The Advocate and news., 1898-12-07


and church members. 1t Is problem
OF how to make human life more sacred,
valuable and respectable than the abun-
dance Of things the individual or the ma
ton may possess. Among all classes
there Is growing feeling that some
sort Of a new religious movement Is the
sole hope Of peaceful social reVolu-
tion. The revolution does not wait for
what we call "clear thinking" which
term has become the familiar cant Of
hypocrites and towards; nor for the
want Of analysis, which has become
sort OF an intellectual hysteria, exhaust
ing to the moral nerve of both teacher
and student; but for the want Of spir-
itual adventure, which alone achieves
progress and makes right. The social
conscience Graves a religion, the social
shame and woe cry for a salvation, the
world waits for a faith, for which men
are once more ready to die or live with
equal joy.
Now, the most significant fact Of the
hour Is the appeal Of the social con-
science from Christianity to Christ. The
rising faith of the people is everywhere
turning to Jesus, while turning from the
church. To the Christian religion and
its official attitude there Is the strongest
antipathy and social distrust; for Jesus
there is an increasing reverence and
social loyalty, having in 1t heroic ele-
ments and strong enough to call church
less men to martyrdom for his names
sake.
If the church would furnish the faith
which the people crave and deal with
the human fact we now confront 1t
must bring forth a new Christian syn
thesis In the form Of an economic state
ment Of the teachings Of Jesus. But we
can have no such revival as that for
which we wait until we have In mind a
clear distinction between the Christian
life and the life that Is conventionally
religious. To accept the existing Chris
tian religion may be very remote from
accepting Christ and the order OF things
for which he stood know OF no church
that processes faith in Christ in the
sense Of taking him at his word and
believing his life livable and workable In
the world. A church may be an actively
religious institution, but in no adequate
sense Christian.
JESUS DISTRUSTED RELIGION"
Christianity began, so far as 1t issued
from Jesus, not as new religion, but
as a mode Of living. In religion as a
thing in itself Jesus was not interested;
rather, he looked with profound distrust
upon what was then, and Is now, both
officially and popularity understood by
religion" The organized cult Of wor-
ship, the great ethnic religion that has
grown up bearing his name, Is some
thing that Jesus never contemplated.
Jesus had nothing occult or trans
cendental, mysterious or supernatural to
teach. Although we idly distinguish be-
tween natural and revealed religion, It
was to show natural religion as social
living that Jesus taught and worked. To
rid the human mind Of the distinction
between the natural and the supernat-
ural, primitive pagan superstition
which still Clings to us, was one of
Jesus most faithful efforts To show
forth his own divine SOnship as the nat
ural life Of man, with the brotherhood
Il brought as the normal human order,
was to Jesus an unfailing inspiration.
Yet We must not mistake Jesus for a
mere teacher Of ethics, either individual
or social. Is was as teacher OF eternal
principles that Jesus came, and his life
is revelation Of love as law. He did
not come as one teaching something
new so much as one unfolding what was
old; he came as an interpreter Of what
had been the human meaning Of religion
from It's beginning. He talked In an
ethical and social language that was
then no more unknown to the Hebrew
church than It Is now unknown, in an
other way, to the Christian church. It
was the language of the redeemed so
ciety calling men to repentance as the
condition Of its realization; the tongue
of the kingdom of God calling men to a
new moral birth as the lrst condition Of
citizenship
MEANING on "TrE9E KTNGDOM OF