The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1886-11-19

young men nurtured by such a paren-
tage, instead of being attracted by the
sacrifices inseparable from true
priesthood in the church of God, are
like so many Demases, turned away
from it by the love of the present
world nor further than the command
ments of the law of righteousness are
forgotten, or that the Lords day is
profaned, or that intemperance and
RIGHTEOUSNESS reap their harvest of
death at the very heart of civiiza-
ton, so many of whose homes, whose
schools, whose riches and even so much
of whose poverty knows not God
THE FAMILY THE SOCIAL UNIT.
Verify there is a cry on the earth, in
the air, and from the heavens, to work
while it is called today, before the
night cometh wherein no man can
work. Fellow laborers with Christ, it
is well that we see clearly on what
lines we are to work in His name, and
how we are to WELD the power of
His truth and the grace Of His king
dom. Society at large, the state, the
church, are indeed to be the objects of
our solcitude. In and through the
church we are to leaven all life with
the incarnate word. But just now be-
cause of past neglect of its claims and
of its safeguards, as we'll as because
of its inmost hold upon all that lies
beyond it, whether society or the
church, our first and most urgent call
is to care for the family, and to build
i. up anew on the foundations origin
ally built of God and consecrated by
the Saviour of men. To this end these
are the things we are to do. In oppo-
sition to the false theories concerning
the relation of the sexes and the nature
of the marriage bond, the people of
God must be taught, as hey have not
been, that the family, not the indivi-
dual, IS the unit of society, and that
the family creates the state,rather than
the state the family. Without citizens
there can be no state, and without fam
| lily there can be no citizens. The law
of the household must determine, not
be determined by, legislation of the
state which affects the well-being of
the family. The essentials of domes-
tic life have been ordained and estab-
lished by the will of God, and underlie
the constitution of society. These it
is the function of civil government to
protect and regulate, but not to change.
CHRISTIAN EDUCATION.
Again, parents are responsible to
God first, and to the state afterward,
for their children There must be
authority in the household commensur-
ate with this responsibility, and neither
church nor state may rightly or safely
interfere with that authority or with
the responsibility bound up with it.
How far the state has done SO, and
with what results, it does not fall with
in our province to inquire. But of
the church's action iD this regard it is
our duty TO speak. 1t has been her
purpose in all the agencies she has
sanctioned for the religions training o!
her children to provide helps, not sub
stitutes, for fathers and mothers in
the foremost task which God has laid
upon them. That these helps have
ceased to be what they were intended
to be and have become something else
thereby devolving upon others outside
the home the work which God means
shall be done inside the home, very
largely explains the widespread decay
of domestic religion and morality now
so pregnant with disaster to the churcl
and to the nation. To stop this decay
to plant again in the old souls of hom,
the germs of healthier growth, to re
store the family to the divine orbit o
its power, to readjust on the old basi
its relations to the church and to tn
state, is by every consideration tn
most pressing problem of the day.
THE CHURCH AND TIE SCHOOLS.
As one way of dealing with thi
problem, the time has come when tn
church of God must change her a,ti
tude, must take higher, stronger, NOR
definite ground in regard to the educa
ton of the young life in the broade
sphere of the nation. She has mes
sage to deliver, duty to discharge i
this matter. Too long already hav
both been held in abeyance. At tn
close of this first century of her ow
and of the oountrys history, 80 full Q
solemn warnings, as wei, as of grea
achievements, let her voice 90 fortt
declaring that, ~hatever others ma
do, she cannot, without protest and rt
sistance, allow the salt of Christ's Goi
pei to be cast out, little by little, froI
4 the education of the children OF thi
a land; that she cannot without utter di
; loyalty to her divine commission a,
+ quiesce in what has grown to be I'll
r policy of the day on this subject, ,whicl
+ because of its inability to agree upo
!, the fundamentals of religion to |
taught in the public schools, has lapse
l, into the perils OF heresy of model
y secularism, that these schools can be
y do their proper work when giving i
religious teaching whatever. We =
r the friends os these schools, sustain,
r by such liberal expenditure; and b
~ cause we are so we desire all the mo
to see them placed on the only ba
which will be at once enduring a
benefcent. 1t is not to be denied tn
!. we are confronted with tendencies
+ the training of the children of t
or church and of the nation which in
ie =: cate changes in the feeling and opini
H y of this generation as dangerous as tn
70 are profound; changes which strike
p pie the church's hold upon the loyalty a
~ love of The children now being n
a. tured in her bosom, and threaten to
as as flict an incurable wound upon the mo
ee interests of the nation.
re DRIFTING INTO APosTAoY.
al We are drifting into an apost;
nd from the eternal law of righteousn,
an the supreme factor in the making
IN. public and private character, which
no end only in the eclipse of the mob
tn hopes and franchises of human
he redeemed by the precious blood of
10 Son of God,
to There are those who regard the p
oe, ent widening divorce between educat