The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-12-26
CHRISTIANITY AND CHILDREN.
BY CHARLES II. HENDERSON.
The University of Chicago.
Christianity begins
11with the Holy Night, represent

"ISTORIC Christianity begins
I1with the Holy Night, represent
ed by Correggio as scene of COM
monplace reality and coarseness
glorifed by radiance which streamed
from the Divine Infant. The Son of
Man began as babe, passed through
the typical phases of human life, and
sanctifed all. When the Logos gave
himself in revelation to humanity he
entered it's life by the lowly gate of
humble birth. Millions "Hymn on
Christ's Nativity" sings of the peace
full hour which ushered in reign of
peace and goodwill. Enchanted
shepherds listened to the heavenly
song of hope:
"Time will run back and fetch the age of
gold
And speckled vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
| And leprous sin will melt from earthly
mould.
Yea, IfuGn ana JUSTICE GneH
Will down return to men.
Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wear
ing,
Mercy will sit between,
Throned in celestial sheen
For thus the classic poet of Puritan
ism has interpreted the angelic
praises: "Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among men,"
Out of the life and teachings of
Christ and his apostles have grown
the historic forces and institutions of
organized Christianity in the worlds
life. No man understands the New
Testament unless he has read the
commentary which the holy charity
of the church has written on the
pages of history. 1t is useless to at
tempt to dissect the service rendered
by the church from other elements.
The task is as impossible as to distin
guish the waters of rivers in the Gulf
of Mexico. All good is Christian.
Moonlight is reflected sunlight.
If more exact historical investiga-
ton some day shows that sanctify-
ing power touched the ancient family
other than that ministered by priest
or presbyter, we shall not admit that
this purifying energy was not due to
the immanent Christ Why should
we take gems from Christ's crown by
refusing to credit to the Logos the
moral grandeur of stoicisms
From the first the church diffused
in the Roman empire the Hebrew
yearning for children, made more
tender by sweet memories of the Di-
vine Babe, made universal by the
doctrine of human brotherhood.
Therefore bishops went about to
gather up waits and foundlings and
gave to holy women the care of de-
formed and abandoned infants. The
penitential discipline did not fail to
censure and punish members of the
church for acts which among their
heather neighbors were regarded as
venial faults.
The free common schools, secular
and goddess" as some assert, are
clearly product of Christian inhu-
ences. They are in direct and historic
line with the church schools of the
bishops of early days, of the monas-
tic schools of the Middle Ages, of
the institutions patronized by Char
lemagne, of those created by Luther
and of the prophetic establishments
of our New England fathers. If our
American secular schools have little
direct religious teaching, they are at
least conducted by persons who en-
body, in the main, Christian ideals of
character and conduct. Another in
stitution, the Sunday school, has been
developed in America as nowhere
else, just because the church could
not depend on the state for religious
teaching. Never before was seen
such a magnificent army of unpaid
voluntary instructors, giving their
lives to the hottest task of humanity.
State-supported schools, ruled by
political parties, might give better
intellectual instruction, but could
never supply the moral enthusiasm
and inventive spirit of these most free
schools of piety and patriotism.
Nothing but united effort of all Chris