Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1909-10-03
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eternal and everlasting forces which he
knows TO reside in the human spirit He
goes on to combat what is perhaps the
most popular prepossession OF the
church'S mind:
Il believe that we have enormously con-
ceived the field OF the Christian Church
mislead me. the Christian Church now
adays is tempted to think of itself as
chiefly phlanthropic institution.
chiefly an institution which shall
is necessary for carrying on those
great enterprises which relieve the dis
tress, distress of body and distress OF
mind. which disturbs the world and
so excites our pity among those men
particularly who have not had the adj
vantages OF fortune OF of economic OPP
portunity. And yet l believe that this Is
only very small part of the business of
the church. The business OF the church
is not to pity men. The business of the
church is not to rescue them from their
suffering by the mere means of material
relief. or even by the means of spiritual
reinsurance. The church cannot afford
to pity men, because IL knows that men.
If they would but take 1t, have the rich
est and completest inheritance that II Is
possible to conceive. and that. rather
than being deserving of pity. they are
to be challenged to assert in themselves
pendent of pity. No man who has re-
covered the integrity of his soul Is any
longer the object of pity, and it is to en-
able him to recover that lost integrity
that the Christian Church is organized To
my thinking. the Christian Church
stands at the center. not only OF philan-
thropy. but at the center of education. at
the center of science, at the center OF
philosophy, at the center OF politics: In
short. at the center of sentient and think
ing life. And the business OF the Chris
tian Church, Of the Christian minister, 10
to show the spiritual relations of men
| III
they be physical or spiritual. 1t Is moth.
ing less than to show the plan of life ana
mems relation to the plan of life"
| The task DR.. Wilson assigns the nin-
"in terms that will satisfy the man OF
science and the deeper students OF the
ology but also in terms and from point
of view that will aid the man In the street
who can see only little part or the
plan" BY showing men that there is q
plan, and showing that plan to them ultf>
mately in its completeness. the minister
| may discover for men their spirits. We
read further:
| II sometimes think that men in our
| age are either losing their spirits or
| thinking that they have lost them. 1t is
very confusing age for man OF con-
science. In the modern organization or
economic society. for example, no man IS
complete whole, every man is frac-
| ton. No man is an integer. His con-
| science has to reckon out for itself what
| part the fraction plays In the Wnole ana
| what possibility of independent action
there is for the fraction. The undetach-
able fraction lies embedded in the mass
and cannot be entirely Disseminated from
| it, and men have allowed their con-
| sciences to run down because the mech
anlsm in them seemed to be affected by
great magnets outside. which made II i'm
possible for them to work independently.
All their little individual compasses were
| disturbed by great masses-chiefly OF gold
lin their neighborhood, and they have
asked themselves how they could disens
| gage their consciences and become inde-
pendent fnstrumentalities in the sight OF
| God. The task is so tremendous and SO
| perplexing that many men have adj
| iourned the effort and have decided that
all they can do is to drift with the gen.
eral movement Of the mass. They are
craving to have some one rediscover their
| spirits for them.
! What the minister has to do is to
- reveal God to men, reveal God TO
them in their own spirits, reveal God to
| them in thought and in action, re-estab-
lish the spiritual kingdom among us BY
procla inning In season and out OF season
that there is no explanation for anything
| that is not first or last a spiritual eX-
PLANTATION. and that man cannot live by
| bread alone, cannot live by scientific
thought alone; that he is not only starv-
| ing, but that he knows that he Is starv-
ing and that digestion of this dry stuff
thar he takes into his mouth is not pos
sible unless it be conveyed by the living
water Of the spirit