The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-10-20
"CITY0F REFUGE" CHURCH
EPISCOPAL CHURCH SERVES AS SUCH
IN NUMEROUS CASES.
People Who Disagree over other
Places of Worship Can Unite There
-GrOwth in Membership.
New York Mail and Express.

New York Mail and Express.
The President and his wife, who belong
to different religious communions, cannot
solve the difficulty presented by this differ
ence in exactly the same way that a certain
Governor of Rhode Island solved a similar
problem. This Governor, the story runs,
was a COngregationalist and his wife
Baptist. They had been married happily in
Newport, where they lived, about midway
OF a certain week, and were ideally agreed
on all subjects save this one OF church
membership. The Governor had been try
ing in vain to convince his bride that she
ought to go TO his church, and she had been
laboring, possibly tearfully, TO persuade
him to so TO hers. 1t was apparent that
neither one would yield and neither was
willing to go TO church alone. The Cover
nor in particular. was convinced that it
would be a derogation of his dignity if his
wife went TO another church than the one
he attended. 1t was sad predicament.
Sunday morning, and church time. came
around without any answer to the question.
OF course, they must go to church some
where. They made themselves ready and
walked together out of the house and to-
gether down to Spring street on which, one
TO the south and one to the north, both the
Congregational and Baptist churches were
situated. This was the parting of the ways.
The question had to be settled then
and there and settled in a moment,
for people were going by their way to
church and the bells were ringing. They
paused on the corner for one terrible in
slant. Directly in front of them, but facing
he oth oil r-,I,,
ity Church, Episcopalian-a church which
neither had ever attended. Mary" said
the Governor, I'VE will go to Trinity And
so they did. and afterward became COM
municants and brought their children up
in that fold. The compromise saved the
dignity of both of them This solution, as
l have said, is impossible in precisely this
form in the case of the President and his
wife, for Mrs Roosevelt already belongs to
the Episcopal Church.
THE ROOSEVELT CASE.
We have happily passed the time when
serious trouble would be likely TO result
from or much be thought of a man at
tending one church and his wife another.
No modern American church organiza-
ton now holds to the doctrine of exclu-
sive salvation. Mrs. Roosevelt is unlike
the good old Scotch woman, the last
victim of a hundred schisms This old
woman and her husband were members
of a religious community which had split
and split until these two were the only
ones left in the fold. A preacher said to
her: Il suppose you think that you and
John are the only persons who will be
saved" and she made answer: 'Hoot,
mon, I'm so sure o. john We ad-
nit that people may be saved in other
churches than ours, But the problem
often arises in Protestant families, and
the solution of separate attendance sell
dom aVails for the reason that the family
comes TO consist of more than husband
and wife. The father may go TO his an
cestral church and the mother to hers,
but what is the ancestral church OF the
children? 1t is oftenest in such cases.
the mothers church that triumphs. 1t
is easier for man to give UP a church
than for a woman, and the child, ninety
nine times out of a hundred, inclines TO
learn his religion from his mother, not his
father. 1t takes a firm faith and a strong
will TO impose the paternal religion on a
child when there is a maternal one. The
inheritance of faith is in the female line.
1t is noted that the Roosevelt children go
to the Episcopal Church with their mother.
L have in mind a case in Massachusetts
in which a well-knOwn educator and his
wife reached a different sort of compro-
mise from that OF the Rhode Island Gov
ernor and his wife. The husband in This
case was Unitarian and his wife an Epis-
copalian. She would not give up her
and she consented, at her husbands earn
est request to make arrangement
whereby the whole family went one Sunday
to the Episcopal Church and the next to
the Unitarian This involved maintaining
pews in both churches 1t worked well
believe it is still in force nominally, at any
rate. But the children are all good Epis-
copalians. They have attended many
religious services at the Unitarian Church
as they have at the Episcopal Church, but
the social life, the cohesive purpose, the
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the Episcopal denomination, together with
that same powerful maternal influence set
tied that question. long ago. One hears the
children say: Last Sunday we went to
papa's church: next Sunday shall go
to our church..
IT BECOMES OUR CHURCH"
"Our church it is getting to be to more
and more people in these United States.
The story of the Rhode Island Governor
and his wife is typical. The hostile joke
about the Episcopal Church taking in so
many new people because it never bothers
them about their politics or their religion"
is merry quip after all. They get as much
religion there as they would get in some
other places, doubtless. The church is at
tractive to those who tire of eXtemporized
worship, on account of it's liturgy; attrac-
tive to those of literary taste and poetic
temperament because the words of its
service are surprisingly beautiful: attrac-
tive to everybody account of the simple
dignity of its worship. Reproached with
latitudinarianism, ii nevertheless permits
any one TO be as strict as he wishes to be-
II is near enough to half a dozen other
folds to overlap them and absorb their
memberships Lutheranism, to the Dutch
Reformed Church, to the Swedenborgians,
to the conservative Unitarians and the
more formal wing of the Congregational
lists while it's evangelical wing has marked
attractions for members of all the evan
gelical denominations 10 whom the lturgic-
al worship appeals.
Religiously it is not a cave of Adullam,
but a city of refuge 1t would be inter
esting to take the delegates of the Cen
eral Convention, which has been in
sion this week at San Francisco clerical
and lay, and see to how many folds their
religious inheritances and former personal
or family affiliations reach back At least
one very conspicuous member of the con-
,.nntinra i Pinrnnnf MnrOan has q n