Norwich bulletin., 1909-07-17

Willlc tA4c iOLlcI may uHd ll rinCW ilCi ~. I suggest this. as just one possibility to be considered.
 Now come down to few lesser matters. I shrewdly suspect that there are about as many different explana- tions why farmers don't go to church as there are farmers who don't. Some few don't believe in the church. We'll, that surely isn't the churches fault. may not believe in Cutchegan rock. That isn't the fault of the rock. Nor will it prevent my skinning my nose if attempt to walk where I believe it isn't but 1t really is. Some don't go because they're too stfngy to pay pew rent. Some don't go because they don't like the choir. and some because they don't like congregational singing. Some don't go because the minister talks too long, and some because he doesn't preach good, long, old-fash- toned" sermons. One doesn't go be- cause Mrs. Jones told her that she hears Aunt Sally Loomis say that she overheard Deacon Pringle tell his wife that he once found the parson read ing, not the hymn book. but work on botany, one Sunday afternoon. I don't really believe there's very much to be done or said about these don't go's.''
 Here, however, is one real reason: Our churches are almost invariably kept shut up six days of the week. Then, on warm summer Sunday, an hour before service time they are gin- gerly opened, only a few windows be- ing lowered or raised, because due re- gard must be had to various fears of drafts" The congregation gathers to sit in semi gloom in an atmosphere dead and stagnant from a weeks im- prisonment, and to struggle valiantly to keep itself physically awake. Your average farmer is accustomed to days of vigorous activity, outdoors. in full air with the winds blowing, and the clouds drifting. and the birds chatter ing, and the whole world bubbling and leaping in exuberant life around him. Is it any wonder that he goes to sleep in church? Or that he is so ashamed of his lapse-and of his wife's conse- quent discomfort on account of it- that he sometimes comes to dread the ordeal?
 Take another suggestion: The phrase, Sunday go- to- meetin' clothes has become a slang expression in many quarters. The farmer usually wears easy if decidedly unhandsome cloth ing during the week. But he must dress up" for church. He must put on a pair of tight shoes which hurt his feet and a suit of conventional black which gals him at a dozen seams and puts him into an unpleasant per- spiration The wife and children must also fix up" with their best toggery. It simply wouldn't do for the Joneses not to make as good an appearance as the Smiths. The old horses must also be curried off. and the harness looked over to be sure it is bright and gilt tering. The carriage must be washed, perhaps. Sunday morning on the farm is sometimes turned into a period of feverish stress and discomfort by the supposed demands of church. going et- iquette. All this leads to a state of mental irritation and touchiness which is remembered with regret and antic- ipated with dislike. A neighbor of mine, who lived one summer in a house where father mother and three children went four miles to church every Sunday, told me, once, that she never saw them start off but all five were so snappish that she didn't even dare wave her hand at them as they drove away.
 Still again: If the farmer is up to his job and is worth his salt as farm CT, he has done six days hard work and is tired Sunday morning. Per- haps he ought to rest on Saturday, so as to be fresh on Sunday. Whether he ought, to or not, he doesn't. And, if the farmers wife is up to her job and IS worth her salt she has done six days hard work and is tired Sunday morning. The demand of both for rest, the simple relaxation and inertia of the tired animal, is an insistent and sometimes constraining demand. Any unusual activity becomes repellent and undesirable. Remember, please. that there's a big difference between get ting to church from the close-by par sonage or the neighboring village res- idence and from the farm. two, three. Tour, live miles back among the hills
 Manifestly, these reasons which | have suggested why some farmers don't go to church, do not carry blame to the church.. nor do they lay it on the shoulders of the ministers. They may none of them be sufficient req sons, or even good reasoning. But. dear hearts, very few of us always act from good reasoning, in any functions of life. We act from habit, according to convention, because others do SO. with regard to our own. selfish desires, sometimes in pure whim. If all of us. always, acted according to intelligent reason, we might not be any hand somer, but oh, how much happier we all would bel The one clear thing seems to be that. if do my own duty faithfully. follow the right as God gives me to see the right, lay no temptation or hindrance in another's path but always give my neighbor low ing help when he needs it-then cannot be held responsible for his con duct or its results. Nor can he be giy- en any blame for mine