There was a melancholy pause, then Father McClosky said with something of the expression of a dog that expects a beating,—
“I’ll speak next, and encourage ye. Phy is it, I don’t know, but there’s mighty few men that comes aither to mass or confession nowadays, though the women are pretty faithful, the Blessed Mother be praised.”
“It is true,” said the High-Churchman; “the proportion is very discouraging: I have about six times as many female penitents as male.”
Father McClosky looked very quizzical just at this point; but, catching a pleading glance from his host, he helped himself to a cup of coffee, and left the floor to the rector of St. Andrew’s.
“My church has been very full of late,” he said, “and the increase has been chiefly men; the growth would be still more marked, I dare say,” he added, smiling, “if the expression of our host’s peculiar views were not restrained—muzzled, so to speak—out of deference to my feelings.”
He exchanged a glance of affectionate confidence with Ernest Clare, then the latter turned to Pastor Schaefer.
“It rests with you now to speak, Herr Pastor,” he said, “though I believe I know what your reply will be.”
“My church is full every Sunday,” said the pastor proudly, “and the men outnumber the women two to one.”
“And, I believe, formerly the proportions were reversed,” said Mr. Clare. “Gentlemen, my own experience has been similar to that of the Herr Pastor. When I began my ministry, I preached to congregations of women. This did not impress me as at all in order; for the Revelation of God was a revelation to men; the Jewish Church was a church of men, the Bible was written for men, and Christianity was preached to men. Therefore, if it have now lost its hold upon them, it must be either that we men, as men, have undergone a radical change, or that the faith which once moved us is wrongly preached. Of course, an unbeliever would say that the world is outgrowing Christianity; but that women, as more conservative and less enlightened—as a class—than men, cling to it longest. But I am not addressing a party of unbelievers, but of Christians, therefore we may dismiss that explanation at once.”
“But even though a man may not have outgrown his coat, yet if it has been fastened up behind by two or three heretical pins, he may not be able to put it on,” said Father McClosky innocently.