1 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^H| j ; ; i f UG 1 liiiiiii ^^M $B EbM T17 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY A. J. W. MYERS ASSOCIATION PRESS New York : 347 Madison Avenue 1919 (3 vLis Mf Copyright, 1919, by The International Committee op Young Men's Christian Associations ''n To MY MOTHER AND THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER In Gratitude and Love 448713 Digitized by the Internet Arciiive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/christianlifeincOOmyerrich FOREWORD Leadership, the management of and participation in great movements, and the kind of service that touches roots and causes, appeal to men and women today. It is significant that no one can make a study of the Church, such as is here presented, without being impressed over and over again that such work, more than anything else, characterizes the essential nature of the Church's life at the present time. This course seeks to enlist men and women in that noble fellowship of service. The call is urgent. Those with the spirit of the Crusaders will not fail to respond. Under the "Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work" a Scripture reference is always placed first. These passages are not cited as proof texts. But our in- spiration to service comes largely through the Bible, and the suitability of these passages as a background for our think- ing will, it is hoped, be apparent. Suggestions to students throughout the course ought to be followed conscientiously. Not one of them has been made except under the conviction that it would be of real help. The aim is to arouse personal interest and induce indepen- dent thought and investigation. The study will have failed of its purpose if the students do not get into closer personal touch with the local conditions affectmg human welfare and develop a more sympathetic understanding of others. The student should set aside a certain time each day for the study, so that he may be able to sit down unhurried to vii viii FOREWORD enjoy the course, without being haunted by the thought that he is taking time from some other work. This attitude of mind is important. As many days and class meetings should be given to each chapter as are necessary for thorough study. The course is planned equally for men and women. It is hoped that the study, investigations, and class fellowship may promote good citizenship and the extension of the Kingdom of God. The book is the result of consultation and cooperation be- tween the North American Student Movements and several of the Church Sunday School Boards, in an effort to provide material for training students more adequately for work in relation to local churches. The Canadian National Student Council appointed a committee representing the denomina- tional Sunday School Boards, the Dominion Council of Young Women's Christian Associations, and the Canadian National Council of Young Men's Christian Associations. The Com- mittee on Voluntary Study of the Council of North American Student Movements — representing the Student Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations in the United States, the Student Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations in Canada, and the Student Volunteer Movement — cooperated through a special sub-committee. The author has worked in direct relation with these com- mittees in the preparation of the manuscript. While the book was planned from the viewpoint of the situation in Canada, the author has had experience on both sides of the FOREWORD ix line, and gives attention also to the problems in the United States. Combining as it does, this study of Christian Hfe in the community from the viewpoint both of the problems in Canada and in the United States, it is hoped it will prove of help to individuals and groups in both countries. CONTENTS Page Foreword vii I. Introduction 1 II. The Challenge 8 III. The Challenge (continued) 22 IV. The Forces at Work Making for Improve-' MENT 35 V. The Place and Power of Religion 62 VI. The Function of the Local Church 67 VII. Opportunities for Service through the Church 81 VIII. Opportunities for Service through the Church School 98 IX. How to Take Hold 116 CHAPTER I THE VIEWPOINT OF LIFE The writer of this book believes profoundly that every normal young man and young woman wants to make the greatest possible success of Hfe. This assumption is taken for granted in every chapter. Our students amply justify this faith. And what a time it is in which to live and to be young! We have sometimes envied men and women who lived greatly because of the stirring events of their day. But never was there a time when great events crowded so fast upon each other. Idealism, morality, the cry of the weak, the voice of God, have called thousands of our young men and women to fields of battle. Our blood tingles with enthusiastic loyalty to them and to God's Cause, for which they fought as truly as did any of the saints of old. Those who work in factories, on farms, by conserving, saving, and in every other way that strengthens the Right, are an essential part of that vast army. During the World War, deeds of heroism, self-sacrifice, personal loyalty, and love abounded in military and in private life and most of all perhaps among the cruelly downtrodden in the Httle nations of Belgium, Armenia, Serbia, Roumania, Montenegro, Assyria, Poland, and the overrun portions of France, Italy, and Russia. With all its sorrow it was a time of exaltation. Faith, at first shaken to its very foundations, has been based more firmly on the Rock, and the glorious victory has filled all the AlUes with gratitude to God. They can cry out in the words of the Psalmist: "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory" (115: 1). "We were like them that dream . . . The Lord hath done 1 2 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY great things for us; whereof we are glad " (126: 1, 3). Never in our generation was ttierii such a keen sense of the need and of the presence of God. Ten thousand voices call. Irresistible appeals come day- after day. Every spark of sympathy, self-sacrifice, and heroism in us responds. We are impatient to get at many things. It is sometimes difficult to see just what our efforts are accompHshing or what we can do. The spectacular and that which brings quick results seem sometimes to be alone worth doing. We need to be reminded that often the most fundamental and far-reaching service is not spectacular and brings no visible and quick returns. This course of study seeks to direct the attention to some fundamental things. These are not always showy, but they are permanent — per- manent in their need and in their results. It seeks to point out the opportunity offered for life investment through the Church. We all want to make a success of our lives. It is well for us first to take some time to make clear to ourselves just what we mean by "success" in life. Let each student stop and write down just what he considers essential for himself if his life is to be a success. If each will do this for himself and write out in his own words what his ideal for his own fife is, it will help to clarify his thinking and will also help to center attention on the crucial points in the following studies. After all, there are but two main classes into which all life purposes may be divided, though the forms are legion. The first main division comprises all that are self -centered. This desire may express itself in a determination to make money, to attain position, to get fame, to be sought after, courted, pandered to, to be popular, to have a care-free, easy time, to sit in the place of authority and sway the scepter of influence. All of us have had at times such dreams. We have pic- tured ourselves rich — with a fine house, motor cars, motor boats — influential, our advice sought by leading people, the center of admiring crowds. While these are often but passing THE VIEWPOINT OF LIFE 3 "day-dreams," they help us to appreciate the point of view. With most people these dreams are merely the giving free rein in fancy to the desire for personal gratification, for power and approbation that is inherent in our nature. Unfortu- nately with many these ideals dominate their hves. It is the philosophy of those often amiable ones, who are at home in any crowd and can take a drink, or swap a shady story, or accept a rake-off without any moral revolt. Browning's "The Patriot'' gives a classic picture of the man whose burn- ing ambition is to be popular and who gives freely of pubUc funds to gain applause. George EHot has uncovered merci- lessly the person of great promise who seeks only his own interest. Tito in " Romola " is a wonderful study of the inevi- table development of a life full of promise and of good impulse that allows self-interest to become its aim. The revelation makes us tremble, for the same elements are in our own hearts. Napoleon has been perhaps the greatest example of a life centered in self until ecUpsed by the emperor and war lords of Germany. One of the serious results of such a purpose for young college people, even if it never has been expHcitly expressed, is that it warps our judgment as to what occupation or vocation we should follow. For example, if we want to be rich and have certain luxuries we never even stop to consider the possibility of taking up for our life work the ministry, missionary service, the Young Men's or Young Women's Christian Association, social service, teaching, or similar work, however great the need or however great our qualifications for such work may be. These get no hearing. They are simply brushed aside. If one is resolved on a care-free life of ease, the question of right is ruled out. Not "Is it right?" but "Is it easy or profit- able?" is the deciding consideration. The present world crisis gives many examples, both of individuals and nations, who act on this principle. But who admires the slacker? What halo is about his head? Who wants the place he will be given in history and in the judgment of the future? CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY 1 The second division includes all whose purpose it is to help others and make the world a better place in which to live. Persons with this ideal, as in the former division, are also found in every walk of life from the lowest to the highest. When the dominant purpose in hfe, among many conflict- ing ends, is to be true to the best and to help others make the world better, the question which the young man or woman faces honestly is. How can I make the best investment of my life? Life is the most precious thiog one has — the one possession of any permanent value. Whether one regards his life as insignificant or important he must, if wise and sincere in his purpose, take the utmost pains to see that it is invested to the best advantage. The decision as to one^s hfe work and atti- tude to life is therefore of utmost importance, the more so because there is about it a certain finality. Once the die is cast, seldom does the inclination or the opportunity come to change. And this is as true of one's attitude to life as it is of the choice of life work. To decide on one's investment of life, the most momentous decision anyone can make, it is necessary to study: First, one's own ability; second, the needs of the world; and, third, the possible openings. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that opportunities for service are not hmited to a few caUings. There is opportunity in every honorable calling — in labor, business, agriculture, politics, the professions, on land or sea — great opportunity and great need. But the question everyone must ask is. In which can I, with my powers and limi- tations, make the best investment of my life? Sometimes it seems to young people that service means negation of self, ^'burying oneself," ^'throwing away one's prospects," crucifixion. But can we name any admirable person whom people love and history honors who has not given of his best to serve his fellows and make the world better? Is not service the dominant characteristic of each one whom we love? For example — Florence Nightingale, David Livingstone, Abraham Lincoln, Lloyd George, "Papa" THE VIEWPOINT OF LIFE 5 Joffre, Frances E. Willard, General Booth, Harvey, Pasteur, Dickens, Tennyson, the Brownings, Longfellow, Edith Cavell, Paul, Jesus. Make a list of those whom you greatly admire and love and see if it is not a characteristic of every one of them. Did "service" in any of these mean the negation, crucifixion, throwing away of the real self? Or did it mean the nurture and development to wondrous proportions of the real self? The student has privileges and opportunities bestowed upon him by the labor of others that are given to but few. It is estimated that the colleges and universities are kept up for about five per cent of the people; the high schools for about ten per cent. This places upon every student an unescapable obligation to use his life to the best advantage, to make conditions better for others, and to hand down a richer heri- tage to future generations as some slight return for all that has come to him from the labor and sacrifice of others. This obligation is increased a millionfold by the price at which liberty and everything we hold dear have been purchased for us in this terrible German war. As these have dedicated themselves by ''offering themselves willingly," we must dedU cate ourselves to the unfinished task of Christ's Kingdom. "Life is a leaf of paper white Whereon each one of us may write His word or two — and then comes night. Greatly begin! though thou have time But for a line, be that sublime, — Not failure, but low aim, is crime." — Lowell, "For An Autograph." The call is imperative. Every college student, like the host of college men and women among the Allies in the War, must make his life count for the most. He should be able to give direction and leadership in the local community. This does not mean holding a prominent place, being in the lime- light, "lording it over" others. "So shall it not be among 6 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY you," said the Master. It does mean that he should stand behind every influence for good, a whole-souled, confident, sympathetic supporter, who inspires by word and by consistent example. It is hoped that this course will enable the student to see the issues more clearly and to have greater skill in making his influence count. The student must survey the thousand opportunities and demands that meet him in any calling, sometimes weigh higher salary and personal gain against greater influence, and decide in which he will get the biggest returns for his invest- ment of effort. He must not exclude in his survey, if he is honest with himself, any life work at home or abroad. The whole world Ues before him as a field for Christian service. The question is, Where can he make his life count for most? That question marks a straight line. The honest student will hew to the line, let the chips fall where they may. But whatever the calling, two facts stand out distinct and clear. First : No one can be his best self or serve others effec- tively without living in close conscious fellowship with God — that is, without rehgion. And, second, bearing in mind that the Church — that is, organized reUgion — is found every- where, on the whole the greatest opportunities for service to persons in any vocation come through the Church and similar forms of organized religion. These are the theses of this course of study. First, it will be necessary to see conditions as they are, in order to appreciate the challenge in the present situation to every college student. Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read Matt. 13:45, 46. The pearl merchant found what was for him the greatest investment. He staked every- thing on hds decision. Is not the Kingdom of God for every- one the finding of what is for him the greatest investment of THE VIEWPOINT OF LIFE 7 his life and throwing every resource of his life into that endeavor? Note how much depends on: (a) One^s ideal of what constitutes success; (6) whether one has faith and courage to pay the price and invest everjrthing, as did the pearl merchant. 2. If everyone wants to make a success of life, why are there so many moral failures? One should give a brief character sketch of "The Patriot'' or recite the poem and another one of Tito. How do these two studies help us to understand ourselves? 3. Make a Hst of favorite characters and classify them, as suggested in the text. To how many of these may the life work they adopted have looked like "sacrifice"? How does it appear now? 4. What special obligation rests upon young people today to make the world better, because of (a) the inheritance from the past; (b) the price paid by others for us in the War? What rests upon college students in particular, because of the special privileges that have come to them through the money and labors of others? Each student should sketch how and at what cost our privileges have come to us, such as educa- tion; freedom in religion; lands (pioneers); courts of justice; political institutions; freedom from German tyranny. 5. Each student should decide this question for himself: Am I ready to invest my whole life in what I am convinced is for me the best investment? In this connection study the parable again and consider the first thesis on page 4. / CHAPTER 11 THE CHALLENGE Granted that every wholesome young man and young woman is anxious to make the best of life and that the only real success is the investment of one's life in such a way that others are helped and the world is made better, the question arises, What remains to be done? So many reforms have taken place, so many improvements made, that young people sometimes sigh because nothing worth while is yet to be accomplished. But so far is this from being the case that there never was a time in all history when there were so many big, worth-while things to do and such opportunities for young people to make their influence felt. In other days events moved slowly. Today they crowd upon each other. What formerly took a generation to do may now be done in a year. The record of the changes taking place since the beginning of the War reads like a romance. For example, a few of them are: Government control of railroads and other industries; regulation of prices and profits; woman suffrage; prohibition; prevention of waste; conservation of food, coal, and other necessities; and the recognition of idleness, including the idleness of the rich, as crime. Now that the War is over, the question arises: How can we secure the subordination of private interest to the common good in peace time as was possible in war time? Why should not every entrenched evil be a stinging challenge to the youth with red blood who stand, like noble knights of the Round Table, ready for any "quest^'? "The fervor of the old Crusaders is needed now and in a grander cause — not to rescue from the Saracen the sepulchre THE CHALLENGE 9 in which our Lord was supposed to have lain, but to rescue from poverty and suffering and social misery the people for whom the Lord died/' ^ Let us look at the fields. The time is ripe for a mighty advance if we are of the right mettle. We will take a few specific cases and seek to discover conditions as they are, and by implication, as they ought to be. The contrast between the '^are" and the '^ ought to be'' is an irresistible challenge to everyone who believes in God and Humanity and who wants to make the best investment of his or her life. The most precious thing in the world is the little child. ''We love these little people," said the immortal Dickens, "and it is not a sHght thing when they, so fresh from the hand of God, love us." Jesus taught, by word and act, their inestimable worth. Every one is born in the image of God, and is loved by Him. Yet the number of deaths in the first year of life and the first five years is appalling. About one- quarter of all deaths are infants under one year; and one- third are under five years of age. Medical authorities agree that a large number of these, fully one-half, are preventable under proper social conditions. Britain has reduced the death rate of children five years of age and under by one-half since the War began. This is a marvelous triumph for a nation in the throes of a supreme struggle. It also is a terrible indictment of other nations and of all nations in the past. If anyone were seen abusing or killing one child he would be lynched. Yet we are too often unconcerned at this wholesale destruction of little children. As Germany's ruthless slaying of children aroused the indignation of the civilized world, so must there be a great moral and spiritual uprising against everything that injures little ones. Some of the causes of the death of children are: 1. Lack of proper and sufficient food. We do not know what it is to be hungry, but hundreds of little children are Watson, "Social Problems and the Church's Duty," p. 132. 10 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY starving. Lack of proper nourishment weakens the con- stitution and renders the child Hable to contract any disease to which he is exposed — such as measles, whooping-cough, convulsions, and pneumonia — and these diseases, which are seldom fatal to well-fed children, sweep off the starved little ones by the hundred. It is estimated that 2,000,000 children in the United States are, through poverty, denied the conmaon necessities of Hfe! 2. Impure food. Milk is the staple for children. Many cities had the experience of Rochester. It introduced munici- pal '^ clean milk'^ in 1896. In eight years the number of deaths of children under five was reduced 50 per cent. Further, how many deaths are caused by the exposure of food to dust and flies by fruit, grocery, and provision stores? Yet in many towns and cities such exposure is not prevented either by law or pubKc opinion. 3. Bad housing. Did you ever see the dark rooms, the unsanitary houses, the unspeakable conditions in which some people live — even in your own town? Land speculation, greed, and lack of an aroused pubHc conscience are among the causes of this moral iniquity. Perhaps too little attention has been given to rural conditions. Is it safe to assume that housing conditions are always good in the country? 4. Ignorance on the part of parents. Many mothers have no training in the care of children. The schools in the past have given none. Spargo tells of a seven weeks* old baby in a city in the United States fed on sausage and pickles, and an eight weeks* old child fed on sardines and vinegar, black pudding and whisky. It is well known that the greatest difficulty of the pubhc school and Sunday school is the igno- rance and indifference of the home. 5. Preventable diseases. Disease has no divine right to exist. Every disease weakens and makes more liable to other sickness. In the prevention of disease we must carefully look into such matters as the following: Are quarantine laws strictly observed? Are streets and yards clean? Is the THE CHALLENGE 11 water good? Are children given proper medical treatment before as well as after they get sick? A little lad in school examined by the school doctor showed symptoms of spinal trouble. If developed, it would pain and handicap him all his life. The doctor kindly pointed this out and told him how to treat himself and what exercises to take. The lad eagerly followed his suggestions. After some months practi- cally every trace of the trouble was gone. Can we estimate the value of that one result of school medical inspection? Yet over seventy per cent of our school children need medical or dental care and many will suffer all their lives if neglected now. What can we say about the untold number of children cursed from birth by inheriting the poison of the "deadliest of all diseases," syphilis, and other venereal diseases? While undeveloped bodies make a touching appeal, un- developed minds make an even stronger one. Practically every community has a number of defective children. Are they being properly educated and trained ? Or are we adding to the burden placed on them from their birth — which is heavy enough, God knows — the neglect, instead of the nur- ture and training, of what little they have? We should count up the cases or find out the number from other investigators and see what is being attempted on their behalf in our own community. Defective fathers and mothers always have defective children. This fact must be faced and also its bearing on the treatment of defective adults and on the future. But apart from the backward and subnormal children, have we ever figured out how many children in our community receive even the common school education? If we get down to facts and figures it may surprise many to find what a small per cent complete the common school course. The story that all of our boys and girls get a common school education is a myth. But education means the enriching of life, as is plainly seen when we contrast the person whose mind has been culti- 12 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY vated and stored with the treasures of the past and present and the one who has not been so enriched. Every pupil who leaves the public school with undeveloped mind has been grievously sinned against. Every citizen who has not been trained intellectually and is not fitted to do some necessary work in society is cheated out of his rights. In so far as he is ignorant and unskilful, he is a weakness to his country and to society. To see the reasonableness of this, one has but to think of persons who have always labored under one or both of these handicaps. Formerly even a rudimentary education was the monopoly of the rich. Then the State made it possible for all. The question now arises, Should not every child who shows talent in any special line — such as music, art, electricity, agriculture — have full opportunity for develop- ment? Should not the State make this possible, as it has put elementary education within the reach of all? The State and society would be repaid for this expenditure by the development of even one or two persons of talent and genius. When we consider the present state of education and all the possibilities that open up before a person or a nation if properly developed, the securing of a real education for all and the opening of every avenue to all is surely a cause worth living for. Undeveloped social life also makes its appeal to us. In recent years it has been borne in upon the conscience of people that very many children and young people in the country as well as in the city have little or no play life, no leisure, no books, httle beauty of surroundings or companionship — the things that make life rich and livable. Take one httle inci- dent from the Juvenile Court in a prairie city, where of all places land is most abundant. Two little lads were charged with steahng bulbs out of flower beds. The judge was a real lover of children. He got the confidence of the boys. They said they wanted to have a little garden, too, like other children. They took him to see theirs. All they had was about a yard square of tramped earth and ashes in an un- THE CHALLENGE 13 sightly, miserable backyard with practically no sunhght. This they had dug up and planted with bulbs they could not buy. Should they have been commended or punished? What was the real crime? Who were the real criminals? Yet how many good citizens would be shocked if told they were parties to this crime against childhood? Then, again, we are appalled when we ask how many children are not being taught about the loving Father and Jesus who loves them. How many are growing up without fellowship with God? In Canada it is estimated (1916) that there are about 300,000 Protestant children under twenty years of age, who are not even enrolled in any Sunday school and therefore presumably are getting no direct rehgious education. In the United States the number is estimated to be considerably over 3,500,000. Besides, much of the teach- ing of those receiving instruction in religion is inadequate, some of it misleading. No greater need exists today, none makes a more convincing appeal to young men and women, than the rehgious nurture and training of every person for the welfare of the world and the extension of Christ's King- dom. Here are some of the rights of the children: 1. To be well born. One of the vices of this age is an unwillingness to assume the responsibilities of parenthood. Race suicide is a significant spiritual perversion and decline. There is also a lack of the sense of the sacredness of parent- hood and childhood on the part of parents. Then, again, should persons who have hereditary diseases or who are defectives be allowed to marry ? 2. To Hve. This imphes decent housing, nourishing food, wholesome surroundings, good mothering — ''The inalien- able right to a mother's care which thousands lack." The above necessitate a living wage and proper hours of work. 3. To be protected. "Existence is to hundreds of children a veritable hell." 4. To play. This is another inalienable right. For this 14 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY there must be proper rooms, yards, playgrounds, and freedom from work. 5. To have a sound education. 6. To know the loving Father and have fellowship with Him. These are the rights of every child. Some will say, "A program like that will cost too much." But, putting the appeal in its lowest terms, it costs more, infinitely more, to neglect it. This is strikingly brought out in Charlotte Perkins Oilman's poem: To THE Wise — A Bargain " Said the Slum cluld to the Wise — To the people of place and power Who govern and guide the hour. To this people who write and teach, Ruling our thought and speech. And all the Captains and Kings Who command the making of things: — 'Give me the good ye know. That I, the Child, may grow. Light, for the whole day long. Food that is pure and strong. Housing and clothing fair. Clean water and clean air. Teaching from day to day. And room — for a child to play.' Then the Wise made answer cold: 'These things are not given, but sold. They shall be yours today If you can pay.' 'Pay,' said the Child, 'Pay you? What can I do? ' Only in years slow length Shall I have strength. I have not power nor skill. Wisdom or wit, nor will — What service weak and wild Can you seek of a Httle child ? ' THE CHALLENGE , 16 But the Wise made answer bold: 'Goods must be bought and sold; You shall have nothing here Without paying — paying dear.' And the Rulers turned away, And the Child cried on then, 'Stay, Wait, I will pay/ Tor the foulness where I live, Filth in return I give. For the greed that withholds my right, Greed that shall shake your might. For the sin I live in and learn. Plentiful sin I return. For my lack in home and school. Ignorance comes to rule. From where I sicken and die. Disease in your homes shall lie. My all uncoimted death Shall choke your children's breath. Degenerate, crippled — base — I degrade the human race; And the people you have made — These shall make you afraid. 'I ask no more, I take The terms you make; . And steadily, day by day, I will pay.' " Something is being done for the promotion of child welfare almost everywhere. The student should make a list of all the agencies at work along these lines in his own commimity. When the list is completed it would be most suggestive to write down ways in which students in every walk of life — medicine, agriculture, household science, law, theology, engineering — might be of most help. When one considers what yet remains to be done in this one field the task is big enough and sufficiently worth while to 16 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY claim the allegiance of every young man and young woman of high ideals. One cannot conceive of any richer investment of one's life than to throw it into the struggle for the saving of children, and making conditions such that thousands of lives may be saved, bodies well developed, and minds and lives enriched through education, through service with and for others, and through fellowship with God in Jesus Christ. The fields are white already to harvest. So far we have been thinking chiefly of the children. All life is sacred. And yet ''It is estimated that among 10,000,000 persons of the well-to-do class the annual deaths do not exceed 100,000; among the best paid of the working class the number is not less than 150,000; while among the poorest workers the number is at least 350,000.'' ^ That is, the death rate among the poor in congested parts of cities is two or three times as high as in the districts where the well- to-do live. Should it be so among the children of God? Who is responsible when it is tracked down beyond the land- lord and employer? This raises the whole question of wealth and poverty. When the magnificent Vancouver Hotel in Vancouver, B. C, was opened, the first meal given was a free full course dinner to all the ''worthy poor" women and children in the city. Every case was carefully investigated by the King's Daughters. The aim was to give tickets only to those who otherwise would have no real Christmas dinner.* No doubt a few got in who could have had a good dinner of their own, but only a very few. On the other hand many of the needy ones would be too proud to accept "charity." About 1,500 crowded the great dining hall. This was a magnificent act on the part of the hotel management and they deserve great credit for it. But here is the thought which rankles and the question that will not down. Why were there 1,500 "worthy poor'.' 2 John Spargo, "The Bitter Cry of the Children," p. 6. THE CHALLENGE 17 women and children in a prosperous Canadian city — so poor that even at Christmas time they could h^ve no Christ- mas dinner? And conditions in this respect are much worse in the great cities of the United States. Why should wealth be in the hands of the few? How are fortunes made? Most have been made by the rise of real estate values, ownership of natural resources, monopoly of some pubUc utility such as transportation or gas, or of some necessary commodity such as food, clothing, and fuel, *'poH- tics,'' ^^ promotion'^ of companies, or '^manipulation" of markets, and the fortune is often associated with methods that are not moral and with character devoid of high ideals or a quickened conscience. Notice how few make wealth through great service. Why should one per cent of the people enjoy without working as much income as fifty per cent earn by hard labor? There is crying need for a better system of land control in cities. At present the lay-out and growth of cities; the type of dwelling; the size of the lots; and the price is largely under the control of the real estate agent. In a small western town just one-sixth of the town-site that has been subdivided and sold is at all occupied. The area of Edmonton when it had 50,000 people was seven square miles larger than Toronto when it had over 500,000. Many have been ruined through land speculation and exploitation and it is one of the chief causes of slum conditions. Should not society control its land, use it for the good of all, plan the town so as to make it health- ful and beautiful, and make suitable dwellings and surround- ings possible for all its citizens? During recent years en- lightened public opinion has done much. A number of agencies are at work. Now for the real drive. In recent years, progress has been made in pure food laws and in preventive medicine. Note, for example, the improve- ment of municipal water supply over the old system of in- dividual wells; the advantages of a good milk standard, of clean streets, sewers, and better sanitation. The value and 18 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY economy of this work is revealed in the freedom we enjoy from the periodic plagues of ancient cities and of places in non-Christian lands today. The Spanish influenza epidemic would in other days or in non-Christian lands have been a veritable "Black Death" plague. Emphasis is gradually being placed on prevention of causes rather than on the cure of cases. But little more than a good beginning has been made, as is manifested, for example, by the ravages of tuber- culosis and the carelessness of many citizens in regard to its spread. Professor Irving Fisher of Yale estimates that there are 3,000,000 persons in the United States suffering from some kind of sickness. The resulting loss of wages is about $550,000,000 and the expense of medicine, medical attend- ance, and extra food an equal amount, bringing the cost of illness up to $1,100,000,000, at least half of which is prevent- able. Adding the loss from preventable death, which is estimated at $1,100,000,000, it makes a total of $1,650,000,000 that ought to be saved. Canada's loss through preventable sickness and death would be about one-twelfth of thi^ or $137,500,000 annually. This is merely the money side. No one can estimate what it means in anguish and sorrow, broken homes, and orphaned children. Take this case. A carpenter and his wife in Toronto were hard-working, honest people. They had a large family. By careful saving they had laid by $200 or $300. The first two years of the War there was httle carpenter work to be had. The wife got sick, the doctor ordered her to take a complete rest, then to go to the hospital and have an operation. Hus- band and wife knew she should do all this if she was to regain health. But it would take all the earnings of their lifetime. And the children were to be thought of first. Together they kept on as best they could without the medical attention. Her life will be shortened and full of pain. This is only one and a mild example of what is going on everywhere with children and adults. Only by pleading that they were paupers could they get free medical treatment. The same THE CHALLENGE 19 condition prevails in practically every place in Canada and the United States. Great Britain is making health, like school education, a first charge on the State. The idea is that none should be deterred from obtaining the best medical treatment on the score of cost, but should be a community charge, as is the case in the best family life. The province of New Brunswick has appointed a Minister of Pubhc Health with full cabinet rank and large powers. These are signs of a better day. The present system places upon the sick and poor the added burden of heavy doctors' bills. It also leads to neglecting symptoms and to the use of patent medicines because of the cost of seeing a doctor. To the annual cost of preventable diseases and deaths (which as stated is $1,650,000,000 in the United States and $137,500,000 in Canada) must be added that of patent medicines on which alone the two countries are said to spend $200,000,000 annu- ally. What would it mean if even one-tenth of this were spent on prevention and education in addition to what is being done! There is similar need in regard to law. If justice is the end, why should money have every advantage of legal talent and court appeal? It is not difficult to cite instances, where, in spite of judgment after judgment, money has defeated justice or where the innocent and needy have been cheated out of their all because left to the mercy of unscrupulous law- yers and trustees. The modern orphanage is a very different institution from that of Dickens' time. But is our policy right? If a family is poor, the mother has to go out day after day to work. Notice the results: children left to themselves without a mother's care; mother overworked and under-fed; children without proper food, clothes, care, or training. In this way bodies suffer, nerves suffer, minds suffer, morals suffer, spiritual life suffers. Or the children are sent to an orphanage. However good, an orphanage is not a home. Britain, New Zealand, Australia, some of the United States and Canadian 20 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY provinces have come to the position that every mother who has to go out to work should be paid a salary by the State to look after her own children and keep her home intact. This plan entails large expenditure and consequently high taxes. Students should study both sides of the question and know the facts, in order to give wise leadership when the question arises in the community or nation. The question of old age must be considered. Old age is a nightmare to the honest poor. The President of the American Society for Thrift said that "according to recent government statistics ninety-eight per cent of the American people are living from day to day on their wages and a loss of em- ployment would mean pauperism for all but two per cent.'' That is, ninety-eight per cent of the people are dependent on others when they get too old to work! Some coun- tries propose to provide an annuity for all deserving persons who reach a certain age, not as a gift but as theirs by right. They have spent their lives in the country's work. They should get an honorable support. At present a retiring allowance is granted only to those who hold high positions and get big salaries, such as judges and cabinet ministers! Discuss the gain that adequate provision for old age would be to human life and happiness. Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read John 4: 1-42. Note how true verse 35 is to the present situation and verses 36-38 to the student class (38 b). 2. Make a list of the most striking gains made in social organization during the War. 3. The class should, either individually or in small groups, make a personal investigation into conditions of child life in the college or home town or city. This will include at least an examination of housing conditions, backyards, and play- grounds in the most congested districts. Make a list of the chief child welfare agencies and the work of each. THE CHALLENGE 21 4. Indicate graphically on a blank map of the community the density of population and the number of deaths (1) of children, (2) of adults, in each section. Consult the Board of Health. 5. By personal investigation find out the number and age distribution in each grade in the public school and the grade pupils were in on leaving school during the last few years. 6. Demonstrate the effect of the present system of land control on the growth of the college or home town and on the dwelHngs, building lots, parks, and playgrounds of the poor. 7. By personal investigation ascertain what has been done in recent years to prevent disease, and estimate its success. Discuss the advisability of making the care of health and providing for old age a national matter. Find out definitely what has been done in your own state or province. See Rauschenbusch's 'Christianizing the Social Order." CHAPTER III THE CHALLENGE (Continued) The problems confronting the present generation have by- no means been exhausted. The high cost of hving and the difficulties of distribution clamor for investigation. Take the following simple cases: A crate of fowl in the Fraser Valley before the war cost $6.25; expressage to Vancouver was thirty-five cents; cost to consumer in Vancouver $12.15. In 1918 farmers in Connecticut received six cents per quart for milk, consumers paid nineteen cents. The student can supply similar cases from his own experience. Again, while barrels of peaches, apples, and other fruits rot on the ground in fruit districts the price is maintained at scarcity prices and hundreds of famiUes in nearby cities starve for fruit. Why? Several needs are apparent: elimination of excessive profits of middleman; cooperation in direct buying and selling be- tween producer and consumer ; and control of transportation by the people instead of by money-making corporations. Some persons must put their Uves into the fight if these changes are to be brought about. I Must we not insist that all who work receive a living wage? A minimum wage, that is, a wage below which no one in each line of work can be paid, is being adopted in some places especially in Britain. Many capitalists oppose it bitterly, saying it will cripple industry. If a student citizen is to help his country solve her problems he should understand this im- portant, contentious question. Girls in stores with poor pay, hving miserably, and tempted beyond their strength into ways of sin; men with families not earning enough to provide necessities; men and women in sweat shops working out their 22 THE CHALLENGE 23 lives for a pittance — how can these things be in a Christian brotherhood? We are not only our brother's keeper now, but we are also trustees for the future. To us are committed the national re- sources. We should exercise the same jealous care over these as we would over property left to orphaned children and placed under our care. But are we conserving or squander- ing them? Are they kept for the people or gambled into the hands of the privileged? Who control the forest area, the mineral deposits — the people or a few corporations? Are we conserving the soil or exhausting it by "wheat mining''? Never have ideals been so high in some respects in business. For example, the slogan in the best circles is, "Tell only the truth in advertising"; and "He succeeds best who serves best" has become almost a religion. Yet false weights and measures are constantly being confiscated, adulteration is a fine art, pure food and drug laws seek to prevent the sale of not only adulterated but positively harmful foods and medi- cines; false advertising, such as so-called firesales, and manipu- lation and monopoly for inflating prices, abound. (For ex- tended references see Rauschenbusch, ' 'Christianizing the Social Order," page 207 et seq). The Great War has demonstrated the heroism and self- sacrifice of the people for the cause of liberty and the rights of others. Thousands have given their time, their money, their lives — and what was dearer to them than life. It has been a time of great and noble living. And yet we stand appalled at this stupendous fact, that in this very time there were other men and women who took advantage of the nations' extremity to amass wealth and steal the bread from the poor by increasing prices. It is said that 9,000 persons became millionaires in the United States on war contracts during the first year or two of the War. Mimition profits were often excessive. One Hamilton, Ontario, manufacturer returned $750,000 excess profits. Others making similar profits made no returns and were not compelled to in the early days. The 24 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY report of the acting commissioner on the Cost of Living C'Cold Storage in Canada, 1917'') finds, "Certainly seemingly- excessive charging/' One company is said to have made eighty per cent profit on bacon, when the government inves- tigation said that ''a profit of one-quarter of one per cent per pound'' would have netted over a quarter of a million dollars. Following such investigations the Government lim- ited profits to, not eighty per cent but eleven per cent, all excess profits going to the State. In the United States a similar firm is alleged to have made over 1,000 per cent profit and the reports of investigations into war contracts have been positively humiliating, even in such matters of life and death as aeroplane building, clothing, and munitions. In politics there are many examples of the highest ideahsm. There is also an ever-growing public sensitiveness to graft. But in politics there have been tragic happenings. Christian character alone can blot out corruption from public life. The power of the saloon as a foe of everything that is good and as a malignant force in politics is being recognized. As an example of the extent of corruption to which it stoops, take the following: Prohibition carried in British Columbia by several thousand votes. But the soldiers' votes in Eng- land and France were overwhelmingly against it. An in- vestigation was held and of the less than 6,000 votes polled 4,697 were thrown out. Such irregularities as the following were brought to light: fifty-nine previously killed and missing, voted; 698 names appeared twice and fifty-two three or four times; 651 were not in France or England at the time; 1,266 cannot be traced at all in Canada; 848 had no connection with British Columbia; 1,125 records and details were en- tirely lacking! Even this is not quite as bad as what hap- pened in the United States where, it is asserted, the brewers, uniting with the German-Americans, the bitterest, most treacherous enemies of the nation at war, purchased at least four influential newspapers; also, it is alleged, made use of a chain of papers, that have been barred from Canada and THE CHALLENGE 25 many localities in the United States; and maintained a large fund for lobbjdng. Prohibition is now enacted in Canada until after the end of the War, in the United States during demobilization, and in Britain it is making great gains. And now by vote of an overwhelming majority of individual states, the United States has written prohibition into its constitution. Further steps are necessary, especially for the protection of the peoples of Asia, Africa, and South America, who will become a prey to the brewers when the home market is closed. The White Slave traffic and the drug slavery are still entrenched. The dual standard of morality — a lower one for men than for women — maintains our connection with the dark ages. Men and women everywhere are making great mistakes in their lives, are living useless, selfish, harmful, plague-spreading lives. Sin is claiming its victims and from its nemesis there is no escape. There is a call such as was never heard to all true men and women to get into the fight, the ancient fight of Right against Wrong- on behalf of God and suffering humanity. *'Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side; Some great cause, God's new Messiah, offering each the bloom or blight. Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right. And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness and that hght." — Lowell, "The Present Crisis." The fact is that, while there never were so many Christians, so much Christian activity, and such high ideals, the present social order is not Christian. Instead of making it easy to do right, it too often makes it hard to do right. As it is con- stituted in competitive business, the one who can wring the last ounce of strength out of his workers, substitute children 26 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY and women for men, and cut wages, can outbid the one who tries to live up to the highest moral ideals. So it is in poli- tics, and too often in social and professional life. In a team and in good family life the aim is to bring each up to the highest level; but in the present social order this point of view has not yet become the pubhc conscience. So far we have been thinking chiefly of the home lands in a world at war. Beyond is the world of nations and the coming of peace has torn aside the veil that has limited our vision. These years of war and now of peace are apocalyptic times. Such visions as have been given to us were never possible to the greatest prophets of any other age. In the first place, after the horrible revelation of blood- lust, hatred, passion, cruelty, and the breach of every law of humanity or Christianity on the part of a powerful nation, there came the vision of the glorious heroism of Belgium sacrificing everything but her soul; of the marvelous courage of France; of the faith of Great Britain (including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa and Newfound- land) who without a day^s delay for the sake of honor threw all she had into the fight, in the historic words of her premier, "for the liberty of the world and the independence of the smaller peoples"; the fidelity of Japan and China and the service of betrayed Russia and Roumania. Then there were wonderous examples of highest idealism and courage in Siberia, Montenegro, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Armenia, Poland, Czecho-Slovania, and among other people of whom we knew little; and finally in the United States. Suddenly we saw the wondrous, unsuspected nobility of human nature of all races of whatever color and wherever found and the strength of ideals and unmeasured depths of heroism and un- selfish service. The collapse of militarism by the absolute surrender of Germany and her allies, of the massed forces of materiaUsm based on expediency, throwing morals and religion to the winds, has given a new and stronger faith in the dominance THE CHALLENGE 27 of spiritual things and the confidence that in the providence of God right must triumph. There has come, too, a new sense of brotherhood among the nations. All the allied countries have shared food, medi- cal supphes, clothing, munitions, and resources, denying themselves that others might have enough. They have poured out their treasure without stint. Great Britain has already given her immense treasured gold reserve and liqui- dated her extensive securities in other countries, and given billions to help finance her allies; and of her children nearly a million he buried, some in every one of the fifteen theaters of war and in all the seven seas. And France (reported to be only one-third as wealthy as the United States) has already given $24,000,000,000 and the lives of over a mil- Hon of her children. Belgium, Italy, Serbia, and other nations have likewise known no limit in their service. A common endeavor, the sharing of common hardships and sacrifices, the bitterness of defeat, and the joy of victory have bound race to race in a new brotherhood. The effect on some of the other nations must be even greater than on us. For peoples in India to cross "the black water," the ocean, is to break caste. Yet thousands did so because of loyalty to the country that had done so much for them and had made "the word of an Englishman" a synonym for trustworthiness and fair dealing. In the same way the Holy War of the Moslems, proclaimed by the instigation of Germany, failed. The Moslems of India and Egypt remained loyal. "As for India, the home of 67,000,000 Mohammedans, there was no response save that of sohd loyalty to Great Britain. The Mohammedan leaders of North India pe- titioned the British Parliament to let Indian Mohammedans go to the defense of Egypt." ^ Besides, Arabia has set up an independent Kingdom of the Hedjaz. These things mean 1 J. Lovell Murray, "The Call of a World Task in War Time," p. 76. 28 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY the dawning of a new day to these and other peoples. Simi- larly, nations like Japan and China, that have been watching and weighing Christianity, have seen that it did not fail in the War but that its ideals have triumphed. And it all means that nations are open to the Gospel of Christ as never before. It is almost staggering to think of the opportunities in India, China, the Balkans, and among the new nations in Austria and Russia! All these peoples are looking to the Christian nations for help and for the guarantee of their liberty. Just now the need for food and the bare necessities of life in devastated nations will strain the resources of the Allies. It is estimated that over four milHons died of starvation during the War. Now every individual must try to save and pro- duce food and other commodities that millions more may be kept from suffering and death. But it is estimated that in Asia and Africa over 200,000,000 always go to bed hungry, 100,000,000 sleep without any shelter, and how Httle impres- sion this fact makes on us! The work of the Red Cross in war has opened our eyes to the necessity of preventing and healing wounds and diseases everywhere. Never again can the Christian world be as in- different to the millions of suffering ones all over the world. In India alone there are said to be 400,000 blind, 200,000 deaf-mutes, 100,000 lepers, and 5,000,000 preventable deaths a year. A similar situation exists in other non-Christian lands. The torture inflicted by the savagery of German and Turk scarcely exceeds the suffering inflicted by the witch- doctors in their ignorant treatment of disease. We are touched by the great numbers of orphans and widows left by the War in the allied countries. But, as Lovell Murray points out, "In all, over 2,000,000 Armenians and Syrians are homeless and destitute and of this number some 400,000 are orphans. ... If every married soldier under arms (in the Greek War) were to be killed, all the widows that would be left would not suffer a tithe of what THE CHALLENGE 29 Indians 26,000,000 widows are suffering now. We can no longer be indifferent to these suffering millions.'' ^ There is also the insistent need of rebuilding the waste places and restoring the broken homes of the war areas. It is hoped that all young people may have a big share in this work. But it opens our eyes to see the vastly greater need of establishing something like homes in non-Christian lands and of bringing to them some share of the blessings we enjoy in the humblest homes every day. In the home land, with the dislocation of industry on account of peace and its necessary reorganization, every factor that makes for friction between labor and capital is present. The situation is full of danger. What will be the gain if, having fought against autocracy in the War, we allow autocracy and force to rule in industry at home? Or if, having sacrificed to maintain order in the world, we find that anarchy and Bolshevism are running riot in our own land? A class war is easily possible. To avoid the clash, with all its suffering and bitterness, will require wise leader- ship and also an intelligent, brotherly sympathy for others on the part of both labor and capital. With people of intelli- gence and Christian character we can go forward with utter confidence and solve all problems. To this desired end every college man and woman may contribute largely. Whatever makes for real brotherhood and mutual sympathy and understanding among different classes and nations lays the imperishable foundations of that world brotherhood which makes the league of nations and international coopera- tion and good will possible. It was Tennyson who, in his marvellously prophetic poem, " Lockesley Hall " first in modern times visuaHzed air fleets for commerce and war and set up in the popular mind the ideal of a world league: 2 Ibid, Chapter IV. 30 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY " For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see, Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be; Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails. Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales; Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rain'd a ghastly dew From the nations' airy navies grappling in the central blue; Far along the world-wide whisper of the south-wind rushing warm, With the standards of the peoples plunging thro' the thunder storm; Till the war-drum throbb'd no longer, and the battle-flags were furFd In the Parhament of man, the Federation of the world. There the common sense of most shall hold a fretful realm in awe. And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in imiversal law." Gladstone, in 1871, advanced the idea still further. The Hague conferences gave the idea further embodiment. Early in the War societies of most influential persons were formed all over Britain for promoting a world league. It has been espoused by the United States and supported by other countries. Its realization will be one of the great gains of the war. It can only be a success if children, young people, and adults are led out of narrow provincial patriotism into a sense of world-brotherhood which the Christian religion at its best alone makes possible. Even as late as fifty years ago Christianity was sharply divided into denominations. Between them there was Httle fellowship and often hostility. That is now largely a thing of the past. The closest cooperation is now a fact in most places between the different branches of the Protestant Church and in many activities with the Roman CathoHc and Jewish faiths. In Canada three leading denominations — THE CHALLENGE 31 Congregationalist, Methodist, and Presbyterian — are com- mitted to organic union, while these, together with the Anglican, Baptist, and other denominations, the Salvation Army, the Sunday School Association, the Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations, work in the closest harmony and fellowship in the promotion of religious educa- tion and social welfare. Though this movement is not so advanced in the United States, it has begun and is moving steadily. Educated young people today are living in a wonderful time and can do a great deal to forward the cause of unity and good will. There must be developed the Christian attitude of mutual benefit and good will. That is not a visionary's dream. It is already the attitude in family life, in education, and in organized reUgion. It is growing stronger in politics, in busi- ness, and in religion. It is becoming a world consciousness. Even in imagination we can scarcely picture the change in the world when classes, nations, and peoples shall live to- gether on that Christian basis. It is manifest, then, that into whatever life-work one may enter or in whatever community one may live, great issues are at stake. The call is insistent for men and women of vision and character. Whoever will lose himself in the cause of the Best will find a larger life in the new civihzation. We are today at the opening of a new era. We are not specta- tors. We are sharing in the work. Thank God for the thrill and joy of it. *^ It is a great adventure, the building up a civilization — the noblest which could be undertaken by any persons. It is at once the noblest work and the most practical of all enter- prises, and I can conceive of no greater exaltation of the spirit of man than the feeling that his race is acting nobly; and that all together are performing a service, not only to each other, but to humanity, and those who come after them, and that their deeds will be remembered." ' 3 George W. Russell, "The National Being." 32 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY To every young college man and woman today comes this challenge. Every great ideal is a challenge as is also every sordid life, every case of poverty — in goods, health, mind, companionship, and most of all in fellowship with God. And if the need is great in Christian lands what can be said of the non-Christian world! Are we as ready to live for others as were the men and women who served in the War, in order that in our country liberty and love may flourish and that we may be worthy of the sacrifice of her citizens? They held aloft the torch of liberty and service. We must not break faith with them. The poem of that gallant Canadian, Colonel John McCrae, "In Flanders Fields," lives not only because of its beauty but because it appeals to our hearts. Its message is all the more impressive when we know that Colonel McCrae has given his life for the cause of humanity in Flanders fields. "In Flanders fields, the poppies grow Between the crosses, row on row. That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly, Scarce heard amid the guns below. "We are the dead. Short days ago , We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved ; and now we lie ; In Flanders fields. "Take up our quarrel with the foe! To you, from failing hands, we throw The torch. Be yours to hft it high! If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies blow In Flanders fields.'' We shall keep faith by driving out ignorance, hate, jealousy, greed, sin that separate classes, peoples, and nations. The THE CHALLENGE 33 only force that can effectively do this is brotherhood, love. And for this Christ alone has pointed the way. The glorious life and sacrificial death of Christ redeemed life from sordid- ness and ennobled it forever. The glorious dead ''in Flanders fields'^ and over the whole world call on us to be true. To squander life in some narrow, selfish pursuit would be a stupid blunder. Rather each will seek to make life tell for most in the progress of the race — that is, to bring in the Kingdom of God. Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read Luke 10 : 1-16, 30-37. One cannot but feel that if Jesus were speaking these words today he would include students in the highly favored class. 2. Gather information on the difference between price paid to producer and by consumer in essential commodities and how this difference might be lessened. 3. Discuss the influence of prohibition, and the resulting danger of the exploitation of non-Christian lands. What preventive measures should be taken? 4. Discuss the new world consciousness and brotherhood and the needs of the present day. Read J. Lovell Murray^s "The Call of a World Task,'^ Chapter IV. 5. Enumerate the nations that need help at the present time and the kind and extent of assistance required. 6. Through careful investigation and study give actual examples of, first, autocracy and second. Bolshevistic tend- encies in our own land. Make clear the serious dangers and effective preventive measures. What relation has the whole problem to child weffare, education, and religion? 7. Find out definitely the movements in which the various churches and denominations are cooperating and what further might be done in this respect. 34 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY 8. Honestly and prayerfully each one should answer the question, Am I willing to "take up the torch" thrown "from failing hands" and not "break faith" ? Am I willing to dedi- cate myself to the unfinished task? On what condition can I really pray, "Send forth naore laborers"? CHAPTER IV THE FORCES AT WORK MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT The last chapter gave us a glimpse of what might appear to be the "world welter." Society is so vast and complex and the needs are so great that one may feel bewildered, hope- less. Can our httle life make any impression on the mighty surge of the life of the world? In this connection several things are to be considered: First, Society is an organism. Each individual is an organ, a "member in particular" to perform a special function. However insignificant the part may be, it is essential to the welfare of the whole. "If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? . . . And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee. . . . And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it" (I Cor. 12 : 15, 21, 26). Everyone who earns an honest living in an honorable occu- pation and does some necessary work in society to meet a human need is contributing to the welfare of the whole. If done in the spirit of love and service, that is, as work is done in the best family circle, it is a real contribution to the bring- ing in of the Kingdom of God. The faithful, efficient dis- charge of the day's work makes for the happiness and success of all. A moment's reflection will show how true this is. The honest, upright dealer in food is doing a wonderful service as God's assistant in distributing food to His children. So the farmer, gardener, dairyman, and others provide them 35 36 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY with food. The clothier helps Him clothe them. The doctor, nurse, and apothecary help Him care for His sick children. The postman is a public benefactor, the policeman a public guardian. The street cleaners keep away disease and add to the joy and comfort of the people. The ditch-digger makes cities and dwellings dry and conveniences possible. The teacher enriches and develops human life, the home-maker is the likest to God — and so on. Every person who is not a parasite is an organ of society with a special function to per- form for the good of society. If he fails, the whole organism suffers. We know this when the mailman fails to come or is late the day we expect a letter; or when the milkman isn't around before breakfast; or the bread is sour! Here then is the first and fundamental service, each is called on to perform: do our own work to the best of our ability and in the spirit of love and service. Such an example, in any Hne of work, is a powerful factor in bringing in the better day. And if one does not so do his own work well and in this spirit, his influence in any other line is lessened or nuUified. A woman in New York did a great deal of lecturing on the art of housekeeping. Her own house was a sorry example of the opposite. A man in Ontario made eloquent pleas for thrift and economy in war time, while each one of his children had his or her own expensive motor car! In Nova Scotia a graduate of an agricultural college came back to live on the run-out farm his father had left him. He got a Farmers' Institute organized, but noticed that the farmers did not seem to take his suggestions seriously. But in his third year his own crops were better in every way and his stock as good or better than the rest of the district. Estimate the influence of these different persons when these facts are known. The reader will do well to make the thought of Van Dyke's Uttle poem entitled *^ Work" the resolve and prayer of his own heart: FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 37 "I^et me but do my work from day to day, In field or forest, at the desk or loom, In roaring market-place or tranquil room; Let me but find it in my heart to say. When vagrant wishes beckon me astray, 'This is my work; my blessing, not my doom; Of all who live, I am the one by whom This work can best be done in the right way/ Then shall I see it not too great, nor small. To suit my spirit and to prove my powers; Then shall I cheerful greet the labouring hours, And cheerful turn, when the long shadows fall At eventide, to play and love and rest. Because I know for me my work is best." The second thing to be remembered is this: that there are many mighty forces in every community that are making for better conditions and higher ideals or may be directed in that way. It is only in moments of despondency or weakness or because of lack of thought and perception that we feel that for this great work ^'I even I only am left " (I Kings 19 : 14). There are many mighty upbuilding forces at work. The student should make a careful survey of these forces and then relate himself to them in the most helpful way possible. This is essential if each is going to make the best possible investment of his life in the community in which he lives. Recognizing that to be a negative or mere neutral quantity is to throw one's better self away, that to stand alone is to court failure, make out a list of the more outstanding forces and agencies to be found in the community to which you are going, or from which you come, and make a brief note as to how you or any other college student may support and co- operate with each one of these forces. Community agencies and forces will, of course, differ in the city, town, or country, and also in different communities. But in every center will be found forces which may be classed 38 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY under the following heads: education, social conditions, in- dustry, recreation, government, and religion. But it must be distinctly understood that these divisions are artificial and merely for convenience. For anything that is really educational is a strength to social living, industry, recreation, and rehgion. Good recreation is also educational, social, and a help to industry and religion. Anything that helps persons to Uve their best lives and makes conditions of living better is reUgious. Everything that promotes true reUgion makes for better recreation, industry, and social conditions and is educational. It may be that you would make a different classification from that here suggested, but the essential thing is to recognize every community force, to see its value, and to support and cooperate with it. In order to help us appreciate the fine work that is being done and the consecrated endeavor of multitudes of citizens to improve the social order and to develop human life, let us examine some of the work that is being done under the headings given above. The discussion of a few representative movements should help the student to appreciate every endeavor to pro- mote the general welfare. It is always illuminating to find that there are others who cherish some of the ideals we our- selves cherish. And in almost every community there are those who for years have worked for some reform. They need your help and encouragement as you need theirs. Jot down, defi- nitely, as you go along, how a doctor, teacher, agricultural representative, minister, business man or woman, and others could work through each of these agencies. 1. Education. "I tell you in a word, that a diligent, devoted school teacher, preceptor, or any person, no matter what is his title, who faithfully trains and teaches boys, can never receive an adequate reward and no money is sufficient to pay the debt you owe him; so, too, said the pagan, Aris- totle." — Luther. FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 39 When girls as well as boys are included, this statement is as true today as it was when spoken nearly 400 years ago. The school is a mighty national force in upbuilding human life, in unifying different elements in the population, and in making citizens of non-Enghsh speaking people. It would be well to discuss here the value of really national schools over any narrower system, such as parochial and private schools. This is a vital question in some places now and we should be clear in our thinking about it. The future of our country and of the world depends largely on the school. And daily the school is becoming a more efficient social force. Great strides are being made, the most outstanding, perhaps, being the Fellowship School in Great Britain. How can we cooperate with the school and lead the community to appre- ciate it? Show how the attitude of the district is reflected in the school building, the care of the building, rooms, and grounds; in the supphes; in the character of the teachers; in the support and encouragement given; and, as a result, the attitude of the pupils to hfe and the influence of the school for good. How can the teacher work through her school to serve the community? Remember teaching is enriching life. Much of the opportunity for this real education is outside the textbooks and even outside of school hours. What can the doctor, lawyer, or other college graduates do to stimulate a strong public sentiment in support of the school and education and progress, bringing the local school up to the highest state of popular favor and efficiency? Take three examples of the pubHc schooFs influence, in addition to regular school work. The first is in "the ward," Toronto. The little children on the streets are ragged, dirty, untrained. But in the school each pupil — all from the same community — is a model of cleanliness in person, school habits, and clothes, including even shoes, and of thoughtful courtesy. The lady principal and the teachers are justly proud of their pupils and of the place the school has as a mighty community force for good. The pupils share this 40 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY laudable pride. Thinking of the future of the world, one must thank God for such schools — and they are legion. The next is on the lone prairie. There was only a mere handful of timid children. The teacher had the idea that schools were for more than grind and drill. He took his cornet and he and his pupils learned new songs together. With his camera he helped them see some of the beauties of nature. He played with them and taught them new games. A few delightful children's books were brought into the school, which pupils could read as soon as they were through their work. life became fuller and richer for these children. Pride was taken in keeping the yard clean, the men of the dis- trict painted the building, the women decorated the interior. There arose a new social consciousness and a new spirit of service and mutual helpfulness. The third school is in a western town. Nine nationalities are represented, but all are learning to read and write the English language, to salute, honor, and love the flag, and are having developed in them the best ideals of Christian citizenship. In school and on the playground they are imbibing the principles of democracy. They resent being called foreigners. Similar results are being attained in many kindergartens, high schools, colleges, technical schools, and universities. Every student and graduate should be able to do much in the community to strengthen each of these institutions. He may also be able to promote night schools, schools for foreigners, trade schools, and household science schools. It is far less expensive to maintain schools than to allow people to be ignorant of the country's language and institutions or without skill to do useful work. Discussion should bring out whether the person who is especially interested in child welfare, crime, charity work, better farming, votes for women, purity in politics, social reform, moral character, or any progressive movement should ally himself with the public school or other educational institutions. FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 41 J. W. Robertson, when Commissioner of Agriculture in Canada, in an address before a group of normal students contrasted the lives of two young men who went to the great West together. Both were school teachers. One gave up teaching, because he could not make money fast enough. He got a chance in speculation. In twenty years, through land booms and otherwise, he made a half million. The other beheved that to guide a human life and help it develop right was the greatest investment. Every year for twenty years he averaged fifteen graduates from his school — 300 lives inspired by his ideals, each the center of ever widening influence. The former seems a tragic failure, the latter an ever living success. Books, magazines, papers have a mighty educational in- fluence. The student in a community can, through the pubhc library if one exists, and through reading clubs and personal influence, direct the reading and create a demand for the best literature. Any person who appreciates the best art and music can wonderfully strengthen and stimulate those who have worked for years along these lines with all too little encouragement. Every piece of good music, every copy of a great picture, every room however poor and simple which shows good taste, is a direct uplift to the race. The local newspaper in a small town usually has a hard struggle. The editor rarely hears anything but adverse criticism. The editor in a small eastern town was soured and bitter. He readily printed articles against the church or church people. The minister got to know him, brought him work, found out his love for literature, had him lecture for him, helped him with news items, and talked under- standingly about an editor's difficulties. At the farewell dinner to the minister, th« editor, a very taciturn man who never spoke in public, said, ''Mr. Blank is the first person whom I have met in many years who has appreciated an editor's difficulties. He has helped me back to better faith in men and a more wholesome view of life and duty." Was 42 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY it worth while? Helping such a life is a permanent contri- bution to the welfare of the world. 2. Social Conditions. In almost every community there are forces at work for improving conditions. Anything that ministers to better living is helping to solve the world's prob- lems. The following are some of the improvements for which forces in almost every community, under one auspices or another, are at work: a. Better homes. This may take the form of better housing laws and building regulations, municipal house building, or the promotion of the more general use of paint, whitewash, decorations, pictures, flowers, and conveniences, and the beautifying of lawns and backyards. Is there need along these Hues in your county, district, town, or city? b. Better health. Combating disease and preventing dis- ease are given an important place in the Bible, in all Chris- tian teaching, social service, and missionary work. Discuss the contribution made to the economic prosperity, industry, and happiness of the community by anything that lessens sickness and promotes health. A great many in the medical profession have, by self-denial and unselfish, heroic service, approached very nearly the example of the Great Physician and have won a crown of glory in the minds and hearts of all people. Some of the ways in which better health is being promoted from different angles are as follows: Child welfare; better hygienic and health habits; wholesome play and recreation; housing reform; medical and dental school inspection; pure water, milk, and food; quarantines, district nurses, and com- munity doctors; hospitals and departments of pubHc health; clean streets and sanitation; screens and swat-the-fly-cam- paigns; reasonable hours of labor, with leisure, helpful recreation, and a weekly rest day; a living wage, and ade- quate provision for old age and for the needy; workmen's compensation and safety first; educational campaigns on diet, cooking, and homemaking; town planning, and the FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 43 elimination of the horrible evils of overcrowding and land speculation; campaigns against all forms of intemperance; the prevention of crime and more helpful treatment of criminals. These are some of the activities found in most centers. c. Better morals. Most juvenile crime is, as Jane Ad- dams says, "A love of fun gone wrong.'' Juvenile courts should be established in every large town and administered in the '^ paternal'' spirit set forth in the Act. But in dealing with the problem of crime the chief stress should be laid on prevention: homes that are homes, pubHc schools and Sunday schools that are vital and full of interesting activity are the best safeguards against crime. Let the boys and girls that have gone wrong have big brothers and big sisters. But let us also see that every boy and girl has many real big brothers and big sisters so that they may never go astray. The law can do little until an offense has been committed. But the home, school, community, church, and right-spirited citizen all influence to right living and helpful citizenship. d. Care of the needy. Society should be so organized that every needy person is cared for. We should feel some- thing akin to family disgrace — as we would feel if a brother or a sister had to beg — when we see anyone begging. If persons are unworthy of being helped they should be set at work; if worthy, but unable to work, they should have ade- quate care ; if they lack skill, they should be educated. Many devoted persons everywhere are working with great energy to solve the problem of the care of the needy. The tre- mendous success achieved in the reeducation of maimed, blinded, shattered soldiers makes it easily possible for the community or state to provide such help that practically everyone forced to beg or to become dependent on others may become a self-respecting, producing member of society. Here is a great opportunity for college men and women to be of real service and to give direction and leadership. e. Fuller social life. Consider the contributions societies 44 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY such as the Y M and Y W C A, the King's Daughters and the grange have made, and also how a better mail service, the rural telephone, and community recreational and social centers enrich hfe. The students should famiharize them- selves with recent developments in social center work, both in connection with the pubhc school and as a community enterprise. 3. Industry. Here many helpful movements find their origin and nurtm-e. Some builders of railroads and pro- motors of mills, mines, and other industries have it as dis- tinctly and definitely their object to promote the common good as have the social reformers. Many conscientious men and women have risked all they possessed to promote some industry which they thought would be a good thing for the country. Think of the contribution inventions have made to the common good and of the number of explorers and investigators who have given their hves a free offering for the cause of progress. In business the idea of service is becoming more clearly recognized as the essential thing. Formerly the motto was, "Let the buyer beware." The aim was to dispose of the goods. If the buyer was not smart enough to watch his own interest, he suffered. Now the best business houses look after the interests of their customers. "He succeeds best who serves best" is a well-known business motto. It is not difficult to cite examples of firms that began with the idea of being of service. Now we know that it is not sur- prising that these have prospered while the self-seekers often failed. Honest dealing and reliable goods enabled business to break down the old barter system and the more recent "beating down" buying, in which the skinflint with money bought cheap and the self-respecting person paid dearly be- cause he gave what was asked, and to introduce the one price system. Banks by their accuracy and honest deahng, accounting for every single cent in accounts of a few dollars or thousands, have greatly aided in building up a high type FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 45 of business transaction. Can you make clear some of the contributions to character and good living that have been made, for example, by the one-price system and the confi- dence which banldng has inspired? Discuss how much has been done by labor unions to im- prove wages, hours, and conditions of labor; to modify factory laws; to secure protection of life, and to defend the rights of the poorest workman by labor unions. With all their faults, where can greater self-sacrifice be found on the part of the many for what they regard as the rights of others? Men and women by the thousands have sacrificed everything and endured starvation almost, to support the rights of fellow-workers in other cities and other trades. Consider also how much time and energy boards of trade put into work for the pubhc welfare, and the enormous con- tribution made by such organizations as the grange and grain growers' associations, farmers' institutes, women's institutes, fairs, pure-bred stock and prize seed associations, and all movements for cooperative buying, selling, and distribution. It may come as a surprise to many to find what business firms are doing and how much money they put into welfare work for their own employes. The class should investigate and report on this. A little informed thinking will soon lead one to see that in the mighty forces of industry are possibilities of service that, though seldom considered, have been and are mighty factors in the bringing in of the Kingdom of God. Any educated person may be able, by cooperation and leader- ship, to bring this ideal of service to consciousness and make it the definite aim in the industrial movements of his com- munity. 4. Recreation, The value of recreation has come to be recognized in recent years. Students of this course know the importance of recreation and sport. It is to be remembered that one's character can be judged by how he spends his leisure time. While people are busy they are not in much 46 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY moral danger. It is in leisure time that the barroom, pool- room, gambUng dens, and such places gather in their prey. Discuss some of the ways in which sports and recreation have benefited people and communities, and make a hst of the needs of both the country and the city in this respect and the ways in which any citizen may promote good recre- ation and sport. Take up the following points: a. Supervised play. It is necessary to have decent play- grounds within easy reach of all the children. Children should be taught to play. It will be a surprise to many to find that in almost every center is a band of people who have long worked to this end. b. Team games and athletics. The character-building value of sports is well known, developing self-coDtrol, quick judgment, decision, honesty, helpfulness, loyalty, courage, and generosity. One difficulty is that often the few take part and the many sit on the bleachers. c. Amusement. This is one of the big problems in many places. While the general public criticize, some few will be found to be studying the problem seriously and giving guidance to better things. The aim should be to provide a high type of wholesome amusement — not by denunciation but by driving out the lower forms. Now that the saloons are being closed, an obligation rests on the community to minister especially to those who spent most of their leisure there and know nothing better. A great many abuses have come in, usually because recre- ation and amusement are commercialized. The public dance hall, with its degrading associations and lurking dangers, the cheap type of motion picture shows, the debasing pool room, result. The Young Women's and Young Men's Christian Associations have shown how amusements and recreation may be an elevating agency. In every community there are those who are enthusiasts in sport. With a httle support and direction tennis clubs, bowling and curling rinks, base- ball, football, basketball and hockey teams, snowshoeing FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 47 clubs, camping parties, and a great variety of glorious out- door sports may be organized, and the anemic, unwholesome kinds will tend to atrophy. The local ball team, in a little prairie town, though sup- ported by the town, did not have the respect of the best people. Few attended its games because of the rough play and rougher language. Two young men came to town. They were found to be good players. Asked to join the team, they said they would if dishonest play and bad language were cut out. Before the season was over the men on that team, which before was the worst in the league, would stop a game if the visiting teams indulged in ungentlemanly words or play. The character of league games changed completely and, naturally, the games were patronized as never before. But it did not stop there. The boys' team had observed all that happened. They called a solemn conclave and decided to clean up their sport. But how enforce their law? No older friend was with them to guide them, so they decided that any fellow who heard another use bad words or saw him do anything "crooked'' must "draw off and hit him right in the face"! For some days blood flowed, be- cause they had no older person of strong character as their counsellor. But they also cleaned up their sport. Are there any groups of boys or girls in your community who need a real friend? The motion picture shows in a certain village were horrible. The new teacher beHeved that most theater managers are ready to give the best they can get if it is appreciated. She was right in so thinking. She got to know the manager, told him she was telling the children stories from Dickens' novels and Shakespeare's plays and she wished they could see them played. Next week one of these was on the bill. The chil- dren and their friends came. Then on certain afternoons, when he could get a film she wanted, she would interpret the pictures, such as a play of Shakespeare, a science film, or 48 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY Bible scenes, as they were shown. Is it any wonder that the character of the ''shows'' changed completely? Cooperation, recognition of what is good, friendly insight and helpfulness are powerful factors in working reformation, though sometimes stern measures are necessary. The aim should be to secure clean, helpful sport and amusement that is recreational, whether commercial or through community cooperation, or both. 5. Government Every citizen should take a close, per- sonal interest in every governing body, such as the school board, board of health, the township, town, or city council, the local legislature, the National Government. This is as necessary for women as for men. The attitude should not be to find fault, but to get into sympathetic touch, so as to understand the problems and lead the governing bodies to realize that their work is to minister to the people, protect their interests, and develop the best conditions of living. Usually a large proportion of those in office are using their best thought and effort to improve conditions, and give time and money beyond what most of their critics imagine. But many lack knowledge, vision, and the commendation and support of good citizens; while the lower element is always around, pulling every wire and using every influence. Just adverse criticism by good citizens is necessary; helpful encouragement and support are also necessary and often more effective. A young household science graduate saw the need of many improvements in the public school. She always went to her trustees for counsel, honored them in every way, helped them see their work in a new light, incidentally put in their way photographs of other schools, got them to meet any traveling educationist, and brought her most ardent supporters into friendly touch with the board. The necessary improvements came. A graduate of a law school started practice in another small town and in much the same way succeeded in bringing the town council to the place where they saw their position FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 49 as a public trust for public service. He discovered that most of them were anxious to do right. Many church people would be surprised if they knew how seriously many members of the council and of Parliament take their office and how ardently they work for what they believe is the common good. They need the inspiration, vision, and uphft that come from the sympathetic support of the best people. It is true that there are times when nothing but a direct fight will win victory. Such conditions must be faced fear- lessly at whatever personal cost, and all the good forces rallied. But in ordinary circumstances much more may be accomplished, as above examples show, than is ordinarily thought possible. Perhaps under this head may be placed that promising, potent force which is becoming increasingly prominent and which we may designate as community life. It represents the surge into consciousness of the community spirit, which insists that the community is a neighborhood or big family and should share life as it is shared in the best family life. The consolidated school, the school as a commimity center, community playgrounds and recreation, county improvement associations, civic theater, and community church are important manifestations of their spirit. This drawing to- gether of the community to promote the best good of all, breaking down isolation and jealousies in wholesome co- operative effort for mutual good, is surely one of the signs of the growth of the Kingdom. It offers a great opportunity to educated young people, especially in the new movement for week-day religious education. 6. Religion, In all of the forces mentioned and in others not mentioned, there are great possibilities of good. Indeed when one thinks over the fine idealism and the actual practice of industrial, recreational, and political circles, one feels all these ''are not far from the Kingdom.^' The bringing in of the kingdom of helpfulness, good will, love, does not seem nearly so far off and visionary when we see how near these 50 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY great forces at their best come to the highest ideals. It is necessary only to bring these ideals, usually latent, to con- sciousness and make them the dominating purpose, not only in a few cases but generally in human society. Religion is one of the greatest forces in the world. There is a temptation in an age of activity when there are so many things to do to underestimate its value. The next chapter will discuss its place and power. Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read I Cor. 12 : 4-31. Paul here speaks of society as an organism. Each one is a '^member in particular.' ' What can the student do to promote sound health in that organism, locally and throughout the world? Can we remove causes that make others sources of pain and disturbance ? 2. Is each one a "member in particular?'' By a large number of concrete cases from humble and exalted positions show whether this is so. If it is, what effect should it have on the spirit in which each does his work — including myself? Read again Van Dyke's poem. 3. By actual investigation gather first-hand knowledge of the chief forces for the promotion of good living in your home or college community. For example, let one group find out what the public school is doing besides merely teaching the textbooks. Visit a few schools, discuss each with teachers, school board, etc. Another group will have a real voyage of discovery if it gets into personal touch with all the movements for improving social conditions; another, with what industries and business are doing in welfare work (besides visiting local plants, write to some big national firms) ; another, with move- ments for better recreation (also write national organizations for information) ; and another, with what the various govern- ing bodies are doing; etc., etc. This work should be full of FORCES MAKING FOR IMPROVEMENT 51 thrilling inspiration. Discuss how a good citizen may con- tribute largely to better things. 4. Does the success of a league of nations depend on the personal character of the people? If so, what bearing has this on the relation of supporters of that idea to the reli- gious education of the young? CHAPTER V THE PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION It sometimes happens in college and in the affairs of our busy, everyday life that we feel rehgion has no essential place or power today. So many cherished behefs of the past have had to give way before modern progress that some have doubted the validity of the claims of rehgion. Is it very much more than a pleasant, helpful sentiment? Are not such forces as those mentioned in Chapter IV actually doing what- ever is being done, and capable of doing all that is necessary to make the world what it ought to be? This whole question is a central one for the student — for everybody. On its answer depends one's attitude to his work, to Ufe, and to God. Let us face the question frankly, not from the point of view of theology or apologetics, but from the point of view of the college student who is profoundly interested and serious. In the first place, we must recognize the fact that religion has not been "invented"; it is not the product of priestcraft. Religion is a race-impulse just as self-preservation or the eating of food is a race-impulse. To seek to know the Power Beyond and Above and to enjoy His care, protection, and love is as much a human craving as the desire for water is an imperative demand of the body. It is an essential part of what is meant by "human'' being, not something added or affected, not a separable shred of life, but an integral and essential part of its texture as human and no more separable than are the physical, or the intellectual, or the social char- acteristics. As the physical is essential and inseparable from what is meant by a himian person in this world, so is the religious nature inherent, essential, and inseparable. Reli- 52 PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 53 gion has existed from the earliest days of human Hfe. It has continued ever since, changing in form and expression accord- ing to the needs of the age but ever increasing in depth and in momentum. It is found wherever man is found. Man without rehgion is as impossible as man without intellect. Religion inherent in man's nature is developed through urgent needs. This is perhaps most clearly seen in the earliest beginnings when hfe was not complex. Early man felt the elemental needs pressing — ^the need of food, of shelter, and of defense from the elements, animals, and man. It was early found that success depended first, on some unknown factor — the will of the gods; and second, on the group acting together for the common good. It was religion that supplied the key to both. It taught mea how to under- stand the gods and it supphed a bond strong enough to bind the group together for a common goal. Whoever could read the will of the gods as revealed in signs, portents, or the inner consciousness came to be looked upon as the most valued member of the group and necessary to its welfare. So it was natural that those who could do this — the shaman, medicine man, priest — came to be set apart as a distinct class. The basis of religion from the human point of view is shown in germ in this early, simple society: first, the essential nature of the human person, the race impulse for fellowship with God, the inherent, imperative demand of the human soul to find Him; second, a pressing human need, a vital common interest; third, cooperation for the common good, and fourth, the need of having specially trained and consecrated leadership in spiritual things. It will be of interest to trace in class how these characteristics have persisted in widely differing times, races, and circumstances. Now let us go a step further. It is all very well to say that religion is a race impulse. Some race impulses must be crushed out in modem hfe. What needs does it spring from and satisfy? If these are not permanent needs and the satis- factions ennobling, rehgion may well be a passing phase of 54 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY experience. The following are some of the contributions of religion that measure up to the most exacting demands. 1. One of the deep-seated needs of man is to find adequate causes. He is driven to this by the very constitution of his nature. This need manifests itself in the interminable ques- tions of children, in the myths of early man, in the best thought, the science, philosophy, and theology, of the most highly developed races. One question especially has always fascinated man, namely, What is the Cause of causes ? Reli- gion supplies an adequate answer — God, the Creator. But some will say, ''That answer is sufficient for childhood. But in college we have come to understand how vast and complex the world is. Our wide knowledge and deep thought make it impossible to believe that God created all." These words are very familiar. They express an experience com- mon to many — perhaps to most of us — in the first year or two of college life. But consider this. Belief in God, the Creator, might be thrown out because it is hard, were it not for the fact that it is so much harder to believe the alternative. Doubt, skepticism, atheism not infrequently get possession because of cowardice in facing alternatives or of lack of intellectual penetration to see and state them clearly. What is the alternative to belief in God, the Creator? Belief in uncreated, unintelligent, insentient laws and in chance — "the fortuitous concourse of atoms." Now "laws" are simply the habitual or invariable ways in which things happen. If laws are the cause, then the cause of a thing happening is the-way-it-has-al ways-happened! An unsus- pended apple always falls to the earth. The cause of its falling is that-it-has-al ways-fallen! Assisted, of course, by chance. We refuse to believe anything like this in the simplest affairs of life, because we know it is not tru£. Fancy the watch made by impersonal "laws," assembled part to part by chance, coming just when required to the watchmaker's window, set going, regulated, and with the price marked on it! The human mind just because it is human demands a PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 55 satisfactory and reasonable Cause. The ostrich-like may hide his head in the desert sand of doubt. The intelligent will face the facts. The alternatives are an all-wise, all- loving God who works according to laws; or insentient laws and chance. Each view requires faith, the latter much more than the former, because it is irrational and contradictory to all experience. Religion gives the glow and inspiration of a God who is Father and a universe that is rational, friendly, where man is in his Father^s house and that is '^crammed with heaven." Here is inspiration to work because the universe is moral and the destiny of man is glorious. The other way lie despair, degeneration, suicide. The student must make his choice. He has 'Hhe will to believe." Religion gives an adequate Cause that has inspired the race to glorious achieve- ment and to an unconquerable faith in the Right, in the nobility of every life, and in the high destiny of man. It was this that sustained France, Britain, Belgium, and the other Allies in the darkest hours of the terrible four years' struggle. Men and women will not die for insentient laws or for a Right that is based on chance. 2. Everyone at times craves companionship. We may be self-sufficient most of the time and may feel quite independent of others. But is it not so that at times we must have some one to talk to and confide in ? At such a time many folks but irritate us. We long for the one or two kindred spirits. If this is not so, what significance have the words chum, comrade, friend? And these close friends must always be few. There is but one in our experience who comes near to satisfying us at all times. For this one we select and reserve a word that elevates that one on a towering pinnacle where only one can stand, the sacred word — lover. And there are some experi- ences and moods that even that one cannot fully share and satisfy. This very familiar experience tells us that the human heart seeks ideal friendship, and will not be satisfied with less. That ideal transcends human possibilities. It is the longing of the human life after God (Psalm 42). But how can the 56 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY finite get into fellowship with the Infinite? Hear this cry all through human experience — '^0 that I might find Him." "Show us the Father.'^ And then comes to us the boldest and most beautiful conception of the human heart and mind, that God revealed himself in human form — incarnated in human life. *""" "The very God! think, Abib; dost thou think? So, the All-Great, were the All-Loving too — So, thro^ the thunder comes a human voice Saying, 'O heart I made, a heart beats here! Face, my hands fashioned, see it in myself! Thou hast no power nor mayst conceive of mine: But love I gave thee, with myself to love. And thou must love me who have died for thee!'" — Browning, "An Epistle of Karshish." Religion, and religion alone, gives a friendship that satisfies every craving of the human heart, a friendship that stands the supreme test "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" (John 15 : 13). The value of this one contribution, given to us only in religion, surpasses all computation. It is this companionship with the great and good God that makes prayer and meditation such a strengthening, upHfting power in life. Great leaders such as Chinese Gordon, Living- stone, Gladstone, Washington, Lincoln, Lloyd George, Admiral Beatty, and the outstanding civil and mihtary leaders among the Allies gave first place to prayer, recognizing that all strength comes from God. Here is a picture given by the Toronto Globe ^ in November, 1918: "A soldier had gone into an old church in France, and as he stood there a gray-haired man, with the marks of a Gen- eral on his uniform, entered the church, accompanied simply by an orderly. The soldier paid little attention at first to the man, but was interested to see him kneel in the church praying. Three-quarters of an hour had passed before the man arose from his knees, and when the soldier followed him PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 57 down the street he was surprised to see soldiers saluting him in great excitement and women and children stopping, with awe on their faces, as he passed by. It was Foch. . . . ^'It is said that this was no unusual occurrence, for Foch never fails to spend time every morning and every night on his knees, and has done this all his Hfe." j, Foch was then conducting the biggest military campaign the world has ever seen. It was in the midst of the victory drive. Yet he had time and felt it necessary to spend time in prayer. But we are often " too busy " ! Or we think it old-fashioned Cir not important! 3. Students — especially young students — are sometimes supposed to be more sure of their own sufficiency than of anything else. But in our own hearts we know that this is not always so. Men in all ages — the greatest and best as well as others — have cried out in pain and distress because of the sense of their own incompleteness and insufficiency. It may be an expression of weakness, the lack of strength to do a task, to live one's life, to bear a burden, to face death; it may be a yearning after some ideal, the outbreaking of an aspiration; it often is because of failure, mistakes, or the sense of sin, but whatever it is, it is a sense of incompleteness that earth and its fulness cannot satisfy. It is as conmion among the rich and cultured as among the poor and ignorant. It is as characteristic of the strongest and noblest as it is of the weak. It is the cry for forgiveness, for redemption, for at- one-ment with one's best self and with God. Religion meets this deep, human need and satisfies it. Paul, Chinese Gordon, Lincoln go out strengthened to their world work and the poor, distracted, broken driftwood of the slums rise through the same power to high purpose and noble living. 4. Yet another outstanding human need always demands satisfaction. After this life — what? All sensible people, all who think, ask this question. This life with all its inequali- ties, its injustice, its love and joy, its aspirations unfilled — is 58 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY it all? Is death just the grave? Even those who spurn religion often seek some message of comfort from this ministry at the funeral of their loved ones because in the heart burns a hope unquenchable. Surely here is one of the deepest needs of the human heart. Religion alone brings with confidence and authority the glad message that death is not the end but the entrance into a better, richer, fuller life. The ecstasy of this glorious truth rings through the triumph song of Paul as the significance of it bursts upon him as it has upon countless multitudes: ''Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your victory? Death, where is your sting?" and he adds, ''The victory is ours, thank God! He makes it ours by our Lord Jesus Christ. Well then, my beloved brothers, hold your ground immovable; abound in work for the Lord at all times, for you may be sure that in the Lord your labour is never thrown away" (I Cor. 15: 54-58, Moffat's trans- lation) . This same assurance has made men strong to "stand im- movable" in every emergency. It is a tower of strength. Nothing did more to inspire those who endured beyond our power to imagine and those who died for us in the awful War. Hear the message of Sir Arthur Currie, Commander of the Canadian Corps in Flanders during the terrible battle of Picardy, March 27, 1918, when the fate of the empire and of the world seemed to be in the balance. He said in part to those who are among the strongest and bravest of men: "Under the orders of your devoted officers in the coming battle, you will advance, or fall where you stand, facing the enemy. "To those who fall, I say: *You will not die, but step into immortaUty! . . . Your names will be revered for ever by your grateful country and God will take you unto himself. "On many a hard-fought field of battle you have over- come the enemy, and with God's help you shall achieve victory once more." PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 59 The French are always sustained by the consciousness that those who fall are still fighting with them. "They are not dead" is the message brought to us from the field. In times of ease we may be flippant or atheists. But in the supreme moment of life and of human history the glori- ous truth of immortality has made endurance and victory for the Right possible. It is religion that has preserved and teaches this Easter faith. 5. Religion gives a foundation for faith in the triumph of the Right, Faith in the Right holds in spite of the fact that all the odds are against it. Though Right is on the scaffold and Wrong on the throne, faith in the ultimate outcome does not wane. Why? Because of the faith that God stands, in the shadows perhaps, keeping watch. It is this that has sustained men and women in every age to keep up the fight when everything else failed them. It has given rise to the unconquerable conviction that ''one, with God on his side, is a majority." It was this that enabled Sir Fowell Buxton to advocate the abolition of slavery, though he stood alone in Parhament. When his first bill was read it was received with shouts of derision, but he said, ''Mr. Speaker, the reading of this bill is the beginning of a movement that will surely end in the abolition of slavery throughout the British Dominion." This prophecy was fulfilled in Britain a whole generation earlier than anywhere else in the world. Confidence in the triumph of the Right can never die while the belief in God lives. This is one of the untold blessings religion has brought to the world. The following quotation from the Toronto Globe of April 24, 1918, recalls another striking historic incident: "During the awful tyranny of the French Commune in 1871 the venerable Archbishop of Paris was arrested and brought before the Tribunal. As he stood before his Judges he asked: 'What do you wish, my children?' They an- swered: 'Do not speak to us like that; we are your superiors. Who are you?' they asked. He replied: 'I am the servant 60 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY of God/ And when they asked again, 'Where is God?' he answered, 'Everywhere/ Then they issued an order for 'the arrest of one God, who was everywhere/ But, as someone has aptly pointed out, that order was never exe- cuted. And we today are sure that before Germany — who is fighting against everything for which Jesus Christ and Christianity stand — before Germany can win this war she must execute an order for 'the arrest of one God, who is everywhere/ Those who have God as their Captain are absolutely sure of victory/' When the great Allied victory came in September, 1918, one of the most illuminating and significant features of the time was the almost imiversal acknowledgment that "before, beneath, and behind all the human skill and power shown by the Alhes were the Divine Presence, Wisdom, and OverruUng Strength/' King George said, "The hour is one of solemn thanksgiving and gratitude to God/' Lloyd George said, "Let us thank God" and repeated the words of the Psalmist " Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory/' Asquith said, "The House (of Commons) could do nothing but acknowledge its gratitude to Ahnighty God/' The British Parliament at once adjourned when it was reported that the armistice was signed, and the members went in a body to a nearby church to imite in praise and thanksgiving. In Toronto and many Canadian cities the crowds thronging the streets kneeled in prayer and united in the Doxology. A New York scene is thus described: "Before the celebration had lasted more than a few min- utes a tall, fresh-cheeked English girl, with the Devonshire bloom still on her cheeks, clunbed on the platform of ' Liberty Hall.' The crowd became hushed as she raised a hand. Then in a clear, silvery voice the girl sang the Doxology. A churchly calm spread over Times Square. Heads were bowed and hats came off as the song of praise to the Almighty winged its way upward." In France, Belgium, Serbia, and the other nations that have PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 61 experienced the crushing heel of the Hun, the spontaneous outpouring of the people's gratitude to God was overwhelm- ing. Better for a nation to perish miserably than to lose this contact with God which is the heart of reUgion. Truly the Psalmist expressed a fundamental fact in the life of the individual or nation: "If God be for us who can be against us?" Fight the good fight whatever the odds. The Right must prevail. 6. And what has always inspired confidence in others and work for themf What has sent missionaries, social workers, reformers, against their own selfish interests, often against the advice of friends and family, sometimes against the policy of the church, to work for the outcast and for social ideals? At basis this: that all are equal in God's sight. Here is the root of the driving ideal which is modifying all thought and making over the world, the brotherhood of man. Just now the world has become a neighborhood as far as being brought close together is concerned. The nations should live together as good neighbors do. What alone will make this possible? The recognition of each other as brothers — as sons of God. Permanent peace can be based on no other foundation. Trade will not give a safe basis; nor labor; nor capital; nor can invention; nor peace propa- ganda; nor international law. All these have snapped like broken reeds. The world has had a rude awakening. But when people regard each other as brothers, as children of God, then peace is inevitable and permanent. Whoever prays for peace let him labor incessantly to fill the world with the spirit of love and brotherhood. These issue in good will. This is the Christian message. 7. Rehgion has ever taught the supremacy of the spiritual, the ideal, the personal over against all the crass forces of the so-called material world. At times the world in its wisdom has laughed at the very idea of these immaterial forces, which it called creatiu-es of fancy, such as ideaUsm, prayer, hope. But never has force — crass, material, consciousless, brutal 62 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY force been so focused as it has in this world conflict. The world has had a chance to see force displayed to the very limit of human invention and resource. It has been a riot of crass, material force. But what say the leaders ? Admiral Jellicoe, when head of the British Navy, said in effect : ''We need more prayers.^^ Admiral Beatty, who succeeded him, said: "We need a revival in religion." It is said that when news came in 1914 that the German hordes were stopped in their trium- phant march toward Paris, Lord Roberts said to Kitchener, *'Only God Almighty could have done this," and Kitchener replied, ''Somebody must have been praying!" Sir William Robertson, when heading the British war machine in England, said: "I fear that even yet too many of us are putting an undue amount of trust in chariots and horses. We may confi- dently rely on our soldiers and sailors fighting bravely, and count upon having abundant ammunition, but we must not stop at that. ... A serious determination on the part of the nation to seek and deserve divine help would, we may hope, enable us to take a true perspective of the War, and it would undoubtedly furnish valuable help to our gallant sailors and soldiers at the front." The statesmen of the allied countries are equally explicit. They insist that every moral and spiritual triumph is a greater gain than a successful battle. The proclamations of gover- nors of many states in the United States tell this same story. Here is the message of Governor Holcomb of Connecticut at Easter 1918: "We should be willing to make whatever sacrifice is nec- essary to ensure the preservation of human liberty. I there- fore, appoint ... as a day of fasting and prayer and request that all of the people of this state bend the knee to Almighty God and fervently and devoutedly pray for the success of our cause ... a conclusive victory and that a permanent peace be estabhshed." PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 63 And what is morale? The greatest victory of all is to break down the morale of the enemy; the surest sign of victory is the high morale of one's army. It is a spiritual quality. An army of high morale and spiritual force is unconquerable. Again and again military leaders have asserted "the all- important factor is the morale of the men.'' This is why the backing of the folks at home is so important and why loyalty on their part wins wars. Morale is spiritual force. It is this spiritual force that insures victory, not only in the Army, but also in life and in any worthy undertaking. One of the most enlightening studies in the last days of the War and the first days of peace was that of the great newspapers, such as the London Times, New York Tribune, Toronto Globe, and many others of their standing. Their pages, news and editorial alike, are openly, persistently, consciously, explicitly teaching great spiritual truths. 8. One other contribution comes alone from religion — that is, dynamic. One may have desires and hopes, but too often he cannot put them into effect until he gets in touch with God. As witness let us call the thousands of drunkards and others who had sunk very low in sin. They were im- potent until some "Power" came into their lives. Then came inner unity and harmony and a new purpose. It is equally true of good people. John Wesley's fruitless ministry gave place to a revival that shook the nations when the new dynamic came. We all know these facts from our own ex- perience and from the testimony of untold numbers of other people. The same is true of organizations and of nations. An irreUgious nation can never be truly good or permanently great. Carlyle was not prejudiced in favor of orthodox religion, but this is what he said: "There has never yet been a nation that did anything great in the world that was not deeply religious. Men of a praying disposition are to be envied; not because they get answers to their prayers, but because when a man really 64 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY prays he judges his own conduct, and nothing in it mean or base escapes him, and this stimulates him to honesty and activity . . . The conviction is borne in on a man that, through the mystery and darkness, everything is ruled by One most wise and most good; and he learns to say in his heart: 'Thy wiU be done/" Recall Punches striking cartoon of Belgium. By opposing her puny strength to the mighty force of the Hun, she had lost all — but not her soul! Remember also the warning of prophets, priests, and laymen in the United States against that nation's losing her soul, though she should gain the wealth of the whole world by remaining out of the War. Nations, as truly as individuals, need God to give the moral and spiritual power, dynamic, to carry out great ideals and be a mighty force for good in the world. It is not by chance that the nations today which stand for most are Christian. It is because either the leading nations adopt Christianity or Christianity gives them leadership. Both reasons place Christianity in the forefront as a national asset. 9. One final contribution of religion must not be over- looked. It develops worthy motives. It touches the inner springs of life so that the life is guided by its best and highest aims. It is not a veneer. Ordinary education may develop mental ability, but leave the purposes of life low and base. But the Christian religion touches the source and all the life is changed. And its compelling motives are love to God shown forth in loving service and good will to men. These considerations show something of the distinctive place and power of religion in private and national life. The essential purpose of religion is to secure the development of each person to his highest and best. No one can live his best life or attain to anything like his possibilities as a moral and spiritual force who does not have fellowship with God as He is revealed in Christ, or who does not, in His spirit, work with or for his fellows. Religion, therefore, seeks to lead each one into intimate, personal fellowship with the Father; to help PLACE AND POWER OF RELIGION 65 each one to be an efficient member of society working for the good of the whole, so that the community, the social order itself, shall be Christian and promote not selfish ends and vested interests, but the common good. This is the spirit which exists in the best family life, where all dwell together in loving fellowship, thoughtful of each other's welfare, counting no service a sacrifice, and united in loyalty to the Father and in the zealous support of his purposes. ReUgion is the only power that can do this. It has done it in countless himian fives; it is working out its purposes in community and national life. Of all the forces at work it is the most fundamental and potential. Every student, if he loves his country and his f eUowmen, should study to know how he can make his biggest contribution to the spiritual forces that redeem men and nations. Now think back over the forces at work as outlined in the last chapter. AU are of the utmost value. We must do everything we can to support them. But is it not so that, alone, they fail to touch the heart of the problem? Suppose everyone were weU educated and lived in a good home; that playgrounds and parks abounded; that health were good, wages high, and prices reasonably low — aU conditions greatly to be desired — would the problem be solved, would people be better, or the world safer ? One nation, one hideous example, mocks us! Then think over the contribution refigion has to make as briefly sketched in this chapter, and, weighing the whole subject in the most matter-of-fact way, see if its contribution is not the essential one without which no real progress can be made. Refigion is broader than any one organization or than all organized refigious bodies. It is a great spiritual body — the communion of aU the befievers. In the New Testament it is spoken of as "the body of Christ." As God revealed Himself in Christ, so, in Christ, He reveals Himself through the Church. The word '' Church " then, as used in these studies, means refigion in its broadest sense, but especiaUy as it 66 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY expresses itself in an organized way. It includes the churches or denominations, the Young Men's Christian Association, the Young Women's Christian Association, the Salvation Army, and many others. However far any single reUgious institution may fall below the ideal, it does stand for the supremacy of spiritual forces. It is well at this stage to ask ourselves: Which of all the forces in any community has as its sole and single purpose the service of others, seeking only the highest development and best weKare of each one without thought of personal gain? Which, with all its Hmitations, is doing most to inspire right living? Which has power to give dynamic to a life, a movement, an organization, a force, or a nation, both to conceive noble ideals and to live them out in everyday life? Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read Psalms 126 and 115. How wonderfully these express the experience of peoples on the day of victory in the liberated parts of France, Belgium, and Armenia! They grow out of similar national experiences. Read also I Cor. 15: 53-58, keeping in mind the milUons of homes that were bereaved in the German War. 2. Discuss fully the nine main points in the chapter, making clear the bearing of each one as a factor in the life of the college man and woman who wants to serve humanity and make the world better. 3. Having decided the question raised in the last two paragraphs of the chapter, what should be my relation to religion, to organized rehgion, even if I may think that in its present organized form it is far from perfect? CHAPTER VI THE FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH The function of the local church is to help every person of every age and condition to live his best life. No one can so live who is not bound up with the great spiritual forces spoken of in the last chapter. The student should face these ques- tions now: Is it possible for anyone to live his highest and best life without God and apart from spiritual reality? Can the world ever be safe and brotherhood established in all the every- day affairs of men without an unshaken belief in God and in the inherent worth and immortal destiny of man? No stu- dent should be content with loose thinking on these funda- mental, crucial points, because his vital — not formal — response to these questions modifies his life and work and his attitude to every other experience of life. The church building embodies concretely before us and all the world, faith in God and in His presence among us; faith in the supremacy of the spiritual and in man's eternal worth and destiny; and the call to serve others in the spirit of Jesus. Just as its spire catches the eye and silently but constantly points upward; just as no settlement, country, village, town, or city looks complete without its picturesque features; so, the ^church points to the highest life and testifies that no life is complete without God and spiritual things. How much the world — so much with us — needs this testimony! J. H. Oldham, in his book ''The World and the Gospel,' ' says: "The Christian Church is a witness that there is a world of spiritual reality which faith can apprehend. Through the centuries multitudes of men and women have trusted in the God and Father of Jesus Christ and proved Him to be 67 68 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY what Christ declared. . . . The victory of Jesus is not simply a fact in past history. ... He has opened the Kingdom of Heaven to all who beHeve in Him. He is alive for evermore, continually present in His Church and dwelling in His people." ^ \ This constant, silent testimony is one function at least which the Church inevitably fulfils whether it is represented in the magnificent cathedral, the simple meeting-house, the chaplain^s, Salvation Army, or Y M C A hut; whether in the great congregation, the "two or three," the Sunday-school class, or the family group. It testifies to the real. And this is what Jesus claimed: "So Jesus cried aloud, as he was teach- ing in the temple, 'You know me? you know where I come from? But I have not come on my own initiative; I am sent, and sent by Him who is real. You do not know Him but I know Him, because I have come from Him and He sent me' '' (John 7: 28, Moffat's translation). That was the world's need in Jesus' day; it is the world's need today — to know Him who is real! For this one reason every student who longs to help humanity must show no uncertainty as to his attitude and allegiance. His attitude and allegiance are quite independent of the quality of leadership and efficiency in the local church. His allegiance is to a Cause, to an Ideal. For this religion, embodied in the local church, stands. Whether one wills it or not, his attitude to all that religion stands for will be pro- claimed to the world by his relationship to the local church. And this relationship will greatly hearten or discourage the godly, spiritually-minded residents. No amount of preach- ing or protesting will counteract an attitude of indifference or opposition. Every student will do well to ponder these things carefully. The position is not held that one should be content with the church as it may be in any particular place. Far from it. But if improvements are necessary, who has Pages 37 and 216. FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 69 such a chance to promote them as the college man or woman who has shown by word and example and by sympathetic cooperation in every good endeavor that he behoves in God and the supremacy of spiritual things? Apart from this constant, essential witness of the Church to spiritual reality, what further functions has it? Is its chief work to keep its own organization — or its many or- ganizations — running? One might be led to believe this from observation of some churches. The work of the Church is to serve the community and the world. Losing itself thus, it gains a fuller, richer life; living to self, it loses its life. Pause long enough to contrast organizations of these two types as shown in their attitude to community conditions, religious education, and missions. Religion seeks to develop each person to his highest and best. It is now patent to everyone that no one can exist in- dependent of social conditions. As society is made up of persons, so each one is individually bound up with society. Language, transportation, industry, mail service, food, cloth- ing — everything testifies to this. The Church, therefore, beheves that success comes only when the promotion of the best personal character and the best social conditions go hand in hand. It is an easy matter to cite examples of failure in individual life through bad social conditions; of good social conditions through bad or weak character; and the success attending the promotion of both together. It would appear then that nothing that touches human life is alien to the Church, This does not mean that it should per- form all the functions of society, but it does mean it should inspire society to do its work well. The Church at first carried on all the work of education. Long since this has been taken over by society. Yet the Church is still imder obligation to see that every child gets a good education. So with the administration of justice, charity, and everything else that makes for human weKare. Manifestly, then, the exact function of the Church depends 70 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY on the character and needs of the community. In some places, as in China and Africa, the Church may have to carry on the work of education, medicine, government, justice, and industry, as it had to do in the early days in this country. The institutional church in a congested city district may be very different from the one in the restricted residential sec- tion; the Salvation Army differs from the country church, and both from the Young Men's or Young Women's Christian Association. But while differing in detail the work of the Church may be thought of imder the three heads of Worship or Inspiration, Instruction, and Training. Its function is to inspire, inform, impel. It must, however, be emphatically asserted that these are not separate and distinct, but merely qualities of the one process. Any helpful worship instructs and gives mighty impulse to action; vital instruction inspires and stimulates activity; work and training should always be an inspiration and must help one acquire knowledge. Yet there is a real distinction between these three phases of work. Let us examine each in turn. 1. Worship or Inspiration. We have seen that religion is characteristic of human life. Worship is one of the universal forms in which reUgion expresses itself. It is one of the char- acteristics of life above the brute stage, for was not Tennyson right when he said: "For what are men better than sheep or goats That nourish a blind life within the brain, If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer Both for themselves and those who call them friend ? For so the whole round earth is every way Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.^' — "The Passing of Arthur." Three fundamental ideas in Christian worship are, first, the sense of the presence of God as a loving Father — "the practice of the presence of God," as Brother Lawrence phrased it. Nothing can take the place of this Christian conception. FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 71 In the terrible German War all hope and faith and sanity would have vanished had not people had this to cling to — God, as loving Father, is in the world and all around and within us. If this be so, the Right must prevail. Victory may be delayed, but it is certain. Second, the conscious identifying of the human will with the divine will. This does not mean the surrender, in the sense of the suppression, of the human will. It means, on the con- trary, the fullest development of the human will until it attains to that height where of free and voluntary choice it accepts the highest as its aim and proudly identifies itself with God as revealed and incarnated in Christ. Such a partnership cannot know defeat. Listen to the fellowship the early disciples felt. "It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us" (Acts 15: 28). A common New Testament phrase is "Fellow-workers with Christ." Jesus taught this: "I call you not servants . . . but I have called you friends" (John 15: 15). The Christian Church alone has the au- dacity of faith to stand sponsor for such a conception of fel- lowship with God. The world can never be elevated other- wise above the material. As Jesus incarnated the spirit of God, so, the Church teaches, may we incarnate His spirit. Third, Christian worship implies not only the consciousness of God as Father and fellowship with Him but also the expres- sion of this faith hy the person or group worshiping. One of the most precious opportunities of parents, teachers, and the Church is to train others in the adequate expression of their attitude to God. One expresses this by bodily posture, by prayer, praise, singing, Bible study, giving, and especially in one's constant and habitual attitude to life. For example, a pessimistic, grouchy outlook dims the revelation of God's presence in the world. Fourth, the outgoing impulse to help others. Christian wor- ship can never be selfish. Prayer that one's own life may be better, for example, is always in order when the purpose is that thereby we may serve better. 72 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY Worship strengthens and enriches life. A Hfe devoid of worship is hke a flower without grace or beauty or fragrance. Such an one is without lofty sentiment or the finer touch and sensitiveness. Worship, communion with God, promotes the best character because, in addition to what has been said, it helps one to see things in their proper perspective. Our own petty interests often bulk so large that they blot out the whole universe. Seeing them in the light of the Eternal pm-poses — as we do, for example, in prayer — they shrink to something Uke their proper proportions. A frank ex- change of experiences among students on this point would be of real value. Again, it mobilizes one^s moral and spiritual resources. We start some endeavor with enthusiasm. The task gets heavy. Results are disappointing. Others fail us. The temptation to quit is strong. We need moral reenforcements. In wor- ship our best self is, for the time, in complete control. We feel more strongly our fellowship with God and with the good and great of all ages. The struggle takes on new meaning. The spiritual seems the only real. The divine purpose in hfe becomes clearer. We get a new grip and go out vic- torious. This has been the happy experience of many after a service of public worship, or quiet meditation and prayer. Worship makes us feel our kinship with others — the solidarity of the race. Not only do we pray for the welfare of others, but it unites us in a noble purpose with others and breaks down caste. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant are all children and brothers. This is one of the beauties of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. It makes all one — the needy children of a loving Father. Worship touches the will and motive. This is fundamental in character development. Out of the heart are the issues of life. Worship inspires noble living, purifies life, elevates ideals, dethrones pride and selfishness, renews courage, and unifies one's own life in concentrated purpose. Through wor- ship we are conscious of our unity with God and with His FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 73 people. The life without fellowship with God is of all most barren and desolate. It is illuminating to discuss the men and women whom we admire, to see what place worship had in their lives. One is forced to the conclusion that no matter how perfect one may- be physically or mentally, he is dwarfed and abnormal unless he has the wellspring and ennobling influence of worship bringing him into fellowship with God and with others as His children. The artists keeps before him clear colors and looks at them often to keep his color image correct. Worship keeps the spiritual vision clear. The church service with its reverence, its song and prayer, its fellowship, the sense of God's presence, its hallowed memories, the consciousness of the high destiny of man, of purpose in life, of the supremacy of spiritual values — these things, even apart from the sermon, are neces- sary to vigorous spiritual health and make possible the promise: "They shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint" (Isa. 40:31). Many claim they can worship God better in their automo- biles than in a stuffy church. But all day long, up hill and down dale, the only time they think of God or mention His name is when a tire punctures or a chain breaks! The same general experience is true of all who think they will worship better out-of-doors. It is easy for people to deceive them- selves, and the notion that they can keep up their spiritual life while rejecting the regular assembhng together for worship is one of the commonest and cheapest deceptions. Another idea Uke it is that Sunday may be spent as any other day. It is not difficult to trace the growing coldness, indifference, and spiritual decline of those who absent themselves from service or do not keep Sunday sacred. We need to set aside some time every day and one special day especially for communion with God, while keeping up that fellowship as we go about our work. In these days of rush and activity we need the 74 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY poise and control that come from meditation and prayer. The trained college man and woman know how true this is. 2. Instruction. Usually we underestimate the instruction given in public worship. We often fail to appreciate how much our lives are enriched by the messages of the hymns, stirring us deeply as they are sung together. Then, can we estimate how much of the general knowledge of the Bible is acquired through the impressive reading in church and in exposition? It would be reason enough to come together to read the Bible and sing. But is it not so that practically all the general knowledge of music is acquired through the church services? That is no mean contribution. The same service is being done for art. The greater part of what is known of foreign peoples, customs, and countries has come through the Churches teaching of missions. This, more than anything else, has taken away our provincialism and made us citizens of the world. How has temperance knowledge been dissemi- nated? Then through the offerings, notices, societies, and general work, knowledge is obtained of all the Churches vast concerns, at home and abroad, and its activities are foimd to be greater, in volume, extent, and ramij&cations, than al- most any other enterprise. Besides all these forms of in- struction the sermon is a great educational power. There are those who speak slightingly of the sermon. Granted that at times it may be below par. Yet compared with the regular addresses in any other organization, such as business or poli- tics, the sermons or reUgious addresses are vastly superior. Fancy hstening to the ordinary poUtician once or twice a week for even three months! The preacher, who is prophet as weU as priest, must ever hold a place of power and influence. The living voice of the public speaker wiU always maintain a place of peculiar influence in disseminating knowledge. From such considerations it is evident that the Church is one of the greatest agencies for the propagation of knowledge. But in addition to the regular services, every agency and organization of the Church gives instruction. Think of FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 75 what has been accomplished by the mission study classes, the various societies of women, brotherhoods, clubs, circles, and auxiharies. But the great agency for distinct educa- tional work is the Sunday school. Because the work of religious education is most important of all it must be carried on as efficiently as in the best school or university. Wonderful strides have been made in this direction within recent years. The Hve Sunday school of today (and it is equally true of the church) is very different from that of ten or twenty years ago and must not be judged by what it then was. All of Chapter VII is given to a discussion of oppor- tunities of service through the church school. 3. Training, The Church seeks not only to inspire and instruct but also to train its people. Religion and life are one. Separated, rehgion is a sham and life is ruined. The teach- ing of religion must, then, be a training in hving. Inspiration that does not issue in action weakens character. Instruction that is abstract, unrelated to life, is not Christian education. The only successful religious education is that which results in hving one^s daily life according to the principles of Jesus. One cannot learn a simple thing such as to play a game or to bake a cake except by training, doing, even if one knows the rules or recipes by heart. Much less can one learn how to live in modern complex life except by being trained in actual life conditions. It is not enough to know a few verses by heart, to have some facts, or feel inspired, though all of these things are essential. Along with them must go actual train- ing, actual work, in order that one may acquire skiU in putting his principles into practice. To bring out clearly how thor- oughly this is accepted now in educational work consider the complete revolution that has been wrought in this respect in the kindergarten, pubUc schools, technical schools, agricul- tural colleges, business colleges, and the teaching of household science. An accepted axiom is that conditions must be as much like actual life as possible. For example, consider the business college with its bank, money, and business trans- 76 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY actions; the agricultural college with stock, farm, and orchard; the domestic science school with its baking, sewing, and millinery. The contrast between these and the old-style schools with their abstract, bookish, apart-from-life courses is most striking. So, in religious work, it is essential to pro- vide that all instruction and inspiration issue in Christian activity. For this reason the Church becomes the central power-house for every form of helpful endeavor in the com- munity and world. It cannot be otherwise. The principles of religion call for the investment of every life in the service of others and in making conditions better. Something of how the Church is succeeding will be shown in the next chapter on '' Opportunities for Service through the Church." By training, the person is led to apply the truth in his own life and to work out for himself his own problems in the light of that teaching. Our work fails most of all in this — and it is as true of ordinary education as of religious education — that the thing taught does not function in life. Now char- acter shows itself in everything that one does or thinks. In our thinking we divide things up into sacred and secular; personal and social; home and foreign; and similar classifica- tions. These divisions are entirely artificial and merely for convenience. They have done harm. People have actually come to feel that they may be religious by times or in certain activities only; that the personal life may be good but not the social life or vice versa; that one may be religious but not missionary. It helps us to get down to basal things to see that character is one, a unity, and that it expresses itself in every activity. As the "heart," the person himself, is, so is his hfe. No amount of disguise can make it otherwise. One may deceive himself and others — as often happens — by profession or by apparently good deeds, but fundamentally his character remains unchanged. Appearances do not change fundamentals. Now it is religion alone, as was pointed out in the last chapter, that can touch the inner motive and will, that can change the source. The inner life FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 77 — the real seK — reveals or expresses itself in every thought and action, and training must provide channels for this ex- pression in adequate Christian activities. But for the sake of concreteness we can think of one ex- pressing or reveaUng himself. a. In personal life.^ Religion must train each one in per- sonal habits and self-control. The daily reading of the Bible and prayer or the morning watch, is so important that no one who is intelligent can afford to omit the practice. Personal purity is essential for self-respect. Without it one is a malignant plague-spot. So one must have courage to do right, decision of character, which comes only through train- ing in making choices and decisions, and in putting one's de- cision into practice — that is, in exercising the will. Each one needs to be trained in friendship through having chums and friends and in ministering to them. The Christian — who must be a good citizen — must, because of his religion, have courage and faith and not be a pessimist. Rev. Howard Walter in "A Book of Friendship" has summed up a great deal in the following little poem, the thought of which is the desire of all who try to live right: "I would be true, for there are those who trust me; I would be pure, for there are those who care; I would be strong, for there is much to suffer; I would be brave, for there is much to dare; I would be friend to all — the foe, the friendless; I would be giving and forget the gift; I would be humble, for I know my weakness; I would look up, and laugh, and love, and lift." b. In the community. Work done to help others in one's neighborhood or to improve conditions is often spoken of as social service. Every comimunity offers many opportunities 2 Just to see how impossible it is to separate public and private life let the reader or the class name one sin that is purely personal and does not affect one or more other persons! 78 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY for training in helpfulness and in making conditions better. It is absolute stone-blindness that permits any religious or- ganization to teach, without training its people actually to put into practice in the comnaunity the truth presented. When all our religious bodies see the significance of training, every such body will be, in effect as well as in potentiahty, a power-house for every upbuilding influence and forward movement. c. In the world. The world is but a large community. Foreign mission work differs not a whit from social service or home mission or community work. It is all an attempt to help others and to make conditions better. No one can be educated who is ignorant of or indifferent to the rest of the world, and he cannot be a Christian without doing his best to help whenever that help is needed. So the Church — for many, many years the only agency to do this — seeks to train its people in loving care and sympathy for all peoples in the world, by training them in praying, giving, working for other peoples. 'I At the present time the needs of the world are great enough to call out every atom of love and service in the hearts of all the people. There is the reconstruction and rebuilding of all the lands blighted and cursed by the touch of the Hun; the care of thousands of orphans whose parents were done to death and all their goods destroyed or carried away; the find- ing and caring for multitudes of destitute, crazed, wounded, and maimed; besides the similar and even greater work of the same kind in non-Christian lands where the curse of sin has been doing the same work throughout the centuries. Now (1918) for four or five years in Britain and Canada and in other of the Allied countries, and for two years in the United States, men and women have been putting their whole heart and soul into work for others — in the ranks, through the Red Cross, and many other forms of service. During the War the old, narrow self-centered life and outlook have given place to a forgetfulness of self and a giving of resources, FUNCTION OF THE LOCAL CHURCH 79 energy, time, and self for others. It was all focused and unified by a great patriotic fervor. It would be nothing less than a calamity to civiUzation if these people who have caught a ghmpse and enjoyed a taste of unselfish living should slump back into the old narrow, selfish grooves again. It must be the endeavor of everyone who has ideals of race development and better conditions in the world to strive with might and main to conserve all this mighty torrential force of altruism, to direct it into adequate channels, and to maintain all its momentum by presenting moral equivalents of war and of the fusing power of patriotism. If this can be done the brother- hood of nations and good will to men will be assured. Here is a worth-while task for idealistic young men and women! Is there any appeal with an adequate motive or program to unite all right-thinking people except that of the Christian religion? What motive can compare with that set forth in the Sermon — or rather the Teaching — on the Mount, and what program with that which Christ gave to His disciples? Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice Work 1. Read Matt. 5:1-7: 29; 28 : 16-20. Ponder these words in the light of the present world situation and its real, permanent betterment. 2. Students who are specially interested in the inner nature of the Church are referred to J. H. Oldham^s ^'The World and the Gosper^; and all are advised to secure for themselves and to study Fosdick's "The Meaning of Prayer." 3. Is it possible for anyone to five his best life without fel- lowship with God? 4. What is the value of worship to one who is busy every minute of the day trying to promote social improvements and to do worth while work? 5. Discuss the upbuilding value of the local church through worship, instruction, and training in any district you know 80 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY well. What is the value to a college man or woman of the quiet worship and fellowship in worship of the regular church service? 6. Take any community and by actual investigation find out accurately how many have t^ken up any definite work for others at home or abroad and estimate what influence the church — religion — had in each case. 7. If Howard Walter's little poem expresses the desire of young men and women, is not rehgion necessary to the fulfilment of this ambition? 8. If one really visualizes the mighty needs of the world to- day and his own limitations, must he not first take refuge in Dod and then dedicate himself to the service of others? CHAPTER VII OPPORTUNITIES FOR SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH This course assumes that every wholesome young man and young woman wants to make the best investment of his or her life. It set forth the thesis that the only investment that is worth while is by living a clean, strong life through companion- ship with God, to help others and to make conditions of life better. An attempt was then made to sketch briefly the actual situation today. This in itself brings an imperative challenge to serve. But it was pointed out that in this undertaking one does not stand alone, that there are great forces everywhere with which one may ally himself and through which he may work. One of these, the greatest, is religion. The place and function of religion were next con- sidered. The present chapter seeks to discuss the question whether the best opportunity for service and cooperation with other forces is not through the local church. Organized religion is the most universal and important of all the upbuilding forces. It is found in every comer of the land. Its organization is adaptable to all conditions. It always has the allegiance of high-souled, devoted men and women, boys and girls, who are anxious to serve without any selfish end in view. But one may say, "What I want to do is social work, help people directly and many churches have nothing to do with social conditions. They claim that their work is to 'preach the Gospel.' '^ Such an attitude on the part of any church is largely due to the following causes: 1. An outgrown conception that the Church deals with 81 82 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY only one narrow phase of life. Religion ministers to the whole of life. As Watson says in "Social Problems and the Churches Duty ^': "The Church stands and must ever stand for the reahty and permanence of spiritual needs. Man is essentially a spiritual being and cannot live by bread alone. He can never outgrow his need of a church, his need of worship and prayer and spiritual aspiration. If he did so he would cease to be a man and reel back into the beast. And yet it is not the spiritual needs of the people that first impress one who moves about among them. It is their material needs, their insecure hold on the very necessaries of life. And it is material needs they are most conscious of." The Church now recognizes that everything that touches the material, mental, social, and religious interests of people is its special concern. 2. Failure to grasp the fact that the individual has no existence apart from the social organism. Life is bound up indissolubly with others and with material and social condi- tions. It is not Christian and not wise merely to preach to starving people. A saloon can undo the effect of many sermons. 3. Ignorance of actual conditions. When men and women of spiritual vision are brought into direct contact with those who are in misery, poverty, or pain, or are unjustly treated, there is no question as to what the attitude of the Church should be. But many good people — and especially those who oppose a social gospel — are ignorant of conditions. In the first tremendous dislocation of business caused by the Great War a group of Christian people in Edmonton, Alberta, asserted indignantly that there were no unemployed in the city. At that moment there were 1,000 men out of work. A few photographs of bad housing conditions were shown in Charlottetown, P. E. Island. Most people thought they were from New York or London or some other metropolis and SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 83 could not believe there were such places in their own beautiful city. The same reaction will be secured in almost every town or small city where a survey is made for the first time. Naturally, citizens who do not know conditions see no need of a social gospel and can have little or no enthusiasm for any improvement campaign. Every student should ask himself whether he knows conditions in his own home community and also his college town. Arrangements should be made to accompany some social worker who knows the conditions. 4. A mistaken view of "the Gospel/' identifying it with a certain type of preaching and with keeping the institution running. But this is not nor has it ever been the conception the Church had of its mission as the following considerations will suggest. a. It is not the view of the Old Testament. Prophets and teachers burst out in intense, burning messages about social injustice, the grinding down of the poor, oppression, low wages, cruelty, and extortion. Compare Isa. 1 : 12, 17; Amos 8 : 4-7; Mic. 6 : 11-13 and many other passages. There are all sorts of laws in the Old Testament relating to employers' liability, safety, sanitation, and quarantine, capital and labor, leisure, land-tenure, and kindred subjects. b. The life and teaching of Jesus are largely concerned with social conditions which He knew at first hand. Recall His never-to-be-forgotten teaching by burning word and more eloquent deed concerning the poor, the sick, the down- trodden, the outcast, the prodigal; and His intimate knowl- edge of farming, fishing, and taxes. Notice His terrible denunciation of evil (Matt. 23 : 25, 26) ; his driving out of the grafters (Mark 11 : 15-17); his Gospel for the twelve (Matt. 10 : 5 e^ seq) . He makes the final test of life how we invest our lives for others (Matt. 25 : 40, 45). c. The early Church concerned itself directly with social conditions. One of its first organizations had to do with social service (Acts 6 : 3-6). The Church Fathers give many examples of the same kind. Kingsley in "Hypatia'' lets in 84 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY an interesting side-light on the place community problems had in the church of the fifth century. Cyril of Alexandria, speaking of his engagements, says : "Now, then, let me see: five minutes for these Jews; then an hour to look over the hospital accounts; an hour for the schools; a half hour for the reserved cases of distress; another half hour for myself; and then di^dne service." d. It is well known that churches and monasteries of the Middle Ages were centers for rehef and rescue work, care of the sick, industry, justice, education, and art. e. The modem foreign mission movement, as well as that of the early years of the Christian era, believes that its minis- try is to every part of human life and social conditions. Among the missionaries sent out are not only preachers but doctors, nurses, school teachers, builders, farmers, engineers, and many other social and industrial workers. f. Today in the living churches there is no difference of opinion. The Church exists to serve the community and the world, to spend and be spent for others. The Salvation Army, the Y M C A, the Y W C A, and other similar organizations always made this their aim. The Federal Council of the Churches of Christ of America speaks in general for the great body of evangelical Christians in its "Social Ideals" adopted in 1916. According to these the churches stand for: 1. Equal rights and justice for all men in all stations of life. 2. Protection of the family by the single standard of purity, imiform divorce laws, proper regulation of marriage, proper housing. 3. The fullest possible development of every child, espe- cially by the provision of education and recreation. 4. Abolition of child labor. 5. Such regulations of the conditions of toil for women as shall safeguard the physical and moral health of the com- munity. 6. Abatement and prevention of poverty. SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 85 7. Protection of the individual and society from the social, economic, and moral waste of the liquor traffic. 8. Conservation of health. 9. Protection of the worker from dangerous machinery, occupational diseases, and mortality. 10. The right of all men to the opportunity for self- maintenance, for self-guarding this right against encroach- ments of every kind, for the protection of workers from the hardships of enforced unemployment. 11. Suitable provision for the old age of the workers, and for those incapacitated by injury. 12. The right of employes and employers alike to organize; and for adequate means of conciliation and arbitration in industrial disputes. 13. Release from employment one day in seven. 14. Gradual and reasonable reduction of hours of labor to the lowest practicable point, and for that degree of leisure for all which is a condition of the highest human life. 15. A Uving wage as a minimum in every industry, and the highest wage that each industry can afford. 16. A new emphasis upon the application of Christian principles to the acquisition and use of property, and for the most equitable division of the product of industry that can ultimately be devised. The most enthusiastic student or graduate will find this program is as broad and inclusive as anyone could demand. It strikingly resembles the historic program of the British Labour Party, couched, as it often is, in the words of the gospels. Let the student, of all persons, beware of the fallacy of judging the Church of today by the past, or by some isolated instance or on hearsay. The live churches of today are bring- ing dynamic and enthusiasm to every good cause. Numerous concrete examples will be given in this chapter. The student or graduate who professes to want to help others and who leaves the Church out of his reckoning is either insincere or ignorant of what the Church is. 86 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY The claim is not made that organized religion has always been the leader in every good cause or that it always recog- nized God in contemporaneous events. It always consisted of ordinary, frail human beings. Sometimes it has opposed good movements until they established themselves. On the other hand, it has almost invariably been true that good causes were championed by religious people who had been nurtured and quickened by the message of the Church. This, after all, is the way an organization progresses — through the pioneering of its own children — and is as true of education, law, medicine, and science, as of the Church. Again, it must not be forgotten that the Church has pro- moted multitudes of causes in an uphill battle for years before public opinion supported them. These three processes, then, are seen constantly at work : 1. The Church promotes causes far in advance of public opinion and when the case is won hands over the cause to some other organ of society. This happened in the case of education, prohibition, and charity. A few minutes might be spent in tracing the history and progress of these and other similar activities. 2. The Church as an organization opposes movements, ;Until their inherent value establishes them. Two notable examples are the Robert Raikes Sunday School and the Christian Endeavor Society. Both were at first opposed by the Church, though, of course, promoted by persons inspired by the Church's message. Now they form an integral part of church work. Other examples may be thought of as, for example, the labor movement. In almost every case these causes are promoted by persons who were inspired by religious influences. 3. The Church cooperates heartily with reform movements. This is particularly true in our own day. Each reader will take time to recall several examples from his own experience. The Church promotes and assists every good cause, directly or indirectly, in the following ways: SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 87 a. The Church seeks to bring each person into fellowship with God as Father and with men as brothers. This means high ideals of personal purity and social helpfulness. These principles cut the roots of all social injustice. People holding them simply cannot long endure to see their fellows wronged. The experience of Zaccheus with its many modem counter- parts; the changes that took place in a generation in the New Hebrides — from cannibalism to Christian citizenship; the history of slavery and of responsible government are examples of this fact. b. What the Church aims to do for individuals it aims to do for every agency that affects human life. Students should get a clear idea of such things. Religious influences have succeeded in changing: college life and sport, conditions on the railroad and in lumber and construction camps, life in the slums and in shops and factories, politics and the ad- ministration of justice; and have conducted the long, con- sistent, effective fight against the saloon and all sorts of vice. c. The inherent tendency of religion is to unite all forces in the spirit of service. Many churches have succeeded pretty well in doing this in their own sphere. But it is true that denominationalism has been in some cases a dividing force. At the present time, however, the spirit of unity is coming to its own in a broader appreciation of extra-church forces and of other denominations. Witness the close fellowship between the Salvation Army, the Young Men's Christian Association and the Young Women's Christian Association, the Protestant denominations, the Kiiights of Columbus, and Jewish societies; in the many unions of different con- gregations in the community; the larger movement for or- ganic union of denominations, especially in Canada; the absence of all denominational bitterness, as is evidenced in the Federal Coimcil of Churches, the Sunday School Council of Evangelical Denominations; and the close cooperation among evangelical churches. One case will illustrate the last point. In one district of northern Ontario, by close 88 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY cooperation between the Methodists and Presbyterians each has saved over forty ministers and over $25,000, while each ministers to fully one-third more people more effectively and missionary contributions have increased one hundred per cent. There is no overlapping and each congregation has its own definite territory and a worth-while piece of work to do. Such cooperation is in effect all the way from Ontario to the Pacific Coast. Similar attempts are being made in the United States. Suspicion and friction between denomina- tions are practically things of the past. d. The Church's chief contribution comes through inspir- ing leadership and creating public opinion. No improvement can be carried out until people are educated and a great mass of public opinion has been created and leadership inspired. The Church has succeeded in inspiring leadership. When tempted to think that the best social work is being done outside the Church it is well to ponder the significance of the following from Rev. D. Watson's "Social Problems and the Church's Duty": "There is scarcely a philanthropic agency which is not worked by church members. Take, for example, the excel- lent 'Handbook of Glasgow Charitable and Beneficent In- stitutions.' It contains accounts of 292 Societies, Institu- tions, or Charities representing ameliorative and benevolent efforts on behalf of inebriates, prisoners, fallen women, the aged, the bhnd, the deaf, the dumb, the incurable, orphans and widows, indigent soldiers and sailors, consumptives, epileptics and convalescents, the defective and feeble-minded, and every one of these agencies is carried on by members of the churches who, it may be presumed, have drawn their inspiration from the churches with which they are con- nected. It is the rarest thing to find anyone who is not a church member taking part in this unselfish work." ^ At first the above may astonish; but take any specific case, as for example. Red Cross work, or any great war drive 1 Pages 141, 142. SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 89 or other helpful undertaking. Where and by whom has most of it been done? Or, test it by the reverse. Do atheism, unbelief, materialism, impel to social service? Try to make a Ust of hospitals, orphanages, homes, and movements for social good so inspired and supported! One is suddenly faced with a great void. It helps us to appreciate — and we are likely to need the stimulus — what rehgion means to the world. From a great wealth of cases the few following are given to indicate what surprising results come from the investment of effort through the Church for the good of others. It is not possible to give a fraction of available examples taken from all ranks of life. In a middle-western city a labor federation was formed. The young minister became a member and joined in the deliberations. Because of his broad knowledge of conditions and his intelligent sympathy, he was made a member of the executive. No important step was taken without consulting him, no important delegation appointed on which he was not asked to serve. His influence was thus brought to bear on the heart and center of the movement. The whole labor influence was swung into closer sympathy with moral and religious forces, an acute situation was tempered, and a bitter strike averted. The minister and his people through their cooperation and fellowship served the community, built up the Kingdom, and, of course, strengthened themselves and their church. Just as an example of a great opportunity wasted, consider this : A minister continually grumbled to a visitor about the roads, the poor farming, and, in general, most of the prevailing conditions in his community, saying they might easily be improved. ^'Is there a farmers^ institute?" he was asked. ''Yes," he replied. "Are you a member?" "No, but I attended once or twice (slight pause). ... I gave them a paper on heredity! " He never gripped the situation nor his opportunity. He never got closer to them than an abstract 90 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY paper on heredity! He wonders his people are not progressing and that his church is not prospering. It is not hard to con- trast the influence of the one who identifies himself with a movement with that of one who patronizes or '' knocks." In a country community in the Maritime Provinces no organized effort had been made for commanity betterment. The young physician, working through the Church, aroused it to the call to leadership. Under its direct influence, by organization and inspiration, the following resulted within three years: Farmers' institute, women's institute, women's foreign missionary society, Christian Endeavor, tennis club, reading club, civilian rifle club, lecture course, anti-tubercu- losis campaign (resulting in swat-the-fly and anti-spitting campaigns, and the general use of window and door screens), a fine new church built, grounds improved, school building painted and decorated, and a strong committee formed of leaders in both political parties who pledged themselves to allow no bribery or liquor at the election and notified all can- didates to this effect, the result being the cleanest election in that district in a generation. In a city in the central states the churches were divided in the usual way. There was no close cooperation between them. A young lawyer with vision succeeded in organizing them into a federation for the study of local problems. This resulted in a social survey of the city under trained leadership. The following are some of the results: A number of Sunday schools were reorganized; several undesirable hotels, really saloons, were closed; a new public library with a children's department, then a rare adjunct, was opened; a city "clean- up" week was successfully carried out; household science and medical and dental inspection were introduced into the public schools; strong candidates were nominated and a majority elected to the city council, resulting in better government and law enforcements; and good bylaws were passed forbidding exposing of food to flies and dust and governing the handling of milk. Best of all, the public was educated and a strong SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 91 public opinion created which will increase and bear more fruit year after year. At a summer school in Auburn, New York, the following story was told: A young business man, a college graduate, came to a country village. There was little or no social life and people were not interested in local improvement. Get- ting in touch with a few of the people, he started a reading club. It grew in numbers and interest. Books accumulated. A ''Front Lawn" campaign started, leading to keen pride in beautiful home surroundings. A local option triumph put the hotel — a rum shop — out of business. The hotel was bought and made into a public library and community center. A few years later the denominations agreed to the building of one conmiunity church. Now there is a united commu- nity, progressive and intelligent, with well-kept homes, a delightful social life, and an intense pride in school and church. School teachers have done revolutionary work in hundreds of cases. But one or two examples must suffice. A new principal came to the consolidated school in a well-known center in Manitoba. Deeply interested in children and there- fore in Sunday school work, he was able to give just the added enthusiasm and strength that the progressive local workers needed. The Sunday school of his own church was organized. A Natural History Society developed into a Social Service League. The spirit of cooperation was so strong that the Presbyterian and Methodist Churches united and a consoli- dated Sunday school resulted, the pupils being brought several miles in vans, some pupils walking as much further to meet the vans. This resulted in better teachers, better grading and attendance, effective teacher training, and activities and service for the pupils. The community life has received a permanent uplift. It was a ''slip of a girl" who came to the school to teach. Scarcely anyone had ever gone from that school to college. Education was decidedly not popular and about the only interest shown in religion was that the minister was called in 92 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY at marriages and deaths. But with the new teacher school work lived! What fascinating mysteries she revealed in nature, what stories glowed in history, and what journeys were enjoyed in geography! Then they did actual sewing and cooking — boys and girls together — while the boys also made new bits of furniture for the school and fixed up the yard. Within a year the whole intellectual set and the attitude to education had changed. This could be seen shining in the faces of the children and in the fresh paint on the school. The same keen enthusiasm manifested itself in her Sunday school class and soon spread through the Sunday school. The new Graded Lessons made a great improve- ment and several classes, within two years, met regularly every week to work for others in need. The lives of at least forty children were changed and enriched, by that one normal graduate working through the Church and doing her own school work well. Many adults were also deeply influenced. That was a life worth while. As near as one can get the facts this is the result of a young college fellow's organizing a Sunday school class of eleven older boys. They were just at the age when some people fancy boys have no use for reUgion. He did not believe so and found, as everyone does who knows boys, that they were not interested in anything else quite as deeply as in religion, Of that class seven became ministers and missionaries, several of them being of exceptional ability and holding positions of great influence; two are leading men in the Y M C A; one is a lawyer, one of the most honored laymen in his church. Of the eleven only one made a failure of life. And perhaps that young leader often thought of his class as a mere side-line! Isn't it truer to say that this class was his real life-investment, and his occupation, like Carey's, but a means of paying ex- penses ? One often wonders if this is not true of most of us. The incidental kindness, thoughtfulness, sympathy, and help may be our real contribution, the remembered or "unre- membered acts of kindness and of love." SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 93 An undergraduate assisted at ^'The Other Fellows Boys* Club'^ in Halifax — an outgrowth of organized religion. One of the boys was noted for his troublesomeness. This student noticed the boy made his figures nicely. He praised him for it and made him feel he might be a bookkeeper and accountant. That was about as much of a vision to him as for most boys to dream of becoming Premier of Britain or President of the United States. But the seed rooted. No more trouble was experienced from ''the worst boy in the club.'' The boy was discovered to himself. It was the first glimpse he had ever been given of what he might become. He started on a new path and made the vision real. The agricultural representative has an extraordinary oppor- tunity for service. One was sent to a very backward com- munity in the eastern states. Everything was down at the heel — farming, school, church. People were suspicious of each other. Cooperation was never even dreamed of. By degrees, that seemed very slow to him, he gained the confi- dence of the people. By his own life and example he showed how religion touched every part of life. Under a revived Sunday school and church and better farming methods, courage revived and optimism drove out the depressing clouds. Cooperative buying and selling, community fairs, a good roads' association, a woman's institute, and similar activities changed the complexion of the life of the people. But the greatest gains made were in the deepened reUgious consciousness of the people, the revival of family reUgion, the consequent closing of the saloon, the development of the children in fellowship with God, and the voluntary dedication of every member of his Sunday school class to the service of their fellowmen in the spirit of Jesus Christ. President Butterfield of Massachusetts Agricultural Col- lege gives many examples of similar work done by the local church.^ Here is one: 1 "The Country Church and the Rural Problem," p. 143. 94 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY "This little parish, set high in the nigged Vosges, con- sisted of not over one hundred families. . . . The region had for centuries been the football of war, its fields had been harried, its manhood drained . . . The people were taxed far beyond their power to pay. Their poverty was beyond description. They were practically slaves. They had no schools and were ignorant to a degree. Physical misery and moral degradation were wedded. Note the picture of the same parish half a century later . . . The hills and valleys of the Bau-de-la-Roche had become fertile and fruit- ful. Everywhere there were evidences of a prosperous agri- culture. Every acre was well tilled. Each homestead had its orchards and flower gardens. Splendid mountain roads and substantial bridges gave access to the great world be- yond the hills. Schools flourished. ... A local improve- ment society concerned itself with developing the beauty about home and farmstead. An agricultural club flour- ished. A well-ordered system of irrigation had been in- stalled. Peace and plenty reigned supreme. Thrift marked the labors and savings, intelligence directed the industry of all. Simple but charming houses covered a beautiful family life. Religion served to bind men and women to their fellows and to their God." Volumes would not suffice to tell of the miracles wrought by visiting nurses, household science directors, pastors' assistants, Sunday school workers, social workers, and college men and women in every walk and occupation. Standing before the world welter as indicated in Chapter II one sometimes feels utterly helpless. But one must re- member how near many of the greatest forces are, in many cases, to the Christian ideal and also how one multiplies his influence through organization. This is how it is that a small number of trained soldiers have often overcome a big body of brave, well-armed, but undisciplined men; how a team, in- dividually inferior, "walks over" another untrained in team play; how many a good cause, approved by the unorganized majority, is defeated by a few "interested" parties. The value of organization is well displayed in the success of the SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 95 Y M C A, the Y W C A, and the Salvation Army. The student who shoulders his rifle and goes to war alone, who undertakes political reform without organization, who at- tempts to evangelize foreign lands unattached to any or- ganized body, unless all experience is misleading is destined to failure just as he would be if he attempted to make his own watch and clothing or to deliver his own letters and provide his own locomotion. It takes a long while to perfect an organization. Our mail system, law courts, institutions of free government, churches, are the result of the work of generations. Now let each student carefully list all the effective organizations in his own community or in the place where he expects to work. If he does this honestly the following conclusions seem in- evitable: 1. Religion is the only organized force that has as its sole object the highest good of every person and the improvement of every phase of the social order, 2., It alone holds supreme the love of the Father^ the br other- hood of man, the value of human life, and the dominance of the spiritual. And nothing else supplies adequate motive and dynamic to direct the voluntary wills of men. 3. Religion is the most universal of organized forces. No corner of the land is without some form of organized religious life. It is adaptable to every circumstance and form of help- ful activity. 4. It affords opportunity for the exercise of every talent. The highest quality of statesmanship is demanded of its leaders; the best business ability to handle the finances and organize the resources; the highest culture of mind and heart is not too good for its services. Workers of all kinds are eagerly wel- comed. Persons skilled in anything — athletics, teaching, organizing, crafts, music, art, nature, finance, entertaining, — find here scope and audience. It will prove interesting and enlightening to make a list of the openings in the Church such as the following: foreign missions (for preachers, teachers, 96 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY doctors, nurses, farmers, and builders); home missions; Y M C A and Y W C A; ladies' aid society; brotherhood; social service; big brother and big sister movements; Red Cross; teaching in Sunday school, night school, or foreigners; athletics; clubs and organized classes; pubhc health; lecture courses; entertainments; household science; nursing and first aid; singing; debating; art; and many others. Whether one's talent is great or small, here is an organiza- tion with the highest ideals that needs and uses everything one can invest. And of this we are sure, not one cent of our money or any of our effort goes to forward the selfish ends or interests of any official, but goes directly to enrich human hfe. So far we have only considered working through the Church. The question of joining the Church and of taking up religious work as one's vocation will be discussed in the last chapter. The more one thinks over life the more one is impressed with the fact that of all one's labor and striving the only real, permanent, satisfying results come from investing our lives for others; the obligation resting on college students is very great; the opportunities for service through the Church ar« unhmited. God is calling. We are free to decide as we will. Suggestions for Study, Investigation, and Practice 1. Read again the Bible references given on page 83, sec- tions, a, b, and c. 2. Discuss the social gospel of the prophets; of the early church; and of foreign missions. Read sections of Watson's '^ Social Problems and the Church's Duty." 3. Should one judge ''the Church" by one congregation or by the policy of the churches? Take the British Labour Party's social program as published in the Survey, Nov. 30, 1918, and many other places. It is regarded as the highest declaration of ideals yet promulgated. Compare it with the declaration of the churches on page 84. What forces are doing most fundamentally, to make this program an accom- plished fact? SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH 97 4. The criticism is often made that organized religion has opposed some good r^orms. Investigate any great up- building force, such as medical, legal, and educational so- cieties, and see if its record is different. For example, what was the early attitude of the medical societies to Harvey's theory of the circulation of the blood, or to osteopathy; of the legal societies to juvenile courts (read Judge Lindsey's fight for this reform) ; or the educators' early attitude to the kindergarten? How do you explain this? 5. Make a list of reforms the Church has championed and is now promoting. Different members of the class should interview leaders in different lines of work to get these facts. 6. Report on all the matters in which the various religious bodies are cooperating. Each student can study one phase, such as federations of churches ; the Sunday School Council of Evangelical Denominations; war work; home missions; for- eign missions; and others. 7. By actual first-hand investigation of all the philanthropic agencies in your community find out first how many were pro- moted and are maintained by non-church people and second, the proportion of workers and supporters who are church members. 8. Discuss the various examples given on pages 93-4 as to whether the college man and woman's association with the Church helped or hindered their work for others. Let each student gather other similar incidents from books or in- vestigation. 9. A non-church-going, reckless-hving dentist said to the writer, ^'I know this country could not last ten years without the Church." Consider the place religion has had in the country's past and its influence today and discuss his state- ment. 10. Is it necessary for one to work in an organized way if he is to make his biggest contribution? If so, is not the Church the most universal, available, and adaptable organ- ization, and one that embodies the highest ideals? CHAPTER VIII OPPORTUNITIES FOR SERVICE THROUGH THE CHURCH SCHOOL The only success that is success is so to Hve that other per- sons may be helped and conditions made better. Glance over Chapters I and II again. Take some community with a normally staple population and with it definitely in mind think out and write down prac- tical answers to the following questions: How can a community make sure that its citizens, in twenty years^ time, will have higher ideals of human life and social justice than obtain today? How can a congregation in such a center make sure that in twenty years ^ time it will have more skilled workers and be doing better work than today? How can parents make reasonably certain that their grown- up children will be men and women of good character and noble purpose? How can Christian people make surest provision for the spreading of the Kingdom in years to come? How can citizens make sure of the future of their country and of the "federation of the world''? Which is the more strategic, profitable, and permanent, to bring up children and young people in fellowship with God and in the service of others, or to seek to change them when of mature years? Granted that the only investment of one's life is so to live and work that the world is bettered, discuss this thesis: The investment of one's life in the lives of children brings quickest returns, brings largest returns, and is surest. These are the three tests of an investment. 98 THE CHURCH SCHOOL 99 Jesus taught that every child is born in the image of God; that to the child belongs the Kingdom; and to make His words unmistakable He took a child and set him in the midst and said that such was the greatest in the Kingdom. He taught that it is the Father's good pleasure to give them the Kingdom; He put His arms around the children, laid His hands on them, and blessed them. The Kingdom is the in- heritance by birth of every normal child, wherever born. Parents, teachers, and other adults are the trustees. None but the basest if left as trustee for a child — even if an entire stranger — would cheat him of one dollar. But how have even parents and the rest of us discharged our trusteeship in regard to the only inheritance that really matters? In the best family life the aim is to help each child develop day by day and hve his best life as a child — boy or girl — youth, and adult. No family wants any child to get into dis- grace for the joy of rescuing it again! The joy of parents is full when the child lives every day a clean, honorable life. The aim of the Church and nation is the same in this respect. The State spends millions to educate boys and girls so that they may be good citizens. The Church finds its greatest increase from work with the young. After careful investiga- tion it has been found that between seven and eight out of every ten who have decided for Christ did so under twenty years of age, and that only one out of every thousand made such decision after thirty years of age. These are startUng figures. Most of those who decided under twenty years of age developed, naturally, from early days, into conscious fellowship with God. It would be interesting to find out how many of the class had that same experience. On the other hand, a correspondingly large proportion of crime originates in these early years. Remember also that the general attitude to life and one's life-work is usually decided well within this period. For example, to mention only a few musicians and missionaries: Mozart had made a mark as a musician at four years of age, 100 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY Dussek and Kalkbreuner at five, Hummel and Chopin at nine, Beethoven at eleven; Duff received his impulse to missions at four, Fidelia Fiske, Eliza Agnew, Alexander Mackay in childhood, Livingstone at twelve. Chamberlain at fourteen, Chalmers at fifteen, while most who go to the foreign field are definitely committed and many sail under twenty or twenty-five years of age. These considerations, backed by innumerable other facts and by our own experience, are overwhelming evidence to the importance of the first few years of life in the development of character. Here the home stands absolutely supreme. One develops more in the first five years than in any other five years of life. One is astonished at the list of achievements in these years: for example, language, accent, habits, and the basis of future health and quality of mind. King George of Great Britain, whose splendid quaUties of mind and heart have en- deared him to milUons, said in an address recently, "The foundations of national glory are set in the homes of the people. They will only remain unshaken so long as the family life of our nation is sound, simple, and pure.'^ Any- thing one can do, therefore, to keep the home in its attitude to and work for the young is directly moulding the future and making an investment that will pay dividends forever. Are these some of the fundamental weaknesses of the home: lack of appreciation of the sacredness of parenthood, of the sacredness and possibilities of childhood, ignorance of how to care for children and how to train them, underestimation of the value of mental, moral, and spiritual development as compared to material gain ? Add to this list and discuss how one in any occupation may help remedy these defects. Four ways of helping, in addition to what has been sug- gested in preceding chapters, are within reach of everyone: First, by forming high ideals for one's own home and living up to these ideals when the home is established. No service is greater than this. Besides this should every young man and young woman seek definitely to fit and train himself for THE CHURCB SCHOOL 101 home making or does this/ ability, conje nati^rally;? What does the State or Church do^rlGfimtelyf to i^hi^'did?: .What are some of the things such training should include? Second, by cultivating a love for children and a personal interest in everything that concerns them. Recall how Jesus watched street children and took a personal interest in them. Third, by promoting everything that makes for the welfare of the child as suggested in Chapters II and IV. Fourth, by find- ing the fullest opportunity for direct help to persons of all ages through the church school, or Sunday school. Here the organization is complete and flexible, affording every facility for whatever service anyone can offer. Let us consider some of the openings in the church, or Sunday school. The Primary Department includes first, the Cradle or Font Roll. The aim is to enroll every child as soon after birth as possible and so teach that the child has a place in the Church and Kingdom. In this way many parents come to see the privilege that is theirs, of dedicating their little ones to God in baptism. A certificate of membership is given and the child is remembered on each birthday and on other occasions. Through visiting and remembering the babies on the Cradle or Font Roll is one of the most effective ways of strengthening the home. A young girl fresh from normal school heard the call for a Cradle Roll superintendent. She volunteered. There were only ten babies. The surprise many of the parents felt and the glow of pleasure and pride that the " teacher '' should remember their baby, was remarkable. Every birthday was an opportunity to visit and give some little gift — a picture or flower. When any were sick she could show how the Church loved the little ones. And when one died, through her simple ministry of kindness and love the parents both became new in Jesus Christ. Homes were brightened, a better attitude to life was developed, and the teacher was overwhelmed by the results of what seemed to her so small a service. The Primary Department also includes the beginners, ages 102 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY four and five, and the prinxarfe. ages six, seven, and eight. There h t^c? more f aj^cinatirig-. work than teaching a class of five 'or six of these children or of superintending a Depart- ment. The little children of our own and of all lands, in- cluding the non-Christian lands, love the Father with all the passion of their little hearts when He is presented to them as Jesus revealed Him. He is as real to them as their earthly parent. Coming in with a few early spring flowers from the lawn four-year-old Alice exclaimed: '^Look, Mamma — God^s presents to us." David, three years old, lay on his cot with his playthings. A heaty electric storm came on. Just after a frightful crash the solicitous mother peeped in. David lay with wide open eyes, his toys forgotten. " Mother," he asked, ''does God make the thunder?" She said, "Yes, darling." After a moment's thought he said, " I love God but I don't like the big noise He makes." Alexander Duff received his missionary impulse hearing stories in Sunday school about India and handling objects of heathen worship. Each stu- dent in the class can give instances of how real and how near God is to little ones. The need for trained workers with little children is great, both at home and in the foreign field. The opportunity, especially for college girls with their exceptional education and training, is unequalled. No more delightful or sacred privilege can be desired than that of leading a group of little children in worship. They should have their own room which should be made as attractive and home-like as only a woman can make it. It is delightful to guide them in sing- ing, and interpreting their own songs; in using beautiful verses of Scripture and hymns that they can understand; in expressing their own hearts to God in prayer and developing a natural, happy fellowship with God the Father; and to help them to be a blessing to others. All this the leaders can accomplish by their own wholesome, pure lives and helpful service in the sphere of a little child's life! Or what can be more attractive and important than to be THE CHURCH SCHOOL 103 the center of a class of about six eager, confiding, responsive children six to eight years of age? It is a delight to teach them the wonderful Bible and other stories selected for use in the graded courses; helping them cooperate with God in taking care of birds, animals, flowers; leading them to appre- ciate their homes, food, clothes, companions, and all God's good gifts; making Sunday school, and so rehgion, a real joy to them; cultivating their fellowship with God and making worship natural and helpful; directing them in doing such loving service as they can for others and which they are so eager to do; and helping each one in every way to achieve his own best and most beautiful life as a httle child — this is a work in which angels may well envy us. There are many things these children can do for others. Here are just a few suggestions: Make scrap books for children at home or in mission lands, string beads and colored pop- corn, make simple doll's clothes, give and repair toys. They can save money by denying themselves candy, etc., because of a higher motive. Children are capable of heights of service often undreamed of by grown-ups. They dehght in helping others and crave to be led and directed in service. The reward is the unselfish, whole-hearted love of httle children! Besides, there is the consciousness of sharing with Christ, work He loved to do; of seeing lives develop beautiful and strong without gross mistakes or hateful blemishes; and of making the greatest contribution to the strength, welfare, and happiness of the nation, the world, and the Kingdom. Every college student should look upon himself or herself as being called of God to see that the little children have the best possible. A busy New York specialist living in Bloom- field, New Jersey, who loves little children, was convinced that the Sunday school was not doing its best work. Through his efforts an expert worker was brought in. The whole work was transformed. Happy, eager children gathered, and dis- liked leaving school. His influence is bearing rich fruit in the lives of the httle ones in that place and will continue 104 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY through the years to come. A teacher, doctor, lawyer, farmer, or business man, by calUng attention to the needs and advocating improvements in the work with children, has great influence for good. It would be a fine exercise to describe minutely a primary room, session, and lesson period as each should be and to discuss the importance of the work with little children. When nine years of age pupils are promoted to the Junior Departmentj where they remain for three years. Here the children delight in action and in stories of heroes and great events. They are most loyal to anyone who is their friend. And they will gladly deny themselves to help others. What better investment could one make than to lead this depart- ment in its worship; or a group of about six such pupils in their delightful, frank, earnest study of lessons such as the graded lessons provide; and in their midweek activities? A leading lawyer in a western province who is prominent in all great social movements, is found every Sunday with his class of girls of eleven. It looks as if it were such' insignificant work. Hear what he says: ''I believe my best work in life is what I am doing in this class.'' Here is one of Canada's great hockey players known also in the United States for his whirlwind playing. Around him sit seven lads, open-eyed, open-mouthed, almost worshiping him as they study Bible heroes and as he leads them to live as manly boys in fellow- ship with the Man of Nazareth. It would change the atti- tude of many a thoughtless student to know the character and standing of many of the Sunday school teachers in our churches. And these children delight to work for others. A teacher took her class of boys to the home for incurable children. They were touched by the suffering and got to know some of the sick. They asked the matron what they could do to help. She mentioned a number of things, one being that the children liked honey on their "pieces" between meals. The boys went to the stores, invested the class-money in THE CHURCH SCHOOL 105 honey and sent it to the hospital. They then went to work, meeting every week, to make more money to help others. A class of girls was told that some Ruthenian children in Mani- toba would have no Christmas presents. ''Let us help," they said. Every week they met, gathered around a table, the president and officers conducting the meeting. Then they took up their work. Some made strings of popcorn; some scrap books; others sewing-bags. The teacher assisted each as required. Then she would read or tell a missionary story. No happier group could be found than these hard-working children, because it was a work of love. And the teacher wrote, "The beauty of it is, 'Missions' is now no abstract term to these children. They have a vital interest and love for others in need, which is the spirit of Jesus. Wherever these children go I feel they will be real missionaries." Every year since then the interest, gifts, and work of this class have multiplied manifold. The teacher's faith has been fulfilled. An accomplished young woman in Montreal had a class of boys. They visited some of the poorest tenements and worked hard to make presents and to earn money in order to buy others for the children of these poor people at Christmas time. Christmas Day they dehvered the parcels. There were so many that one of the boys took his new sleigh. They were a happy group as they went from door to door, made happy by the gladness of the poor children at sight of the presents. As they gave in the last parcel, a door below opened and a little ragged lad stood there. He had received nothing. The boys were stricken with sorrow. All at once the lad with the sleigh said, "My sleigh!" and quickly pulled it up and. gave this most cherished possession to meet another's need. It is an honor to have the privilege of being a friend and leader of generous-hearted, noble boys and girls who are so ready to be loyal, to love, and to serve. A returned missionary told of being able to see from a hill in Africa the smoke of a thousand villages in none of which was the name of Jesus known. In the audience was a boy of 106 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY about twelve. No one thought of him. Years later towards the close of a brilliant medical course friends said, ''You'll be the leading doctor in Scotland." But he said, ''No, the thousands of villages in Africa call! " And Livingstone found a continent. Did that missionary ever make a better invest- ment than when he influenced that junior boy? What is the comparison between making money and touching the life of a boy or girl? The years from twelve to twenty are fraught with great issues. Revolutionary physical development calls for a total readjustment. Old social relations do not hold. A new independence, without which there could be no progress, comes into being. Most important decisions are made: One's life work; the quality of one's work and one's attitude to life; one's attitude to Jesus. And yet just in these harvest years the number of girls and boys who have no definite religious education, and no wise guidance by some older sympathetic Christian, is appalling! Nearly half of these older boys and girls are not regularly in any Sunday school. This is largely because they are not understood and the Sunday schools are not built to meet their needs. Yet it is just in these years that idealism and heroism and eagerness to serve are at their highest, as witness the number who gave themselves willingly for their country in the War, even mis- representing their age to be allowed to go; the fact that almost all who take up church, social service, and mission work volunteer during these years; and that eight out of ten of all who joined the Church did so at this period of life. It is just in these harvest years that, too often, they are lost to the Church. But a great change is coming. Schools are being re-made. The need is for leadership. Thousands of the best who went to the front, will not return. The older boys must take their place. The older girls, too, are ready to serve in any capacity. They need leadership. A young man who understands boys, a young woman who understands girls, and who has education THE CHURCH SCHOOL 107 and training, must realize that he and she have been bom for such a time as this. All through the Church there is an awakening and in Canada all denominations have united in a program for boys and girls that has met a wonderful response. A class of older boys in Vancouver were the terror of the school. Teacher after teacher was driven out. A young man took them. He discarded the unsuited uniform lessons and they discussed together the great men and women of the Bible. The class organized itself and carried on its work. Mingling in sports with the teacher, the boys caught a new vision of the place of religion. Before the year was out they were earnest workers, the class had become the backbone of the school, and all but one were members of the church. A mixed class in a small Ontario town showed all the usual signs of sleepy indifference. A young woman became teacher. Through the week she met her girls for sport, sewing, and other interests, and a young man took the boys for their activities. The work these students have done for the community and for missions, and the change in their own character, are phenomenal. As one small indication of their new attitude to religion it may be noted that two years ago not one would lead the class in prayer while now there is not one unwilling to do so. Formerly it was difficult to know what to do at the mid- week meeting when such was held. Now there are fully wrought out programs for the boys and girls, of which perhaps the best is the Standard Efficiency Tests. In Canada this is known as the Canadian Standard Efficiency Tests, in the United States the American Standard Program for Boys. It incorporates the good points of the Scouts and other organiza- tions. But unlike these it is the program for the Sunday school class and not a separate organization. Parallel courses are prepared for girls. These programs aim to touch every phase of their lives and help them to see that religion inspires and ennobles everything in life. As a result of such 108 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY programs thousands of older boys and older girls are en- thusiastically studying the Bible in Sunday school and at weekday meetings and doing a wonderful amount of Christian work. Best of all they are getting the Christian view of life and putting the Christ motive into all they do. ^'The Jesus Way'' has become not only a watchword but a Hving reaUty to thousands. In this particular crisis in the country and in the work of the Kingdom, God expects every college man and woman to give support and leadership in this work. Take but two examples out of scores, equally good. In Vernon, British Columbia, older boys were not vitally interested in the church school. The Canadian Standard Efficiency Test was intro- duced. Every church had its class. Practically all the boys now are enthusiastic workers, ready to teach or work in any capacity. Boys from all denominations meet for discussion, sport, and other interests. A new community spirit has developed, and many older boys have new direction and pur- pose in life and are throwing their energy into the movements that build up. In a small town near Brandon, Manitoba, there was not an older girl in the place. They were all "young ladies." The chief characteristics were affectation, dressiness, and giddiness, and the chief aim in life to walk the streets with boys. A college graduate came to town and took an interest in them. Through work on Sunday and delightful purposeful work through the week, these girls found the richness of hfe. From being empty and frivolous they developed into the highest type of girlhood. In three years over seventy became active workers in every good cause and sixty of them had joined the various churches. But the church school ministers to more than children and older boys and girls. It serves young people, eighteen to twenty-four years of age, and adults as well, and it includes all in the community in its membership. But in the great majority of cases the young graduate should give his personal THE CHURCH SCHOOL 109 leadership to pupils under twenty. They can also direct and inspire leadership and better work for the older pupils. There are graded courses of study for young people who form the Young People^s Department of the school. This department, meeting through the week, does not only the regular work of a Yoimg People's Society, but also a great deal of work for the community and for missions. If one will recall what he himself owes to some little society at home one can estimate more accurately the value of this work for the young people of our country. Here are a few examples at random from hundreds that might be cited: An older business man, a college graduate, who taught the Bible class spoke with glowing pride: "Jim was indifferent to rehgion. We got him interested in the young men^s Bible class. He grew. Went west to farm. There was no church or school. He organized a school and because there was no one else became superintendent. Within three years the school became a congregation." "To think," he added, "that I, through Jim, am carrying on a school and whole congregation in the west!" In a small middle-western town the young women^s Bible class did the ordinary perfunctory work. A young public- school teacher took charge. They got permission to partition off a piece of the basement for their room. They took up the discussion of vital problems and became a normal class. In two years ten teachers graduated from it so that the school had not only enough teachers for itseK but was able to help other schools. That teacher has multiplied herself fifteen times in two years. Every school needs such a class. Here are some of the things young people have done: built an addition to the church for their own room; excavated and remodeled the basement; reseated the church; beautified grounds; cleaned up sports; supported poor families; edu- cated children in foreign lands; carried on propaganda such as temperance, anti-tuberculosis, "swat the fly," beautiful lawns and back yards. Best of all, by study and work done, 110 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY thousands have caught the spirit of Christianity and have acquired such training and skill that they ever afterwards were leaders wherever they went. The Adult Department includes first, the Bible class. This should be a school for discussion of the problems which bear heavily on everyone who takes his share of the world's work. The aim should be to bring insight, inspiration, and strength so that these problems may be interpreted in the spirit of Christ. What an opportunity for a college man or woman to get a Bible class on its feet! And in every community what need there is of the ministry of love and cheer and courage that a good Bible class can bring! It would be a splendid achieve- ment to get these influential groups of adults discussing, in the light of the Bible, such questions as the place and import- ance of education, health and housing, recreation and amuse- ment, libraries and reading rooms, a living wage, hours of labor, early closing, the sacredness of the ballot, the signifi- cance of the home, the importance of family reUgion, the place of missions in the world's history, Christianity com- pared with other religions, the contribution of the Church to the nation. The influence of adults bears directly on the conununity Hfe and one's own energy and strength and help would be multipUed as many times as there are persons in the school whom he could inspire with his own Vision. In every church there should be a course, for a few months at least, on some subject bearing on the rights of the child — health, play, education, and reUgion. Surely the Church should provide help for parents and those who will have homes of their own in the great work of nurturing and train- ing children. The college man or woman, knowing the need, can help mold the present and future homes of the nation. The Adult Department also includes the Home Depart- ment. Here should be enrolled every person who is not actually at school. The aim of the Home Department is to develop group or family religion. Thousands need the help THE CHURCH SCHOOL 111 it can bring. Hundreds have found new life through its ministry. It is not easy to overestimate the good that comes to a person or a family from reading a few verses of the Bible and lifting up the heart in prayer. The college student's in- fluence can count mightily in bringing this about. In addition there is need of help in the training of leaders. Every group of officers and teachers feels the need of stimulus and training. The new Teacher Training books are the best the schools have ever had. Many schools lack only a leader. If the college man and woman is anxious to serve, here is a natural opportunity. Many of the students of Agriculture, Household Science, and Teaching at MacDonald College, Ste Anne de Bellevue, Quebec, take special courses to fit themselves for this work that they may be of real service to the Sunday schools in their communities. Their work is bringing splendid results. Under the leadership of one or two persons of vision all the teachers and officers of a com- munity may be united in a community class or training school. Anything that helps those who have to do with rehgious edu- cation is a contribution to the welfare of all in the community and to many beyond. It will be seen that the church school requires no external organization, but only the class or department, organized and meeting on Sunday and once through the week. Also that its work is of the broadest character so that whatever talent one has he can find ample room for its exercise, and an efficient, flexible organization to make it effective. In every department of the Sunday school what oppor- tunities for the most effective missionary service! Every- one who gives zeal and training in that work makes a perma- nent contribution, for the influence goes on year after year in ever widening circles. The appeal of childhood and youth cannot find students unresponsive. It will be seen readily that the work outlined for the Sunday school is no longer restricted to the care of one shred or in- terest in life. It aims to develop each one to his highest and 112 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY best as the ideal is set for us in Christ. One cannot do this without seeking by all means in one's power to better all the conditions that make for health, for a developed and trained mind and body, for rich, wholesome social living, and for pure, strong moral character and spiritual life. That is, the one who gives himseK to the promotion of rehgious education necessarily promotes every cause and agency such as those suggested in Chapter III. Root one's interest in the Sunday school and every helpful agency has necessarily a new recruit. And now, as never before, communities are promoting the teaching of religion by Bible study in connection with the public schools, daily vacation Bible schools, community weekday religious schools, and training schools for leaders. It is one of the most significant movements of the time. The college student has a wonderful opportunity for leader- ship here. Some of the special reasons why the college man and col- lege woman should help in this work are the following: 1. The school is carried on by volunteer workers. They often feel they are alone. Usually they welcome a new worker with joy. A trained recruit is an inspiration to them. Does the student recognize how eagerly the ordinary church looks forward to the return of the student at vacation time or to the coming of the new teacher, doctor, agricultural repre- sentative? Do they recognize that the sinister and evil influences also look forward with equal eagerness? If stu- dents only realized this vividly, fewer would be on the wrong side or try to be neutral. In moral and religious influence there can he no neutrality. 2. The college man and woman have enjoyed privileges shared by few, conferred on them by the labors of others. The resulting moral obligation is self-evident. 3. Because of these privileges and the position held in the community they have an influence much greater than they ordinarily would have. Everyone will watch for their attitude to the Church. Without their knowing it the boys THE CHURCH SCHOOL 113 and girls are shaping their lives by their example. There is no neutral ground. However good or harmless one's inten- tions, his example is virulent if it weakens loyalty to what stands for the best. It will be, unfortunately, easy to give examples of the injury to a community caused by the in- difference or opposition to the Church on the part of the col- lege graduates, whether teacher, doctor, lawyer, agricultural representative or nurse. It is still easier and much more pleasant to share the blessing and strength that come from loyal enthusiastic, outspoken support and cooperation with the Church and other helpful agencies. The writer cannot forget the effect on himself of a professor of philosophy in a great university speaking out frankly in class, whenever the occasion arose, of the supremacy of spiritual things and the predominance of Jesus of Nazareth. What must be the effect on boys and girls and young people who have not very deep convictions of the words and example of their teachers and leaders — the people they look up to and honor! 4. The student and newcomer is free from any local jeal- ousies, has seen work in other places and is expected to make suggestions where perhaps young people in the community would be frowned down. 5. Students have had time to think out the issues of life, away from the world-welter and the struggle for bread. They have come to see that not what we get out of life but what we put into it, is what makes success. They recognize the truth of what Horace Greeley said when dying: ^^Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, riches take wings, those who cheer to- day will curse tomorrow, only one thing endures — Char- acter.'' In these reconstruction times every one feels that his best efforts are but tiny compared with the needs in his own and other countries. But the War has clearly shown that a country is not made safe or great by its citizens being trained in body and mind, or by the extent of its industry and trade. Germany has shown the futility of trust in these things. A country is great only if the character of its people 114 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY is noble and good. It is for this reason that reUgious educa- tion is essentially the fundamental work in reconstruction. It is perfectly clear that it alone will solve the difficulties of such countries as Russia and Turkey. No more sacred duty rests on Christian nations today than the development of Christ- Hke character in its own children and young people and in those of the mission lands throughout the world. This being so, where can one get such returns as from work with and for children and young people in the church school? Then the question comes, "Am I fitting myself during these college years to give leadership in this great and fundamental work?"^ Suggestions for Study, Investigation and Practice Work i 1. Read Matt. 18: 1-14; Mark. 10: 13-16. / 2. Discuss every question on page 98. Contrast Christ's words about children and our fidelity — my fidelity — as trustee. 3. What influence should the above and the facts re- corded on page 99 have on church work and my investment of life? 4. Discuss the importance of the home in character for- mation and how the college graduate could help the home. Come to definite decisions about questions under (1) page 112. 5. Plan to have each member of the class visit for several Sundays, the best departments and classes in which he is specially interested. For example, one will visit the best Beginners or Primary Department; another the Junior; others. Older Boys and Girls, Seniors, Young People, and Adults; and others will study vacation Bible schools and community weekday schools for religious education. 6. Each one should also visit the weekday sessions of the department, including those using the Standard ESiciency Tests, and of Camp Fire Girls, Girl Guides, and Scouts. THE CHURCH SCHOOL 116 7. Discuss thoroughly these visits in the class, making a point of reporting every exceptionally good example of wor- ship, study, service, or organization. Make notes of these for future use. 8. If one is anxious to help children achieve their highest and best — the aim of reUgious education — is it true that he must necessarily want to promote every helpful child welfare agency? (Page 110.) 9. Is it true that we cannot be neutral in our influence either for or against morals and religion? What bearing does this have on one's outward attitude to these things? 10. Discuss the statement ^^ Religious education is essen- tially the fundamental work in reconstruction," keeping in mind the future of our own and other lands. Then thought- fully read again the last sentence in the chapter. CHAPTER IX HOW TO TAKE HOLD Provided it is true, as we believe it is, that every wholesome student is eager to make the best investment of his life and to work through whatever agency will give the best results, and further that the student is convinced that the Church offers the best opportunity for service, the question arises, how can one actually take hold? In some places, it will be said, the church is progressive and one will be welcomed and set to work but in other places the church is narrow and dead, even the minister and the officials see no need of change, and all would oppose, or kill with in- difference, any attempt to move out into a larger service. Unfortunately the latter is sometimes true, but one fact is usually overlooked by those who make the statement, and that is, that in practically every church the real workers feel keenly the need of progress and will welcome with open arms the college man or woman who has the larger vision. If the church as a whole does not see its opportunity, what a chance for the man or woman fresh from college and rich in the ex- perience of what others are doing to lead it out! How much one multiplies himself who sets a whole organization at work with new motives and new enthusiasm! Such a result is far more fruitful than even highly successful individual effort. A very great deal depends on the attitude with which one ap- proaches the local church. Herein hes one of the greatest causes of success or failure. Human nature is so constituted that it is easy to place the blame on others for results due to our own shortcomings. A good deal of the reported lack of sympathy with new ideas — though not all of it by any 116 HOW TO TAKE HOLD 117 means — is due to the attitude and spirit of their advocates. We have all met some of these people — good folk with fine ideas but — well, just their attitude! Common sense tells us that we can do little upbuilding work with any group upon whom we look with a sense of ridicule, or patronizingly, or with a feeling of superiority. Nor can one hope to do anything purposeful or progressive with any body of people if he chiefly finds fault with what they are doing and is always indulging in negative, destructive criticism. The market is glutted with this kind of com- modity. The college student should be too wise to try to carry such goods. One word of hearty commendation and good will does more for the world than volumes of indis- criminate faultfinding. Neither can that person hope to succeed in any community who comes ostensibly conscious of his superior wisdom and his heaven-appointed mission to transform it, and who therefore assumes control and takes credit for all that is done. May heaven protect the church that is under the evangel of the college " highbrow." And no community sifts, weighs, and correctly estimates one more accurately than the country, though the city may reveal its mind more quickly. These statements are so self-evident that one would have to apologize for making them were it not that these same mistakes are being constantly made, even by well-intentioned people. Whether these mistakes "easily beset" the collegian let each answer for himseK. Now, on the other hand, the best people in every community honor one who is a true friend, who loves people, and who, with sympathy, modesty, ability, and helpful, constructive policy works with them. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the one who takes up his work in any community in this spirit will have the backing and support of the best people and great opportunity for leading out into new and richer fields of service. "Oh Lord, help me to love my people" was the constant prayer of a young minister about to be settled in his first charge. He felt that he could hope to do little other- 118 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY wise. This should be the prayer of everyone who seeks to serve. In seeking to take hold, then, the first step is to de- velop and cultivate within ourselves the right attitude to those with whom and through whom we work. The second point is, gain the confidence of the people. The college man or woman locating in a community should show at once his attitude to spiritual things. This will be judged pretty largely by his attitude to the Church. Even if one has been a bit lax in church attendance in college, it must not be forgotten that now he stands in a different relation to others. The eyes of many are upon him; the young people especially will be mightily influenced; the positive or the negative re- ligious forces will get new impulse from his action, especially from the first impressions. First impressions are difficult to change. Therefore let him run up his colors, nail them to the mast, the very first day! Nothing should on any con- sideration prevent his attending church from the first. Besides, it is the easiest way for any one who wants to live his best life. It is the best time to make a fresh start. And one inevitably attracts to himself the positive or negative forces as inevitably as does the magnetic yeedle attract or repel. It is written of Jesus that on His return to Capernaum ^*as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day'' (Luke 4: 16) and entered heartily into the worship and teaching. Identifying oneself in this manner with what the Church stands for naturally gains the confidence of the church workers, who gladly admit us into the family circle. And this is necessary, a fact overlooked by many harsh critics of the Church who wonder why the Church does not come to them, rank outsiders and critics as they are, and take their advice and leadership — an attitude no one would assume to a lodge, business concern, or any other organization. A practical difficulty arises where there are two or more competing churches in the one community. If the student attends one, does he not thereby alienate the other? A good deal of this talk originates with those who overestimate their HOW TO TAKE HOLD 119 own importance. No church is going to grow envious or rise en masse because a young teacher, doctor, or agricultural representative does not honor them with his presence! Turn the tables for a minute. Let the student ask himself, ''Would I turn against an engineer, dentist, or music teacher because he attended the other church?^' How absurd! There is another good reason for identifying oneself with one church at once. Difficulty is sure to arise if one hesitates, hovering between two or more. Each then expects, and has a right to expect, one's allegiance. Disappointed, a reaction is apt to set in. People feel they have not been treated quite fairly. It is always dangerous and decidedly wrong to play with the feelings or affections of others. This is a good thing for young people to remember in reference to personal friend- ships as well as to the Church and other relationships. One thing all decent people will be anxious about, not whether the newcomer is Jew or Gentile, Baptist, Methodist, or Presbyterian, but whether he is religious, whether he can always be counted on as a force for every righteous, humane course. And one guarantee to them will be his devoted alle- giance to his own church. Having the right attitude to others and identifying himself with the Church, in the great majority of cases he will receive many invitations to help. But whether so or not, the next step is to get into close touch with that group or section through and with which he feels he can do most, such as, for example, a department of the Sunday school, the missionary or social service committees of the young people. Now the open sesame is to know the work and so he able to make sugges- tions that will appeal to the group and open up new vistas. The ordinary church workers welcome new ideas and while some will not respond, will even oppose, the live workers will respond. It is to be borne in mind that conditions are not otherwise outside the Church. Ideals would work Uke a charm if it were not for folks! If one can present a big pro- gram that will swing all the church, that is a great achieve- 120 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY ment. But often the best work is done by permeating a small group and working out successfully progressive plans there. It will then very soon spread throughout the other organizations of the church and community. (Read again Chapters VII and VIII.) Two points need to be kept in mind. First, that to be most effective the student should know the present-day work of the best churches. So many students know only some old- fashioned church that belongs to twenty years ago, judges all church work by this — as is also often the case in speeches, articles, and books — and while in college never gets to know anything of the best practices of today. There is as much difference between the two types as there is between the hospitals, factories, schools, and other institutions of the former and the present day. One who does not know some- thing about, for example, the revolutionary Religious Educa- tion Movement and the consequent change in Sunday school work is not in a position to exert his best influence for better educational work in the Church. Too often the student knows no more about church work on leaving college than when he entered. Every student who wants to help promote the Kingdom of God should take particular pains to know at first hand everything he can about how the Church of today carries on its work. This can be done by working in a church, by visit- ing and observing others, and by study. Several courses on the modern Church are issued by various Sunday school publishing houses. The other point is this. In religious work it often happens that he leads most who least appears to lead. A weakness for being in the spotHght does not enhance one's effectiveness. The best leader is the one who develops others, so that they carry on the work whether he remains with them or not. The student should have this as his ideal. The best test of one's work is not what has been done but how many are quahfied and eager to continue the work and to push out in ever increasing endeavor. HOW TO TAKE HOLD 121 But one need not confine his energies to one group. Each has many interests and many contacts. While perhaps giving his chief strength to some one undertaking, he touches and inspires many others, setting groups to work in many directions. Take one case. The church was at a standstill. The progressive party was held up. A new business man was appointed on the building committee. He never made a speech in his life. But things began to move. Creaking wheels were oiled. The new church took form. The young people undertook big things. A large choir came into being. The manse was made quite fit to live in by the Ladies' Aid. A cooperative local company of farmers was organized to dig river mud — a great step towards better farming. The various public school houses in the district were scarcely recognizable in their new paint and equipment. All he did was to give the little touch here and there that was needed to smooth away difficulties, to swing opinion, to add his in- fluence to break the deadlock. Then, one thing succeeding, the idea spread. Nothing is more contagious than a good idea incarnated in life and expressed in successful action. In order to be as effective as possible the student or graduate should not only be identified with but should he a member of the local church. Some misguided folks tire us with their chatter about its being narrowing to join a church. Who is the better friend, one who is not loyal to his own family or one who is? Who is the better soldier, one who is not loyal to his own country or one who is? Whom do we prefer as a chum, one who sticks to his friends or one who is so broad he has none? Another excuse is that one can be just as good without joining a church. So, some argue, they can be just as good without keeping one special day in seven, or habitual times for prayer and Bible reading. Others argue that regular forms of marriage are unnecessary as is also constancy in love. For many years influential persons have argued that total abstinence limits personal freedom. It is safe to leave de- 122 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY cision to the honest thought of each student who knows what it is to try to Hve right, for such an one knows the value and absolute necessity, in the present stage of human develop- ment, of sanctions, standards, and the pledged ideal. Still another well-worn objection is that some members and office-holders are unworthy and that many outside the Church are much better than they. Also that the Church's gospel lags behind modern progress. For an answer let us turn to the Master Himself. In the first place Jesus joined the reform movement of John the Baptist. He did not by any means agree at all points with the stern prophet. John had only a partial revelation. His preaching was harsh, his doctrine narrow. Hear him cry, ''The axe is laid unto the roots of the trees; therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire." But of Jesus it was said, "The bruised reed will he not break." John's coarse clothing, austere manner, and desert life were the opposite of the ideals of Jesus. Jesus was much superior to John intellectually and in spiritual things. Yet he publicly united with John's mission because it represented a great moral and spiritual reform. Then, again, Judas was one of Jesus' personal band, an office-holder in fact. Jesus must have known something of his character. Yet he continued leader of the band and invited others to become members. Men like Peter, James, and John also remained in the company. Yet some pre- sumably intelligent people affect to be unable to join a church because, forsooth, there are imperfect people in it! These questions can be left to the modesty of each student. Then there is no getting away from the fact that we must work in an organized way to be effective. The history of the Church is a wonderful record of achievement. Its contribu- tion at the present time is essential to human welfare (Chap- ter VI). It is the only organization which is entirely devoted to the unselfish service of humanity in the broadest sense of the term. It is responsive to every cry of need, to every noble HOW TO TAKE HOLD 123 impulse. Led and inspired by Christians of vision, it becomes the mainspring of spiritual life. In many cases it is true it needs new blood, new impulse. Have our students and graduates anything to contribute? Here is their great opportunity. Besides, there is always the influence of our example on others. What would our country be like if our people gave up the Church? The thought staggers us. The best teach- ing is example. The old Eastern proverb is right, "What you are speaks so loud I cannot hear what you say.^^ For others, and particularly for boys and girls, the Church stands for God and service. They need to be committed now to some great Cause. On this depends very largely their moral and spiritual life and their stronghold in lifers tests. Your attitude and example may be the determining factor in their decision. Besides, everyone needs the stimulus of Christian fellow- ship and the strength that comes from being linked up with the best men and women not only of the present but of all time. If it is true that there are some unworthy people in the Church, it is also true it contains men and women of such nobility of soul that most of us are unworthy to imloose the latchet of their shoes. We, if we are trying to do anything worth while, need their fellowship and must consider it one of our greatest blessings to be allowed to be fellow-workers with them. No one can retain his enthusiasm for every good cause in the face of indifference, ignorance, opposition, defeat unless he is sustained and inspired by this fellowship, and faith in God through Jesus Christ, and commitment to a great cause. "A great task demands a great faith. To live a great life a man needs a great cause to which he can surrender, something divinely large and engrossing for which he can live and, if need be, die. A great rehgious faith will lift him out of his narrow grooves and make him the inspired in- strument of the universal will of God. It is the point at 124 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY which the mind of man coincides with the mind of the Eternal." ^ After all the reasons are sifted that good people give for not joining the Church, we now come upon the real foundation reason. Is it not the hesitation to throw oneself out of his narrow groove, to trust himself to a great cause, to commit himself publicly and irretrievably? Is the basal reason a bit of cowardice ? Of lack of faith ? Yet without that step there can be no complete harmony and focusing of all one's power. Commit oneself! How often since the War began has this truth, so long insisted on by the Church, been seen to be fundamental. Men and women, hotly patriotic, who just stop short of volunteering. How cheap words are! Actual commitment makes all the difference in the world. The United States was strongly pro-ally. But how it found its soul when it declared war! We all need definite, irrevocable commitment to have the new life. Lack of it makes many a good citizen weakly good. Just what actually committing oneseK is on the part of one who means well and resolves mightily is brought out with a novelist's ^ power in the story of a young student whose soul revolted against war. His friends went. His brother went. His closest friend was killed. Then his brother was killed. The night he got the wire from home of his brother's death he saw things differently. He decided to go, though he hated it as much as ever. Then his mother's letter came. "He answered this letter at once. He wrote: 'I couldn't bear it either, if I were not going out. But of course I'm going now.' As he signed himself, ^Your loving Michael' he thought: 'That settles it.' Yet if he had considered what he meant by settling it he would have told himself that he meant nothing; that last night had settled it; that his resolution had been absolutely self-determined and abso- lutely irrevocable then, and that his signature gave it no ^ Rauschenbusch, ''Christianizing the Social Order," p. 40. ^ May Sinclair. Italics mine. HOW TO TAKE HOLD 125 more sanctity or finality than it had already. If he was conscript he was conscript to his own will. He went out at once with this letter, though he knew that the post did not leave Renton for another five hours. It was the sliding of this light thing and the fall into the letter box that shook him into realization of what he had done and of what was before him. He knew now why he was in such a hurry to write that letter and to post it. By those two slight acts, not dread- ful nor difficult in themselves, he had put it out of his power to withdraw from the one supremely difficult and dreadful act. A second ago while the letter was still in his hands he could have backed out, because he had not given any pledge. Now he would have to go through with it. And he saw clearly for the first time what it was that he would have to go through.'^ ^ Definite, irrevocable commitment is necessary to make life strong. How much of the hesitation to join the Church is due to the fear of committing oneself ? Not a reason of which one can be overly proud! Every thoughtful person knows that we are face to face with grave problems at the present time. The world conflict has created a new world. No one can foretell what may happen any day. No patent remedy will suffice. It is a time for earnest prayer and reverent consecration. But suppose the gravest and most electric situations develop, seeming to threaten existing institutions, customs, and sanctions, whether to improve or destroy — what can be the greatest safeguard in any and every emergency? I wish every reader could be brought to real grips with this situation and be forced to think it out. It is clear at once that nothing remedial will do. No amount of better wages, housing, health, etc., etc., will touch the problem, though, as will be seen from former chapters, the author stresses the necessity for all such im- provements. The only effective safeguard in the handling of dangerous and momentous problems is the good character of the May Sinclair. Italics mine. 126 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY people concerned. The most trivial discussion is fraught with greater dangers among drunken outlaws than the most vital and stupendous question among cultured men and women. No one may be able to say what is the best solution of the thousand questions that must be solved in these days. But we need have no fear of calamity if our people are men and women who have achieved for themselves, in conscious fellow- ship with God, nobility of character expressed in love to God and their fellows. Whether the decisions arrived at are the wisest or not, the great things at stake will be safe. All of us want to do everything we can for our country and the world. We envy those who have been able to give themselves, body and sold, to winning the War. Two whole generations of college men in Great Britain and France, not to mention Belgium and other European countries, have been wiped out; the losses in Canada and the United States have been very heavy. By their lives and their deaths they call to us. We have heard the challenge. It sings to us in the unforgettable lines "In Flanders Fields.'' It comes particularly to the greatly blessed college students. Will we take up the torch? Will we live that men and women, boys and girls, may keep safe here the cause for which they died there ? Will we give ourselves, body and soul, to developing that character which alone can make the torch burn steadily and not go out? This is the real test to which each student is being subjected. God Himself knows how eager each one is to measure up to every test for his country and for his Master. So today let each one dedicate himself anew — to his country, to his f ellowmen, to God — dedicate himself and re- solve to put all his energy in whatever line of work he may be engaged in, to use every endeavor to promote the develop- ment of the highest character among all people everywhere, and especially to promote in every way the best religious education of all children and young people and to seek the voluntary commitment of each one to a great and noble cause. This is the most effective and far-reaching of all work. HOW TO TAKE HOLD 127 It would be quite inexcusable to close this course without confronting the student with one further question. We all are agreed today as to the magnificent opportunities for carry- ing out our dedication and resolve in any occupation. Not a few are specifically "cut out" for definite lines of work. But most students have qualities that would bring success in any one of various fields. Just now when the need is so great, when churches and mission fields are so seriously undermanned, when material gain is so tempting in other fields, the student must frankly face the question, ''Should I not take up some form of religious work for my life work? '^ The churches and mission fields just now need hundreds. Rehgious education calls for an ever-increasing number as directors of religious education, secretaries, and pastors' assistants; social work and every other line of distinctively Christian activity calls for volunteers. No one wields a greater influence than a good minister, or than one who leads children and young people in religious things. Missionaries and social workers are great in service. Every religious leader today deals in big affairs and leads and handles people — the Idnd of work that is so inspiring to young people! It is a good plan to write down for our own private use reasons why we should and why we should not take up distinctively Christian work. To write down in black and white our reasons for and against any line of action is a great clarifier of our thinking. We have a share in the making of a civilization, in shaping the destiny of our nation and of the world. We are being tested by the mighty events about us. The Church must be roused to undertake big things. The people responded to every great appeal in the War. They will rise to heroic en- deavor if the world needs in religious education, social ser- vice, and missions are presented in a big way. God help us each one to do his part humbly and well, so that after all the travail of life he may be satisfied. The noble words of Josiah Royce the philosopher bring us a ringing closing message; 128 CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE COMMUNITY '^You, at this moment, have the honor to belong to a generation whose hps are touched with fire. . . . The hmnan race now passes through one of its great crises. New ideas, new issues — a new call for men to carry on the work of righteousness, of charity, of courage, of patience, and of loyalty — all these things have come and are daily coming to you. When you are old . . . however memory brings back this moment to your minds, let it be able to say to you: That was a great moment. It was the beginning of a new era. . . . This world in its crisis called for volunteers, for men of faith in life, of patience in service, of charity and of insight. I responded to the call however I could. I volun- teered to give myself to my Master — the cause of humane and brave living. I studied, I loved, I labored, unsparingly and hopefully, to be worthy of my generation/' Suggestions for Study, Investigation and Practice Work 1. Read Luke 4: 14-22. Should not every student follow the example of Jesus in this particular, and can he not in a real sense claim vs. 18-19 as his own? (All preaching of the Gospel is not by public speaking.) Why did Jesus seek a personal decision about Himself from His disciples? Matt. 16:13-16. Read Luke 6; 9:1-6 and 10:1-9. In what way can I have the fullest share in this service of humanity? On what condition can I pray the second sentence of Luke 10:2? 2. Discuss the two points stated on page 118 in relation to work in any organization, and how far we can go in taking Jesus as our example as suggested on page 118. 3. Are not the two points on page 120 true? See that everyone in the class studies some particular phase of church work as it is carried on today. The Sunday school waa studied in the last chapter. Now take up by groups such work as city missions; home missions; foreign missions; social HOW TO TAKE HOLD 129 service. Personally investigate as many of these activities as possible. Do not leave college without seeing the best examples of them and other church undertakings. Go to the head officials and get facts as to amount of money given, proportion of this that actually goes to the work, number of persons touched, and other items. Compare with other efforts in the same line carried on apart from the Church. 4. Do you believe in the contagion of a good idea incar- nated in life? What are you going to do in the local com- munity that will be "catching''? The Sunday school may be transformed or any number of other things done. 5. Discuss the value of committing oneself to a cause. What is the value of such decisions to boys and girls twelve to twenty years of age? 6. Facing the multitude of concrete problems before the nations today is "the only effective safeguard the good char- acter of the people concerned"? Take concrete cases such as a labor difficulty, a misunderstanding with someone, a national boundary dispute. 7. The class should get from the Young Men's Christian Association, Young Women's Christian Association, and the various mission and social service boards the list of oppor- tunities in the home and foreign field. Then let each one write out the reasons why he should and should not — if there are any — give his life to this kind of work. 8. Read again "In Flanders Fields," page 32 and the^ closing quotation, page 128. 9. Try to sum up for yourself the opportunities that open up to you for the leadership of service through the Church. UNIVEESITY OF CALIFOENIA LIBEAEY, BEEKELEY THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW Books not returned on time are subject to a fine of 50c per volume after the third day overdue, increasing to $1.00 per volume after the sixth day. Books not in demand may be renewed if application is made before expiration of loan period. frdiMjuuu^ 280ec'49 :'AQB^ YA 03796 :487h3 8Vi /A3 UNIVERSITY OF CAUFOftNiA LlBftARY-