress is in the direction of larger\ncharity for men of all religions. Already, in spite of its failures, it\nhas shown far more of this temper than any other religion has exhibited;\nand when it gets rid of its own sects and schisms, and comes closer to\nthe heart of its own Master, it will have a power of drawing the peoples\ntogether which no other religion has ever thought of exercising.\"\n\nI have spoken of the fact that Christianity claims to be a universal\nreligion. That was the expectation with which its first messengers were\nsent forth. They were bidden to go into all the world and preach the\ngospel to every creature. There has never been any other thought among\nthe loyal followers of Jesus than that the day is coming when every knee\nshall bow to him and every tongue confess him.\n\nThis expectation of universality is not shared by all the religions of\nthe earth. Many of them are purely ethnic faiths; they grow out of the\nlives of the peoples who adhere to them; it does not seem to be supposed\nthat any other peoples would care for them or know what to do with them.\nThe old Romans had a saying, \"_Cujus regio, ejus religio_\"--which means,\nEvery country has its own religion. The earlier Hebrews had the same\nidea; they thought that every people had a god of its own. Jehovah was\ntheir God; Baal was the god of the Phoenicians, and Chemosh was the god\nof Moab. They believed that Jehovah was a stronger God than any of these\nother deities, but they did not seem to doubt their existence or their\npotency. Even the prophet Micah says: \"For all the peoples will walk\nevery one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of\nJehovah our God for ever and ever.\"[9] The later prophets gained the\nlarger conception of universality; they believed that there was but one\nsupreme God, and therefore but one religion, to the acceptance of which\nall mankind would at last be brought. The narrower conception of\nreligion as a national or racial interest has, however, prevailed and\nstill prevails among many peoples. The Hindu religion, which numbers\nmany millions of votaries, has no expectation of becoming a world\nreligion. Indeed, it could not well entertain any such expectation; the\nsystem of caste, on which it rests, makes it necessarily exclusive. It\nhas no missionary impulse; its adherents are content with a good which\nthey do not seek to share with other peoples. The same thing is true of\nmany of the minor faiths.\n\nNow it is manifest that religions which do not expect to be universal\nare not likely to exceed their own expectations. \"According to your\nfaith be it unto you\" is as true of systems as of men. And none of us is\nlikely to be strongly drawn to a faith which has really no invitation\nfor us, no matter how stoutly it may maintain its own superiority. No\nreligion which has only a tribal or racial significance can make any\neffective appeal to our credence. The note of universality must be\nstruck by any religion which claims our suffrages.\n\nThere are certain great living religions which make this claim of\nuniversality. Judaism and Parseeism have both entertained this\nexpectation, but the fewness of their adherents at the present time\nindicates that the expectation is but feebly held. The three living\nfaiths which aspire to universal dominion are Buddhism, Mohammedanism,\nand Christianity.[10] Each of these hopes to possess the earth. Each of\nthese is strong enough to enforce its claim with some measure of\nconfidence.\n\nRecent estimates give to Buddhism 148,000,000 of followers, to\nMohammedanism 177,000,000, and to Christianity 477,000,000.\nMohammedanism has been rapidly extending its sway in Africa during\nrecent years; Buddhism is not, probably, making great gains at the\npresent time.\n\nIf any form of religion is to become universal in the earth it would\nappear that it must be one of these three. If any of us wishes to\nexchange the religion of his fathers for another faith, his choice will\nbe apt to lie between Buddhism and Mohammedanism. What claims to our\ncredence and allegiance could either of them set up?\n\nIt would not, for most of us, be an easy thing to turn from the faith of\nour fathers to any other form of faith. The ideas and usages to which\nwe have been accustomed all our lives are not readily exchanged for\nthose which are wholly unfamiliar. Rites and ceremonies and customs of\nother religions, which may be intrinsically as reasonable and reverent\nas our own, strike upon our minds unpleasantly because they are\nunwonted. It would, therefore, be somewhat difficult for us to put\nourselves into a mental attitude before either of these great religions,\nin which we should be able to do full justice to its claims upon our\ncredence.\n\nYet if we could gain the breadth of view to which the disciples of\nChrist ought to attain, we should be compelled to admit that each of\nthese great religions has rendered some important service to mankind.\n\nWhat those services have been can only be hinted at in this chapter. Of\nIslamism, Bishop Boyd Carpenter testifies that it \"has been, and still\nis, a great power in the world. There is much in it that is calculated\nto purify and elevate mankind at a certain stage of history. It has the\npower of redeeming the slaves of a degraded polytheism from their low\ngroveling conception of God to conceptions which are higher; it has set\nan example of sobriety to the world and has shielded its followers from\nthe drink plague which destroys the strength of nations. And, in so far\nas it has done this, it has performed a work which entitles it to the\nattention of man and no doubt has been a factor in God's education of\nthe world.\"[11]\n\nOf Buddhism even more could be said. In the words of Mr. Brace:--\n\n\"Sometime in the sixth century before Christ there appeared in Northern\nIndia one of those great personalities who in a measure draw their\ninspiration directly from above.... When he says, 'As a mother at the\nrisk of her life watcheth over the life of her child, her only child, so\nalso let every one cultivate a boundless good-will towards all beings,\n... above and below and across, unobstructed, without hatred, without\nenmity, standing, walking, sitting, or lying, as long as he be awake let\nhim devote himself to this state of mind; this way of living, they say,\nis the best in this world'--when these words come to our ears we hear\nsomething of a like voice to that which said, 'Come unto me, all ye that\nare weary and heavy-laden.' From a thousand legends and narratives we\nmay gather that to Gotama the Enlightened (the Buddha) the barriers of\nhuman selfishness fell away. To him the miseries of the poor, the slave,\nthe outcast, were his own; the tears which men had shed from the\nbeginning, 'enough to fill oceans,' were as if falling from his eyes.\nThe great pang of sorrow, piercing the heart of the race, inconsolable,\nunspeakable, struck to his own heart. For him the sin of the world, the\nunsatisfied desire, the fierce passion and hatred and lust, poisoned\nlife, and he cared for nothing except for what would change the heart\nand remove this fearful mass of evil.\"[12]\n\nThe character of Gotama as it emerges from the reek of tradition is one\nof the noblest in history, and while the religion of which he was the\nleader has been defiled by all manner of corruptions and superstitions,\nit has borne much good fruit in the life of many peoples.\n\nIt would be easy to point out the radical defects in both these\nreligions; let me rather call attention to some of the distinguishing\npeculiarities of our own faith.\n\n1. The God whom Jesus has taught us to believe in, is a far nobler\nobject of affection and trust than is ever presented to the thought of\nthe followers of Mohammed or of Gotama. He is our Heavenly Father,\ninfinite in his purity, his truth, his kindness, his compassion, his\ncare for all his children.\n\nNow it is true that the central and fundamental difference in religions\nis that which concerns the character of the deity. The best religion is\nthat which worships the best god. And when we compare the Christian\nconception of God with the Buddhist conception or the Mohammedan\nconception, we cannot fail to see which is the highest and the purest.\n\nA brilliant Japanese scholar, discussing this subject of the relative\nvalues of religions, was asked if, in any respect, the Christian\nreligion was better than the Oriental religions, and he promptly\nanswered: \"Yes; the Christian conception of God as the Heavenly Father\nis higher and better than that of any Oriental religion.\" If that is\ntrue it settles the whole question.\n\nIt is, perhaps, inaccurate to speak of Buddhism as having any conception\nof God. \"The very idea of a god as creating or in any way ruling the\nworld,\" says one authority, \"is utterly absent in the Buddhist system.\nGod is not so much as denied, he is simply not known.\" Buddha taught\nmen to be compassionate to one another, but he did not teach them to\nlook above themselves for any divine compassion. It is true that they\nnow venerate him, and even pray to him; for the human soul will\npray,--its instinct of dependence, its craving for fellowship with\nsomething higher than itself will prevail over all theories; but this\nprayer must be somewhat incoherent, for the worshiper believes that\nBuddha has no longer any conscious or personal existence. And there is\ncertainly no conception in his mind of any such fatherly relation with\nany Power above himself, who loves him and cares for him and knows how\nto help him, as that which Jesus has revealed to us.\n\nThe Mohammedan Deity is indeed a person, but he is a relentless,\nomnipotent Will. The worst phases of the old Calvinism--those which have\ndisappeared from Christian thought--are the central ideas of the\nMohammedan creed. God is represented in the Koran as fitful and\nrevengeful, as arbitrary and despotic; he is a very different being from\nthe God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.\n\n2. The religion of Jesus emphasizes, as no other religion has done,\n\"the redemptive principle in its idea of God.\" It does not hide the fact\nof moral evil as the source of all our woes, but it shows an eternal\npurpose in the heart of God to save man from sin, even at the cost of\nsuffering to himself. This is the meaning of redemption; it is the\nsalvation of men through a divine self-sacrifice. No such revelation of\nthe love of God as this has ever been made to the world, except through\nthe life and teachings and death of Jesus Christ. No wonder that when it\nis simply and clearly presented to men it wins their hearts. A Chinese\nwoman, listening to a recital of this redemptive work of God, turned\nsuddenly to her neighbor and said, \"Didn't I tell you that there ought\nto be a God like that?\"\n\nWe shall look in vain through the scriptures of the other religions for\nany such conception of the relation of God to men. Men must save\nthemselves by their own endeavors; they must obey or they will suffer;\nperchance by their own suffering they may be purified: but that God\nshould stoop to earth and stand by the side of sinning and suffering\nman, and save him by suffering with him, is a truth to which none of\nthem has risen.\n\n3. Christianity, above all other faiths, is the religion of hope. It\nnot only kindles in our hearts the hope of overcoming the sin which is\nour worst enemy, but it conquers in our hearts the fear of death and\nopens up to us the prospect of unending and glorious future life, in the\nsociety of those most dear to us.\n\nMohammedanism also permits us to hope for future blessedness, albeit its\nrepresentations of the life to come are not always such as to purify and\nelevate our thoughts. Buddhism, on the contrary, though it tells us that\nwe may be reborn many times, assures us that each reappearance in this\nworld will be attended with suffering and struggle; from which, if we\ncontinue to walk in the true path, striving more and more to conquer our\ndesires, we may at length hope to be delivered; but the blessedness\nwhich comes at the end of all this struggle is simply forgetfulness: we\nshall lose our identity and be remerged in that fount of Being from\nwhich at first we came. Existence is the primal evil: to get rid of\nourselves is what we are to strive for; salvation is our disappearance\nout of life, our absorption in the ocean of unconsciousness. This is the\nbest that Buddhism has to offer us. Not many of us, I dare say, will\nwish to exchange for this the Christian hope.\n\nThere are many other characteristics of the Christian faith on which it\nwould be interesting to reflect, but these three great elements are\nsufficient to enable us to form our judgment as to its comparative\nvalue. No religion which in these particulars is inferior can ever draw\nthe world away from the leadership of Jesus Christ. And it ought to be\nclear to all who can comprehend the needs of human nature that while\nthese other faiths, in view of the great services they have rendered to\nmankind, are not to be despised; and while it is probable that the\nworld, until the end of it, will be indebted to them for contributions\nwhich they have made to our knowledge of the highest things; yet there\nis no good reason why any one who has been walking in the light that\nshines from the life and teachings of Jesus Christ should wish to turn\nfrom his way into the ways of Mohammed or Gotama.\n\nIt is not by any happy accident that Christianity is growing far more\nrapidly than any other form of faith, and now vastly outnumbers every\nother; it is not a strange thing that the lands in which it prevails\nare far more prosperous and far more powerful than the lands in which\nother religions prevail. It is winning the world. It is winning the\nworld because its interpretation of life is a truer interpretation than\nany other religion has offered; because it meets and supplies the\ndeepest wants of men more perfectly than any other religion meets and\nsupplies them.\n\nThe great evolutionary law is at work here, as everywhere. There is a\nstruggle for existence among religions, as among all other forms of\nlife. The law of variation has had full play in all this realm; human\nnature has produced a great variety of religious ideas and forms, and\nnatural selection is doing its work upon them. The fittest will survive.\nAnd the fittest religion will be the religion that ministers most\nperfectly to human needs; that makes the best and strongest men and\nwomen; that rears up the most fruitful and the most enduring\ncivilization.\n\nEverything visible within the horizon of our thought to-day indicates\nthat the religion which will survive--the permanent religion, the\nuniversal religion--will be the Christian religion.\n\nIt will gather into itself the best elements out of every other form of\nfaith, but the constructive ideas will be those which have found most\nperfect expression in the teachings of Jesus Christ.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nThe Social Side of Religion\n\n\n\nWe have found in our previous studies that religion is a central and\npermanent element in human nature, and that Christianity bids fair to be\nthe permanent form of religion.\n\nBut the readers of these pages are constantly meeting with those who\nwould admit both these statements, yet who are disposed to deny or\nignore the value of the church in modern society. They believe in\nreligion, they say; they even believe in the principles of Christianity;\nthey may go so far as to say that they believe in Christ; but they do\nnot believe in the church. What they seem to object to is organized\nreligion. They appear to think that it ought to be diffused, somehow,\nlike an atmosphere, through the community. We hear Christians talk,\nsometimes, about \"the invisible church;\" that is the only kind of church\nwhich these objectors are disposed to tolerate. _Institutional_ religion\nis the special object of their distrust.\n\nSome of the more radical among them oppose religious organizations, not\nbecause these organizations are religious, but because they have an\nantipathy for all forms of social organization. It does not take an\nopen-eyed onlooker long to discover that social organizations of all\nkinds are infested with many evils. Social machinery is never perfect in\nits construction or operation. It is always getting out of gear; there\nis endless friction and clatter and confusion; it takes a great deal of\ntrouble to keep it moving, and its product is often of poor quality.\nWhen men get together and try to co\u00f6perate for any purpose, by orderly\nmethods, they are always sure, because of the imperfection of human\nnature, to do a certain amount of mischief. Often their organization\ntends to tyranny; freedom is unduly restricted; selfish men get\npossession of the power accumulated in the organization, and use it for\ntheir own aggrandizement; it becomes, to a greater or less extent, an\ninstrument of oppression. Thus government, which is normally the\norganization of political society for the protection of liberty and the\npromotion of the general welfare, sometimes becomes, as in Russia, a\ngrinding despotism despoiling the many for the enrichment of the few.\nThus, in our American politics, we have the machine, which is simply the\nperversion of party organization, and which in many instances has\nbecome, under the manipulation of greedy and conscienceless men, an evil\nof vast proportions.\n\nLooking upon these abuses with which political organizations of all\nkinds are always encumbered, some men propose to abolish all forms of\npolitical organization. This is anarchism, of which there are two\nvarieties,--the anarchism of violence, and the anarchism of\nnon-resistance. Czolgosz represents one type and Tolstoy the other. For\nthe anarchism of violence we can have only detestation and horror; to\nthe anarchism which expects to abolish laws by ignoring them and\nsuffering the consequences, we must extend a respectful toleration.\nNevertheless the anarchism of Tolstoy offers us a programme which is\nhardly thinkable. For we are made to live and work together; and if we\nwork together effectively we must have rules and working agreements,\nmethods of co\u00f6peration, and these, whatever name we may give them, will\nhave the force of constitutions and laws. The great co\u00f6perations, on\nwhich the welfare of society depends, involve social organization. Even\nif the form which this takes should be largely economic, it would have\npolitical force and significance. Man is a political animal; it is his\nnature to live politically; and, as Horace says, you may drive out\nnature with a pitchfork, but she is sure to come back. And the same\nweaknesses of human nature which infested the old forms of organization\nwould be found in the new ones, unless human nature itself were\nregenerated.\n\nThose who would destroy political society on account of its abuses are,\ntherefore, guilty of the same foolishness as that of the man who burned\nhis house to get rid of the rats. Doubtless the rats all escaped and\nwere ready to enter, with reinforcements, into the new house as soon as\nit was builded.\n\nThe same reasoning applies to ecclesiastical anarchism. Those who,\nbecause of the defects of church organizations, would abolish the\nchurches, are equally unpractical. For it is not only true, as we saw in\nour first chapter, that religion is a primal fact of human nature, it is\nequally true that religion everywhere has a social manifestation. The\nsame impulse which moves men to worship, draws them together in their\nworship.\n\nAny deep or strong emotion makes human beings congregate. Just as a\nflock of sheep huddle together when they are frightened, so men, when\ndeeply moved for any cause, seek one another. As the impulse of religion\nis one of those by which men are most deeply moved, it always brings\nthem together.\n\nSo long as religion keeps the form of fear it produces this result; when\nfear is succeeded by more grateful emotions, and men begin to have some\nsense of the goodness of the Power they have been blindly worshiping,\nthen their gladness and gratitude bring them together. Religion,\ntherefore, in all lands and ages, has been a social interest; indeed, it\nhas been the strongest of the bonds uniting human beings. To demand a\nreligion which should have no social expression is to fly in the face of\nnature, and forbid causes to bring forth their normal effects. Wherever\nthere is religion men will be associated, and their worship and their\nwork will be carried on under forms of social organization. Anarchism is\nno more thinkable or workable in religion than in politics.\n\nIf this is true of religion in general, it is eminently true of the\nChristian religion. The characteristic note of Christianity is its\nemphasis on the social relations. In this it simply exhibits what we may\ncall its scientific temper, its tendency to keep close to the facts of\nlife, to give the right interpretation to nature and to human nature.\n\nA modern sociologist[13] tells us that \"the sole point of view, aim and\ngoal of Jesus, in all his teaching and by implication of all his acts,\nwas social. The divine Father whom he proclaimed was social--a Being\nwhose one attribute was love.\" When we say that \"God is love,\" this is\nwhat we mean. He delights in Companionship, and finds his happiness in\nthe relations which unite him with his creatures. Since his own supreme\ngood is in these reciprocal affections and services, we cannot imagine\nthat he could expect us to find our good in any different way. If we\nshare our Father's nature, we must seek our happiness where he finds\nhis. The blessedness of life must therefore be in our social relations.\nSuch is the teaching of Jesus. Such is the essence of Christianity.\n\nWhile, therefore, every religion by its very nature tends to bring men\ntogether, Christianity lifts the social impulse into the light and\nsanctifies and transfigures it, making it not merely a concomitant of\nreligion but the heart of religion. The effect of this revelation was\nseen in all the ministry of Jesus. Whereever he went the people flocked\ntogether. \"Great multitudes followed him.\" Into the wildernesses, up to\nthe mountain tops, across the stormy lake, they made their way; it was a\nday of great congregations. It was because they wanted to be with him,\nof course; but when they came to him they came together, and one of the\nthings he sought for them was that they should like to be together. That\nwas surely a lesson that they learned of him; for as soon as he had gone\nthey began to gravitate together. Every day they met, sometimes in the\ntemple courts, sometimes in their own homes, for praise and prayer;\nevery evening they partook together, in little groups, of a simple meal,\nin memory of him. Their religion, from the start, manifested a marked\nsocial tendency. Indeed, we might give it a stronger word, and say that,\nin the beginning, it was socialistic; it seemed to threaten a complete\nreconstruction of the industrial order. For \"all that believed were\ntogether, and had all things common; and they sold their possessions\nand goods, and parted them to all, as every man had need.\"[14]\n\nJust how far this communistic experiment was carried it is difficult to\nsay, but it is evident that the disciples felt that their religion ought\nto permeate and control their entire social life. And there has never\nsince been a day when the social side of religion has not been\nrecognized and provided for. The very impulse which is kindled in their\nhearts when they are brought into association with Christ, brings men\ntogether. Communion, fellowship, these are the first words they learn.\nIt has been so from the beginning. One of the great Christians of the\napostolic age admonished his converts against \"forsaking the assembling\nof themselves together,\" and that admonition has always been heeded. No\nother religion has brought people together so constantly and in so many\nways as Christianity has done. Christian people are always getting\ntogether, to pray together, to sing together, to partake together of the\nsacraments, to listen together to the teaching of the pulpit, to study\nthe Bible together, to take counsel together about their work, to unite\ntheir efforts, in manifold co\u00f6perations, for the upbuilding of the\nKingdom. They have even come to believe--and they are profoundly right\nabout it--that it is a good thing for people to come together just for\nthe sake of being together, even when no distinctly religious business\nassembles them. To establish and promote pleasant and amicable social\nrelations between human beings is a Christian thing to do. It is a sign\nof the progress of the Kingdom, and a preparation for it, when men and\nwomen enjoy meeting one another for no other reason than that they like\nto be together. It is a condition of the manifestation of the love which\nis the fulfilling of all law. The stranger, as many languages testify,\nis apt to be the enemy. The chief reason why he is dreaded and hated is\nthat he is not known. Acquaintance allays suspicion and promotes\nsympathy and kindness.\n\nNot the least of the services which Christianity has rendered to the\nworld may be seen in what it has accomplished in bringing human beings\ntogether socially. Setting aside its purely religious function, it has\ndone, in Europe and America, more than all other agencies put together\nto promote acquaintances and neighborly relations among men. It has\ndone, as we shall see by and by, far less than it ought to have done in\nthis direction; its failures in this department of its work have been\nmanifold and grievous; but after all this is admitted, it must still be\naffirmed that it has done most of what has been done to socialize\nmankind, and no other institution or agency is entitled to throw stones\nat it because of its deficiencies.\n\nWhen, therefore, those who read these chapters hear the criticisms and\ncavils to which I referred at the beginning, they will know how to reply\nto them.\n\nWhen they hear an argument which assumes that the church is worse than\nuseless because all social institutions are worse than useless, they may\nanswer that the reasoning is unsound, because it repudiates the deepest\nfacts of human nature; that social institutions, the church among them,\nare natural growths as truly as the cornfields and the forests.\n\nWhen they hear any one maintaining that he believes in the principles of\nChristianity but not in the social organizations which embody these\nprinciples, they may well reply that the principles of Christianity\nnaturally and inevitably embody themselves in forms of social\norganization; that you could no more prevent it than you could prevent\nlight from breaking into color or spring from coming in May; that, as a\nmatter of history, the growth of Christianity has been signalized by a\nmarvelous development of the social sentiments and habitudes which must\nfind expression in some kind of social co\u00f6peration; and that, as a\nmatter of fact, after all necessary deductions have been made, the\nchurch has been a powerful agency in developing that temper of\nlikemindedness which makes civilized society possible.\n\nThere is still another cavil to which it may be needful to refer. It is\nbased on the notion that religion, after all, is a purely individual\naffair; that it concerns only the relations between the soul and its\nGod; that therefore public worship is not only needless but unseemly.\nPrayer is sometimes described as \"the flight of one alone to the only\nOne;\" and it is sometimes contended that any other than private prayer\nis a violation of all the higher sanctities. If this were true, of\ncourse the church would be an anomaly or an imposition. And while there\nare not many who would urge this argument unfalteringly, some such\nnotion as this may be found lying at the bottom of a good many minds.\n\nThe words of Jesus, in the sixth chapter of Matthew, are sometimes\nquoted in support of this criticism upon public worship: \"And when ye\npray, ye shall not be as the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray\nin the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be\nseen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But thou,\nwhen thou prayest, enter into thine inner chamber, and having shut thy\ndoor, pray to thy Father which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth\nin secret shall recompense thee.\"[15]\n\nBut we must learn to interpret the words of Jesus as meeting the\noccasion on which they were spoken; and before we base any\ngeneralizations or rules of conduct upon them, we must bring together\nall that he said and did which bears upon the case in hand, and try to\narrive at some meaning which shall include and explain it all. When we\ntreat the utterances and acts of Jesus after this manner, we shall find\nthat no such deduction as that which we are considering can be drawn\nfrom them.\n\nWe discover, in the first place, that he himself did not always pray in\nsecret; for several of his prayers made in public places are reported\nfor us. Moreover, he told his disciples that when even two or three of\nthem were gathered together in his name, he would be in the midst of\nthem. The implication is that they would be in the habit of gathering\ntogether in his name, and that there would generally be many more than\ntwo or three of them.\n\nThe only form of prayer which he has left us is manifestly intended\nprimarily, not for secret worship, but for social worship. The pronouns\nof the \"Lord's Prayer\" are all in the plural number: \"_Our_ father who\nart in heaven;\" \"Give _us_ this day our daily bread.\" For solitary\nprayer these phrases are not suitable.\n\nWhen he went away from his disciples he left them a great promise of the\nmanifestation to them of that Spirit which had been given without\nmeasure to him; and he bade them tarry in Jerusalem until that promise\nshould be fulfilled. Accordingly they assembled, about one hundred and\ntwenty of them, in an upper room in Jerusalem, and \"continued\nsteadfastly\" in prayer together for many days. The response to this\nprayer was that outpouring of the Spirit by which the apostolic church\nwas inspired, and equipped for its work. Saint Peter told the disciples\nthat this was the gift of the ascended Christ,--the fulfillment of his\npromise to them. If this was true, it can hardly be conceived that he\ndisapproved of the common prayer in answer to which this gift had come.\n\nNor can any reasonable interpreter of his words and deeds imagine that\nhe intended his admonition in the sixth chapter of Matthew to be taken\nas a prohibition of public worship or of social prayer. Those words were\nsimply a reproof of ostentation in worship. The Pharisees, whose conduct\nhe is castigating, \"loved to pray standing in the synagogues and in the\ncorners of the streets, that they might be seen of men.\" It was a\nprivate and personal prayer, offered in a public place, to advertise the\ndevotion of the worshiper. With our private and personal prayers the\npublic has no concern; it is a manifest indelicacy to thrust them before\nthe public; the place for them is the secret chamber. Individual sins\nand sorrows and needs we all have, and when we talk with our Father\nabout them we ought to be alone with him; but we have also common sins\nand sorrows and needs, and it is well for us to be together when we talk\nwith him about them. It is therefore a gross perversion of these words\nof Jesus to quote them in condemnation of acts of public worship. His\nentire life and the example of all those who were nearest to him, as\nwell as the testimony of the best Christians in all the ages, unite to\nrender such a notion incredible.\n\nIf I have succeeded in answering the cavils which seek to discredit the\nchurch as a social organization, and especially as an agency for the\nmaintenance of social worship, let me go on to suggest some positive\nreasons for the existence of such an agency.\n\nSuch an opportunity as the church offers for social worship is essential\nto the maintenance of religion. Religious feeling the expression of\nwhich was confined to the relations between the individual and his God,\nwould become self-centred, egoistic, and morbid. If there were no\npraying but secret praying, if the social element were eliminated from\nprayer and praise, faith would take on ascetic forms, devotion would\nbecome rancid, sympathy would be smothered, and the character of the\nworshiper would be hardened and belittled. There is a place and a time,\nas we have seen, for private devotion; probably many of us make far less\nuse of it than would be good for us; but any attempt to shut our\nreligion into the closet would be suicidal. It would mould there. To\nkeep it fresh and wholesome it must be taken out into the light and air;\nthe winds of heaven must blow through it; our desires must mingle with\nthe desires of others; our voices must join with their voices; we must\nlearn to think of the needs, the struggles, the sorrows, the hopes that\nare common to us all, to put ourselves in other people's places when we\npray, to feel that our religion is a bond that binds us to our kind.\n\nThere is a kind of prayer which we could only use in the\ncloset,--intimate, personal, dealing with matters of which no one else\nhas any right to know. But there is another kind of prayer for which\nthere is no other place than the great congregation; a prayer in which\nmany pleading hearts unite; in which the sympathies and hopes and\naspirations of a thousand worshipers are blended. Such a prayer, if some\none can give it voice, is something far higher and diviner than ever\nascended from any secret shrine.\n\nIt is true that the prayer of the great assembly does not always find a\nfitting voice. It is sometimes arid and formal; it is sometimes palpably\ninsincere and perfunctory, alas for our human disabilities and\ninfirmities! The power of the leader to forget himself, to gather up\ninto his heart the common needs of those who are listening, and pour\nthem out before God, is sometimes wanting. Not seldom we may find\nourselves wishing for those forms of prayer, sanctified by centuries of\nuse, in which the Christian church, in all the lands of earth, has made\nknown its requests to God. These are always dignified and reverent;\nevery truly devout heart may find utterance for some of its deepest\nneeds in the petitions of the Book of Common Prayer. But most of us have\nheard prayers in the sanctuary which lifted and kindled us as no written\nprayers could ever do. If the leader of the devotions could be \"in the\nSpirit on the Lord's day;\" if he could forget himself; if the simplicity\nwhich is in Christ could take possession of his thought, if he could\nlook over the company round about him before he closed his eyes, and\nwith a swift glance could glean out of that field of human experience\nsome inkling of the trials, the perplexities, the griefs, the struggles,\nthe tragedies of the lives there before him, and with a great, fervent,\nenergizing[16] prayer could carry them all up to God, there would be\nsomething in that which would convince all who were listening that the\nhighest form of prayer is not secret prayer, but social prayer. Nor is\nit an uncommon thing to hear, even in humble pulpits, prayer which\neffectually meets this great demand.\n\nIt goes without saying that, for the highest forms of praise, we must\nhave the conspiring voices of the great congregation. We cannot let\nloose the hallelujahs in the closet; that would be almost as unseemly as\nto pray on the street corner. If the Bible is any guide as to the forms\nwhich our worship should take, praise must constitute a large part of\nit. And praise is mainly a social act.\n\nEven the preaching gathers much of its impressiveness from the\ncongregation. The message which stirs the hearts of five hundred\nworshipers would make much less impression upon any one of them if he\nheard it alone. It could not be given to him alone, as it is given to\nthe five hundred; that is a psychological impossibility. There is\nsomething in it when the five hundred hear it that is not in it when the\nsingle auditor hears it, and that something is, far and away, the best\nthing that it contains.\n\nAll these considerations show that public worship is essential to the\nvigorous maintenance of true religion. The elements which it supplies to\nreligion are vital elements. Let no man imagine that by reading the\nBible and good books at home, and by worshiping in his closet, or, as\nsome are fond of saying, \"in God's first temples,\" the life of religion\ncan be successfully maintained. It never has been maintained in that\nway, and it never will be. When men forsake the assembling of themselves\ntogether for worship, there is no more reading the Bible and good books\nat home, and no more praying in the closet, much less in the woods.\nSingle individuals might, if the religious atmosphere of the community\nwere kept vital round about them, continue to enjoy religion. Invalids\nare often forced to deprive themselves of social worship; but if they\nare there in spirit, something of the benefit finds them. But a\ncommunity which deliberately abandoned social worship would be a\ncommunity in which no private worship would long be maintained.\n\nIf, then, we agree that religion is an essential element in the life of\nmankind, we must see that it is necessary that some institution should\nexist which shall make provision for social and public worship. The\nChristian church undertakes primarily to fulfill this function. It has\nother large and important relations to society, of which we shall speak\nfurther on. But this is its first concern. I hope that it has been made\nevident in this discussion that it is a very important function. I hope\nthat those who read these pages may be able to see that if we are to\nhave any religion in our land, the kind of work which the church\nundertakes to do cannot be neglected. That the church is not doing this\nwork as well as it ought to be done is true enough; we shall have all\nthat before us presently; but the vital necessity of the work is not\ntherefore disproved. The work would be better done if those who now hold\naloof, because they see its defects, would put their lives into the\nbusiness of mending them.\n\nThere are very few men and women, after all, in our modern society, who\ndo not say, without hesitation, that we must have churches; that it\nwould not do to let them die; that they are essential to the social\nwelfare; that, imperfect as they are, they supply a need which every one\ncan recognize. They have no hesitation, either, in admitting that if\nthere are to be churches, somebody must belong to them, and share the\nresponsibility for their maintenance. But when the question is asked,\n\"If somebody must, why must not you?\" a good many of them are not able\nto give a very clear answer. Very often the excuse that is set up is\nsome form of theological dissent. But that is not, in many cases, a\nserious barrier. It might shut some men out of some churches; but there\nare great varieties of creeds, and the conditions of membership in some\nchurches are so simple that no really earnest man is likely to feel\nhimself excluded. If it is essential that the work of the church be\ndone, and if the reader of these pages has not convinced himself that he\nis exempt from the common human obligations, then he can find, if he is\nin earnest, some church with which he can conscientiously ally himself,\nand in whose work he can bear a part.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\nThe Business of the Church\n\n\n\nWe have seen that religion is a social fact; that religious feeling\ncreates social organizations, and is preserved and promoted by them. God\nis love, and love is social attraction; the children of God, who are\nmade in his image, must find in their hearts a tendency to get together\nand worship and work together.\n\nWe find here a reciprocating action. An apple seed produces a tree which\nin its turn produces apples with seeds. So the religious impulse\norganizes the church, and the church cultivates and propagates religious\nimpulses. The point to be emphasized is that religion, and especially\nthe Christian religion, is inseparable from social forms; that its\nnatural result is to bring human beings together in co\u00f6perative groups.\n\nIt is the business of life to organize matter; there is no life without\norganization; the inorganic is the lifeless. These are facts which\nshould be borne in mind by those who approve of the religious life but\nobject to religious organizations. If religion is life, it will create\norganic forms.\n\nIn our last chapter we showed how worship, in its highest expression, is\nessentially social, and how impossible it would be to maintain it\nwithout the aid of institutions having the same essential purpose as the\nChristian church. Let us turn our thought now to the other great\nfunction of the church, the regeneration of human society.\n\nReligion cannot be kept alive without alliance with the social forces;\nthe social forces cannot be kept in healthful operation without the aid\nof religion. Neither blade of a pair of shears will cut without the\nother. You cannot raise corn without seed, and you can only get seed\nfrom corn.\n\nReligion is not an ultimate fact. When men are religious just for the\nsake of being religious, their religion is good for nothing. Religion is\nfor character. Its end is gained when it has made us good men and women.\nReligion is for service. It finds its justification in the work that it\ncan do in making a better world of this. Jesus gave us the truth about\nit when he said, \"The Sabbath was made for man and not man for the\nSabbath.\" And he carried the truth forward to a larger application when\nhe said, \"I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.\"\n\n\"_To save the world._\" That was the errand of the Christ; that is the\nbusiness of his church. It is not merely to save a certain number of\npeople out of the world, and to get them safely away to another world;\nit is to save the world.\n\nThere is no danger of giving to this phrase too wide an application. We\nare entitled to the expectation that this salvation is to have a large\nscope; that it is to include the earth and all its tribes of life. When\nwe speak of making a better world of this, we ought to mean the physical\nworld as well as the social world and the moral world. It is a true\ninsight of faith which makes the poet say:--\n\n    \"The world we live in wholly is redeemed;\n    Not man alone, but all that man holds dear:\n    His orchards and his maize: forget me not\n    And heartsease in his garden, and the wild\n    Aerial blossoms of the untamed wood,\n    That make its savagery so homelike; all\n    Have felt Christ's sweet love watering their roots:\n    His sacrifice has won both earth and heaven.\n    Nature in all its fullness is the Lord's.\n    There are no Gentile oaks, no Pagan pines;\n    The grass beneath oar feet is Christian grass;\n    The wayside weed is sacred unto him.\n    Have we not groaned together, herbs and men,\n    Struggling through stifling earth-weights unto light,\n    Earnestly longing to be clothed upon\n    With one high possibility of bloom?\n    And He, He is the Light, He is the Sun\n    That draws us out of darkness, and transmits\n    The noisome earth-damp into Heaven's own breath,\n    And shapes our matted roots, we know not how,\n    Into fresh leaves, and strong, fruit-bearing stems;\n    Yea, makes us stand, on some consummate day,\n    Abloom in white transfiguration robes.\"\n\nThis vital sympathy between man and his environment is never lost sight\nof by the great prophets. The redemption of man must mean, as they\nclearly see, the redemption of the world in which man lives. When the\ndrunkard is reformed, the house which he inhabits puts on a new face and\nthere are flowers instead of weeds in his garden. Isaiah knew that when\nhis people were redeemed from their captivity, the wilderness and the\nparched land would be glad and the desert would rejoice and blossom as\nthe rose.\n\nThat wonderful passage in the eighth chapter of the Romans shows how\nstrongly Paul had grasped the old prophetic idea; he beholds the whole\ncreation humiliated and disfigured by its share in man's degeneration,\nand waiting to be delivered with man from the bondage of corruption\ninto the liberty of the glory of the children of God. That expectation\nis yet to be realized. It is an essential part of the Christian\nexpectation. It is part of what redemption means.\n\nTrue, it is that by the selfishness and thoughtlessness of man large\nportions of the earth's surface have been despoiled; mountains have been\ndenuded of their forests; fertile lands have been worn out, and fruitful\nfields have become wildernesses. But we are beginning to reverse this\ntendency, and now many a wilderness is being reclaimed, arid plains are\ngreen with corn, and the forests are creeping back upon the hillsides.\nAs men become socialized, as they learn to co\u00f6perate for the common\ngood, as some sense of their social responsibility gets possession of\ntheir minds, we shall see this process extending; the waste of the\ncommon resources of the earth will cease; deserts will be visited by the\nlife-giving water; swamps and jungles will be subdued; the earth, in\nmany regions now uninhabited and desolate, will be made to bring forth\nand bud that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater.\n\nAll this is the natural result of the quickening in human hearts of the\nsocial sentiments, by which they are drawn into closer co\u00f6peration for\nthe common good; and this quickening of the social sentiments is the\nwork that Christ came to do, and the work that his church will be doing,\nwith all her might, as soon as she fully understands what is her\nbusiness in the world.\n\nThe redemption of the physical order will be the result of the\nsocialization of mankind. It is an integral part of the work that Christ\ncame into the world to do. It is part of what he meant when he said that\nhe came to save the world. When we realize this, we get some idea of the\nscope of the redemption which he proclaims. It is not a superficial or a\nsentimental thing that he proposes; it takes hold of life with the most\ncomprehensive grasp; it proposes to redeem not only man but his\nenvironment.\n\nIt is not, however, the redemption of the physical order to which Christ\nprimarily addresses himself. He begins in the spiritual realm. He begins\nwith the individual. His first concern is to reveal to every child of\nGod the great fact of the divine Fatherhood, and to bring him into\nfilial relations. His whole programme for humanity rests on this simple\npossibility of realizing the Fatherhood of God. If this can be realized,\neverything else will follow. If any man is in the right filial relations\nwith his Father in heaven, he cannot be in wrong social relations with\nhis brother on the earth. If he is in harmony with God in thought and\nfeeling, he must think God's thoughts about his neighbor, and the law of\nlove will be the law of all his conduct. No man can love the God and\nFather of our Lord Jesus Christ with heart and soul and mind without\nloving his neighbor as himself. Heartily to believe what Jesus has told\nus about the Father, and fully to enter into fellowship with him, is to\nput ourselves into such relations with our fellow men that every duty we\nowe them will be spontaneously performed. In a society composed of men\nwho were thus in harmony with God the only social question for each man\nwould be, \"How can I best befriend and serve my neighbor?\"\n\nThat the religion of Jesus begins here, in the heart of the individual,\ncannot be questioned. And it must never be forgotten that there can be\nno sound social construction which does not build on this foundation.\nBut it is well to remember also that here, as everywhere, a foundation\ncalls for a building, and is useless and unsightly and obstructive\nwithout it. The foundation of Christianity is the reconciliation of\nindividual souls to God, and the establishment of friendship between\nthese individual souls and God; but what is the structure for which this\nfoundation is laid? It is the establishment of the same divine\nfriendship among men. That is the building for which the foundation\ncalls. If the building does not go up, the foundation is worthless. If\nthe building does not go up, the foundation itself will crumble and\ndecay. The only way to save a foundation is to cover it with a building.\n\nFault might be found with the figure, but the fact which it imperfectly\nillustrates is beyond gainsaying. The right relation to God, which Jesus\nalways makes fundamental, cannot be maintained except as it issues in\nright relations with men. Here is the apostle John's blunt way of\nputting it: \"If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a\nliar; for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, cannot love\nGod whom he hath not seen. And this commandment have we from him, that\nhe who loveth God love his brother also.\"\n\nThe commandment is, in fact, only the statement of a logical necessity.\nHow could any human being enter into a loving communion with that great\nFriend whose love is always brooding over our race, who is seeking to do\nus good and not evil all the days of our lives, who is kind even to the\nunthankful and the evil,--and not be a lover of his fellow men and a\nservant of all their needs?\n\nIt is evident, therefore, that a religion which has no room in it for\nsocial questions cannot be the Christian religion. The social question\nis the one question which Christianity--genuine Christianity--never\nceases to ask. The first thing it wishes to know about your religious\nexperience is, how it affects your relations with your fellow men. It\ninsists that your relations must first be right with God, but in the\nsame breath it declares that there is no way of knowing whether or not\nyour relations are right with God except by observing how you behave\namong your fellow men. Faith is the root, but faith without works is\ndead, being alone; and works concern your human relations.\n\nThese principles enable us to determine what is the business of the\nchurch. Its business is to foster and propagate Christianity, and\nChristianity exists to establish in this world the kingdom of heaven.\nThe church is not, therefore, an end in itself; it is an instrument; it\nis a means employed by God for the promotion, in the world, of the\nkingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven is not an ecclesiastical\nestablishment; it includes the whole of life,--business, politics, art,\neducation, philanthropy, society in the narrow sense, the family: when\nall these shall be pervaded and controlled by the law of love, then the\nkingdom of heaven will have fully come. And the business of the church\nin the world is to bring all these departments of life under Christ's\nlaw of love. If it seeks to convert men, it is that they may be filled\nwith the spirit of Christ and may govern their conduct among men by\nChrist's law. If it gathers them together for instruction or for\ninspiration, it is that they may be taught Christ's way of life and sent\nout into the world to live as he lived among their fellow men. Its\nfunction is to fill the world with the knowledge of Christ, the love of\nChrist, the life of Christ. That is what Christ meant by saving the\nworld. The world is saved when this is true of it, and it is never saved\ntill then. The work of the church is successful just to the extent to\nwhich it succeeds in Christianizing the social order in the midst of\nwhich it stands.\n\nIf by means of its ministrations, the community round about the church\nis steadily becoming more Christian; if kindness, sympathy, purity,\njustice, good-will, are increasing in their power over the lives of men;\nif business methods are becoming less rapacious; if employers and\nemployed are more and more inclined to be friends rather than foes; if\npoliticians are growing conscientious and unselfish; if the enemies of\nsociety are in retreat before the forces of decency and order; if\namusements are becoming purer and more rational; if polite society is\ngetting to be simpler in its tastes and less ostentatious in its manners\nand less extravagant in its expenditures; if poverty and crime are\ndiminishing; if parents are becoming more wise and firm in the\nadministration of their sacred trust, and children more loyal and\naffectionate to their parents,--if such fruits as these are visible on\nevery side, then there is reason to believe that the church knows its\nbusiness and is prosecuting it with efficiency. If none of these effects\nare seen in the life of the community, the evidence is clear that the\nchurch is neglecting its business, and that failure must be written\nacross its record.\n\nEven though it be true that large numbers are added to its membership,\nthat its congregations are crowded, its revenues abundant, its\nmissionary contributions liberal, and its social prestige high; yet if\nthe standards of social morality in its neighborhood are sinking rather\nthan rising, and the general social drift and tendency is toward\nanimalism and greed and luxury and strife, the church must be pronounced\na failure: nay, even if it be believed that the church is succeeding in\ngetting a great many people safely to heaven when they die; yet if the\nsocial tendencies in the world about it are all downward, its work, on\nthe whole, must be regarded as a failure. Its main business is not\nsaving people out of the world, it is saving the world. When it is\nevident that the world, under its ministration, is growing no better but\nrather worse, no matter what other good things it may have the credit of\ndoing, the verdict is against it.\n\nThis judgment rests, of course, against the collective church of the\ncommunity or the nation, rather than against any local congregation. It\nmay be that there are a hundred churches in a city, and that ten of them\nare working efficiently to leaven society with Christian ideas and\nprinciples, while the other ninety are content to fill up their\nmembership lists and furnish the consolations of religion to the people\nwho make up their congregations. The church of that city would probably\nbe a failure, but the ten congregations which had accepted Christ's idea\nof the church and were striving to realize it could not be charged with\nthe failure. They would have done what they could to prevent it. If the\nrest had been working in the same way, the results would have been\ndifferent.\n\nThe point on which attention must be fixed is simply this, that the test\nof the efficiency of the church must be found in the social conditions\nof the community to which it ministers. Its business is to Christianize\nthat community. There is no question but that the resources are placed\nwithin its reach by which this business may be done. If it is done, the\nchurch may hope to hear the commendation, \"Well done, good and faithful\nservant!\" If it is not done, no matter how many other gains are made,\nthe church must expect the condemnation of its Master.\n\nIt must not be gathered from this argument that the church in modern\nlife is a failure. There may be discouraging signs, reasons for\nsolicitude; but it may appear, after all, that the signs are on the\nwhole encouraging. We are not maintaining that the social tendencies in\nmodern society are all downward; far from it. We are simply pointing out\nthat it is only by observing these tendencies that we can judge whether\nor not the church is fulfilling its mission.\n\nIt is greatly to be feared, however, that many of the churches of the\npresent day fail to apply this test to themselves. Their social\nresponsibility is by no means so clear to them as it ought to be.\nIndeed, there are not a few among them that spurn it altogether,\ndeclaring that their business is to save souls; that the condition of\nthe social order is no concern of theirs.\n\nThere is some reason to believe that phrases of this kind are often used\nwithout due consideration of their meaning. What is meant by the saving\nof a soul? Is not the one sin from which souls need to be saved the sin\nof selfishness? Is not the death that threatens the souls of men, from\nwhich we seek to rescue them, simply the result of the violation of\nChrist's law of love? What is salvation but bringing them back to\nobedience of this law? And this law finds expression in the social\norder--can find expression nowhere else. It is the law of our social\nrelations. What possible evidence can you have that a soul is saved\nuntil you see it entering into social relations and behaving properly in\nthem?\n\nIt is to be feared that these very simple truths are not always so well\nunderstood as they should be. There is a notion that salvation is\nsomething metaphysical, or legal, or sentimental; that it consists in\nthe belief of certain propositions or the experience of certain\nemotions. But all this is delusive and puerile. If it is with the heart\nthat man believeth, he \"believeth _unto righteousness_;\" that is the\ndestination of his faith; and unless his faith goes that way and reaches\nthat goal, there is no salvation in it. Righteousness is the result of\nsaving faith; and \"he that _doeth_ righteousness is righteous\"--none\nelse. Righteousness is right relations--first with God, and then with\nmen. And no man can have any evidence that he is in right relations with\nGod except as he finds himself in right relations with men.\n\nThe message of Christianity, we often hear it said, is to the\nindividual. Yes, it is; and what is the message of Christianity to the\nindividual? The first thing that it tells him is that he is not, in\nstrictness, an individual, any more than a hand or a foot or an eye or\nan ear is an individual; that he is a member of a body; that he derives\nall that is highest and most essential in his life from the life of\nhumanity, to which he is vitally and organically related; that no man\nliveth to himself; that his good is not, and can never be, an exclusive\npersonal good,--that it is in what he shares with all the rest. The doom\nfrom which Christianity seeks to save the individual is the doom of\nmoral individualism; the blessedness into which it seeks to lead him is\nthe blessedness of love.\n\nThus it appears that even these cant phrases by which the church\nsometimes tries to fence itself off from the world into a pietistic\nreligiousness that has little or nothing to do with life, all point,\nwhen you get their real significance, to a relation between the church\nand the social order so close and vital that any attempt to sever the\nbond must be fatal to the life of both. The church is in the world to\nsave the world; that is its business; and it can never know whether it\nis succeeding in its business unless it keeps a vigilant eye on all that\nis going on in the world, and shapes its activities to secure in the\nworld right social relations among men.\n\nIn what manner the church is to carry forward this work of\nChristianizing society is a practical question calling for great wisdom.\nIt may not be needful that the church should undertake to organize the\nindustrial or political or domestic or philanthropic machinery of\nsociety. Its business is not, ordinarily, to construct social machinery;\nits business is to furnish social motive power. It is the dynamic of\nsociety for which it is responsible. But the dynamic which it furnishes\nmust be a _dynamic which will create the machinery_. Life makes its own\nforms. And the church must fill society with a kind of life which will\nproduce such forms of co\u00f6peration as shall secure the prevalence of\njustice and friendship, of peace and good-will among men. It may not be\nrequired to look after details, but it must make sure of the results. If\nthe results are secured, if society is Christianized, if the social\norder is producing a better breed of men, if the business of the world\ngoes on more and more smoothly, and all things are working together to\nincrease the sum of human welfare, then the church may be sure that the\nlife which she is contributing to the vitalization of society is the\nlife that is life indeed. But if the social tendencies are all in the\nother direction, then she should awaken to the fact that the light that\nis in her must be darkness, and that the responsibility for this failure\nlies at her doors.\n\nIt is the recognition and acceptance of this responsibility for which we\nare pleading. That the church, in all the ages, has very imperfectly\ncomprehended this responsibility is a lamentable fact. What the social\naims of Jesus himself were, most of us can fairly understand. The Sermon\non the Mount indicates to us the kind of society which he expected to\nsee established on the earth. He never defined the kingdom of heaven,\nwhich he bade us seek first, but he described it in so many ways that we\nknow very well what manner of society it would be. But the church which\nhas called itself by his name has but feebly grasped the truth he\ntaught. As a late writer has said: \"As soon as the thoughts of a great\nspiritual leader pass to others and form the animating principle of a\nparty, or school, or sect, there is an inevitable drop. The disciples\ncannot keep pace with the sweep of the Master. They flutter where he\nsoared. They coarsen and materialize his dreams.... This is the tragedy\nof all who lead. The farther they are in advance of their times, the\nmore they will be misunderstood and misrepresented by the very men who\nswear by their name and strive to enforce their ideas and aims. If the\nfollowers of Jesus had preserved his thought and spirit without leakage,\nevaporation, or adulteration, it would be a fact unique in history.\"[17]\n\nThat his disciples held fast so many of the ideas and impulses he\nimparted to them, and that they have been turned to so large account in\nthe reconstruction of the social order, is matter for profound\nthankfulness. But much of this has been indirectly wrought; the\nChristian elements which appear in the industrial order of to-day are\nlargely of the nature of by-products. It can hardly be said that the\nchurch of Jesus Christ has ever, in any age, consciously and clearly set\nbefore herself the business which he committed to her hands. She has\nalways been putting the emphasis somewhere else than where he put it;\nshe has always been doing something else instead of the great task which\nhe began and left her to finish. It is the great failure of history--the\nturning aside of the Christian church from the work of Christianizing\nthe social order, and the expenditure of her energies, for nineteen\ncenturies, on other pursuits.\n\nThe writer from whom I quoted devotes a very interesting chapter to the\nreasons why the church has never attempted the work of social\nreconstruction. He shows that it would have been almost impossible in\nthe early Christian centuries for the Christians to have undertaken any\nwork of social reform; if, under the rigors of the Roman despotism, they\nhad meddled with politics, they would have lost their heads. Then they\nbegan to look for a miraculous return of Jesus to set up his kingdom in\nthe world, and they waited for him to reconstruct the social order. That\nexpectation held them for a thousand years. When it failed, they turned\ntheir thoughts to heaven, and \"as the eternal life came to the front in\nChristian hope the kingdom of God receded to the background, and with it\nwent much of the social potency of Christianity. The kingdom of God was\na social and collective hope, and it was for this earth. The eternal\nlife was an individualistic hope, and it was not for this earth. The\nkingdom of God involved the social transformation of humanity. The hope\nof eternal life, as it was then held, was the desire to escape from this\nworld and be done with it.\" And this led to the ascetic tendency, which\nmade men think this world not worth mending. Then came in the paganizing\ninfluences of the Middle Ages, which made ritual the supreme thing and\nparalyzed the ethical motive; and then followed the controversies about\ndogma, which deadened the life of the church, until finally the great\necclesiasticism was developed, and the church, instead of being the\ninstrument for the Christianization of the world, became an empire in\nitself, separate from the world, arrogating to itself all the honors and\npowers of the kingdom of God. \"By that substitution,\" says Professor\nRauschenbusch, \"the church could claim all service and absorb all\nsocial energies. It has often been said that the church interposed\nbetween man and God. It also interposed between man and humanity. It\nmagnified what he did for the church and belittled what he did for\nhumanity. It made its own organization the chief object of social\nservice[18].\"\n\nThis is only a hint of the process by which the church has been\ndeflected from its course, and hindered from undertaking, with conscious\npurpose and consecrated power, her own proper work. She has done many\nother things, some beautiful and excellent things, but the one thing she\nwas sent to do she has not done.\n\nIt is only in our own time that she has begun to get hold of the true\nconception of her business in the world. That the church is here to seek\nfirst the kingdom of God and his righteousness, to concentrate her\nenergies upon realizing the kingdom of God in the world, now begins to\nbe evident to men of insight; and there is a loud call upon her to\nbestir herself and take up this work so long neglected, and give to it\nall her energies. That is the meaning of the cry, \"Back to Christ,\"\nwhich we are hearing in this generation. It means that the church needs\nto get into sympathy with its Leader and Lord, to try to understand his\nsocial aims, and to understand what he meant when he bade us seek first\nthe kingdom of God and his righteousness.\n\nTwo or three practical suggestions may be ventured here to those who\nhave followed this argument.\n\nWe have seen that, since religion is a permanent need of human nature,\nand since the church is indispensable to the maintenance of religion, it\nbecomes the duty of good men and women to ally themselves with the\nchurch and help to make it efficient. But there are churches and\nchurches. We cannot help noting, as we look over the community, some\nchurches which at least dimly understand their business, and some which\nobviously do not.\n\nSome of us may be connected by birth or confession with churches that do\ncomprehend their true function. If so, let us rejoice in that fact, and\ngive our strength to the support of such churches in their work. It is,\nfar and away, the most important work that is being done in the world at\nthe present day. If we can have part in it, we ought to rejoice in that\nprivilege.\n\nWe may be connected with churches which do not understand their\nbusiness. Possibly we may think that the best thing for us to do is to\ncome out of them, and seek fellowship with churches more enlightened.\nLet us think two or three times before we decide upon this. Perhaps the\nbest thing we can do is to stay where we are and use our best endeavors,\nmodestly and patiently, to bring our own church to a realization of its\nresponsibilities.\n\nWe may not be identified with any church. If we are not, then it is\nclearly the part of wisdom for each one to find the church which seems\nto him to understand its business best, and to give the strength of his\nlife to making its life vigorous and its work efficient.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\nIs the Church Decadent?\n\n\n\nThe assertion is often made that the church is an effete institution;\nthat its usefulness is past; that it is sinking into innocuous\ndesuetude. That assertion has been current for a thousand years--perhaps\nlonger; there have been many periods in which it was urged much more\nconfidently than it is to-day. This fact would suggest caution in\npressing such a judgment. Wise physicians do not hastily pronounce the\nword of doom. They have seen too many patients return from the gates of\ndeath. Men and women who, in their younger days, appear to have a\nslender hold on life, often reach a vigorous old age. The same thing is\ntrue of institutions. It is not prudent to assume that because they are\nailing they are moribund.\n\nThe Christian church, as we have seen, is far from being in perfect\nspiritual condition. Some of her symptoms are disquieting. But even as\nwe often have good hope for our friends when their health is impaired,\nand find that there are good reasons for our hope, so we need not\ndespair of the recovery of the church from the morbid conditions which\nwe acknowledge and deplore. That the patient has a good constitution and\nsurprising vitality is indicated by the experience of nineteen\ncenturies. More than once, through this long lifetime, she has been in a\nworse way than she is to-day, but she has rallied, and returned to her\nwork with new vigor.\n\nAt the beginning of the sixteenth century her case seemed to be\ndesperate; but heroic remedies were used, and while the cure was far\nfrom complete, and did not reach the root of the malady, there was at\nleast a partial recovery. In England at the beginning of the eighteenth\ncentury, and in America at the end of the same century, the symptoms\nwere alarming; but she lived through those critical periods, and has\ndone better work since than ever before.\n\nThat the work of the church has been sadly misdirected; that she has\noften put the emphasis in the wrong place; that while she has been doing\nmany things that were worth doing she has largely left undone the main\nthing she was sent to do, was made plain by our study in the last\nchapter. And there can be no doubt that this misdirection of her\nenergies, and this failure to exercise her strength in normal ways, have\nresulted in many morbid conditions, some of which she has partly\novercome, but from some of which she is still suffering.\n\nWith the disorders from which the church has suffered in past\ngenerations we need not now concern ourselves. But the weaknesses and\nailments of the present time demand our attention. We must know what\nthey are that we may help to cure them. That responsibility rests upon\nus all. If the church is to be made whole, it must be by the intelligent\nand normal action of the men and women who are members of the church. We\nmust know, to begin with, what health is, and what is disease; we must\nhave some clear idea of what would be the normal condition of Christian\nsociety.\n\nMen sometimes mistake conditions of disease for conditions of health. In\ncases of nervous breakdown, patients are often spurred on, by the malady\nitself, to work when they ought to rest. The less able to work they are,\nthe harder they work. They do not know that this restless activity is a\nsign of disease, they think it is proof of abounding vitality. And there\nare many ways in which morbid conditions tend to propagate themselves.\nThe instinctive impulses of an invalid are not safe guides. Yet there\nare many cases in which, even if the man is not his own medical adviser,\nhe must have an intelligent idea of what ails him, in order that he may\nbe able to follow medical advice, and adopt the regimen which leads to\nhealth. His reason must be summoned to discern and resist his morbid\nimpulses, and keep himself in the ways of life.\n\nEqually true is it that if the church, which is the body of Christ, is\nout of health, the men and women who are the members of that body must\nknow what ails them, and how to supply the remedy. And when they summon\ntheir reason and seek to have it divinely enlightened, they are likely\nto discover that many of their worst disorders are conditions which they\nhave been cherishing; that some of the things they have been most proud\nof are ills that they must pray and work to be rid of.\n\n\n1. The first and the worst of the church's infirmities is unbelief. In\none of the moments of vision, when the long obscuration of his light in\nthe future centuries was revealed to him, Jesus sadly wondered whether,\nwhen the Son of Man came, he would find faith on the earth. The pathetic\nquery has always been pertinent. Faith is the vital force of\nChristianity, and the weakening of that vital force is the prime cause\nof all its disorders.\n\nThe unbelief which brings enfeeblement and decay to the church of Christ\nis not, however, the kind of unbelief which the church is most apt to\nreprove.\n\nThere is, doubtless, in the church of to-day some weakening of faith in\nthe historical facts of the Christian religion, and in the central\ndoctrines of the Christian creed. Science and criticism have rendered\nincredible some statements which once were universally accepted.\nConsiderable revision of theological belief has been found necessary,\nand it is probable that in this process the hold of some upon the\ncentral verities has been relaxed.\n\nIt may even be that the theories of some Christian confessors respecting\nthe person of Christ have been modified, so that his humanity is more\nstrongly affirmed than once it was. To some persons this change of\nemphasis may seem to be a serious form of unbelief.\n\nAdmitting all this, however, these intellectual changes are not the\nprincipal cause of the enfeeblement of the church. These changes,\nhowever we may regard them, have affected but a small minority of the\nmembers of our churches; the great majority of them continue to hold\nsubstantially the same theological opinions that they have always held.\nThe trouble with the church is not chiefly a lack of faith in the\ncreeds, it is a lack of faith in Christ. And it is not a lack of faith\nin the metaphysical theories of Christ's person, but a lack of faith in\nthe truth of his teaching. It is an unbelief in which the most orthodox\npeople are quite as much involved as those who are considered heretics.\n\nThe central question is not, after all, what we think about the nature\nof Christ. There is good reason to believe that none of the twelve\napostles held, during the life of our Lord, opinions which would be\nregarded as orthodox concerning his person. They believed that he was a\ngreat Prophet, a revealer of God; nay, they believed that he was the\nMessiah, the long promised King, who was to set up his kingdom in this\nworld. Of this they had no doubt. This was the belief that Jesus himself\nsought to fasten in their minds; and when he had drawn from Simon Peter\na confession of this faith he cried out, \"Blessed art thou, Simon son of\nJohn; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father\nwhich is in heaven.\" It was this faith in him as Lord and Ruler of men,\nas the Founder in this world of a kingdom of righteousness and peace, on\nwhich, as he declared, his church should be builded. Such faith as this\nthese twelve men had. They would have found it difficult, probably, to\nassent to the Nicene Creed or the Athanasian Creed; but they believed in\nJesus as Lord and King, and they believed every word of his Magna Charta\nfound in the Sermon on the Mount; and they were ready to do what they\ncould to establish that kingdom in this world. It is just here that the\nfaith of the church is lacking. It believes the Nicene Creed, but it\ndoes not believe the Sermon on the Mount. It believes what men have said\nabout Christ; it does not believe what Christ himself said. It does not\naccept the practical rule of life which he has laid down. It does not\nbelieve that the Golden Rule is workable in modern life. It does not\nbelieve that it is feasible to love our neighbors as ourselves. It does\nnot believe in the kingdom of heaven as a present possibility. It\nexpects that Christ will come, by and by, in person, with miraculous\npower, to revolutionize society, and that after that it will be\npracticable to follow the law of love, in all our human relations; but,\nfor the present, we must let the law of competition control all our\npractical affairs.\n\nOf course it is not often that the teachings of Christ are directly\ncontroverted; they are generally ignored, or passed by, as \"counsels of\nperfection\" which we are to admire rather than obey. But we sometimes\nfind arguments in which disbelief in the teachings of Jesus is\ndistinctly justified. In a late volume, one of the great leaders of the\nGerman church elaborately contends that we cannot follow Jesus in his\nsocial teachings. \"Our attitude toward the world,\" says Herrmann,\n\"cannot be that of Jesus; even the purpose to will that it should be so\nis stifled in the air that we breathe to-day. The state of affairs is\nvery clearly described by Naumann, who says with truth: 'Therefore we do\nnot seek Jesus' advice on points connected with the management of the\nstate and political economy.' But when he goes on to say: 'I give my\nvote and I canvass for the fleet, not because I am a Christian, but\nbecause I am a citizen, and because I have learned to renounce all hope\nof finding fundamental questions of state determined in the Sermon on\nthe Mount,' we can detect a fallacy. He regards as painful renunciation\nwhat ought, on the part of the Christian, to be a free, decisive, and\nvoluntary act.\"[19]\n\nNaumann repudiates, rather regretfully, the counsels of Jesus about\neconomic and civil affairs, but Herrmann says that he does it\nlight-heartedly, because he has found out that these counsels are not\napplicable to existing conditions.\n\nIt is evident that these counsels must be rationally applied,--the\nspirit and not the letter of them is the essential thing; but what these\nteachers mean is more than this. How far they have departed from the\nspirit of the Sermon on the Mount is indicated by the words already\nquoted. The reason why Naumann does not seek the advice of Jesus in\nquestions of public concern is that he is determined to give his vote\nand influence for the German fleet; and Herrmann is following the same\nimpulse when he characterizes the call for the disarmament of the\nnations as a \"noble folly.\" It is evident that the reason why these\nteachers feel that the way of Jesus is impracticable is that they are\nfully committed to the ideas of German imperialism. To conceive that\nnations could dispense with war is a \"noble folly.\" And, for the same\nreason, they conceive that any attempt to substitute co\u00f6peration for\ncompetition in the industrial world would be disastrous to modern\nsociety. The morality of strife outranks, in their judgment, the\nmorality of service and sacrifice. The law of Jesus may be permitted to\nhold some subordinate place; it will be found useful in mitigating the\nsavagery of strife; but as the regulative principle of the industrial\norder it is not to be considered.\n\nThe attempt of these German theologians to frame a philosophical\nrefutation of the Sermon on the Mount gives us something of a shock;\nbut, practically, this has been the attitude of the church in all the\ngenerations. The hopeful sign is that it does now give us a shock to\nhave the doctrine badly stated.\n\nThrough a large part of the Christian era the teaching of Jesus with\nrespect to strife has been flouted by the church. The bitterest and most\nwasteful wars have been religious wars. The disciples of the Prince of\nPeace saw no incongruity in the settlement by the sword of such\nquestions as whether Jesus Christ was of the same substance as the\nFather or of a similar substance; and whether the cup should be\nadministered to the laity in the Eucharist or only the bread. The Thirty\nYears' war in Europe was a religious war. Roman Catholic theories still\nmaintain the right of the church to enforce its teachings by the sword.\n\nAll these facts show how far, through all its history, the church has\ndeparted from the teaching of Jesus. When our German theologians set\nthemselves to prove that the Sermon on the Mount is no sufficient guide\nfor public affairs, they have the whole history of the church behind\nthem.\n\nNevertheless they might have noted that the drift, for the last few\ncenturies, has been in the direction of the teaching of Jesus. It is\nhardly conceivable that Christian nations should go to war to-day for\nthe settlement of points of doctrine. Three hundred years ago the whole\nchurch thought that necessary; to-day a very large part of the church\nwould think it horrible and monstrous. It is not very long ago that the\nchurch believed in the settlement by force of disputes between\nindividuals. The wager of battle was supposed to be a proper and\nChristian way of determining the guilt or innocence of an accused\nperson. To most of the great Christians of the fifteenth century the\nproposition to dispense with that would have seemed a \"noble folly,\"\njust as the proposition of general disarmament now seems to some\ntwentieth century Christians. But the church has learned that there are\nbetter ways of settling personal quarrels than the wager of battle; and\nit is likely to learn, after a while, that there are better ways of\nsettling international and industrial difficulties than the way of war.\nThe church is beginning to see that the way of Jesus is not, after all,\nso impracticable as it has always been supposed to be; it is beginning\nto discern the truth that the law of service is a stronger law than the\nlaw of strife. One of these days we shall find the church of Jesus\ntaking its stand on the Golden Rule as the practical rule of everyday\nlife, and insisting upon the organization of the industrial and the\npolitical order on the basis of good-will. When that day comes we shall\nhave a right to say that the church believes in Jesus Christ. When that\nday comes it will be evident to all that the main cause of the church's\nenfeeblement through all these centuries has been her unbelief. And we\nshall marvel that it took her so long to find out what might there is in\nmeekness and what force in gentleness; and that it was so hard for her\nto understand that the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the\nweakness of God stronger than men.\n\n2. The second of the church's chronic infirmities has been orthodoxism.\nPerhaps it was the recoil of her unbelief in Christ that sent her over\ninto the intellectual prostration of orthodoxism.\n\nOrthodoxy is defined as correct belief. But when we ask what is correct\nbelief, orthodoxy answers: \"That which is generally believed to be\ncorrect.\" Its demand is, therefore, conformity to current opinion. It\nassumes that essential truth has been sought out, registered and\ncertified once for all and finally: this you must believe, and you must\nbelieve nothing other or more than this. Of course, then, belief must\nbe stereotyped and stationary. There can be no growth of doctrine; no\nnew light can break forth from God's holy word.\n\n\"Orthodoxy begins,\" says Phillips Brooks, \"by setting a false standard\nof life. It makes men aspire after soundness in the faith rather than\nafter richness in the truth.... It makes possible an easy transmission\nof truth, but only by the deadening of truth, as a butcher freezes meat\nin order to carry it across the sea. Orthodoxy discredits and\ndiscourages inquiry, and has made the name of free thinker, which ought\nto be a crown and glory, a stigma of disgrace. It puts men in the base\nand demoralizing position in which they apologize for seeking new truth.\nIt is responsible for a large part of the defiant liberalism which not\nmerely disbelieves the orthodox dogma, but disbelieves it with a sense\nof attempted wrong and of triumphant escape. It is orthodoxy and not\ntruth which has done the persecuting. The inquisitions and dungeons and\nsocial ostracisms for opinion's sake belong to it.\"[20]\n\nIt is evident that when for loyalty to the truth is substituted loyalty\nto a prescribed statement of truth, the entire moral order is\nsubverted. Truth for me is what justifies itself to my reason and\ninsight; to that my choices must conform; by that my conduct must be\nguided. To accept statements to which my judgment does not assent, which\nare repugnant to my reason, because others seek to impose them upon me,\nis in the highest degree immoral. \"Let every man be fully persuaded in\nhis own mind,\" is the apostolic maxim.\n\nEvery honest man wants to know what is true, and seeks to have his\ncharacter and his conduct conform to the truth. But orthodoxy insists\nthat he shall limit his acceptance to fixed and definite statements\nprepared for him by others. Freedom of investigation is denied him. The\nlimits are set, beyond which his thought must not range. If there is\ntruth outside of the boundaries of orthodoxy, he must not reach out\nafter it; if he does, he shall suffer the consequences.\n\nFor there always is a penalty for heresy. Those who diverge from the\northodox standards are always exposed to some measure of censure or\ndiscredit. In former days the stake or the gallows was the penalty. John\nHuss and Michael Servetus, Ridley, Latimer, and Cranmer were put to\ndeath on the demand of orthodoxy. It was not because they were not\nlovers and seekers of truth; it was because they declined to assent to\nthe statements which authority sought to impose on them. Orthodoxy has\nfound a great variety of methods of enforcing its demand; in recent\ntimes it does not often resort to physical coercion, but it never fails\nto use some kind of pressure. Those to whom orthodoxy is dearer than\ntruth have ways of their own, even now, of making uncomfortable those to\nwhom truth is dearer than orthodoxy. Thus it is that the progress of\ntruth has been greatly impeded. \"Ye shall know the truth,\" said Jesus,\n\"and the truth shall make you free.\" \"Ye shall know,\" says orthodoxism,\n\"only the truth that has been prescribed and ticketed by authority; ye\nshall be taught what is orthodox, and orthodoxy shall keep you safe and\nsound.\" The entire attitude of the mind is changed, under this demand.\nIt is no longer that of free inquiry, of open-minded search for truth;\nit is that of passive assent, of unreasoned submission to authority.\n\nJust to the extent to which orthodoxism succeeds in forcing its demand\nis progress rendered impossible. There have always been brave men to\nwhom truth was dearer than orthodoxy, and to them we owe all the gains\nthe church has made. \"The lower orders of the church's workers, the mere\nrunners of her machinery,\" says Bishop Brooks, \"have always been strictly\nand scrupulously orthodox; while all the church's noblest servants, they\nwho have opened to her new heavens of vision and new domains of\nwork,--Paul, Origen, Tertullian, Dante, Ab\u00e9lard, Luther, Milton,\nColeridge, Maurice, Swedenborg, Martineau,--have again and again been\npersecuted for being what they truly were--unorthodox.\"[21]\n\nThe temper of coercion, physical or moral, which is an essential element\nin orthodoxism, always produces, in those who do not submit to it, the\ntemper of resentment and rebellion, which largely characterizes what is\nknown as liberalism. Those who are thus flung off into opposition are in\nno mood to examine fairly the truth that there is in orthodoxy. Their\nmental attitude is apt to be quite as unfavorable to the discovery of\nthe truth as that of the other party. Between those who affirm, with\nthe threat of the withdrawal of fellowship, and those who deny, with the\nsense of injury and oppression, the truth has a poor chance for itself\nin this world. The enfeeblement of the church, in all the generations,\nhas been largely due to this cause.\n\nWhat orthodoxism produces when it has free course and is glorified, may\nbe seen in the Greek church. More than any other branch of the Christian\nchurch the Greek church has put the emphasis upon orthodoxy. The natural\nand inevitable result has been that that church has destroyed itself and\nthe nation whose life it has dominated and blighted. It is the Greek\nchurch that has led Russia to its doom. And it is orthodoxism that has\nmade the Greek church a blind leader of the blind, and has plunged\nnation and church into the ditch together.\n\nTruth, not orthodoxy, is the sovereign mistress of the human intellect.\nWhat I must know, for my salvation, is not what everybody says, but what\nis true. There is old truth--truth that has nourished the lives of men\nin many generations; let me cling to that and feed my soul upon it.\nThere is new truth--some fuller outshining of the great revelation of\nGod, in nature or in human nature; let me hail that light and walk in\nit.\n\nIt is often useful for me to know what others have believed and now\nbelieve. Not to be influenced by the consenting voices of the great and\ngood of the past would be childish egotism. But it is always needful\nthat my mind should be open to new truth and that I should be free to\nseek it. Orthodoxism restricts this right and disparages this privilege,\nand in doing this it has greatly weakened the Christian church.\n\nSeveral other sources of weakness must be treated much more briefly.\n\n3. Sectarianism is not the least among them. To a large degree it is the\nproduct of orthodoxism. Men who venture to think for themselves are\ndriven forth from the fold of the faithful and compelled to organize in\nseparate groups. Sometimes they are not driven out, they go out and slam\nthe doors behind them. The seceders often claim a superior orthodoxy;\ntheir separation from the fold is an act of judgment on those they leave\nbehind. The responsibility for these divisions sometimes rests more\nheavily on those who go out, and sometimes on those who stay in. On the\none side or the other, often on both sides, pride of opinion is a main\nprocuring cause. Sometimes men go out because they desire to hold fast\nin peace the truth which they have found, and sometimes they are thrust\nout because they will not permit those who are within to hold fast in\npeace the truth which is their inheritance.\n\nThe ambition of leadership also figures largely. Men who are not able to\ncontrol the church to which they belong are often tempted to lead away a\nfaction in which they may be more conspicuous. Satan, according to the\nMiltonic mythology, was the founder of the first sect; and his\nphilosophy was that it was better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.\nThe leaders of many of the sects have had a similar inspiration.\n\nIt would not be true to say that all schisms have sprung from\nselfishness: they have often originated in a larger vision of the truth,\nand their testimony, which has cost them many sacrifices, has enlarged\nthe thought and enriched the life of the whole church.\n\nIt must, however, be admitted that selfishness, in the forms of ambition\nand pride of opinion, has had more to do with the multiplication of\nsects than love of the truth or loyalty to the Master. The existence of\nsuch numbers of organizations, differing from one another only in the\nmost trivial particulars, cannot be reconciled with the plain principles\nof Christian morality. There is no justification, in reason or\nconscience, for the existence of so many sorts and kinds and classes of\nChristian disciples. Even if we could admit the wisdom of the larger\ndivisions, what excuse can be offered for the endless subdivisions? What\npossible need can there be for thirteen different kinds of Baptists, and\ntwelve kinds of Mennonites, and eleven kinds of Presbyterians, and\nseventeen kinds of Methodists, and twenty-three kinds of Lutherans?\nCould any rational man maintain that these multitudinous variations on a\nsingle string represent distinctions that are useful?\n\nThe rivalries and competitions which these sectarian divisions promote\nare the scandal and the curse of Christendom. The sectarian procedure\nhabitually and brazenly sets aside the Golden Rule and pushes partisan\ninterest, with very slight regard for fairness or equity. Churches are\nall the while doing to other churches what they would not like to have\nother churches do to them. \"Every church for itself, and the angels\ntake the hindmost,\" is the sectarian motto. The competition which exists\nin the ecclesiastical realm is almost always cutthroat competition; it\ndestroys property and crowds out rivals with merciless purpose.\n\nNo argument should he needed to show that the existence of such a spirit\nand tendency in the church must cripple its power and impede its growth.\nThe sect spirit is the antithesis of the Christian spirit; the sectarian\npropaganda is an attack upon the fundamental principle of Christianity,\nwhich is unity through love. The superior loyalty of every true\nChristian is due to the kingdom of God. \"Seek first the kingdom of God\nand his righteousness!\" What makes a man a sectarian is the fact that he\nloves his sect more than the kingdom of God, and is willing that the\nkingdom of God should suffer loss in order that his sect may make a\ngain. Sectarians are doing this very thing, all over the land, every\nday.\n\nHow great have been the injuries suffered by the Christian church\nthrough the existence of this antichristian spirit of sect it would be\ndifficult to estimate. How alien it is to the spirit of Jesus Christ\none does not need to point out. It is simply amazing that the followers\nof him who prayed, in his last prayer, that his disciples might all be\none, in order that the world might believe in his divine commission,\nshould imagine that they can be pleasing Christ while they persist in\nthese childish divisions.\n\nSome sense of the shame and sin of sectarianism has, of late years, been\ngetting possession of the mind of the church, and the tendencies toward\nunity are stronger now than the tendencies toward division. Splits and\nsecessions are rare in these times; movements toward unity are\nmultiplying. All this is hopeful, but many generations of toil and\nsacrifice will be required to recover for the church the ground she has\nlost by the ravages of sectarianism.\n\n4. Only one more cause of the enfeeblement of the church can be\nmentioned here; that is her too close reliance upon the principles and\nforces of the material realm. She too often forgets whence her help must\ncome; she is too willing to go down to Egypt for her allies instead of\ntrusting in the Lord of Hosts. She cannot always understand that she is\nsafer and stronger when she puts her entire reliance on moral and\nspiritual forces; when she refuses to sacrifice truth for the revenues\nof the rich or the friendship of the strong.\n\nThe church is probably suffering more from this cause at this day than\nshe has ever suffered in any former period. She lives in the midst of\nthe abounding marvels of the materialistic civilization; she sees how\nmuch is accomplished through the use of material forces; and the spirit\nof the time gets into her brain and blood, and she begins to think that\nmoney and the things that money can buy are the most essential\nconditions of her growth and usefulness. Therefore she makes such\nfriendships and adopts such policies as will bring to her the revenues\nshe thinks she must have for the prosecution of her work. And thus her\nvision is dimmed for the truth she needs to see, and her arm is weakened\nfor the work she has to do.\n\nNo influence so insidious as this, and none so fatal, has ever assailed\nthe Christian church. She is passing through her greatest temptation. It\nis Mammon who has taken her up into an exceeding high mountain and\nshown her the kingdoms she wants to conquer and the glory she hopes to\nwin, and is saying to her: \"All these things will I give thee, if thou\nwilt fall down and worship me!\" May God grant her the grace to answer\n\"Get thee behind me, Satan; I hear the voice of one who said: Thou shall\nworship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.\"\n\nThat the church has suffered serious injury and enfeeblement from the\ncauses we have considered,--from her lack of faith, from her subjection\nto orthodoxism, from the ravages of sectarianism, from her entanglements\nwith Mammon, no one can deny. But that these evils are tending to\nincrease is not evident. There is reason rather to hope that they are\nall on the wane, unless it be the last.\n\nThat the church is far from being in perfect spiritual condition we will\nall admit. But that she is growing worse rather than better we need not\nbelieve. Most of these maladies are of long standing, but they are less\nacute now than once they were, and there is better hope of recovery.\nAbove all, we may say that the church knows to-day what ails her better\nthan she ever knew before, and that she may therefore more\nintelligently proceed to apply the needful remedies.\n\nWhat kind of treatment is called for will be the subject of the next\ndiscussion.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\nThe Coming Reformation\n\n\n\nIt would be instructive to study the attempts which the church has made,\nin past generations, to escape from the evil conditions into which she\nhas fallen. For she has been convicted more than once of her sins of\nomission, of the perversion of her powers, and the misuse of her\nopportunities, and has bestirred herself to cast off the yokes that were\noppressing her, and the bands that were impeding her progress. It cannot\nbe said that she has ever yet become fully conscious of her radical\ndefect. She has never quite clearly discovered that her enfeeblement and\nfailure are primarily due to the fact that she has been neglecting her\nreal business in the world, or making it a secondary concern. When she\ngets that truth fully before her mind, and that conviction upon her\nconscience, we may hope for better things.\n\nThere was, however, one epoch in her history when she came very near\nmaking this discovery. That was the period of the Reformation in the\nsixteenth century. What happened then is full of interest for us in\nthese days; it throws a flood of light on the problems with which we are\ndealing.\n\nWe have been taught by the historians of the Reformation to think of\nthat event as mainly a theological crisis, as an intellectual revolt\nagainst certain doctrines imposed by the church upon the faithful, or a\nrebellion against the stringency of ecclesiastical discipline. That\nissues of this nature were deeply involved in it is true; but these were\nby no means the only causes of that uprising. It was largely a social\nand economic movement. It was, in its inception, less a reaction against\nbad theology than a revolt against unchristian social conditions. What\nweighed most heavily on the people who started the uprising that we call\nthe Reformation was not theological error and confusion, it was their\npoverty, their servitude, the miseries and wrongs of their daily life.\nThey knew something of the Christ of Nazareth, and they could not\nbelieve that he meant to leave them in that condition, and therefore\nthey began to have a dim sense of the truth that the church which bore\nhis name was misrepresenting him, and needed to be reformed. This was\nthe source of the movement known as the Reformation. It was, therefore,\na sharp reminder to the church that she had wholly forgotten her main\nbusiness in the world.\n\nOne of the latest of the histories of the Reformation, that of Dr.\nThomas M. Lindsay, brings this truth into clear light. His chapter on\n\"Social Conditions\" gives us a vivid sketch of the economic and social\nforces which were operating at the end of the fifteenth and the\nbeginning of the sixteenth century.\n\nIt was the time of transition from the old system of home production and\nhome markets to the era of world-wide commerce. Under the old system,\nindustry had been largely regulated by guilds, and there was a fair\nmeasure of equality; while trade, though not extensive, was regulated by\ncivic leagues.\n\nBut the end of the fifteenth century brought the great geographical\ndiscoveries and the beginning of a world trade. \"The possibilities of a\nworld commerce,\" says Dr. Lindsay, \"led to the creation of trading\ncompanies; for a larger capital was needed than individual merchants\npossessed, and the formation of these companies overshadowed,\ndiscredited, and finally destroyed the guild system of the medi\u00e6val\ntrading cities. Trade and industry became capitalized to a degree\npreviously unknown.... This increase of wealth does not seem to have\nbeen confined to a few favorites of fortune. It belonged to the mass of\nthe members of the great trading companies.... Merchant princes\nconfronted the princes of the state and those of the church, and their\npresence and power dislocated the old social relations.\"[22]\n\nThis enormous increase of wealth manifested itself in every form of\nsenseless luxury. Of refinement there was little; pleasures were coarse,\nindulgence was beastly. \"Preachers, economists, and satirists,\" says Dr.\nLindsay, \"denounce the luxury and immodesty of the dress both of men and\nwomen, the gluttony and the drinking habits of the rich burghers and of\nthe nobility of Germany. We learn from Hans von Schweinichen that\nnoblemen prided themselves on having men among their retainers who could\ndrink all rivals beneath the table, and that noble personages seldom met\nwithout such a drinking contest. The wealthy, learned, and artistic\ncity of N\u00fcrnberg possessed a public wagon which every night was led\nthrough the streets, to pick up and convey to their homes drunken\nburghers found lying in the filth of the streets.\"[23]\n\nSuch were the manners of the house of mirth at the beginning of the\nsixteenth century. It might be supposed that when luxury was so riotous\nthe poor would have plenty, but that is never the case. Profusion at the\ntop of the social ladder means poverty at the bottom. The world has\nnever yet been so rich that waste did not work harm to the neediest.\nEven if the poor had been actually no poorer in these flush days than\nthey had been when manners were simpler, the glaring contrasts would\nhave been maddening. But multitudes of them were, no doubt, not only\nrelatively but positively poorer; the destruction of the guilds of\nlabor, the displacements in industry, had left great numbers not only of\nthe peasantry and the artisans but also of the poorer nobles in\npractical destitution. The organization of society was giving strength\nto the strong and weakness to those of no might--thus exactly reversing\nMary's prophecy of what her royal Son should bring; and those who were\nthus dispossessed and scattered felt, and had a right to feel, that the\nsocial organization under which such things could be done was\nantichristian.\n\n\"While,\" says Dr. Lindsay, \"the social tumults and popular uprisings\nagainst authority, which are a feature of the close of the Middle Ages,\nare usually and rightly enough called peasant insurrections, the name\ntends to obscure their real character. They were rather the revolts of\nthe poor against the rich, of debtors against creditors, of men who had\nscantly legal rights or none at all, against those who had the\nprotection of the existing laws; and they were joined by the poor of the\ntowns as well as by the peasantry of the country districts. The peasants\ngenerally began the revolt and the townsmen followed, but this was not\nalways the case. Sometimes the mob of the cities rose first and the\npeasants joined afterwards. In many cases, too, the poorer nobles were\nin secret or open sympathy with the insurrectionary movement. On more\nthan one occasion they led the insurgents and fought at their head.\"[24]\n\nThe uprising against the church was due to the fact that the church,\ninstead of being the friend of the poor, had become their social\noppressor. Through all these social mutterings runs the outcry against\nthe priests, and this was not because the priests were teaching a false\ntheology, but because they were grinding the faces of the poor. Not only\nin Germany, but all over Europe this cry was heard. \"The priests,\" says\nan English reformer, \"have their tenth part of all the corn, meadows,\npasture, grain, wood, colts, lambs, geese, and chickens. Over and\nbesides the tenth part of every servant's wages, wool, milk, honey, wax,\ncheese, and butter; yea and they look so narrowly after these profits\nthat the poor wife must be accountable to them for every tenth egg, or\nelse she getteth not her rights at Easter, and shall be taken as a\nheretic.\" \"I see,\" said a Spaniard, \"that we can scarcely get anything\nfrom Christ's ministers but for money; at baptism money, at bishoping\nmoney, at marriage money, for confession money,--no, not extreme unction\nwithout money! They will ring no bells without money, no burial in the\nchurch without money; so that it seemeth that Paradise is shut up from\nthem that hath no money. The rich is buried in the church, the poor in\nthe churchyard. The rich man may marry with his nearest kin, but the\npoor not so, albeit he be ready to die for love of her. The rich may eat\nflesh in Lent, but the poor may not, albeit fish perhaps be much dearer.\nThe rich man may readily get large indulgences, but the poor none\nbecause he wanteth money to pay for them.\"[25]\n\nThis revolt against priestly oppression was by no means, however, an\nirreligious uprising. It was characterized by intense religious feeling,\nwith which, as Dr. Lindsay says, \"was blended some confused dream that\nthe kingdom of God might be set up on earth, if only the priests were\ndriven out of the land.\" Among a populace so ignorant it was, of course,\ninevitable that the social revolt should take on fanatical forms. Wild\nzealots arose, drawing the multitude after them, and inciting the people\nto revolution. Hans B\u00f6hm, a wandering piper, had visions and went forth\nas a preacher of righteousness, railing against priests and civil\npotentates. True religion, he declared, consisted in worshiping the\nBlessed Virgin, but the priests were thieves and robbers, the Emperor\nwas a miscreant, \"who supported the whole vile crew of princes,\noverlords, tax gatherers, and other oppressors of the poor.\" He\npredicted the coming of a day when the Emperor himself would be forced,\nlike all poor folks, to work for days' wages. The people flocked by\nthousands to hear him preach, but his day was brief.\n\nThey burnt him at the stake, but multitudes venerated him, and made\npilgrimages to the chapel which had been the scene of his triumph. The\n\"Bundschuh\" revolts which broke out in Elsass and spread through\nSwitzerland and Germany were of a similar character. Then came years of\nfamine, which deepened the popular disquiet, and which help to explain\nthe fact that \"on the eve of the Reformation the condition of Europe,\nand of Germany in particular, was one of seething discontent and full of\nbitter class hatreds--the trading companies and the great capitalists\nagainst the guilds, the poorer classes against the wealthier, and the\nnobles against the towns.\"\n\nThese were the social conditions in the midst of which Luther appeared.\nIt was on this turbulent flood of social unrest that the Reformation\nwas launched. When the great reformer's voice was heard, denouncing\npriestly misrule and hierarchical tyranny, these were the people who\nlistened, and they interpreted his words by their own experience. If his\nquarrel was largely with theological or ecclesiastical abuses, theirs\nwas mainly with industrial inequalities, but it seemed to them that he\nwas fighting their battle. Indeed, his brave words gave fit utterance to\ntheir hopes. For, as the historian reminds us, Luther's message was\ndemocratic. That must have been its character if it was, in any proper\nsense, a return to \"the simplicity that is in Christ.\" \"It destroyed the\naristocracy of the saints, it leveled the barriers between the layman\nand the priest, it taught the equality of all men before God, and the\nright of every man of faith to stand in God's presence, whatever be his\nrank and condition of life. He had not confined himself to preaching a\nnew theology. His message was eminently practical. In his 'Appeal to the\nNobility of the German Nation' Luther had voiced all the grievances of\nGermany, had touched upon almost all the open sores of the time, and had\nforetold disasters not very far off. Nor must it be forgotten that no\ngreat leader ever flung about wild words in such a reckless way. Luther\nhad the gift of strong, smiting phrases, of words which seemed to cleave\nto the very heart of things, of images which lit up a subject with the\nvividness of a flash of lightning. He launched tracts and pamphlets from\nthe press about almost everything, written for the most part on the spur\nof the moment, and when the fire burned. His words fell into souls full\nof the fermenting passion of the times. They drank in with eagerness the\nthoughts that all men were equal before God, and that there are divine\ncommands about the brotherhood of mankind of more importance than all\nhuman legislation. They refused to believe that such golden ideas\nbelonged to the realm of spiritual life above.\"[26]\n\nWhen, therefore, the religious reformation was fairly launched, a great\nuprising of the poor people speedily followed. It seemed to them that\nthe return to Christ meant, for them, the breaking of yokes and the\nenlargement of opportunity, and they proceeded to claim for themselves\nsome portion of the liberty that belonged to them. Their demands, as\nvoiced in their \"Twelve Articles,\" were by no means extravagant, from\nour point of view. The abuses of which they complained were flagrant,\nthe rights they claimed were far less than are now, even in despotic\nRussia, fully granted to the humblest people. And they protested most\nearnestly that they \"wanted nothing contrary to the requirements of just\nauthority, whether civil or ecclesiastical, nor to the gospel of\nChrist.\"\n\nIt would, however, have been unreasonable to expect that such people\nwould confine their protest within the bounds of law and order. It was,\nin fact, a revolution, and it discerned no way to its goal but the way\nof violence. That, indeed, is the path that most of the seekers after\nliberty have felt constrained to take.\n\nWhat was Luther's relation to this uprising? It cannot be said that he\nhad kindled the flame, but he had fanned it to a conflagration. And yet\nwhen it began to rage, he found himself unable to control it. It had\ncome to pass, in the exigencies of the warfare he was waging, that his\nallies were the German princes. Only through them, as he believed, could\nhe hope to win the fight he was making against the Roman hierarchy. If\nhe put himself at the head of the peasants' movement he would alienate\nthe princes, and it seemed to him that the Protestant cause in Germany\nwould he stamped out in blood. And therefore, after vainly attempting to\nquiet the insurrection, with whose principal aims he had confessed\nhimself in sympathy, he turned upon the peasants in almost savage wrath,\nand in his tract \"Against the Murdering, Thieving Hordes of Peasants,\"\nhe urged the princes to crush the insurrection. \"In the case of an\ninsurgent,\" he says, \"every man is both judge and executioner.\nTherefore, whoever can should knock down, strangle, and stab such\npublicly or privately, and think nothing so venomous, pernicious, and\ndevilish as an insurgent.... Such wonderful times are these that a\nprince can merit heaven better with bloodshed than another with prayer.\"\n\nThe princes followed Luther's counsel, and the peasants' uprising was\nput down with relentless severity. Thus ended in blood the movement\nwhich promised to make the church the champion of social freedom. It\nseems, as we look back upon it, a tragical issue. What these poor people\nasked for was really only a crumb or two from the table of the lords of\nprivilege; they thought that the brotherhood taught by Jesus warranted\nthem in expecting it, and they seemed to hope that the church of Jesus\nChrist, when purified from formalism and superstition, would support\nthat expectation. It must have been a bitter disappointment to them. And\nit is a sorrowful reflection that the great hero of the Reformation\nfell, in this matter, so far below the Christian ideal.\n\nDoubtless his strenuous repugnance to revolutionary methods was a good\ntrait in his character; but surely revolutions are sometimes\njustifiable, and it looks, at this distance, as though this one was as\nnearly so as most of those that have succeeded. If Luther had put his\ngreat heart and mighty will at the head of this movement which he\nconfessed to be most righteous, it might have succeeded, and\nProtestantism, in its beginnings, might have made a firm alliance with\nthose whom Jesus Christ recognizes as his representatives in the earth.\nBut it was hard for him to believe that the poor of this world, chosen\nto be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, were stronger allies than\nthe German nobles. He thought that he must have the support of the\nprinces, and he turned his back on Christ's poor.\n\nIt was a melancholy conclusion, not only for Luther but for the cause\nwhich he represented. \"It is probable,\" says Dr. Lindsay, \"that he saved\nthe Reformation in Germany by cutting it free from the revolutionary\nmovement, but the wrench left marks on his own character as well as in\nthe movement he headed.\" One wonders whether success won at such cost is\nworth having; and whether, if he had gone down with the peasants in\ntheir struggle for freedom and opportunity, the sacrifice would not have\nbrought a larger and fairer Reformation.\n\nIt was the coming reformation to which your attention was called, and we\nhave kept our eyes for a long time upon the past. But this history has\nbeen uttering, through the entire recital, its own prophetic word.\nConditions have greatly changed since the sixteenth century; but we are\nstill confronting the same issue which forced itself upon the church in\nthe days of Luther. Many of the disabilities and wrongs under which the\ncommon people were suffering then have been removed, but the poor are\nstill with us, and the cries of millions of overworked, underfed,\npale-faced men and women and children have entered into the ears of the\nLord of Sabaoth. There ought not to be any poor people in this country;\nif it were a thoroughly Christian country there would not be. If there\nwere those who because of mental or physical defect were unable to care\nfor themselves, we could easily provide for their wants, and in the\nexercise of such compassion we should find an abundant reward. If there\nwere those who because of idleness and vice were indisposed to provide\nfor themselves, we should find a way of inspiring them with a better\nmind. But, if this were a thoroughly Christian country, there would be\nno willing workers dwelling anywhere near the borders of want. There are\nresources here which are ample for the abundant supply of all human\nneeds; if ours were a completely Christianized society, the needs of\nthose who were able and willing to work would be abundantly supplied.\n\nWe are often told that this is already done; that there are no poor in\nthis country save those who are either incompetent or indolent or\nvicious. If that could be proved, the question would still remain\nwhether the incompetency and the indolence and the viciousness may not,\nto a considerable degree, be the effects of causes for which society is\nresponsible, and which, in a thoroughly Christianized society, would not\nbe permitted to exist. But it cannot be proved that poverty is wholly\nthe fault of the poor. The fact is that a very large number of those who\nare doing the world's work to-day are receiving less than their fair\nshare of the wealth they produce.\n\nIt is true that there are many laborers who earn large wages. Compactly\norganized labor unions have been able to secure a favorable distribution\nof the product of their industry. But we are often reminded that but a\nsmall percentage of the laborers of this country are organized; and the\nwages of those thus unprotected are often lamentably small. Many\nattempts have been made to find out what is the average wage of the\naverage workman; our census reports contain very carefully prepared\nstatistics. I have taken pains to go over some of these, and here are\nthe results.\n\nIn the textile trades, with 661,451 workers, the average weekly wage of\nall workers is $6.07; of men over sixteen, $7.63; of women, $5.18; of\nchildren under sixteen, $2.15.\n\nIn the iron workers' trades, with 222,607 workers, the average weekly\nwage is $10.46.\n\nIn the boot and shoe trades, with 142,922 workers, the average for all\nis $7.96; for men over sixteen, $9.11; for women, $6.13; for children\nunder sixteen, $3.40.\n\nIn the men's clothing trades, with 120,950 workers, the average for all\nis $7.06; for men, $10.90; for women, $4.88; for children, $2.61.\n\nThese weekly wages are obtained by dividing the annual wage by 52. Often\nthe weekly rate is much higher, but for many weeks the workers are\nunemployed; the only fair estimate is that which is based upon the\nannual wage.\n\nHave we any right to be content with conditions like these? Is the\naverage wage of the average worker, as it is here indicated, all that he\nought to ask? Should society wish him to be content with such an income?\nSit down yourself and figure out just what it would mean to be obliged\nto maintain a family of four or five on such a stipend as is indicated\nin any of these trades--even those best paid. Find out how much should\nhave to go for rent, and how much for food, and how much for the\nplainest clothing, and how much for doctor's bills, and school books,\nand street-car fare, and how much would be left, after that, for books\nand church contributions and the wholesome pleasures which we ought to\ncount among the necessaries of life. Life can be maintained on such an\nincome, but is it the kind of life that we wish our fellow men to live?\nAnd is there any need that life, for the humble laborer, should be\nreduced in this rich land to its lowest terms? With the marvelous\nproductiveness of fields and mines and forests and waters, with the\nimmense development of machinery, by which the wealth of the nation is\nmultiplied, might we not have an organization of industry and a method\nof distribution which would give to the army of manual toilers a much\nlarger average income?\n\nThat is the question they are asking, and it calls for a candid answer.\nTheir needs are not as dire as were those of the German peasants of the\nsixteenth century, but they are real and serious needs. Now, as then, a\ntremendous industrial revolution has dislocated industries and\ndemoralized and impoverished many; now, as then, the concentration of\ncapital in great companies has destroyed small enterprises and left\nmany who were once thrifty stranded and discouraged; now, as then,\nglaring contrasts in condition excite the resentments of the needy; now,\nas then, the propertiless are wondering whether this is the kind of\nthing that the church has been looking for when she has prayed that the\nkingdom of God may come. And there is a feeling now, as there was then,\namong the millions of the toilers, that the church which assumes to\nrepresent Jesus Christ needs to be reformed, in order that through its\ntestimony and its leadership the kingdom of God may come.\n\nIt is sadly true that there are many among these toiling millions who\nare embittered against the church, who have no faith in it, and no\nexpectation that any good will come out of it; but the great majority\nare not hostile to the church; at worst they are indifferent, and this\nindifference is due to their belief that the church no longer represents\nJesus Christ. Toward him there is often a pathetic outreaching of hope;\nif the church would come back to the simplicity that is in Christ and\nwould plant itself on the Sermon on the Mount, it would quickly win\ntheir loyalty. And I cannot help feeling that now, as in the sixteenth\ncentury, there is in the minds of the toiling millions \"a confused dream\nthat the kingdom of God might be set up in the land,\" and that the time\nis ripe for it. Nor can I deem it possible that this great expectation\nof the multitude will now be disappointed. The church of this day must\nbe able to see that this call of the poor and the humble is the call of\nits Master. It is with the weak and the needy that he is always\nidentified; service of them is loyalty to him; neglect of them is scorn\nof him. It is his own word.\n\nThe coming reformation will be signalized by a great change in the\nattitude of the church toward the toiling classes. It will not turn its\nback on them, as it did in Luther's day; it will not maintain toward\nthem an attitude of kindly patronage, as it has done in our day; it will\nrecognize the fact that its welfare is bound up with them; that the\nbarriers which separate them from its sympathies and fellowships must be\nbroken down, at whatever cost; that it must make them believe that the\nchurch of Jesus Christ is their church; that it needs them quite as much\nas they need it; that it is a monstrous thing even to conceive that a\nchurch of Jesus Christ could exist as a class institution, with the\nlargest social class in the community outside of it.\n\nThe coming reformation will consist in the awakening of the church to\nits social responsibilities. It will see more clearly than it has ever\nyet seen, that those who pray that the kingdom of God may come, and who\nare responsible, as citizens of a republic are responsible, for the\nanswering of that prayer, must see to it that justice and liberty and\nopportunity are established in the land. The church of Jesus Christ,\nwith a passion that is born of loyalty to its Master, must set itself to\nthe task of realizing, in the social order, the principles of his\nteaching. That was what the peasants of the sixteenth century called\nupon it to do; and for answer it turned and smote them to the earth. It\nwill not repeat that blunder, which was nothing short of a crime. It\nhears the same call to-day, and when it obeys, as obey it must, it will\nsave its own life and that of the nation with whose destiny it is put in\ntrust.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\nSocial Redemption\n\n\n\nThe New Reformation will be wrought out with weapons that are not\ncarnal. One of the lessons that the church has learned, in the nineteen\ncenturies of its history, is that it must keep itself free from all\nsuspicion of entanglement with physical force.\n\nThat statement needs qualification. It is not universally true. The\nGreek church, as we have seen, is still fatally involved in political\ncomplications; the Roman church, while forced to abstain from the use of\nthe temporal power, has maintained its right to use it; and other state\nchurches, as those of England and Germany, retain some hold upon the\npolitical arm. But we are speaking of the church in our own country; and\nof the American church it is true that it has ceased to rely upon the\npower of the state. The entire divorce which our constitution decrees\nbetween the government of the church and the government of the state has\nbecome, with us, a settled policy, which we do not wish to disturb. It\nis doubtful whether intelligent Roman Catholics in the United States\nwould be willing to have this condition changed, and no other Christians\nwould for one moment consent to it.\n\nWhat the church does in the way of improving social conditions must,\ntherefore, be done by purely moral and spiritual agencies. Society is\nnot to be Christianized by any kind of coercion. The church cannot use\nforce in any way, nor can it enter into any coalition with governments\nthat rest on force. \"It is not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,\nsaith the Lord,\" that the kingdoms of this world are to become the\nkingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ. It is as irrational to try to\npropagate Christianity by coercive measures of any description, as it\nwould be to try to make plants grow by applying to them mechanical\npressure.\n\nNor can the church undertake to dictate or prescribe the forms of\nindustrial society. Its function is not the organization of industry. It\nwould not wisely attempt to decide between different methods of managing\nbusiness.\n\nIt would not, for example, be expedient for the church, at the present\ntime, to take sides in the controversy between collectivism and private\nenterprise. The Socialists declare that the wage system, based on\nprivate capital, tends to injustice and oppression; the advocates of the\nexisting system contend that Socialism would destroy the foundations of\nthrift and welfare. The church cannot be the umpire in this contest, nor\ncan it take sides with either party. Questions of economic method are\nbeyond its province. Its concern is not with the machinery of society,\nbut with the moral motive power. Or, it might be truer to say that it\nseeks to invigorate the moral life of men, and trusts that reinforced\nlife to make its own economic forms. Its business is to fill men's minds\nwith the truth as it is in Jesus, and to make them see that that truth\napplies to every human relation; and it ought to believe that when this\ntruth is thus received and thus applied, it will solve all social\nproblems. When employers and employed are all filled with the spirit of\nChrist, the wage system will not be a system of exploitation, but a\nmeans of social service.\n\nHere is an employer of many hundreds of men, at the head of a very large\nbusiness, which is rapidly increasing. This is not an imaginary case.\nThis employer is a man of flesh and blood, and he is in the very thick\nof the competitive m\u00eal\u00e9e; he is using the machinery of the wage system,\nbut he is governing all his business by the principles of Christianity,\nand the business is thriving in a marvelous way. This does not mean that\nthe manager is piling up money for himself, for he is not: he is living\nvery frugally, and is adding nothing to his own accumulation; but the\nbusiness is growing by leaps and bounds. The increasing profits, every\nyear, are distributed in the form of stock among the laborers who do the\nwork, and the customers who purchase the goods. The men who do the work\nare buying for themselves beautiful homes in the vicinity of the\nfactory; in a few more years they will own a large part of the stock of\nthe concern. This manager is not getting rich; but he has the\nsatisfaction of seeing his business prospering in his hands; he is\nhelping a great many men to find the ways of comfort and independence,\nand he insists that he has himself found the secret of a happy life. It\nis evident that if all employers were governed by the same motives, the\nwage system would be an instrument of philanthropy. Whether this man is\na church member or not does not appear, but he is certainly a Christian;\nhe has learned the way of Jesus, and is walking in it. If the church\ncould inspire all its members with this kind of social passion, all\nsocial questions would be solved. And this is the church's business--to\ninspire its members with this kind of social passion. Without this\nspirit in their hearts, no matter what the social machinery might be,\nthe outcome would be envying and strife and endless unhappiness.\n\nWe have had the inside history of some of the many communistic\nenterprises that have come to grief, and all of them have been wrecked\nby the selfishness of their members, most of whom were seeking for soft\nplaces, and shirking their duties,--each trying to get as much as he\ncould out of the commonwealth and to give in return for it as little\nservice as possible. These contrasted cases show that the machinery of\nthe wage system cannot prevent the exercise of brotherliness, and that\nthe machinery of communism will not secure it. No kind of social\nmachinery will produce happiness or welfare when selfish men are running\nit; and no kind of social machinery will keep brotherly men from\nbehaving brotherly.\n\nWe are often told by Socialists that the present r\u00e9gime of individual\ninitiative and private capital tends to make men selfish and\nunbrotherly, while the tendency of Socialism would be to make men\nunselfish and fraternal. If the church were sure that this is the truth,\nshe would be inclined to throw her influence on the side of Socialism.\nBut, on the other hand, it is urged that Socialism tends to merge the\nindividual in the mass, to destroy the virtues of self-respect and\nself-reliance, and to weaken the fibre of manhood. If the church were\nsure that this is true, she would be constrained to pause before\ncommitting herself to the socialistic programme.\n\nShe knows, in fact, that there is truth in both these contentions. That\nthe individualistic r\u00e9gime has bred a fearful amount of heartlessness\nand rapacity is painfully evident; that such socialistic experiments as\nhave been tried have weakened human virtue appears to be true. Under\nwhich r\u00e9gime the greater damage would be done is not yet quite clear.\nTherefore the church cannot commit herself to either of these methods.\nThe best work she can do, at the present time, is to inspire men with a\nlove of justice and a spirit of service. She must rear up a generation\nof men who hate robbery in all its disguises; who are determined never\nto prosper at the expense of their neighbors, and who know how to find\ntheir highest pleasure in helping their fellow men. If the Christian\nmorality means anything, it means all this. A church which represents\nJesus Christ on the earth must set before herself no lower aim than\nthis. And a generation of men whose hearts are on fire with this purpose\nmay be trusted to fill the earth with righteousness and peace, whether\nthey work with the machinery of the wage system or with the machinery of\nSocialism.\n\nThere are many good men, outside the church as well as within it, who\nbelieve that the existing social order can never be Christianized; that\nit must be replaced by a new social system. But most of us are still\nclinging to the belief that the existing social order can be\nChristianized, so that justice may be established in it, and good-will\nfind expression through it. That it has been sadly perverted we all\nconfess; we acknowledge with shame that it has become, in large measure,\nthe instrument of injustice and oppression. But we believe that it may\nbe reformed, so that it shall represent, in some fair degree, the\nkingdom of God.\n\nThe redemption of the social order is, then, the problem now before us.\nCan it be accomplished? President Roosevelt thinks that it can, and\nthose who stand with him and support him assume that the existing\ncompetitive r\u00e9gime can be moralized and made to represent the interests\nof equity and fair dealing. If this can be done, nothing more is needed.\nIf it cannot be done, the existing r\u00e9gime must make way for something\nbetter. The conviction that it can be done is finding expression just\nnow in the vigorous efforts that are being made to amend and strengthen\nthe laws which restrain plunderers and oppressors, so that opportunities\nmay be equalized and the paths to success be kept open for men of all\nranks and capacities. This is simple justice, and for this the church of\nGod must stand with all the might of her influence.\n\nThat she has been derelict in the discharge of this duty must be\nconfessed. If she had kept the charge committed to her, the inequalities\nand spoliations now burdening society would not be in existence. For\nalthough it is not the business of the church to furnish to the world an\neconomic programme, it is her business to see that no economic programme\nis permitted to exist under which injustice and oppression find shelter.\nThe right to reprove and denounce all social arrangements by which the\nfew prosper at the expense of the many is one of her chartered rights as\nthe institute of prophecy. A church which fails to exercise this\nfunction is faithless to her primary obligation.\n\nThat the church has incurred heavy blame because of the feebleness of\nher testimony against such wrongs must now be confessed, and the least\nshe can do to make amends for this infidelity is to speak now and\nhenceforth, with commanding voice, against all the corporate wrongs that\ninfest society. It may be that by her testimony the magistrates will be\nstrengthened so to enforce the laws that aggressors shall be restrained,\nand freedom and opportunity secured to all; and that thus the existing\nindustrial order may become, so far as law can make it, the servant of\njustice and good-will.\n\nThis is the first step toward social redemption. The re\u00ebnthronement of\njustice is the primary obligation. John the Baptist must speak first.\nThe conviction of social sin is the beginning of social righteousness.\nThe church has a great work to do in awakening the public conscience to\nforms of injustice which are so involved and concealed that our\nattention is not fixed upon them. Professor Ross has just announced a\nvolume with the title \"Sin and Society.\" It is an illuminating word. The\ndeadliest of the evils which are oppressing the community to-day come\nunder this category. They are hidden from the public view. They assail\nyou from ambush and you are helpless. The deadly missiles smite you on\nevery side, but there is no revealing flash by which you can locate your\nfoe. The social order is so complex that wrongs of this nature are\neasily perpetrated. Many of the transactions by which we are wont to\nprofit are veiled injustices. They are of a nature so subtle and\nindirect that the law has not yet defined and forbidden them. Those who\nsuffer these injustices are at a distance from us, and there is a\nnetwork of legal and commercial relations between ourselves and them; we\nknow that they will never confront us and call us to account; it is\nsafe for us to do wrong, and we keep on doing it until our consciences\nare dulled, and we are not able to see that any wrong has been done.\n\nThe fact is, that such a complex social system as ours needs for its\nsafe administration a kind of conscientiousness far higher and finer\nthan that which men needed for honest living fifty years ago. Unless our\nminds are trained to see the right and wrong of very intricate\ntransactions; unless our ethical imagination is sensitive enough to\ndiscern the nature of far-reaching and wide-spreading social relations,\nwe shall constantly be profiting by the injury of our neighbors.\n\nIt is the business of the church to train the consciences of men for the\nmoral problems that confront them, and this work has been but\nindifferently done. The first step in the redemption of the social order\nis the education of the Christian conscience to discern the smokeless\nsins. It is with evils of this character that the nation is now in a\nlife and death grapple; the church ought to be able, by its testimony,\nto lend effective aid in this conflict.\n\nThe nature of the testimony needed may be indicated by a typical\ninstance.\n\nNot many years ago a very prosperous manufacturing company was doing\nbusiness in a thriving American village, giving employment to fifteen\nhundred men and women, many of whom had purchased homes, in the\nexpectation of having permanent occupation and livelihood. It was known\nto be a well-paying business; its stock, which was in few hands, was not\nin the market.\n\nSuddenly a project of reorganization was announced, and stock amounting\nto five times the value of the property was placed upon the market. It\nwas eagerly taken, for the reputation of the company was very high. With\nthe proceeds of this sale of securities the managers made themselves\nvery rich men. It was not necessary for them to do business any longer.\nIndeed, they could not have continued to pay dividends on the amount of\nstock which they had sold; they had never expected to do any such thing.\nWhat they did was promptly to close the business. The price of the stock\ndropped immediately to the neighborhood of zero, millions of values were\ncanceled, and thousands of investors were made to suffer loss. But the\ndirect consequences were seen in the village whose prosperity was\nsuddenly destroyed. Fifteen hundred men and women were deprived, at a\nstroke, of employment and livelihood. In many homes there was\ndestitution and hunger; hundreds of men were compelled to seek\nemployment elsewhere, sacrificing the homes whose value had been greatly\nreduced; businesses that depended on the patronage of the mill hands\nwere ruined; churches were paralyzed; families were scattered;\ndiscouraged men fell into ways of dissipation; young women were led into\nthe paths of shame.\n\nAll this was done under the forms of law, and yet it would be hard to\nfind in the annals of crime an instance more flagitious. And the men who\ndid this thing were church members--members in good standing, leading\nmembers of an evangelical church. Nor does it appear that they suffered\nany discredit in the church to which they belonged, and to whose\nrevenues they continued to contribute out of the plunder by which they\nhad impoverished and ruined so many. The church had not sufficient moral\nsense to reprove and denounce this iniquity. What is worse, the church\nhad not had enough moral sense to make these men see beforehand that\nsuch an act was infamous.\n\nUndoubtedly they would have promptly justified themselves. \"Such\ntransactions,\" they would have said, \"are occurring every day; what the\nlaw does not forbid, and what everybody else does, cannot be wrong. The\nproperty was ours, and we had a right to put our own price on it, and\nsell it for what it would bring. The business was ours, and we had a\nright to do what we pleased with it, to keep it running or shut it down\nwhen we got ready: it is a free country: do you think you can compel a\nman to go on doing business when he prefers to quit? We never guaranteed\npermanent employment to these people: we paid them their wages while\nthey worked for us, and that is the end of our obligation to them.\"\n\nSome such answer they would, no doubt, have made to any one who called\nin question their conduct; and by such an answer they would have\nrevealed the failure of the church to which they belonged to bring home\nto them their social obligations.\n\nThe existing social order can never be redeemed unless a fire can be\nkindled on the earth in whose clear shining light such deeds as these\ncan be seen in all their deformity, and in whose purifying flame such\nexcuses as these will be utterly consumed. We must have laws to make\nsuch wrongs impossible; but behind the laws must be the moral insight\nand the social passion which shall make them effective, and it is the\nbusiness of the church to furnish these. When this is done we shall have\nmade a good beginning in the work of social redemption.\n\nBut it will be only a beginning. The work of John the Baptist comes\nfirst, but one mightier than he must follow. The voice of one crying in\nthe wilderness is but the prelude of that larger revelation which is\nmade upon the mountain top. To bring home to men the obligations of the\nlaw, and to show them wherein they are failing to obey it, is the first\nduty of the church in the present crisis; but it is the gospel with\nwhich she is primarily put in charge.\n\nClearer teaching about social morality is fundamental, but the great\nneed, after all, is the vitalization of morality. The moral code, no\nmatter how accurate may be its precepts, tends to become a dead letter,\nunless it is constantly revivified by the spirit of religion.\n\nThe Sermon on the Mount is often conceived of as purely ethical\nteaching, but the heart of it all is religion. The revelation of the\nFatherhood of God is the light which shines through all these words and\nfurnishes the motive of all this morality. If we do the things here\ncommanded, in the way that Jesus expects us to do them, it is because we\nknow ourselves to be the children of our Father in heaven, living in his\npresence, rejoicing in the great love wherewith he has loved us,\ntrusting in his care, seeking his kingdom, doing his will. The church\nwhich represents Jesus Christ in the world will never forget that its\nbusiness is the leavening of society with the life of Christ; but\nneither can it forget that the life of Christ can only be maintained by\nconstant communion with the Father. That the spiritual life of Jesus\nhimself was thus maintained, the record makes clear. The central fact of\nhis experience was his living union with the Father. We talk of \"the\npractice of the presence of God;\" Jesus was the only man who has ever\nperfectly realized it. And no one who knew him ever failed to see that\nit was the Father's kindness and compassion and grace and truth that\nwere being manifested in his life. It was because he was filled with\nall the fullness of God that he imparted to those who received him the\nspirit of good-will, the passion for social service.\n\nThe church which represents him in the world will need, for its social\nservice, the same inspiration. Unless its life is fed from this\nfountain, its stream will soon run dry. There are those who seem to\nthink that sociology can solve all the problems of our modern life. If\nsociology be sufficiently expanded, this may be true; for a truly\nscientific sociology would have to explain how men came to be social\nbeings, and what is the bond that unites them. If it finds that their\nrelation to a common Father is the fundamental fact of their existence,\nthen it would know that religion is at the heart of it, and that right\nrelations with God are the spring and source of right relations with\nmen. But a sociology which ignores this primary fact has in it no\nredemptive power.\n\nThe more earnestly, therefore, we contend that the business of the\nchurch is the Christianization of the social order, the more strenuously\nwe must maintain that she is powerless to do this work except as her\nlife is fed by faith and prayer. The redemption of the social order is\nthe greatest task she has undertaken, and she needs for it a strength\nthat can only come from conscious fellowship with God. If she ever\nneeded inspiration, she needs it now. If there ever was a time when she\ncould dispense with the divine guidance and grace, that time is not now.\nThe churches which desert the places of prayer, and think to substitute\nthe wisdom of men for the power of God, are not going to give much aid\nin this struggle.\n\n\"It must be claimed,\" says one, \"on behalf of the passion for God, that\nwhere it exists it will--automatically, as has been said--set charity,\nlove, all sweet graces of philanthropic activity, into quick and\nceaseless play.... If the emphasis of religious thought be made to fall\nupon the idea of life, this cannot fail to be; for to have the divine\nlife is to be possessed of and to give out the divine love.... The\nregeneration of human society is found to come from the dominance of\nspiritual passion, even though it be not the first thing on which\nspiritual passion is set; the saint will be--just because he is a\nsaint--a philanthropist too, since a true sainthood must number love\namong the graces of character it brings. It is a fact--one has to make\nthe sad admission--that religious people, professedly spiritual men and\nwomen, have been and still are in some cases eaten through and through\nby selfishness; these are those who, so that they can declare heaven to\nbe their own, have no care for the present hell in which so many of\ntheir fellows spend their days and years. But that is not because they\nare too deeply immersed in the passion for God,--it is because they have\nnot really immersed themselves in its flood. And in claiming for a\nGodward passion the regulative and supreme place among the elements of\nlife, we do but secure a fuller tenancy among those elements of a\nmanward love; for the nature which sets itself to receive the whole of\nGod will, ere it knows it, and as an automatic effect of the new life it\nwins, give itself to its brethren in their need. For God is love, and he\nmust dwell in love who dwells in God.\"[27]\n\nWe may hesitate to say that when the passion for God is the only thing\naimed at it is bound to result in social regeneration; there are too\nmany facts which prove the contrary. The aim must always include both\nthe Godward and the manward obligations; the first and the second great\ncommandments are of equal rank; what needs to be insisted on is the\nimpossibility of divorcing them.\n\nThe church which seeks the redemption of society cannot, then, dispense\nwith its religion. Nothing has been made plainer, during the recent\nexposures of social decay, than the fact that our social morality must\nhave a religious foundation. Even the man on the street is ready to\nconcede that no righteousness is adequate for the present emergency but\nthat which springs from faith in a righteous God. And nothing is more\nneeded, at this hour, than the deepening of men's faith in the great\nreligious verities.\n\nIt is often said that the only cure for existing social ills is a great\nrevival of religion, and this is true. But the revival of religion which\nis needed is not the kind which the churches are most apt to seek. The\nreligion which needs to be revived is not that which puts the sole\nemphasis on the safety and welfare of the individual, but that which\nequally exalts the social welfare; which identifies the interests of\neach with the interests of all; which makes men see and feel that no\nsalvation is worth anything to any man that does not put that man into\nChristian relations with his neighbors. Nothing but religion will do\nthis for any man, and the religion which fails to do this is a spurious\nChristianity.\n\nA great revival we shall see, one of these days, which will have this\ncharacter. It will bind together the two great commandments of the law,\nand make men feel the weight of both of them. It will compel them to\nrecognize the truth that, while the root of their religion is faith in\nGod, the fruit of their religion is love for men. It will drive home the\nfact that the religion which does not hinder a man from being a boodler\nor a grafter; which permits a man to enjoy religion while fleecing his\nneighbors by crafty schemes of finance or artful legalized robberies;\nwhich allows the love of gain to triumph over truth and honor and\nbrotherly kindness; which sits serene and complacent while social\nclasses make war on each other, and children's lives are consumed by\ngrinding toil, and women are forced by want into the ways of shame, and\nthe enemies of society are set free to make gain by the ruin of human\nsouls, is a religion which is not worth having. It will insist that a\nreligion which is rightly described as the life of God in the souls of\nmen, would begin in the house of God itself, and kindle there a\nconsuming flame before which such iniquities could not stand. Perhaps it\nwould set men to saying--they might not feel like singing--Thomas\nHughes's great hymn:--\n\n    \"O God of truth, whose living word\n      Upholds whate'er hath breath,\n    Look down on thy creation, Lord,\n      Enslaved by sin and death.\n\n    \"Set up thy standard, Lord, that we\n      Who claim a heavenly birth\n    May march with thee to smite the lies\n      That vex thy groaning earth.\n\n    \"_We_ fight for truth, _we_ fight for God,\n      Poor slaves of lies and sin!\n    He who would fight for thee on earth\n      Must first be true within.\n\n    \"Thou God of truth, for whom we long,\n      Thou who wilt hear our prayer,\n    Do thine own battle in our hearts,\n      And slay the falsehood there.\n\n    \"Still smite! still burn! till naught is left\n      But God's own truth and love;\n    Then, Lord, as morning dew come down,\n      Rest on us from above.\n\n    \"Yea, come! thus tried as in the fire,\n      From every lie set free,\n    Thy perfect truth shall dwell in us\n      And we shall live in thee.\"\n\nIt is hardly needful to say that the redemption of the social order will\nnot be wrought out without sacrifice. \"The redemption of the soul is\ncostly,\" says the Psalmist. No man is rescued from moral degradation and\ndeath without suffering and sacrifice. Those who are saved are more\noften saved by the suffering of others in their behalf than by their own\nsuffering. But the price of a soul is apt to be high, and love is\nsometimes able to pay it.\n\nThe redemption of society from the welter of selfishness and brutishness\nand cruelty into which it is now plunged will be a costly undertaking.\nThe church is here, as Christ's representative, to take up this work;\nand it must not expect to accomplish it without suffering. \"It is enough\nfor the disciple that he be as his Master, and the servant as his Lord.\"\nIf the Church is Christ's servant, she must not expect to find any\nbetter way than his way of saving the world.\n\nIt is true, as we have seen, that the present deplorable conditions are\ndue to the failure of the church to enforce the Christian morality. The\nprice that she must pay for the redemption of society is heavy because\nof her own neglect. But it must be paid. There is no other way of\nsalvation.\n\nThus it appears that the church which bears the name of Jesus Christ has\ncome to its testing time. It finds itself in the midst of a society\nwhose tendencies are downward. Mammon is on the throne; the greed of\ngain is eating the heart out of commercial honor; reputations are\ncrumbling; confidence is rudely shaken; the most cynical schemes for\nplundering the multitudes are daily brought to light; social classes\nstand over against each other distrustful and defiant; the house of\nmirth resounds with the mad revelry of the wasters, while the purlieus\nare noisome with poverty and vice.\n\nCan this society be redeemed? Can this all-ruling commercialism be held\nin check, and this reign of plunder be overthrown, and all this seething\nselfishness and heartlessness and suspicion be made to give place to\ngood-will and kindness, to trust and truth, to faith and honor? It will\nnever be done without a vast expenditure of sacrificial love. \"This kind\ngoeth not forth but by prayer and fasting.\" Is the church ready for\nthis struggle? Is she willing to put forth the effort and pay the cost\nwhich is required for the redemption of society?\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nThe New Evangelism\n\n\n\nThose who have followed these discussions from the beginning will not be\ninclined to hesitate in answering the question with which the last\nchapter closed. That society can be redeemed, and that the church can\nand will purge herself from the things that defile her beauty and\ncorrupt her powers, and gird herself for the redemptive work assigned\nher, is the faith of every loyal Christian. The grievous failures of the\nchurch we cannot deny and must not palliate; it is of the utmost\nimportance that she be brought face to face with them, and be made to\nsee how far short she has come of her high calling. Such criticism she\nhas received from the beginning. The seven churches of Asia were sharply\ncalled to account by the beloved disciple; their faithlessness and\nneglect were unflinchingly brought home to them. The churches at Ephesus\nand Sardis and Laodicea had as hard things said about them as have been\nsaid in these chapters of the churches of this generation, and probably\ndeserved them no less. We cannot doubt that that clear-eyed witness, if\nhe were confronting the church of the twentieth century, would be\nconstrained to say: \"I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou\nlivest, and art dead.... Because thou sayest, I am rich and increased in\ngoods and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art the\nwretched one, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel\nthee to buy of me gold refined by fire, that thou mayest become rich;\nand white garments, that thou mayest clothe thyself, and that the shame\nof thy nakedness be not made manifest; and eye-salve to anoint thine\neyes, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I reprove and chasten; be\nzealous therefore, and repent.\" In every generation such chastisement\nhas been needed; the need is no greater to-day than in past generations,\nand the chastening love no less. What Lowell says of this country, many\na Christian believer has been constrained to say of the church:--\n\n    \"I loved her old renown, her stainless fame;\n    What better proof than that I loathed her shame.\"\n\nBut this keen sense of her shortcomings is not inconsistent with an\nunfaltering faith in the recovery of her integrity and in her final\ntriumph. And those who have read the history of the Christian church\nwith sympathetic vision can hardly doubt that her brightest days are\nstill before her.\n\nFor while it must be admitted that she has neglected, hitherto, her\ngreat work of social redemption, it cannot be said that she is more\nneglectful of it now than she has been in past years; the truth is that\nshe is nearer to the recognition of it to-day than she has ever been.\nDerelict as she is to her primary obligation, it must yet be said that a\nconsciousness of that dereliction is beginning to make her uneasy, and\nthat has never before been true of any large portion of her membership.\nSince the earliest centuries the possibility of transforming the social\norder by purely spiritual influences has scarcely dawned upon her. So\nlong as society was feudalistic or aristocratic, the problem seemed to\nbe beyond her reach; she might hope to improve society, by inculcating\nkindness and charity, but hardly to reconstruct it upon new foundations.\n\nThe advent of democracy has brought home to her her social\nresponsibilities. Here in America, more than anywhere else, the nature\nof her social obligation has been revealed. Here the fact cannot be\ndisguised that the people are the sovereigns, and that social as well as\npolitical relations are under their direct control. The sovereign people\nhave pledged themselves one to another, in their constitution, to\nrefrain from establishing, by law, any form of religion; but they have\nalso covenanted together to promote the common welfare. This puts the\nresponsibility for social conditions upon the whole people, and the\nChristian people are among them. They cannot avoid the obligation to\napply Christian principles to social conditions. Power is theirs to be\nused in Christ's name and for the promotion of his kingdom. To see that\nsociety is furnished with right ruling ideas, and organized on Christian\nprinciples, is their main business. And while there are many by whom\nthis obligation is still but feebly felt, yet there is a goodly number\nof those in whose minds the leaven is working, and to whom the nature of\nthe kingdom that Jesus came to establish is being clearly revealed. That\nthis number is destined to grow very rapidly we may reasonably hope.\n\nThe present situation is so clearly outlined by a recent writer that we\nmay welcome a liberal quotation:--\n\n\"The first apostolate of Christianity was born from a deep\nfellow-feeling for social misery, and from the consciousness of a great\nhistorical opportunity. Jesus saw the peasantry of Galilee following him\nabout with their poverty and their diseases, like shepherdless sheep\nthat have been scattered and harried by beasts of prey, and his heart\nhad compassion on them. He felt that the harvest was ripe but there were\nfew to reap it. Past history had come to its culmination, but there were\nfew who understood the situation and were prepared to cope with it. He\nbade his disciples to pray for laborers for the harvest, and then made\nthem answer their own prayers by sending them out two by two to proclaim\nthe kingdom of God. That was the beginning of the world-wide mission of\nChristianity.\n\n\"The situation is repeated on a vaster scale to-day. If Jesus stood\nto-day amid our modern life, with that outlook on the condition of all\nhumanity which observation and travel and the press would spread before\nhim, and with the same heart of humanity beating in him, he would\ncreate a new apostolate to meet the new needs in a new harvest time of\nhistory.\n\n\"To any one who knows the sluggishness of humanity to good, the\nimpregnable intrenchments of vested wrongs, and the long reaches of time\nneeded from one milestone of progress to the next, the task of setting\nup a Christian social order in this modern world of ours seems like a\nfair and futile dream. Yet, in fact, it is not one tithe as hopeless as\nwhen Jesus set out to do it. When he told his disciples, 'Ye are the\nsalt of the earth; ye are the light of the world,' he expressed the\nconsciousness of a great historic mission to the whole of humanity. Yet\nit was a Nazarene carpenter speaking to a group of Nazarene peasants and\nfishermen. Under the circumstances at that time it was an utterance of\nthe most daring faith,--faith in himself, faith in them, faith in what\nhe was putting into them, faith in faith. Jesus failed and was\ncrucified, first his body by his enemies and then his spirit by his\nfriends; but that failure was such an amazing success that to-day it\ntakes an effort on our part to realize that it required any faith on his\npart to inaugurate the kingdom of God and to send out his apostolate.\n\n\"To-day, as Jesus looks out upon humanity, his spirit must leap to see\nthe souls responsive to his call. They are sown broadcast through\nhumanity, legions of them. The harvest field is no longer deserted. All\nabout us we hear the clang of the whetstone and the rush of the blades\nthrough the grain and the shout of the reapers. With all our faults and\nour slothfulness, we modern men in many ways are more on a level with\nthe mind of Jesus than any generation that has gone before. If that\nfirst apostolate was able to remove mountains by faith, such an\napostolate as Christ could now summon might change the face of the\nearth.\"[28]\n\nThe time is ripe for such an apostolate. The old type of evangelism has\nplainly had its day. Strenuous efforts are put forth to revive it, but\ntheir success is meagre. It is easy by expending much money in\nadvertising, by organizing a great choir, and employing the services of\ngifted and earnest men, to draw large congregations; but the great mass\nof those who attend these services are church members,--the outside\nmultitude is scarcely, touched by them. Those who are gathered into the\nchurch in these meetings are mainly children from the Sunday schools.\nThere may be evangelists who, by an extravagant and grotesque\nsensationalism, contrive to get the attention of the non-churchgoers,\nand who are able to report considerable additions to the churches; but\nthe permanence of these gains is not yet shown, and we have no means of\nenumerating the thousands who, by such clownish exhibitions, are driven\nin disgust from the churches.\n\nThe failure of the modern evangelism is not conjectural: the year-books\nshow it. The growth of membership in several of our leading\ndenominations has either ceased or is greatly retarded; the Sunday\nschools and the young people's societies report decreasing numbers; the\nbenevolent contributions are either waning, or increasing at a rate far\nless than that of the growth of wealth in the membership. It is idle to\nblink these conditions; we must face them and find out what they mean.\nThis slackening and shrinkage is not a fact of long standing; it\nrepresents only the tendencies of the past twenty years.\n\nWe hear rather frantic demands for a return to the old methods of\nevangelism, but that is a foolish cry:--\n\n    \"The mill will never grind\n    With the water that is past.\"\n\nThe old appeal, which fixed attention upon the interest of the\nindividual, has lost its power. It is not possible to stir the average\nhuman being of this generation, as the average human being of fifty\nyears ago was stirred, by pictures of the terrors of hell and the\nfelicities of heaven. These conceptions have far less influence over\nhuman lives than once they had,--less, doubtless, than they ought to\nhave; for there are realities under these symbols which we cannot afford\nto ignore. But the fundamental defect of that old appeal was the\nemphasis which it placed upon self-interest. \"Look out for yourself!\"\nwas its constant admonition. \"Think of the perils that threaten, of the\nblisses that invite! Do not risk the pain; do not miss the blessedness!\"\nTo-day this does not seem a wholly worthy motive. At any rate, it is\nbelow the highest. Men feel that the religion of Christ has a larger\nmeaning than this. A presentation of the gospel which makes the welfare\nof the individual central does not grip the conscience and arouse the\nemotions as once it did. For the conception of human welfare as social\nrather than individual has become common; that \"great fund of altruistic\nfeeling,\" which, as Mr. Benjamin Kidd tells us, is the motive power of\nall our social reforms, is constantly stirring in human hearts; and\nalthough there are few whose lives are wholly ruled by this motive,\nthere are fewer still who do not recognize it as the commanding motive;\nand a religious appeal which is based upon considerations essentially\negoistic does not, therefore, awaken any large response in human hearts.\n\nIf the church wishes to regain her hold upon the people, she must learn\nto speak to the highest that is in them. A man's religion must\nconsecrate his ideals. A religion which invites him to live on a lower\nplane than the highest on which his thought travels cannot win his\nrespect. And therefore the new evangelism must learn to find its motive\nnot in self-love, no matter how refined, but in the love that identifies\nthe self with the neighbor. It must bring home to the individual the\ntruth which he already dimly knows, that his personal redemption is\nbound up with the redemption of the society to which he belongs; that he\ncannot be saved except as he becomes a savior of others; nay, that the\none central sin from which he needs to be saved is indifference to the\nwelfare of others, and a willingness to prosper at their expense.\n\nThe time has come for the church to take an entirely new attitude in\noffering men the gospel. It has been too well content with pressing the\npersonal advantages of religion, with trying to lure them into\ndiscipleship with baits addressed to their selfishness. It has been\ninventing attractions of all sorts,--fine buildings, sumptuous\nupholstery and decorations, artistic music, brilliant oratory; it has\nthought it possible to enlist men by pleasing their tastes and\ngratifying their sensibilities. So far has this gone that the average\nchurchgoer consciously justifies his presence in church or his absence\nfrom it on the ground of pleasure. If it pleases him enough, he goes; if\nnot, he reads the Sunday paper or goes out with his automobile. It is a\nsimple question of enjoyment.\n\nThe response of those invited shows the nature of the invitation. It\nindicates that the church has been putting a great deal of emphasis on\nthe attractions which it has to offer. We can hardly imagine such\nreplies to be made by those who were invited to listen to the preaching\nof Jesus or his apostles. They did not suppose that it was a question of\nentertainment that they were considering. They knew that it was a\nsummons to service and sacrifice. That, beyond all doubt, was the nature\nof the appeal of the church in those earliest centuries, when it was\nmarching over Asia and Europe, conquering and to conquer. It was not\nbaiting men with soft cushions and pictured windows, with coddlings and\ncomfits; it was calling them to hardship and warfare, to ignominy and\nostracism; the words of the Master to which it gave emphasis were not\nmere metaphors: \"If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and\ntake up his cross and follow me.\"\n\nThe call of the cross has never failed. The power of God and the wisdom\nof God are in it. And it is time for the church to take up this heroic\nnote and sound it forth with new power. This is the new evangelism for\nwhich the world is waiting. It is not a call to be \"carried to the skies\non flowery beds of ease;\" it is not an invitation to the sentimental\nsoul to \"sit and sing herself away to everlasting bliss;\" it is the\nclarion of battle; it is the challenge to an enterprise which means\nstruggle and suffering and self-denial.\n\nThe redemption of society is the objective of the new evangelism. How\nvast an undertaking this is was indicated in the last chapter. Let us\nlook at it a little more in detail. How much does it signify, here and\nnow, in the United States of America?\n\nIt means, first, the reconciliation of races. One thing that must be\ndone is to take this chaotic mass of dissimilar, discordant, suspicious,\nantipathetic racial elements and blend them into unity and brotherhood.\nThe first Christians had a task of this nature on their hands; they had\nto bring together in one fellowship Jews and Gentiles. But that was a\npastime compared with the herculean labor intrusted to us,--the bringing\ntogether of whites and blacks, of Caucasians and Mongolians, of scores\nof groups divided by the barriers of language, of religion, of custom,\nand fusing them into one nationality. No task of the same dimensions was\never undertaken by any people; but this is ours, and we must perform it.\nIt is the task of the nation; but the church of Jesus Christ is charged\nwith the business of furnishing the sentiments and ideas by which alone\nit may be accomplished.\n\nIt means, secondly, the pacification of industry. The contending hosts\nof capital and labor must be brought together, and constrained to cease\nfrom their warfare and become friends and co\u00f6perators. It is absurd to\nsuppose that the war of the industrial classes can continue to be waged,\nas at present, each seeking to overpower the other. Such a condition of\nthings is simply irrational. All warfare is illogical and unnatural.\nHuman beings are not made to live together on any such terms. They are\nmade to be friends and helpers of one another. The elimination of war is\nthe next step in industrial evolution. And it is the business of the\nchurch of Jesus Christ to speak the reconciling word. She has the word\nto speak, and when she utters it with authority it will be heard.\n\nIt means, thirdly, the moralization of business. The trouble with\nbusiness is simply covetousness. The insatiable greed of gain is the\nsource of all the dishonesties, the oppressions, the spoliations, the\ntrickeries, the frauds, the adulterations, the cutthroat competitions,\nthe financial piracies, the swindling schemes,--all the abuses and\nmischiefs which infest the world of commerce and finance. Against all\nthese forms of evil the church must bear her testimony; but the root\nfrom which they all grow is the love of money, and it is this central\nand seminal sin of modern civilization that the church must assail with\nall the weapons of the spiritual warfare. \"Covetousness is idolatry\"--so\nSt. Paul testifies; and a grosser or more debasing idolatry has never\nappeared on earth than the worship of material gain. Unless the bonds of\nthat superstition can be broken, the race must sink into degradation. It\nis the one deadly enemy of mankind. And the church of Jesus Christ is\ncalled to lead in the battle with this foe. Against no other social evil\nwas the testimony of Jesus so trenchant and uncompromising. Nothing more\nclearly evinces his unerring vision of moral realities than his judgment\nupon this encroaching passion. In his day it was an evil almost\nnegligible compared with what it is to-day. It was because he foresaw\nthe conditions which prevail to-day that his words were so hot against\nthe rule of Mammon. The church is face to face with the danger which he\ndiscerned, and she must meet it in his spirit and with the energy of\nhis passion. To make men see the hatefulness and loathsomeness of this\ngreed of gain is the first duty of the church. When that is accomplished\nthe worst evils of the business realm will disappear.\n\nIt means, fourthly, the extirpation of social vice. When covetousness is\nconquered, the procuring cause of much of this kind of evil will be cut\nup by the roots. The greed of gain is the motive which breeds and\npropagates social vice. But there are animal propensities to which these\nincitements make their appeal; and some way must be found of quickening\nthe nobler affections, so that the spirit shall rule the flesh and not\nbe in bondage to it. To fill the thoughts and wishes of men with\nsomething better worth while than the joys of animalism is the radical\nremedy for these degradations. And the church ought to be able to supply\nthis remedy.\n\nThe redemption of society means, in the fifth place, the purification of\npolitics. The dethronement of Mammon will go a long way toward this\nalso; most of the corruptions of our political life spring from the love\nof money. Graft is the first-born of covetousness. But the love of\npower also plays a part in the debauchery of citizenship; and the\ncentral sin of using men as means to our ends is exhibited here on a\nstupendous scale. This is the vocation of the boss and the briber and\nthe political machinist; and a deadlier way of destroying manhood it\nwould be hard to find. It is not only the interest of other individuals,\nbut the interest of the whole community that the corrupt politician\nsacrifices upon the altar of cupidity or ambition; and when a man has\nlearned to turn the one great privilege of service and sacrifice which\ncitizenship offers into an opportunity of private gain, he has sunk\nabout as low as man can go. What more urgent task has the church upon\nher hands than that of making men see the treachery and infamy of this\nkind of conduct? And unless men can be made to see it and feel it, what\nhope is there for free government? Can anybody imagine that democracy\ncan long endure if the ruling motive of the citizen in his relation to\nthe commonwealth is a purpose to get as much out of it as he can and\ngive it as little as he can? All political reforms which leave the\ncitizen in this state of mind are futile. There is no salvation for a\ndemocracy which does not change the direction of the motive in the\nheart of the individual citizen. And this is the business of the church.\nWithout this, social redemption is impossible, and there is no other\nagency which even proposes to accomplish this.\n\nAnd, finally, the redemption of society means the simplification of\nlife. Here, perhaps, we strike more nearly than anywhere else at the\nheart of the whole problem. The bottom trouble of the world in which we\nlive is the enormous over-multiplication of our wants. In the multitude\nof ministrations to our senses, the life of the spirit is overlaid and\nsmothered. Jesus said that a man's life consists not in the abundance of\nthe things which he possesses; it is this elementary truth which the\nworld has ceased to believe. For the most part our life is in our\nthings; our happiness depends on them; our desires do not often rise\nabove them.\n\nThe complexity, the artificiality, the profusion of our belongings\nabsorbs the larger part of our interest. The energies of invention are\nmainly directed to the creation of new wants. As the resources of the\nearth are developed, life takes on an accumulating burden of cares and\nconventions and superfluities. We read, with a wonder which is a thinly\ndisguised admiration, the stories of the extravagances of the people of\nthe whirlpool, but most of us are jogging along after them, wishing that\nwe could get into the swim ourselves. Our houses are cluttered with\nadornments; our social functions are spending matches; our feasts invite\nto satiation; our funerals are exhibitions of extravagance. This thing\nhas been growing by leaps and bounds, and the time has come when we are\nfairly swamped by the abundance of the things which we possess. Nay, it\ncan hardly be said that we possess this abundance; it possesses us:--\n\n    \"Things are in the saddle\n    And ride mankind.\"\n\nIn recent years the cry has been rising for a simpler life. It is a\nvoice in the wilderness; in the din and clatter of our complex\ncivilization it seems faint and far off, but it is making itself heard;\nit begins to be evident to all thoughtful people that we must somehow\nmanage to get away from these entanglements of sense and live a freer\nlife. In these artificialities and extravagances the soul is enfeebled\nand belittled, and the national vigor is lost. If we want to save our\nnation from decay we must learn to live a simpler life. And this change\nwill not be wrought out by evolutionary processes; it means revolution\nrather; not by violence, we may trust, but certainly by choice, by\neffort, by struggle and resistance we shall turn back these tides of\nmaterialism, and lead the current of our national life into safer\nchannels.\n\nWe are not going to strip our lives bare of beauty, or to consign\nourselves to the meagreness of the anchoretic regimen; we shall have\nbeautiful homes and abundant pleasures; but we must learn to make our\nspiritual interests supreme, and not suffer our thought to be blurred\nand our faith enfeebled and our love stifled in the atmosphere of modern\nmaterialism.\n\nSuch, then, are some of the phases of that great work of social\nredemption which now confronts us. Other aspects of the work, not less\nserious, might be presented, but these are some of the outstanding needs\nof modern society. Certainly it is a tremendous work. To reconcile\nhostile and suspicious races; to pacify industrial classes; to moralize\nbusiness; to extirpate social vice; to purify politics; to simplify\nlife;--all this is an enterprise so vast that we may well be appalled by\nthe thought of undertaking it. But this, and nothing less than this, is\nthe business which the church has in hand. For which of these tasks is\nshe not responsible? From which of them would she dare ask to be\nexcused? To what other agency can she think of intrusting any of them?\nNay, this is her proper and peculiar work. For this is she sent into the\nworld.\n\nIn truth, the one thing that the church needs to-day is to envisage this\ntask,--to take in its tremendous dimensions; to comprehend the\noverpowering magnitude of the work that is expected of her. It is this\nrevelation that will rouse her. Never before, in all her history, has\nsuch a disclosure of her responsibility been made to her. And the\nenormity of the obligation will set her thinking. It will dawn upon her\nafter a little, that it is for just such tasks that she is called and\ncommissioned; that the achievement of the impossible is the very thing\nthat she is always expected to do; that the strength on which she leans\nis omnipotence; that she can do all things through Christ who\nstrengthened her. She will see and understand that her progress is not\nmade by seeking the line of least resistance: some such worldly wisdom\nas this has been her undoing. She will learn that it is only when she\nundertakes the greatest things that she finds her resources equal to her\nneeds.\n\nThis is the heroic note of the new evangelism. The work of making a\nbetter world of this is a tremendous work, but it can be done. It can be\ndone, because it is commanded. If there is a God in heaven, what ought\nto be done can be done. To doubt that is to deny him. And there is one\nway of doing it, and that is Christ's way. For all this manifold,\nherculean labor on which we have been looking, there is no wisdom\ncomparable with his. He said that he came to save the world, and he is\ngoing to save it. He has waited long, but he knows how to wait. The day\nof his triumph is drawing near. This world is going to be redeemed. This\nsocial order, so full of strife and confusion, of cruelty and\noppression, of misery and sorrow, is going to be transformed, and the\nlove of Christ shed abroad in the hearts of men will transform it. We\nare not going to wait another thousand years for our millennium; we are\ngoing to have it here and now. This is the gospel of the new evangelism\nwhich it has taken the church a long time to learn, but which she is now\ngetting ready to proclaim with demonstration of the spirit and with\npower.\n\nWe must not hide from ourselves the fact that some great changes will\nneed to take place in her own life before she can give effect to this\ngreat evangel. She must heal her divisions, and fling away her\nencumbering traditions, and greatly deepen her faith in her Lord and\nLeader. Above all, she must simplify her own life. She cannot bear\nwitness, as she must, against the deadly influences of our modern\nmaterialism, until she utterly clears herself of all complicity with it.\nThis means, in many quarters, a radical change in her administration.\n\nWhen the church has thus envisaged her task, and comprehended its\nmagnitude, and when, with her heart on fire with the greatness and glory\nof it, she has laid aside every weight and the sins that so easily beset\nher, and has girded herself with the truth as it is in Jesus, and has\nset the silver trumpet to her lips, she will have a gospel to proclaim,\nto which the world will listen.\n\nIt will tell the world, as it has always told the world, of forgiveness\nand hope, of comfort and peace, of the help and guidance that comes to\nthe troubled soul in believing in Jesus. It will speak, as it has always\nspoken, of the rest that remaineth, and of the great joys and\ncompanionships of the eternal future. But it will have something more\nthan this to tell.\n\nThe kingdoms of this world--this will be its message--are becoming the\nkingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ. It is not an event to be\nawaited, but to be realized, here and now. Nothing is needed but that\nmen should believe the word of Jesus Christ and live by it. We do\nbelieve it, and we mean to show our faith by our works. We believe that\nby simply living together as Jesus has taught us to live, we can make\nthis world so much better than it now is, that men shall think heaven\nhas come down to earth. We believe that the race question and the labor\nquestion and the trust question and the liquor question and the graft\nquestion and all the other questions will find a speedy solution when\nmen have learned to walk in the way of Jesus. And we call you to come\nand walk with us in that way.\n\nIt is not a smooth and thornless way. It is a toilsome and painful way.\nIt is the way of the cross. It means hardship and struggle and\nsuffering. Such intrenched and ingrained iniquities as now infest our\nsociety will not be overcome without conflict. We are not calling you to\na pastime. We are not offering you riches or honors or sensual joys. We\nare calling you to service and to sacrifice. But we are going to build\nhere in this world the kingdom of heaven. We know that it can be done:\nwe know how to do it, and the glorious thing we have to tell you is that\nyou can have a share in it. Look forward with us to the day when--\n\n    \"Nation with nation, land with land,\n      Unarmed shall live as comrades free,\n    In every heart and brain shall throb\n      The pulse of one fraternity;\n\n    \"New arts shall bloom, of loftier mould,\n      And mightier music thrill the skies,\n    And every life shall be a song\n      When all the earth is paradise,\"--\n\nand come and help us to bring that glad time. The Leader whom we follow\nknows the way, and the future belongs to Him.\n\nThat is the message of the new evangelism, and when the church learns\nto speak it with conviction, and to make it good in her life, she will\nfind that the gospel has a power that she has never even imagined it to\npossess.\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\nThe New Leadership\n\n\n\nThese discussions have failed of their purpose if they have not made a\nfew things clear. Let us restate them:--\n\n1. The roots of religion are in human nature. It is a fact as central\nand all-pervasive in the social realm as gravitation is in the physical\nrealm. It is no more likely to become antiquated or obsolete than oxygen\nor sunshine. It is an interest which no intelligent person can afford to\nignore.\n\n2. Like every other living thing, religion grows. It is not outside the\nsphere of operation of Him who said, \"Behold! I make all things new!\" It\nis subject, continually, to his wise economy of renewal.\n\n3. Our religion is Christianity. With the other religions of the race it\nis destined to be brought into closer and closer comparison and\ncompetition, and that religion will survive and become universal which\nmost perfectly explains the universe and provides for the wants of the\nhuman soul. All the indications are that the religion which survives\nwill include the essential elements of Christianity.\n\n4. All religions are rooted in the social nature of man, but\nChristianity, more than any other, is a social religion. It depends for\nits culture and propagation upon the social forces. Some form of social\norganization, like the church, is necessary to the life of religion.\nWorship, to be sane and salutary, must be social; and the life of\nChristianity can find expression only in such co\u00f6perations as those for\nwhich the church provides.\n\n5. As the life of religion is nurtured in social worship and service, so\nits fruit is gathered in the transformation of society. The primary\nfunction of the church is the Christianization of the social order. The\nbusiness of the church is to save the world by establishing here the\nkingdom of heaven.\n\n6. The church has very imperfectly performed this function. It has but\ndimly discerned and but feebly grasped the social aims of Jesus. It has\ntried to do a great many other things, some of them good things; but the\none thing it was sent to do it has largely left undone.\n\n7. A new reformation is therefore called for, and that reformation must\naccomplish what the reformation of the sixteenth century failed to\naccomplish,--the restoration of the social teachings of Jesus to their\nproper rank and dignity. As the reformation of the sixteenth century\nbrought the individual to Christ as a personal Saviour, so the\nreformation of the twentieth century must bring society to Christ as a\nsocial Saviour, and must make men see that there is no way of living\ntogether but his way.\n\n8. The church is therefore called to the redemption of society. But the\nwork of redemption to which it is called is not a reconstruction of\neconomic or political machinery; it is the quickening of the social\nconscience, and the re\u00ebnthronement of justice and love in the place of\nselfishness and strife as the ruling principles of human society.\n\n9. For the redemption of society a new evangelism is needed. The new\nevangelism will not emphasize the interest of the individual; it will\nrather emphasize the truth that the individual can only be saved when he\nidentifies his own welfare with the welfare of his fellow men. And it\nwill not try to win men by offering them ease and safety and comfort,\nbut rather by showing them how tremendous are the tasks before them;\nwhat a mighty work there is to do in delivering this world from the\nbondage of corruption and selfishness; what hardship and toil and\nsacrifice are needed; but how sure the victory is for those who are able\nto believe the word of Jesus Christ and follow, whole-heartedly, his\nleadership.\n\nSuch are the characters and conditions under which the church of Jesus\nChrist presents herself in this new day to modern men. Her record is far\nfrom flawless; it is the necessities of logic, not the facts of history,\nwhich make her infallible. She has blundered along through the\ncenturies, missing much of the work she was sent to do, and staining her\ngarments not seldom with the soilure of greed and the blood of the\ninnocent; but through all these generations the patient love of her Lord\nhas been chastening her, and through many wanderings and stumblings she\nhas come down to this hour. The light upon her candlestick has often\ngrown dim, but it has never been wholly extinguished; the fire upon her\naltars has burned low, but it is still burning. She has not done all\nthat she ought to have done, but she has done a large part of all that\nhas been done to enlighten, to comfort, and to uplift humanity. And the\ndiscipline through which she has passed gives some indication of the\nwork she has yet to do. It is not credible that a wise Providence should\nhave kept her alive so many centuries, and should have made so much use\nof her in the establishment upon the earth of the kingdom of heaven, and\nshould have led her into a constantly increasing knowledge of Himself,\nif he had not meant to make her his servant in the great work now\nwaiting to be done.\n\nHer hour has come, and her task lies before her. It might be urged that\nshe ought to have been better fitted for her work before she was called\nto undertake it; but that is not God's way. We get our preparation for\ngreat work in the work itself. We are called from the sheepfolds to lead\nthe armies of Israel. We are sent out with a few loaves and fishes to\nfeed the multitude. Our powers are developed and our resources are\nmultiplied by using them. And though the church is far from having the\nequipment she needs for the redemption of society, the power and the\nwisdom will come when the work is bravely undertaken.\n\nTo whom, now, does this great enterprise of social redemption make its\nstrongest appeal? It ought to appeal to all good men and women. It ought\nto enlist the powers of those who are in the meridian of their strength.\nThe men whose vision has been widened and whose wills have been\ninvigorated in the great undertakings of industry and commerce ought to\nfind in this proposition something worthy of their powers. It ought,\nalso, to stir the hearts of those who have labored hard and waited long\nfor the coming of the kingdom to hear a great voice saying, \"Now is the\naccepted time: behold! now is the day of salvation!\" To many of those\nwho have not much longer to live life never seemed a thing so fair as it\nis to-day.\n\nBut this great appeal ought most strongly to lay hold upon the hearts of\nthe young men and women of this generation. The enterprise is mainly\ntheirs. If the new reformation comes, they will lead it on. If society\nis redeemed, it will be by their toil and sacrifice. If the church ever\nlearns its business, it will be under their tuition. And it must be by\ntheir voices, chiefly, that the new evangel will be proclaimed.\n\nThe young men and women who have had the patience to read these\nchapters have been invited to consider some large and serious themes. It\nhas been assumed that they did not care for kindergarten talk, nor even\nfor the ethical platitudes to which youth are apt to be treated. There\nhas been no talking down to them; they have been asked to sit where\nJesus sat, among the doctors in the temple, to hear and answer\nquestions, and to consider, with the rest of us, our Father's business.\n\nAll this tremendous work of social reconstruction about which we are\ntalking must be done, and most of it must be done by them. It is to be\nhoped that they will be able to see the urgency of it, and to feel that\nit is something worth their while.\n\nThose of us who have been permitted to come in contact with the more\nthoughtful young men and women of this generation, especially those in\nthe colleges and the professional schools, have been made aware of a\ndeepening conviction among the best of them that the kind of prizes for\nwhich the multitude are contending are not of the highest value. Great\nrevisions have been taking place, during the past few years, in the\nestimates of success. Many careers which, but a little while ago,\nseemed enviable, now appear much less alluring. And while this change of\nattitude is far from being universal, there is a goodly number of young\nmen and women scattered through all our communities whose souls are\nkindled with social passion, and who are asking not so eagerly how they\nmay succeed as how they may serve. To these we have a right to look for\nleadership in the work of social redemption.\n\nMany phases of this work will appeal to them. In education, in\nphilanthropy, in journalism, in literature, in art, they will be called\nto serve; many philanthropies will invite them; the organization of\nindustry upon co\u00f6perative lines will offer some of them a vocation, and\nthe government will be upon their shoulders.\n\nBut what they are asked to consider here is the claim of the church upon\nthem. That claim need not conflict with any of these other vocations,\nunless, indeed, the work of the Christian ministry should offer itself\nto their choice. That possibility, by the way, is well worth thinking\nof. Some of them, let us trust, will keep it in mind for further\nconsideration. If the business of the church is what we have found it\nto be, and the new evangelism is such as we have outlined, the Christian\nministry must offer to any man whose heart is on fire with social\npassion a great opportunity. But for the present let us note the fact\nthat upon those who are not to give their whole lives to the work of the\nchurch, the church has a claim, which they ought seriously to consider.\nWhatever their callings may be, in whatever fields they may be laboring,\nthe church will need their loyal service, and they will need its goodly\nfellowships and its inspiring co\u00f6peration.\n\nThe church which ought to be, and must be, is not for some of us, but\nfor all of us. Even as the state is the political commonwealth to which\nall citizens belong, so the church is the spiritual commonwealth in\nwhich all souls should be included. The interests for which the church\nprovides are the common human interests; it never can be what it ought\nto be, or do what it is called to do, until it gathers all the people\ninto its fellowship. And therefore these young men and women to whom the\nfuture is intrusted must find their places in the church. The church\nneeds them; it cannot fulfill its function without them; and we have\nseen that its function is a vital function; that it furnishes the bond\nby which society is held together.\n\nThe church is God's agency for leavening society with Christian\ninfluences; and these young men and women by whom the social order is to\nbe reconstructed will be in the church. Its leadership will be committed\nto them. They will have the shaping of its life. Its life will need much\nreshaping, and that will be their work. What will they make of it?\n\n1. They will make it, what it has always been, a place of worship; the\nshrine of the spirit; the home of Christian nurture; a school of\ninstruction; a fount of inspiration; a seminary of religion; the\nmeeting-place of man and God.\n\nAttempts have been made in recent years to organize churches--or, at\nleast, associations which should take the place of churches--in which\nreligion should be dispensed with; in which there should be more or less\nof ethical instruction and of charitable co\u00f6peration, but no recognition\nof any connection between this world and any other. That is simply a\nreform against nature, and it will never prosper. For, as Professor\nWilliam James has taught us, in a great inductive study, the sum of all\nthat is known about religion warrants us in saying:--\n\n\"(a) That the visible world is part of a more spiritual universe, from\nwhich it draws its chief significance;\n\n\"(b) That union or harmonious relation with that higher universe is our\ntrue end;\n\n\"(c) That prayer or inner communion with the spirit thereof ... is a\nprocess wherein work is really done, and spiritual energy flows in and\nproduces effects, psychological or material, within the phenomenal\nworld.\"[29]\n\nThese are the indubitable conclusions of modern science; and the\nproposition to ignore the deepest fact of human experience will not be\nentertained by the young men and women of the present day. The church,\nunder their leadership, will be a worshiping church, a praying church.\nIt will keep itself in close relations with that unseen universe from\nwhich its help must come. It will be a channel through which the divine\ngrace will flow into the lives of men. And it will also be, what it has\nalways been, a school as well as a shrine, a place where the teacher\nsearches out and unfolds the truth and the prophet proclaims the message\nthat has been given him.\n\n2. Under its new leadership the church will continue to be a minister to\nhuman want and suffering. The charitable work which has always been\nemphasized in its administration will not be neglected, but it will take\non a new character. There will be less almsgiving, and more of the kind\nof help which saves manhood and womanhood. The young men and women who\nare called to this leadership will understand the worth of souls--that\nis, of men and women; and they will be careful lest, in their relief of\nwant, they undermine the character. Above all, they will feel that while\nit is the business of the church to care for the poor, its first\nbusiness is to cure the conditions which breed poverty.\n\n3. They will thoroughly democratize the life of the church, making it\nthe rallying place of a genuine Christian fraternity, in which men of\nall ranks and stations meet on a common level, ignoring the distinctions\nof rich and poor, cultured and ignorant, and emphasizing the fact of\nChristian brotherhood. We have churches which profess democracy, but\nthere is reason to fear that many of them are little better than\noligarchies; that some of them come near to being monarchies. The new\nleadership will discern the importance of making every member of the\nbrotherhood, no matter how humble, a partaker of its responsibilities,\nand a helper in its services. They will know that the problem of church\nadministration is to make every man feel that he is needed. They will\ngrasp the significance of Paul's figure of the body and its members, and\nwill see that \"those members of the body which seem to be more feeble\nare necessary,\" and that \"those parts of the body which are less\nhonorable\" ought to receive \"more abundant honor.\" They will have\nworkingmen in their vestries and their sessions and their boards of\ntrustees. They will show to all the world that they have accepted the\nword of Jesus: \"One is your Master, even Christ, and all ye are\nbrethren.\"\n\n4. This means that the life of the church will not only be thoroughly\ndemocratized, but greatly simplified. All its administration will take\non plainer and less luxurious forms. The splendors of architecture and\nart, of upholstery and decoration, of ecclesiastical millinery and\nmusic, with which we now so often seek to attract men to the house of\nGod, will be put aside; and the followers of Jesus Christ will get near\nenough to him to have some sense of the fitness of things in the\nordering of the houses of worship where the Carpenter is the social\nleader and where rich and poor meet as one brotherhood.\n\nInstead, therefore, of permitting the church to be invaded and\nvulgarized by the luxury and extravagance of the world, they will turn\nthe current in the other direction. The church, under the new\nleadership, will not take its cue from the world; it will enforce its\nown standards upon the world. \"Out of Zion will go forth the law.\"\n\nBitter words were those spoken at a recent meeting of the Congregational\nUnion in England by one of the greatest of English preachers.[30] \"The\ncommon life of the home,\" he said, \"is often a mere vulgar exhibition of\nthe means of living. We try to persuade ourselves that showy living is\nessential life. In tens of thousands of English homes the mere show of\nthings is the goal of a restless and feverish ambition. Everywhere we\nseem to be loitering and pottering about in the implement yard. Even in\nour universities we must have showy buildings, though we starve the\nchairs. All this peril becomes the more insidious when we pass into the\nrealm of the church of God. Why, the 'means of grace' are often\nmisinterpreted as grace itself. We are obtruding our badges and ribbons,\nour soldier's dress without the soldier's spirit, our music, our\nministers even,--how they look, what they wear, what they do--they are\nall part of the wretched vulgarity of the modern spirit.\"\n\nThe two things are rightly put together. The ostentation of the home,\nthe tawdry luxury and profusion of fashionable society, creep into the\nchurch and set up their standards there, and the religion of Christ puts\non a costume in which its Founder would never recognize it.\n\nWe are dealing here with the very heart of the trouble in our national\nlife, and the problem is one which must be solved by the present\ngeneration of our young men and women. The social conditions which are\ndepicted for us by close students of the life of our luxurious classes\nare ominous in the extreme. The cynical dishonesties and the brutal\nspoliations which have come to light in the realm of high finance and\nbig business are the natural fruit of such a manner of life as many of\nour recent novelists have vividly portrayed. And the wanton extravagance\nof the House of Mirth would not exist if the majority of the people did\nnot admire it. The outcry against it is oftener the voice of envy than\nof moral revulsion. The cure for this evil, as of most others, is found\nin public opinion; and the church must educate public opinion to reprove\nit, and the leadership of the church will be in the hands of the young\nmen and women of this generation.\n\nIt will be evident to them that the place to begin is in the church\nitself. The heartless luxury of the world will not be chastened into\nsimplicity by a church that surrounds itself with splendor and spends\nmoney lavishly upon its pleasures. They will know that a church which\nwishes to reprove the vanity and ostentation of the outside world must\norder its own life in such a way that its word shall be with power.\n\n5. Finally and chiefly the young men and women who are to be called to\nthe leadership of the church will feel that their main business is the\nwork of church extension. But they will give to this phrase a little\ndifferent meaning from that which it has generally carried. The church\nextension to which the boards and societies in the church have been\ndevoted is the work of building new churches in promising fields. It is\nproperly denominational extension. Something of this kind will remain to\nbe done in the new day now before us, and our new leaders will doubtless\nhave some part in it. But the church extension which is most loudly\ncalled for just now is the extension of the life of the church into\nevery department of human life. It is more analogous to what we call\nuniversity extension work. The business of university extension is not\nthe planting of new universities; it is the projection of the university\ninto the community; it is the attempt to carry the light and the\nknowledge and the truth and the beauty for which the university stands\ndown among the people; to popularize the higher culture and the finer\nart. That is a most praiseworthy enterprise, a most Christian\nundertaking. And something very much like this will be the church\nextension for which the new leadership will stand. Its aim will be to\nmake a vital connection between the Christian church and every\ninstitution or agency by which the work of the world is done, so that\nthe influence of the church shall be directly felt in every part of our\nsocial life. It will consider the church as the nursery or conservatory,\nwhose growths are to be planted out all over the field of the world. It\nwill make the church the central dynamo of the community, connected by a\nlive wire with every home, school, factory, bank, shop, store, office,\nlegislative chamber, employers' association, labor federation,--with\nevery organ of the whole social organism, so that the light and power\nwhich are in Jesus Christ shall be the guiding influence and the motive\nforce of our civilization.\n\nThis is the work which remains to be done, and for which this present\nworld is loudly calling. It is the work that Jesus Christ came into this\nworld to do, and he will not see of the travail of his soul and be\nsatisfied until it is done. The opportunity of realizing the social aims\nof Jesus, of organizing society upon the principles which he laid down,\nis offered to the young men and women of this generation. It will be\nopen to them so to order the life of the church that in its democracy\nand its simplicity it shall represent Jesus Christ, and then to extend\nthis life into industry and commerce and politics and art and social\ndiversion, thus bringing all the kingdoms of this world into the kingdom\nof the Christ. It will be their principal task to translate the sermons\nand the prayers and the songs of Sunday into the life of the shop and\nthe factory and the office on Monday and the other days of the week.\nThat would mean, of course, a tremendous overturning in the business of\nthe world; a radical revision of the ideals and standards of the great\nmajority; a new point of view and a new aim in life for the most of us.\nBut such a peaceful revolution in our ways of life would be far less\npainful and disastrous than the revolution which our present habits are\nsure to bring, and it is the only thing which will prevent it. And if\nthe young men and women of to-day will but discern this truth, they may\nhave the honor of leading in the new Saturnian reign.\n\nWe hear in these days from earnest men many anxious questions why the\nmessage of the gospel fails to reach and convince the outside multitude.\n\"Why is it,\" good preachers say, \"that there are so many people in all\nour communities--some of them very good people--who are not at all\ntouched by our appeal? They do not seem to be interested in what we have\nto offer them. They do not appear to feel their need of it.\"\n\nTo this question more than one answer could be given, but there is one\nanswer which needs to be well considered. One reason is that these men\nand women fail to discern, in the life round about them, the reality of\nthe thing which we offer them. For Christianity is, as we have seen in\nthese studies, not only an individual experience, but a social fact. And\nwhile we might not be qualified to judge whether the individual\nexperience, in any given case, is genuine, we could see the social fact,\nif it were in sight. That social fact would be profoundly interesting to\nus, and it would be convincing. Nothing else is likely to convince us.\nIn truth, we cannot understand Christianity at all until we see it in\noperation in society. One man alone cannot give any idea of what it is.\nAs some one has said, one man and God will give us all that is essential\nin any other religion, but Christianity requires for Its operation at\nleast two men and God. In fact, it takes a good many men and women and\nchildren, living together in all sorts of relations, to give any\nadequate exhibition of it. What we need, then, first of all, to convince\nmen of its reality, is a good sample of it, in active operation--a great\nvariety of good samples, indeed. When we have these to show, we can get\npeople interested.\n\nIt would be difficult, if a very homely illustration may be permitted,\nto enlist the interest of any boy in baseball if you made it with him an\nindividual matter. You might try to train him for any given position on\nthe field, but if he undertook to study it out alone it would not be\neasy for him to understand it. In fact, it would be impossible. No one\ncould learn the game all alone. The team work is the whole of it. And it\nwould be absurd to expect any one to become interested in the game\nunless he could see it played.\n\nTo take a similar illustration from a somewhat higher form of art, you\nwould not be likely to succeed in awakening enthusiasm in any one for\norchestral music by giving him his individual part of the score to study\nand play over by himself. No matter what his instrument might be, the\nsolitary performance of the part assigned to it would be the dryest\npossible business. You could not convert any man to the love of\norchestral music by any such process. But if he could hear all the\ninstruments played together, and, better still, if he could play in with\nall the rest, that might be inspiring.\n\nSo you need not expect to convert any man to Christianity unless you can\nshow him Christianity at work in human society. In considering only the\nindividual application of it, its whole meaning and significance would\nbe hidden from him. The team work is all there is of it. Let him see it\nin active operation, and it will awaken his enthusiasm.\n\nThis is, in fact, the essence of the new evangelism to which the young\nmen and women of this day are called. Their business will be to take\nChristianity out into the field of the world and set it at work. It is\nfor this that the leadership is intrusted to them. The church has been a\nlong time coming to this, but it seems at last to be arriving, and the\nyoung people of this generation will be summoned to the great\nundertaking. Surely they may feel that a high honor and a heavy\nresponsibility are thus put upon them. It is the most heroic enterprise\nto which the sons of men have ever been called.\n\nNot all of them will respond to the call. But we may hope that there\nwill be found among them a goodly minority to whom the appeal will come\nwith commanding voice, and whom we may hear answering: \"Yea and amen!\nThe work is ours, and we will not shirk it. It is work worth doing, and\nit can be done. To make a better world of this is the best thing a man\ncan think of; and we believe that Christ's way is the right way. It has\nnever yet had a fair trial, and we are bound that it shall be tried. We\nknow that we shall not make ourselves rich or famous in this\nundertaking; but we shall see the load lifted from many shoulders, and\nthe light of hope shining in many eyes; we shall hear the din of strife\nchanging to the songs of cheerful labor; we shall share our simple joys\nwith those who know that we have always tried to make their lives\nhappier, and who cannot choose but love us; we shall find life worth\nliving, and we shall die content.\"\n\n\n\n\nFootnotes\n\n\n\n[1] _Through Nature to God_, p. 189.\n\n[2] _The Victory of the Will_, p. 213.\n\n[3] _First Principles_, p. 14.\n\n[4] _Ibid._ p. 20.\n\n[5] _First Principles_, pp. 99, 100.\n\n[6] Quoted by Walker in _Christian Theism_, p. 47.\n\n[7] _Christian Theism_, pp. 40, 42.\n\n[8] New York _Independent_, September 12, 1907.\n\n[9] Micah iv, 5.\n\n[10] I do not include Confucianism, because it is, primarily, a system\nof ethics or sociology rather than a religion; and also because it seems\nto have no missionary impulse, and no expectation of universality.\n\n[11] _Permanent Elements in Religion_, p. 143.\n\n[12] _The Unknown God_, p. 228.\n\n[13] Professor D. M. Fisk.\n\n[14] Acts ii, 44, 45.\n\n[15] Matt. vi. 5, 6.\n\n[16] James v, 16.\n\n[17] Rauschenbusch: _Christianity and the Social Crisis_, pp. 93, 94.\n\n[18] Page 182.\n\n[19] _The Social Gospel_, Harnack and Herrmann, pp. 216, 217.\n\n[20] _Essays and Addresses_, p. 194.\n\n[21] _Essays and Addresses_, p. 189.\n\n[22] _A History of the Reformation_, vol. i, pp. 85,86.\n\n[23] _Ibid._ pp. 87, 88.\n\n[24] _Op. cit._ p. 96.\n\n[25] Seebohm, _The Era of the Protestant Revolution_, pp. 57,58.\n\n[26] _Op. cit._ pp. 327, 328.\n\n[27] _The Philosophy of Religious Experience_, by Henry W. Clark, pp.\n234-236.\n\n[28] Rauschenbusch, _Christianity and the Social Crisis_, pp. 414-416.\nThe volume is one that no intelligent student of present-day\nChristianity can afford to neglect.\n\n[29] _The Varieties of Religious Experience_, p. 485.\n\n[30] Dr. J. H. Jowett.","title":"The Church and Modern Life","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":44904}