St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1892-05-16
The Archbishop's Patriotic
and Successful Fight
Against Cahensleyism
Warmly Endorsed by DR.. S. G.
Smith, Of the Peoples
Church.
Protestants and Catholics
Should Learn the Lessons
Of Charity,
And Cooperate in Temper
anee Work and Great So
cial Reforms.

sermon yesterday at the Peoples
church. He said: When Christianity
came it found the world was about
through with its old religions. invarious
forms of nature worship they had min
istered for generations to the hunger of
the human soul. The people OF Asia
| had long before given UP to history
such spiritual secrets as they had. The
| Aryan races in Europe had worked over
| the oldsnateral, added the influence OF
the new environment, buiided fresh
| affairs, made new rituals, and these also
had passed into decay. The intellectual
classes of the classical world were either
openly hostile OF leiItly eOntemDtuous.
! Architecture, music, sculpture. the
forces of the state. and the III
fluence OF society had all been
| invoked, but the faiths thus upheld
could not live. What Jesus did may be
read with sufficient, perhaps with per-
feet accuracy, i'll the four gospels.
Many of His exact words are undcubt-
edly given, ami the genius OF His move
ment is clearly unfolded. 1t was an
ethical and human message bullded
4 upon universal spiritual foundations.
| Appealing to ideas of God, Immortality
and retr.butioH as fundamental. He III
Sisted OH the practicability of the no
! blest dreams of the WiSeSt and best III
all ages. He lived as He spoke, and by
the fascination of His holy presence He
drew about Him Il company of men and
women inibued with His spirit, whom
| He left behind Him
To 80 His Work.
The next stage of the unfolding of
| Christianity is seen III the New Tesla
nlent church, the transactions of which
| are found in the Acts of the Apostles.
only partially given. it is true. but suffi-
GENTLY 10 show the trend of affairs.
| This further Illuminated by the writings
OF the apostles, which are largely given
up to all effort 10 conceive The person
and work OF Christ. The gospels are
largely objective and directive. the
epistles are subjective and speculative.
The new movement was conditioned
ami Influenced 10y the world into which
! IL came. No Seruple was made of using
| the old religious material even by Jesus,
and still less Scrurie was shown by his
| followers. The scriptures of the Old
| Testament were received without eX-
animation and without dispute from
! the Jews. There WIS 10 biblical
! criticism. The sacrament of the Lords
supper WAS a modification or an Old
Hebrew festival. The Easter splendor
was the sunset of paganism rising with
new dawn upon the new world of the
gospel. One of the earliest contacts
and conflicts which early Christianity
passed through was with Greek phil
osoDily. The simplicity of the ethical
message was influenced even III the Cos
| pei of John. the latest OF the biograpl-
zeal records. But in the early centuries
| the modifying work went on with re-
suits. some good. some bad. bnt always
with additions to the early ministry to
| the world, until the changes indicated
| in the epistles became the foundations
| Of formal and
| Systematic heologY.
The next stage logically. but accom-
panying the former i'll historical move
ment, was the conflict of Christianity
with imperialism. The world-empire
| of Rome was antagoaiStic TO ali the
world. The Christian could not go to the
| Pantheon as one of the gods, because
| of the naughty and exclusive elainas
| of his fowly disciples, hence the Chris
tians must go to the amphitheater to
! furnish in their brutal death fresh sport
/ for the Roman mob. That conflict of
| the Gospel with Imperialism lasted with
some intermissioIis for three centuries.
1t was finally settled by the conversion
| OF Constantine. Three centuries later
we find that Christianity. i'll the per-
son of the bishop of Rome, had assumed
the Imperialism it had once struggled
against. Christianity struggled against
| judaism, but accepted the essence of
| Judaism. 1t struggled against pagan
| ism. but it accepted much OF pagansm.
| 1t struggled against Greek philosophy
] and Roman power, but it finally made
room tor both. The Anglican church
| was born out of the struggle of the state
to rise superior to the church, but new
| erthelesS it based its claims upon the
primitive church and its early councils.
| The Lutheran reformation Was revolt
against the practical administration OF
| the Roman Catholic church, both i'll
! morals and in politics. The CalyinlStIc
reformation was chiefly marked by its
extension and completion of the the
| ology Of Augustine. The Wesleyan
reformation was a revival of religion
| such as those of the Old friars of the
| Catholic church put into ecclesiastical
| form by conSummate church States
man, for JOHN Wesley under other con-
| dition5 would have been
A Great Pope.
The movements of PuritanS and Bap-
fists nave their own historical eXplana-
| tons.
What are we to think of the facts of
Christian history as applied to the pres
| emf problem of church life?
If Jesus Christ organized an ecclesi-
aSticiSm, to my mind there is no escape
| from the church of Rome, for that body
presents the best credentials of contlH
uous development from antiquity. If
| the essence of the work of Jesus was
ethical and spiritual, and all church
| forms were but incidental. then the
Roman church has no claims upon the
| conscience There has always been to
me no middle ground between the RO-
man Catholic church and free religious
| democracy.
DR.. Lyman Abbot has lately printed
! a notable paper upon what he calls the
evolution of Christianity. In this he
| seeks to show that the unfolding Of the
external forms of Christianity have all
! been necessary, and all under law.
though sometimes the law is obscured.
| The Roman Catholic church has long
| taught essentially the same doctrine i'll
| its claim of the continuous teaching
| power of the church. If Dir. Abbot
| keeps carefully in mind that the free
| spirit of man is factor in the historical
! drama, and insists always upon the alb
| soIute freedom of the new life, his
doctrine of the evolution of Christian
| lty falls under the historical! philosophy
of Hegel. The dogma of development
of doctrine as claimed by Rome must
be Judged by its fruits. All the lntelli-
gent men out OF communion with Rome
reject body of doctrine. which are
only accepted by intelligent men within
the church OH
The Prior Assumption.
that the church can make no mistakes.
But every one except Roman Catholics
sees that the church has made mistakes.
[ can see how John Henry Newman
might go to Rome if he must have a
historical eccleSasticiSm, after conclud-
ing that the Anglican church was not
the ecclesiasticism of Jesus. But | can
discover far different issue to his per-
plexity il he saw clearly that i'll neither
the Anglican nor the Roman st.nse did
Jesus ever found church.
What shouId be the practical reIa-