St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1879-01-17
PRAYING for the Press.

The list of topics for ''the week
prayer" which has just closed, included
one unusual feature. For the first tim
since this plan of opening the year will
a season of concerted prayer for specific
objects was begun, the committee hav
ing in charge the selection of subject
included ''the press" as one OF the OBJ
iects to be prayed for. On Friday thu
very large number of churches OF th'
evangelical denominations Throughout
the country, which observe this annua
custom, must have united in petitions
in behalf of the press, that its great in
fluence may be exerted in the right dl
rection and that those connected with Il
may have the Divine blessing upon thell
labOrs.
We cannot believe that those whose
vocation it chances to be to express
their own opinions and mould those oil
their readers through the agency of type
and paper, will be Indifferent to this
manifestation of interest and sympathy
on the part of the Christian community,
or will treat it with levity. Journalism
is a profession which has peculiar temp
tatiOns and peculiar responsibilities,
and there are few departments of labor
in which a broad and enlightened con-
science is more needed, or in which the
absence of conscience is more seriously
felt. Not only the secular press, but
journals and magazines of all classes,
and the wide range of books as well are
included in the scope of the petitions
which the churches have offered. The
printed page-be it of paper, magazine
or books the silent but almost omni-
present teacher of the mind and morals.
Its influence is as subtle as it is perva-
sive, and if it is eXerted i'll wrong di-
rection, its power to injure and debase
is almost incalculable.
The churches have taken of late quite
generally to discussing the scope and
power of the press, and the plans which
suggest themselves for Outstanding
and elevating it. A good many ideas
which have been developed in this con-
nection are crude and impracticable
enough, and spring from an entire mis-
apprehension of the conditions of the
problem. The secular press is not to he
transformed by a sudden wrench into
religious press. The work of the daily
newspaper is not in the field of theology
or ethics, but among current news and
opinion. The experiment of running ii
daily newspaper on distinctly religious
or sectarian basis was never yet Il sue
cess, and some papers, started with that
intent, have not survived their first
issue. No daily paper can live in which
the reader can detect some ism or dOXy
between the lines. But what the Chris
tian community may we'll pray for, and
what, if it chooses, it has right to de-
mand and chance TO secure, is that the
secular press shall put itself on the side
of good morals and right living, and
that it shall not cater to low and de-
PRAYED tastes. And after the Christian
community has prayed for this object, it
can go to work to answer its own prayers
by misunderstanding and strnuOusly OPP
posing the circulation of journals whose
tendency is obviously in the wrong di-
rectiOn. The papers which feast on
crime and horrors, which serve up do
nestle scandals with every sensational
accompaniment of detail and headline.
and which delight in anonymous Slau-
derS and inundOeS and assaults on char
acter-theSe papers are pretty clearly
known, and their character is under
stood. The good Christian people who
were praying for the press on Friday,
are there any of them who are i'll the |
habit, in quiet way, of buying and
reading these very papers Then there |
are the ttashy illustrated papers tor the |
youth, the villainouS sheets which tread |
closely on the obscene, and the novels |
of love and intrigue which are multi |
piled by the ten thOusand-arc the |
churches awake to the work they have |
to do i'll cOunteracting or SupDreSSinr /
them 1t is good thing that the |
churches have begun to discuss these
matters; it is better thing that they
have taken to praying over them; it will |
be best of all when they follow up their
prayers with well directed work .-BOS- |
ton Journal. 1871.