The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1897-10-11
Still in the Dark.

is So but most people seem to abhor
statistics, and 1 Will not be so inju-
dici0us as to introduce very many
numerals in my correspondence. l will
only refer, in a casual way, to a few
figures compiled in 1894 80 by the New
York World" Almanac, which fur
nish considerable compact informa-
ton about church affairs.
The figures before me give the num-
Der of churches in the United States
at III 1868; number of members or
communicates, %. 205,901; value of
church property, $67S, 245, S44. In ad-
dition to the foregoing we have 1913
173 Sunday-schools, with 9,71S,4 32
scholars. This gives us a grand total
of 81. 924 1913 individuals to deal with
their own spiritual affairs and en-
deavor to do what they can for the
eternal salvation of outsiders, such as
free thinkers infidels. sinners and other
heather. About half our population
appears to be organized in this army Of
the l ord.
With this showing it would seem that
we ought to be one of the saintliest
nations the world has produced. With
one-half of our population organized to
fight the unorganized sinful rabble we
ought to close up the works of the
devil in these United States, and send
up the grandeSt hOsanna that ever left
terra fi1ma for the sky. Give us 30
per cert, one-half of the people, or
ganized, against any other proposition
imaginable, and if We cannot do it up
in a package and stow it away we are
an ignominous failure. Six hundred
and seVenty-eight millions of dollars
one hundred and seventy-seven thous-
and preachers, with about thirty mil
lion volunteers, ought to evangelize
everything in sight, or convert US to
any reasonable proposition or belief
There must be something wrong with
the army of the Lord, and there are
several people who would like to know
what it is. If the Gospel ever had a
fair chance in the world it has had it
in the United States of America, and
it ought to have conquered the United
States from Plymouth Rock to Bodega
Bay, including Missouri and a part of
Egypt, ILL.,
Most of us realize that there are at
least s., 924 1873 sinners yet at large,
unclaimed and unsaved, but these are
not organized, and have not nearly
1888 leaders and orators. They are
merely the rabble, headed here and
there with Congressman and Ingersolls,
and they ought to be readily dispersed
and subdued. In military ethics any
respectable, organized body should
handle double its number of savages or
disorganized individuals, without pre-
Stunning upon the assistance of the Lord
ar any divine c111onOy-+
Now [ have endeavored to be as SOL
emn, sedate and gloomy as possible in
approaching this subject, and hope I
Will not be charged with rudeness or
levity. I have endeavored to assume
the conventional expressions and soft
phrases peculiar to religious topics. but
somehow statistics mar phraseology,
and common sense will not always. as
it seems, conform with elegance and
delicacy of expression upon this theme
If, now, the churches were to be con-
sidered as a sort of joint stock organi-
cation. one might rudely say they do
not nay dividends at all proportionate
to their working caeital, and let it go
at that. The combined clergy might
say, that is if they ever should say
anything unanimously, that their work
does not stack up like temporal bust
ness, and that it cannot be computed
in a worldly way, like mining stocks or
profit and loss upon commercial trans
actions. They might claim-that is if
they would unite in even claiming
credit-that their books are not subject
to investigation by mundane induisi-
tors, but that their accounts are of
record in a higher realm quite beyond
terrestrial jurisdiction But they must
admit, that is if they will do it, that
their principal business. in the eyes of
the world, lies in saving souls on earth
They cannot save them after they de-
part, and it is not now considered en-
tirely safe to defer salvation to the last
fleeing moment either. 1t must seem
that wherever the departing soul is to
go or whatever its future state, no
other but a base and selfish motive will
permit it to wait the last moment to
reform. Dying sinners do not estab-
lish the Gospel on earth by confessing
belief with their parting breath; and
the clergyman or confessor, in admins
tering the last rites to a dying sinner.
only offers to ease his departure, and
does not profit the world he lives in any
farther than to that extent
It cannot be gracefully denied that
our churches, like every other human
establishment, have their faults. Under
our form of government, whatever they
may be in addition thereto, they are
public institutions. They may be en-
gagged in laying up treasures in heaven,
and all their ambitions may be of a
spiritual and ethereal character, but
I l.
attest that they are maintained by hard
cash, and that the general public is
taxed for their maintenance. This be-
ing the situation there is no sensible
reason why they are not, or why they
should not be subject to public COM
ment and criticism. There is no tan
gible reason in the light of nineteenth
century understanding why we should
not contemplate churches as we do any
other public institutions. The time when
religious topics were to be spoken of
only after one had crossed himself. and
with bated breath and tremulous whis-
per. is passed. A man cannot now be
| successfully characterized as a bias
phemer for criticising churches. past
ors, priests, prelates or popes. and the
Bible itself is not too sacred to be dis
cussed. nor too holy to be reviewed in
reasonable language. and in plain, sin
cere. everyday expression.
AS nearly as can be ascertained many
adverse opinions are entertained con-
corning Christianity and the churches.
as it is expounded and as they are
conducted Opinions after a while
crystalize into popular belief and per-
manent conviction. There is a hard
crust forming about the edges and over
the surface of the fountains of gospel