Los Angeles herald., 1905-02-06
MINISTER EXPLAINS HIS
CHANGE OF OPINIONS
Rev. Benjamin Fay Mills Tells How
the World Is Outgrowing Or
thodox Church

terday in Masonic hall to audiences
ity. In the morning when Mr.. Mills
spoke on What Must l Do to Be
Saved?" standing room was rare, and
in the evening every seat was filed in
two minutes after the doors were
opened and hundreds of people were
forced to turn away.
Mr.. Mills chose for his subject last
evening, by special request, why 1
Changed My Religious Opinions" He
said in part:
At do not ordinarily obtrude on my
congregations my personal experiences.
But there may come time when a
mans experience should be public prop
erty. l am told by eminent ministers
in this city that numbers of people here
and elsewhere, are looking to me for
assistance in their spiritual perplexi-
ties, and 1 have concluded that 1 owe
it to them and to others to make plain
statement as to why and how 1 have
changed my religious opinions. L will
need to divide this into two sections, so
that this evening my topic will be Why
My Opinions Were Changed, and next
Sunday morning What 1 Believe or,
How l Have Altered My Views
my opinions were changed because
1 grew in mental and moral spiritual
development until the conceptions of my
childhood and of the childhood of the
race were as inappropriate to my pres
ent position as a child's clothes would
be to a man. / can say, as Paul did,
When L was a child 1 thought as a
child; but when 1 became man L put
away childish things. The causes of
my growth were three.
First, personal. Intellectually the
old conceptions of God, man and the
universe became no longer tenable. No
reputable university or high school
teaches the old doctrine of the creation
of the world in six days, that the hu-
man race descended from one pair and
that death and sin entered the world
on account of the sin of Adam and
Eve. In fact, no modern man, in or
out of the churches, believes in the fall
of man. But the whole of the old dog
matte system of mechanical. salvation
from an imaginary hell of endless tor
ment depends on faith in mans fall
and his need of special redemption.
"The second reason is a greater one,
namely, that 1 am part of great
world movement. Every time is crisis,
but there are great days when an old
world passes away and new world
comes into existence. We of the yam
guard are not producing this world
advance-we are produced by 1t and
are constituent part of it. New light
is breaking from the eternal word of
God. We are on the upward arc of a
circle.
Began Life Anew
"But.the greatest cause of my theo-
logical enlightenment was because |
place | may in helping in this new
birth of humanity. Like Paul, I'm my
youth, after the strictest sect of our
religion, l lived Pharisee,' drank
In theology with my mothers milk. In
my religious experience l learned all
that is known or can be known of the
power of the old dogmas and the old
ecclesiasticism. was a pastor of or
thodox churches for ten years, east
and west. in country and city. l was
ten years an evangelist with national
mission.
I'm my growth have not sought my
own advantage. From worldly point
OF view l had nothing to gain and
everything to lose. l was like a sue
eessful business man who for con-
science sake should throw away the &C.
cumulations of years and begin life
anew. The large, easily secured finan-
cial reward that always follows a sue
cessful evangelist was mine, and a
perpetual golden river poured its treas
ures through my hands. People whom
| honored and loved loved and hon
ored me. My work had not reached its