The weekly chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Craig County, Okla.) 1905-1913, 1912-05-10
vinita. May 5th, 1912.

| Inc preachers profess ueep ant
tender feeling for two classes of peo
pie, First, the saints-especially i
they have deep and well-flled pocket
books, and have been blessed by the
Spirit with "the grace of giving" Sec
ond, for the sinners who have got the
worst of it, and graduated into the
down and out class. Never is the
| typical minister more truly minister
ial than when he is talking salvation
to some poor human wastrel, who has
sinned away all possibility of self
respect. But the most of us are
neither saints nor wastrels; perhaps
something halfway between. We have
our faults; and we know some of them,
at least. But we have our decencies
and responsibilities, too. Some of us,
strange as it may seem, have our
ideals. The best that in us lies, we
try to do the right thing by man, or
woman, or child. We love our fam
our friends; our hearts are touched
and our pockets, too,--by the sight or
the story of human misfortune; and
if We don't always pay our bills the
day they are due, it is because We
haven't the wherewithal. 1t is true
that we are sometimes hard up" But
the supreme court of Missouri has an
nounced that it takes judicial notice
that the condition commonly describ-
ed as being hard up is a common in
trinity of the race, which does not
necessarily imply moral turpitude. f"
What have the preachers got to say
to us lniddle-of-the-roader who
neither have the grace to be saints,
nor have had the evil fortune to be
misled into the primrose path?
Not very much that is compliment
tary. They seem to resent the fact
that We are decent and respectable.
That isn't in accord with the church
theory of human nature" Accord
Ing to that theory, we are totally de-
proved. We are all gone astray. We
are together become Improbable.
There is none that doeth good, no not
one We are born in sin, and shapen
in iniquity If We are not professors
of the faith and members of the
we haven't any right to be
anything but deprayed and degraded.
It isn't showing proper respect to the
Bible for us to try to be honest, and
pure, and loving, without being con-
verted. One of the greatest English
preachers of the nineteenth century,
Dale of Birmingham, once preached
a sermon on "Perilous Virtues" in
which he warned us to be careful that
our good deeds did not sink us into
perdition.
The preachers may find this kind of
doctrine in the works of a pessimistic
psalmist, or an apostle who was more
than half Pharisee, but they can't find
very much support for it in the words
Of Jesus. And though the ministers
still preach it, the congregations don't
believe it. The common consciousness
Of the church is growing quite as toll
Grant of human decency as it is of
human depravity. That is a very de-
eided gain The spirit of the age is
getting into the church. The church
IS actually recognizing the value of
But the official teaching of
he church still lags behind it's COM
Christians profess today still teach
hat to be human, and not to be re-
is to be a son of perdition,
ieketed through to whatever Hell
here be by limited express, with small
,top-over privileges ard no return
tickets sold.
When one comes to analyze the new |
spirit, which is influencing the church's
feeling towards mankind, though it |
las not yet re-moulded its creeds, one
inds many striking differences from
he old view. of which can only speak
# two.
/. According to the old ideas, the
act that desire was natural as
with sinful and depraved.
fence there We're no innocent hui
nan desires" 1t was wrong for a man
0 wish to be rich and successful.
Wrong for him to love a woman, in
he only way live man, with body
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