Evening capital. (Annapolis, Md.) 1884-1910, 1889-03-16
Can Our Churches he Made more
Useful?

Can Our Churches be Made more
Useful?
Ia the March number OF thu
North American Review, three min
isters-Reys. Mlnot j. Savage, Ell
ward Everett Hale and Washington
Gladden-give their respective an
swers to this question. The firsi
two are Unitarians, the last is
Congregationalist.
All agree that the churches can
be made more useful. Rev. Mr.
Savage. Unitarian, takes the most
radical ground. In his judgment,
the object OF the church is not to
do humanitarian work, however
noble an auxiliary that may be, mol
the dispensing of charity, or even
the mere teaching of morality. All
these are incidental. lie is posi-
tive that mankind are surely drift
ing away from the churches. He
says:
Everybody knows that the churches
have no such hold on the faith. the rev
crence or the prac ical life Of the world
as they used TO have. Why'
His.answer Is:
Early Chrlstendom believed in the sup
posed historical fact of the fall Of man.
And all the orthodox churches of the last
500 years have existed for this one soc,
specific purposr-tbe salvation OF man
from the supposed effects Of the supposed
fall
Now he world no longer believes
in the fall of man. eve might as
we'll face the fact--the churches
might as we'll face it--that free
minded, we'll informed people no
longer believe in any fall of man.
Therefore, says Mr.. Savage. let
the church reconstruct its theology
according to the needs of the time,
and it will be more useful.
The churches should stand for the
great truth Of the divine In human life.
III they do that, all the rest will follow AS
naturally as life giving streams hJw
down into the valleys from the everlasting
hill The one thing, tatn. that they need
TO do ia this present .Dcture of affairs Is
to tearlessly face the morning.
Rev. Mr.. Hale, on the contrary,
advocates still more and more hu-
manitaran work to make the chur-
chcs more useful. Church build
ings should be free to the people to
enter for social ana educational
purposes. Men and women should
feel that they had a home and an
interest there all the time, not
merely for two hours on Sunday.
The church chapel of his pastorate
in Boston was once opened for two
winters to night drawing class.
From that class the evening high
school of Boston was born.
Mr.. Hale would further have the
church parlors open every evening
till midnight, so that strangers and
young men and women who had
nowhere to spend their evenings
might come there and feel at home.
True TO the Boston idea, Mr.. Hale
would have classes in botany, poll
teal economy. ETC., established, also
lectures. And for all the work be
outlines every church should have
ten, or twenty clergymen-
Rev. Washington GLADDEN., the
Congregationalist, takes also the
humanitarian view. lie declares
souarely that the church is to-day
more useful than it ever was before.
It Yields an increasing influence,
which will grow constantly as it
begins to see that
Christianity is not exclusively a scheme
far the transportation uf a purtlon of The
human race nway from this world to 3
mere cangesisl nome beyond the ski. 5,
but plan for tue reoTgaalz stion of life
upsn This Ian [; q pan that iDciudss
every dspaltmest Of human action.
on lne ., posislcs. society. ait. tdu alton,
nnusegnent---aslt the interests Il life.
AVOID APPEARANCES "A worthy
sent eman. haYlng az uuususlly red nose.