The Newtown bee. (Newtown, Conn.) 1877-current, 1891-07-03

when failure is discovered, it is recog-
nized to be failure of that service to the
misery of the world, which service is the
constant effort of the Church. 1t seems
to me to mark a great triumph for the
Cross of Christ, that those who rally
around it, and draw their inspiration from
it, are those to whom even the 10Th CEN
fury Sadducees look for the best life of
the world.
But there is a certain injustice in
this wholesale arraignment of the
Church of God for the unrelieved misery
of earth. Every now and then, a case of
suffering is accidentally discovered in the
top story of a tenement house; woman
is found starving in the heart of great
city, Or family of children is found
weeping over the dead body of forsaken
mother. Such cases are not infrequent,
nor is it an infrequent practice of facile
writers to exploit such as examples of
the -@neglect" of the Christian Church.
There are cutting comparisons made of
the luxury of the city church with the
bare floors of the tenement bedroom. The
number of starving children it would
feed. If a poor unfortunate crawls to the
door of Gods temple to die in her rags
and wretchedness, the incident is worth
many lines of rhetorical verbiage mark
ing the contrast between what Christ did
in His day for needy people, and what
His followers do to-day. A very clever
nd h wi Ia
these lines; one that will cause unthink-
ing Christian people to blush for their
profession, and furnish new jibes and
jeers for irreligious people against the
; Church of God. But what is such an ac-
cusation worth? Let US take the critic on
his own ground. Granted that there is a
great deal of unrelieved misery in the me-
tropolis, or in any busy center of Church
life and work. Is that an honest or logic
al ground for an arraignment of Christi
anity, or the practical methods of Christ
ian benevolence? How was it in the cit
les and towns of Palestine, in
"Those holy fields
over whose acres walked those blessed feet
Which, nineteen hundred years ago, were
nailed
For our redemption, on the bitter cross"
There must have been woeful amount
t of unrelieved misery in Judea, in the days
= of that One who came to give life and to
2 give it more abundantly. Jesus could not
have touched every leper, nor laid His
/ hand upon every aching forehead, or put
food into every hungry mouth, or COM
= forted the agony of every breaking heart.
1 While He was breaking the bread to those
g 5000 men in the wilderness, there might
| have been starving woman and a Sob
! bling child within the shadow of the tenn
: pie at Jerusalem. All men and women
| in need did not make their wants known
I unto Him. But that is not to be laid at
! His door as fault. Why should the
e criminal extravaganza, or waste in heI
e channels of distribution, because there
n are some needs of which she has nc
9 knowledge. For this is the real grava.
e men Of this oft repeated charge. 1t is
:. implied that Christian people care more
q for quartet choirs, and luxurious pews,
= and handsome ornaments in the house of
God, than to minister to Gods needy peo-
pie. 1t is limited that, on the whole, the
: church plays the part of hard Dives
: going to the banquet, deaf to Lazarus
/ lifting his cry at the gate. 1t is grave
y and serious charge.
t But, before God, it is not true. The
= Church is limited, sometimes and
} in some places, in two ways,
2 in the carrying on of her splendid
= work of charity: The lack of means, and
5 ignorance where to apply her service.
= Year by year, the lack of means is grow
f ing to be a smaller obstacle. Where the
real need is known, the means are almost
1 always found.
| 1t is a favorite sheer, in some quarters,
that the possession of great wealth on
, the part of members of the Christian
/ church is inconsistent with the profess
sion of faith in the Carpenter of Naza-
reth, Jesus Christ. have elsewhere ex-
pressed myself in published articles on
, this point, from which 1 beg your indul-
, gence to quote a sentence or two, as ap-
ropos of this wholesale arraignment of
{ wealth in the Church of God, and the ac-
cusation of Inconsistency. "We hear par
ishes spoken of as wealthy clubs and ar
; istocratic cliques. Men whose names are
: famous as bankers or magnates, or mer-
, chant princes, are sneered at as hypo-
critics, because they go to church, and
/, profess some form of faith in Christ.
, Well, doubtless there are hypocrites here
and there, but if in these days should
arise one like unto Christ, heaven anoint-
ed to WELD the whip of small cords, it is
possible that the lash would fall on the
throng without as well as on the congre-
cation within the churches. 1t is easy
enough to pen sarcastic screed, the
point of which is, where are the rich
Christians? as though every rich man
must be selfish Dives and every
poor man a worthy Lazarus. But
what are the real facts ? TO
the wealthy parishes, so called, of our
towns and cities, is due in large measure
the most splendid and lavish beneficence
among the poor, the suffering the wretch
ed, that this world has ever known. To
the very individuals who are paraded so
often as shocking examples of inconsist-