Social And Religious
There is a beautiful sincerity, a certain heartiness about our Norse friendships and social relationships which I have not found elsewhere. Writers in recent years have been bemoaning "the lost kindness" of the world. Among our immigrant people, at least, you will find the lingering fragrance of this old time kindness which for many in this age of pretense and social sham relations has become only a sad, sweet memory of the long ago. I charge us all, as inheritors and trustees of this precious treasure—social sincerity and genuine kindness—let us cherish it, cultivate it and guard it as one of the very greatest valuables of life. For what is life without this, even with all the fine houses and lands, automobiles and aeroplanes? On the other hand, what is life with this genuine spirit of brotherliness in it? With this you can have the lights of Heaven and music of the spheres in a sod shanty. For where real good will is, Heaven is near. So let this beautiful sincerity, or heartiness, vitalize your handshake, flame in your look and thrill in your word of greeting to the fellow traveler over life's way.
If our Norse immigrant has a distinctive contribution to make to America, industrially, politically and socially, no less certainly has he an offering to make to the highest and most important department of life, that of religion. The Scandinavian is almost instinctively religious. You find among them comparatively few specimens of that sleek, beefy, selfcomplacent, godless animal-type, so frequently encountered today in other quarters. The immigrant had encountered too many of the realities of life; had been too often face to face with the ultimate facts of life and existence, to develop the shallow conceits of a mere beef animal whose main experience of life has been largely confined to a full stomach and the animal comforts. Not strange that this creature should speak great swelling words against the Church, the Christ and His followers, as well as against God Himself. The fool has always said in his heart (and with his stomach): "There is no God".
Because of this deep religious devotion characteristic of the Norse immigrant, and evolved amid the majestic mountains, the thundering rivers and water falls, as well as the loudly resounding sea of his birthplace, he built altars to God and established his worship almost as soon as his feet touched the new soil. Partly because of his religious sincerity the expression of his religious life has sometimes showed a certain narrowness of outlook and an intolerance of different religious forms which has not been to his credit. It is because of this latter trait that so many of the Norse immigrants and their descendants have been driven from the church of their fathers and are found in almost every religious sect in the country. We have heard "infant damnation" in its rankest form preached within the last year, and other doctrines as well, which are remnants of Mediaeval barbarism and which most Lutherans today would repudiate. Yet we believe the God of Jesus Christ is becoming more clearly seen, and that the wider horizons of truth are appearing. However, this is my plea: May we cherish the religious devotion, the real piety characteristic of our forebears. This is a contribution greatly needed in an age of religious indifference, if not open hostility. And keeping alive in us and inculcating in our children this religious devotion, may we never be numbered among that class who religiously are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, only fit to be spewed out of the mouth of God and man. Let us be a salt in the religious life of our country, for without genuine religion there can be no morality worth talking about among the mass of mankind; and without morality we can never succeed in developing, or even keeping from destruction, our experiment in democracy. So may we put this, too, our supreme gift, on the altar of our country.
Now we close our humble effort with a word of tribute to those brave, unselfish men and women who left home, friends and native land, that we, their children and descendants, may have a better chance at life and happiness. They have paid the price of those who have to take and to hold the front lines in the great struggle with untamed nature in a new, un-inhabited country. Many are the premature graves, the lonely heartaches and tragedies, most of which only God knows. They have laid the material foundations for us deep and strong. They have also left us an inheritance of ideals and characteristics to hand on to the coming generations. If "American" is a state of mind, a certain kind and quality of ideals and aspirations, rather than a matter of birthplace, then our immigrant fathers and mothers were often more American than the native born. However, in any case these characteristics and ideals above enumerated are the life of our nation and ours to keep alive. And in holding aloft as our slogans, these ideals of industry, thrift, sane conservatism, genuineness and religious devotion, we shall both build the noblest possible monument to the immigrant and also lay the sure foundations for the great future before us and our children.
To the few men and women who still remain of the first generation of immigrants, let us show our love and respect while they still linger with us, for it will not be long that we can have the opportunity. When some political demagog, under the thin guise of super-patriotism, would by legislation or social odium deprive them of the consolations of religion in the old tongue to which they are accustomed, and thus send them with sorrow if not bitterness to their graves, let us have the courage and the manhood to fight these contemptible grand-standers openly and to a finish. The language question will solve itself in a few years in any case and without this violence and insult to a few lingering men and women who have served this country so well and who are now asking only that they be allowed to pass undisturbed to their grave. There they will rest from their labors, but their works will follow after them.