The proper care of any article belonging to the Sacred Service is an expression of Spirituality because it recognizes the article as a medium of spirituality, something which should be reverenced.
The singing of religious songs in any but a spiritual frame of mind would be sacrilege just as the taking of the Lord's name in ordinary conversation or in exclamation is sacrilege.
The same religion or Spirituality which makes one shout, pray and sing should prompt a girl not to wear a pale pink or blue satin dress or other inappropriate fancy decollete dress to worship in God's House. She cannot worship God and mammon at the same time and she should not be the means of distracting anyone from spiritual thoughts through envy or disgust.
The Christ in a person will prevent her from speech and action which would hurt the chances or success of another person. God has warned us that the violation of this rule will surely return evil to the violator. His law has many references to this particular self punishment.
It can not be denied that Divinity has specially endowed the Negro spiritually, but he does not consistently express it in all the forms that he might express it, especially in the great Race cause. He is full of heart, and will give his money, his food, his life, for God—but he does not yet realize that the same love for God that he puts into his gifts should be expressed and applied in his daily walks in life as Christ has expressly commanded.
We are taught that there are four kinds of Emotional Expression: The Egotistic which is self and in the interest of self as in joy, rapture and grief; the Aesthetic which has its expression in Nature and Art; the Ethical which has its expression in the moral law; the Religious which expression is in the faith of the Supreme Being.
As yet the Negro has only fully expressed himself in but two: The Egotistic, or the self interest, and the Religious, or the faith in the Supreme Being.
The Negro undoubtedly brought about his own freedom through his own spirituality, and faith, and the concentrated, united thought of a whole people upon one subject—freedom. His remarkable progress since emancipation has been due to the same faith.
The Negro should be, and could easily be the spiritual teacher—or example—of the world. He must not only prove his spirituality but he must diffuse it, that others may realize its power even if they may not receive its benefit.
Christ, the Supreme Example of spirituality was quiet. Other races hold that ideal, of spirituality. When they see and hear a Negro shout, weep and pray and then find that same person uncouth and dirty, they cannot reconcile the two conditions, and so doubt the spiritual element which they call Emotionalism. (They do not remember that the Spirit may be strong and the flesh weak.)