“This is not mere speculation, Monsignor,” put in Father Waite. “The beliefs of the human mind are its fetish. Such beliefs become in time national customs, and men defend them with frenzy, utterly wrong and undemonstrable though they be. Then they remain as the incubus of true progress. By them understanding becomes degraded, and the human mind narrows and shrinks. And the mind that clings to them will then mercilessly hunt out the dissenting minds of its heretical neighbors and stone them to death for disagreeing. So now, you would stone me for obeying Christ’s command to take up my bed on the Sabbath day.”
Lafelle heaved a great sigh. “Still you blazon my faults,” he said in a tone of mock sadness, and addressing Carmen. “But, like the Church which you persecute, I shall endure. We have been martyred throughout the ages. And we are very patient. Our wayward children forsake us,” nodding toward Father Waite, “and yet we welcome their return when they have tired of the husks. The press teems with slander against us; we are reviled from east to west. But our reply is that such slander and untruth can best be met by our leading individual lives of such an exemplary nature as to cause all men to be attracted by our holy light.”
“I agree with you, Monsignor,” quickly replied Carmen. “Scurrilous attacks upon the Church but make it a martyr. Vilification returns upon the one who hurls the abuse. One can not fling mud without soiling one’s hands. I oppose not men, but human systems of thought. Whatever is good will stand, and needs no defense. Whatever is erroneous must go. And there is no excuse, for salvation is at hand.”
“Salvation? And your thought regarding that?” he said in a skirmishing tone.
“Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts,” she replied earnestly. “To him that soweth righteousness––right thinking––shall be a sure reward. Ah, Monsignor, do you at heart believe that the religion of the Christ depends upon doctrines, signs, dogmas? No, it does not. But signs and proofs naturally and inevitably follow the right understanding of Jesus’ teachings, even according to these words: These signs shall follow them that believe. Paul gave the formula for salvation, when he said: But we all with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed 176 into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. Can you understand that? Can you see that, taking Jesus as our model and following his every command––seeing Him only, the Christ-principle, which is God, good, without any admixture of evil––we change, even though slowly, from glory to glory, step by step, until we rise out of all sense of evil and death? And this is done by the Spirit which is God.”
“Yes,” said Father Waite, taking up the conversation when she paused. “Even the poorest human being can understand that. Why, then, the fungus growth of traditions, ceremonies, rites and forms which have sprung up about the Master’s simple words? Why the wretched formalistic worship throughout the world? Why the Church’s frigid, lifeless traditions, so inconsistent with the enlarging sense of God which marks this latest century? The Church has yet to prove its utility, its right to exist and to pose as the religious teacher of mankind. Else must it fall beneath the axe which is even now at the root of the barren tree of theology. Her theology, like the Judaism of the Master’s day, has no prophets, no poets, no singers. And her priests, as in his time, have sunk into a fanatical observance of ritual and form.”
“And yet,” observed Carmen, “you still urge me to unite with it.”
Lafelle was growing weary. Moreover, it irked him sore to be made a target for the unassailable logic of the apostate Waite. Then, too, the appearance of the ex-priest there that afternoon in company with this girl who held such radical views regarding religious matters portended in his thought the possibility of a united assault upon the foundations of his cherished system. This girl was now a menace. She nettled and exasperated him. Yet, he could not let her alone. Did he have the power to silence her? He thought he had.
“Have you finished with me?” he asked, with a show of gaiety. “If so, I will depart.”
“Yes,” replied Carmen, “you may go now.”