By establishing special redemptive and social missions on the crowded thoroughfares. The first of these was Evangel Hall, Toronto, in which evangelistic work, as well as various sorts of social work, is carried on.
The department has taken up in a large way redemptive and preventive work in the interest of girls, and associated with that educational work along the line of sex teaching among boys and men. There are five homes which are called social service houses, in which girls and women requiring special help are taken care of. Fifteen trained Christian women give their time to this phase of the department’s endeavor, and there is also a large army of volunteer helpers. In connection with this work an educational campaign through pulpit and platform and the distribution of literature throughout the Dominion is carried on. From time to time legislation, federal or provincial, for the more adequate protection of girls and women is sought.
In co-operation with other interested bodies the department keeps up a steady campaign for the suppression of gambling, intemperance, sale of immoral literature, unclean theatricals, the social vice, and the promotion of the positive virtues, the opposite of these.
Special attention is being directed to positive effort and constructive work along all lines aiming at social uplift, and a good deal of legislation toward this end has been successfully put through.
The department has established a lantern slide and film service, and is endeavoring to supply through illustrated means elevating entertainment as well as information and inspiration.
All the evangelistic work of the Presbyterian church is done through this department, so that evangelism and social service are kept in close association in all effort undertaken.
SYNAGOGUE AND COMMUNITY
RABBI HORACE J. WOLF
Temple ‘Berith Kodesh’, Rochester, N. Y.
The changing relation of the synagogue and the community is proving the truth of the hoary platitude that history repeats itself. During the Middle Ages the synagogue was the heart of the secular as well as of the religious life of the community; it was a social center as well as a house of prayer. There the poor man found succor, the stranger acquaintances, the children their teachers, and the young people “their fates.” It would be almost impossible to list all the private and public interests which, clustering about the synagogue, bore witness to the vital part this institution played in medieval Jewish life.