The provincial American and other papers

by Meredith Nicholson

VI

In the end, unity, if it ever take practical form, must become a local question. This is certainly true in so far as the urban field is concerned, and I may say in parenthesis that, in my own state, the country churches are already practicing a kind of unification, in regions where the automobile and the interurban railway make it possible for farm and village folk to run into town to church. Many rural churches have been abandoned and boarded up, their congregations in this way forming new religious and social units. I suggest that in towns and cities where the weaknesses resulting from denominational rivalry are most apparent, the problems of unification be taken up in a purely local way. I propose the appointment of local commissions, representative of all Protestant bodies, to study the question and devise plans for increasing the efficiency of existing churches, and to consider ways and means of bringing the church into vital touch with the particular community under scrutiny. This should be done in a spirit of absolute honesty, without envy, hatred, or malice. The test of service should be applied relentlessly, and every religious society should make an honest showing of its conditions and needs.

Upon the trial-balance thus struck there should be, wherever needed, an entirely new redistribution of church property, based wholly upon local and neighborhood needs. For example, the familiar, badly housed, struggling mission in an industrial centre would be able at once to anticipate the fruits of years of labor, through the elimination of unnecessary churches in quarters already over-supplied. Not only should body and soul be cared for in the vigorous institutional church, the church of the future, but there is no reason why the programme should not include theatrical entertainments, concerts, and dances. Many signs encourage the belief that the drama has a great future in America, and the reorganized, redistributed churches might well seize upon it as a powerful auxiliary and ally. Scores of motion-picture shows in every city testify to the growing demand for amusement, and they conceal much mischief; and the public dance-house is a notorious breeder of vice.

Let us consider that millions of dollars are invested in American churches, which are, in the main, open only once or twice a week, and that fear of defiling the temple is hardly justification for the small amount of actual service performed by the greater number of churches of the old type. By introducing amusements, the institutional church—the “department church,” if you like—would not only meet a need, but it would thus eliminate many elements of competition. The people living about a strong institutional church would find it, in a new sense, “a church home.” The doors should stand open seven days in the week to “all such as have erred and are deceived”; and men and women should be waiting at the portals “to comfort and help the weak-hearted; and to raise up those who fall.”

If in a dozen American cities having from fifty thousand to two or three hundred thousand inhabitants, this practical local approach toward union should be begun in the way indicated, the data adduced would at least be of importance to the convocations that must ultimately pass upon the question. Just such facts and figures as could be collected by local commissions would naturally be required, finally, in any event; and much time would be saved by anticipating the call for such reports.

I am familiar with the argument that many sorts of social service are better performed by non-sectarian societies, and we have all witnessed the splendid increase of secular effort in lines feebly attacked and relinquished, as though with a grateful sigh, by the churches. When the Salvation Army’s trumpet and drum first sounded in the market-place, we were told that that valiant organization could do a work impossible for the churches; when the Settlement House began to appear in American cities, that, too, was undertaking something better left to the sociologist. Those prosperous organizations of Christian young men and women, whose investment in property in our American cities is now very great, are, also, we are assured, performing a service which the church could not properly have undertaken. Charity long ago moved out of the churches, and established headquarters in an office with typewriter and telephone.

If it is true that the service here indicated is better performed by secular organizations, why is it that the power of the church has steadily waned ever since these losses began? Certainly there is little in the present state of American Protestantism to afford comfort to those who believe that a one-day-a-week church, whose apparatus is limited to a pulpit in the auditorium, and a map of the Holy Land in the Sunday-school room, is presenting a veritable, living Christ to the hearts and imaginations of men.

And on the bright side of the picture it should be said that nothing in the whole field of Christian endeavor is more encouraging or inspiring than an examination of the immense social service performed under the auspices of various religious organizations in New York City. This has been particularly marked in the Episcopal Church. The late Bishop Potter, and his successor in the metropolitan diocese, early gave great impetus to social work, and those who contend that the church’s sole business is to preach the Word of God will find a new revelation of the significance of that Word by a study of the labors of half a dozen parishes that exemplify every hour of every day the possibilities of efficient Christian democracy.

The church has lost ground that perhaps never can be recovered. Those who have established secular settlements for the poor, or those who have created homes for homeless young men and women, can hardly be asked to “pool” and divide their property with the churches. But, verily, even with all the many agencies now at work to ameliorate distress and uplift the fallen, the fields continue white already to the harvest, and the laborers are few. With the church revitalized, and imbued with the spirit of utility and efficiency so potent in our time, it may plant its wavering banner securely on new heights. It may show that all these organizations that have sapped its strength, and diminished the force of its testimony before men, have derived their inspiration from Him who came out of Nazareth to lighten all the world.