The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-05-20
DIVINITY SCHOOL ECHOES
EMPHASIZING SERMON BY REV. ".
 r, DICKERMAN, YESTERDAR.

Recent Anniversary of the Yale Divinity
 School Furnishes Food for Thought-The
 Liberal Christians Can Rejoice That They
 Have Furnished seed-Thought to the
 Orthodox Pulpits.
 Rev w. F. D 1ckerman, pastor of the
 Church of the Messiah, preached a most thoughtful and instructive sermon yesterday morning before a good sized
 congregation in spite of the dark and
 gloomy weather His subject was: Echoes from the Yale Divinity School"
 He spoke in part as follows:
 The recent anniversary exercises of
 the Yale Divinity, school afforded some very interesting signs of the times as regards the progress made in religious
 thought. would invite your attention specially to an address made by one of the graduating class on Authority in Religion which was almost revolu- tionary. He denied that the church was authority in religion and also said that the Bible was not authority in re- ligion, neither had the reason authority in religious matters. He said that it was personal experience alone that had authority in religion. For my own part do not see how you can separate req son from the personality, and 1t is most significant fact that the authority of the Bible is even questioned by the divinity school gradute." MT. Dicker- man further said that authority in the early church was the preaching of the word actually spoken by Jesus to His apostles, rather than an appeal to doc uments or traditions, and he held that the same was true to-day.
 There is a mosque in the far east in which there are two columns. between which, if the good Moslem squeezes, he is sure of the Mohammedan paradise. Thus 1t Is customary for them to reduce their dimensions by prayer and fast ing. I would compare the Andover The ological seminary, as the representative of rather venturesome theology, to one of these pillars, and the Yale Divinity school, as the representative of the conservative element, to the oth- CT. It is between these two that the theological student must pass, although it is much more probable that he would break down the pillars rather than les sen or change his dimensions to ac- commodate himself to the narrow and difficult passage between.
 "'Dr. Gordon in his lectures before the Yale Divinity school last winter admit ted the element of errancy in the scrip lures, and insisted on an interpretation as not limited, and that the gospel should not be interpreted by the epis- ties, but rather in the light of a supreme Christology, all of which means that the vital precepts of the life of Jesus shall be more respected than the dog matic utterances of the epistles Now, what is the practical signification of these things to liberal Christians-Uni- versalists, Unitarians and other liberal religious bodies? They must not make the mistake that the liberal orthodoxy will make a stampede into the ranks of the Universalist or Unitarian churches. They will rather accommodate the new heresies than suffer disintegration, The charge of insincerity and hypocrisy of- ten made against progressive ministers in orthodox pulpits is unjust while they are in state of transition, and have not settled these questions. The liberal churches should rejoice that they have furnished the seed thought for the other luOuBl lIlCy may llOl LHfII- selves reap the harvest, Universalists and their kind must not allow other bodies to be more progressive in thought No church can wholly succeed on purely denominational grounds. The of dogmatism is a failure. cannot live on Its record, but all other churches will be com pelled to take up the Institutional church work in practical helpfulness for hu- manity, or fail. Mere Sunday service | is not sufficient justification for the ex- penditure of such vast sums of money. One might just as well shoot sky rock | cts at the sun or hire brass band to bray at the moon and call the fireworks | and the blare of trumpets sufficient ser vice rendered to man and the deity"
 In the evening MT, Dickerman gave | an illustrated lecture on Egypt"
 ..x.