St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1885-02-21
Heller Newton ON Resurrection
and Future Punishment.
Special Correspondence of the Picayune.
NEW YORK Feb. Q, 1885.

/
| last Sunday discourse, were as follows !:
Few questions have been more fre-
| Quently put to me than, How can you
believe in the resurrection OF the body =
| II the liberty which the catholic creeds
| leave under their simple statements Is
| to be tied up to any literal reading of
! their words, there is no wonder that the
| intelligence or honesty OF men is doubt
ed when they make the solemn declara-
! ton of their belief in actual physical
resurrection. But this has never been
| the Interpretation OF the most thought
! full men in the church. 1t is popular
notion, although plainly so lncOncelv-
able that the attempt to state 1t involves
utter incredibilities. No wonder that
such a notion furnishes q target for
/ irreverent wit. But at the core OF the
dogma is the doctrine of the wOrld-Old
faith in immortality harmOnizlng with
nature and the simple teaching OF the
scripture. Life always clothes itself IN
body and therefore beyond the grave
| is not purely spiritual. Ii personal
identity reaches into the life To come
| it follows of necessity that there must
be bodily existence however spiritual
lied. The teaching OF the New lesta-
ment is not rising again OF the old
body but the rising OF man into a
new body.
The doctrine which more than any
other has provoked attacks from the
critics of Christianity ls that OF future
punishment. The frighttul vision of
the orthodox hell is far mOle dogma
of conventional religion than doc
trine of the creed-a dreadful dream OF
the popular imagination rather than a
deliberate official pr0nOuDcelnent OF the
AZ kF4It
fessiOns of faith of the Reformation
era little is said ON this subject. The
Trinity-Nine articles express no opinion
on the nature or duration of future
punishment. lt is popular theology
that has fashioned the mOnstrOus dogma
which is branded upon mems memories.
To seriously believe such a dogma,
would bH to u sensitive soul mere mad
ness, and it is no wonder that outraged
humanity has turned upon it at last, or
that brilliant orators carry their au-
diences with them in their scathiDg ex-
posures OF the fOllies and atrocities of
such belief. In calmer moods, and
by nicer methods, men lnslde the chur-
cheS have also been making this same
indignant protest, and their opposition
has gathered such force and volume as
practically to have carried the day.
chiefly noticeable now as curiosity.
The core of the belief is the perception
that wrong works suffering, and laws
Ordain penalty, aud the conviction that
the same must hold good in the next
world. Instead of becoming obsolete,
this belief is only strengthened by
wider knowledge. The most impOs-
sibie belief is the one that, any law
can he violated with impunity. The
history of nations and individuals
proves the rule that at the head OF
all law stands moral law, sinsuring the
veal of him who obeys it and the
woe of him who disObeys it. Ii We
close the Bible and turn away from
the churches, it will still be impOs-
slble To escape the necessity of be-
iieving in the reality of retributiOn.
Nature and science teach this unmis-
takably. Only stern, avenging law
can hold society together. What will
the petty platltudes OF moral suasIOn
do with the dynamiters Science has
brought to light force Which can
be prepared 10y any man anu handled
by any woman, and civilization has
brought to light wretches who dare
use this force to blow up the most ven
cradle monuments of history aud hurl
To death human beings against whom
they can have no possible grudge I
Shall society prate now about the abOli-
TiOn of capital punishment, build COM
Portable refOrnaEOrles for these mon
sters, and set soft women who find
their spheres in carrying flowers to
murderers TO minister over them
Or shall it strike thea devils down in
righteous wrath as unit to live on
earth7 And then, shall these dyna-
miters walk straight into Paradise I
Will they not rather go to their "OWn
place" in the world to Gomez They
need very real hell, if only to save
them for future heaven. There is
dynamite in wrong deed and poison in
wrong thought. Sins that look pleas
ant now will take on other faces when
we try to escape from them only to find
them haunting as with shaming memo
ries. So even the darkest feature of
the traditional dogma of hell is not
without certain substance of truth"
For my next sermon, concluded our
"heretic.o / propose consideration
of The invulnerability of the funda-
mental faiths of religion under the at
tacks of modern unbelief. In the SER
mons already given have been need
lessly and cruelty misunderstood.
Neither in letter nor spirit have | at
tackled single article Of our creed or
any doctrine put forth by our church in
any of her fOrmnlaries. have spoken
in strong language of several of the
doctrines Of Christianity as they appear
in the popular theology and of the con-
fessions of faith of other churches, but
dlenunciatiOn has not formed the staple
of my discourse. My aim has not been
to prove these doctrines wrong, but
simply to show that, as shaped by the
Calvinistic confessions, and by the
.s.,,,1o~ 2baolnpu khay oiyn fnn nnunT