The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1913-11-05

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II will praise Thee, O Lord, with
my whole heart; for thou hast
heard the words of my mouth, T.
will sing praise to Thee in the
sight OF the angels; I will worship
towards Thy holy temple, and I
will give glory. to Thy name for
Thy mercy and for Thy truth: for
Thou hast magnifed Thy holy
name above all.-Psalm 1877: / and
g"
I take as my own the words of the
royal psalmist in giving answer to the
question, Why churches and church
going people?
Why churches n church-going
people? Because men must worship
God, their creator and sovereign mas
ter; because places of reunion there
n1ust$be where men will. come together
to learn Of their obligations to God,
and in betting name acquit them
selves of those obIigations--recogniz-
ing by solemn prostration of mind,
heartEand body His eternal majesty,
inhaling into their being the perfume
of His being, Identifying with Hiss
will and purposes their wills and pur-
poses, to the end that eve when with
drawn from the more immediate con-
temptation Of His glory and power
they may be, in thought, word and
act, the images Of His holiness, and, in
consequence of their likeness unto
Him, the children of His love. the
privileged. sharers of His b1essedness
in time and in eternity.
The worship of God is the first, the
supreme duty. God set aside, the
paramount command in the ethics of
Justice and moral goodness is disobey-
ed. God set aside, whatever else he
is, whatever else he does, man is fatal
ly deficient in the primary element Of
righteous life;~ by nought else can he
make amends. God set aside, the
foundation is gone from the whole
structure of human mortality: what
survives is ruin Inc chaos.
The speaker is not the enemy Of his
age who, while in gladstone thought
and word he acknowledges it's glories
n it's achievements, dares remind it
of it's misfortunes and mistakes, to
the end that of those m~isfortunes and
mistakes correction be made and perils
hidden within them be put beyond
reach. 81 -,
The question is asked: Is the world
of men today growing better or
worse?. Better, certainly, we will say,
as we view its conquests of earth and
air, it's gains in material wealth and
power. The problem, however, as
sumes a different aspect when we
query j: What Of it's spiritual and eth
lCdI lllS. Ala SlISS IL rs 1tluuplldUly
true that the value of human life lies
chiefly in those higher elements, that
those only are the enduring fount of
greatness n felicity, the answer to
the question, is the world of men to-
day growing better or worse, must in
ultimate analysis be that which we
give to this other question: "What to-
day, in practice n in tendency, is the
spiritual and moral condition of OUR
selves n of the multitude of fellow
men who with us compose the life Of
humanity and determine it's onward
course?"' -~- ssr~ ,- -".~.~-
I quote from an article appearing
a year g in The Atlantic Monthly:
Should Smith Go to "Churct?"
. Smith and I attended the same Sun
day school when We were boys, and
remained for church afterwards as a.
matter of course. Smith now spends
his Sunday mornings golfing, or pot
tering about in the garden, or, in his
club or office, and after the midday
meal he takes a nap and loads his
family into a motor for a flight coun-
tryward . Smith is the best of
fellows an average twentieth century
American, diligent in business, a kind
husband and father, and in politics
anxious to vote for what he thinks to
be the best interests Of the country.
- = In the community where we
. were reared it was not respectable not
to go to church. I remember distinct
ly that in my boyhood people who
were not affiliated with some church.
were looked upon as p~arialns and out
casts . Yet in the same COM
munity no reproach attaches today to-
the non-church-going citizen. A ma
jority of the people I know best, In
cities large and small. do not go to-
church. Most of them are in no wise
a~ntagonistic to religion; they are
merely Indifferent. H.. "a
We all know Smith; we, know too
many that are like him; the number
of those like him is yearly on the In
crease among our neighbors and ac-
Post, commenting on the article in
The Atlantic Monthly, says:
There are literally multitudes of
persons who a remember whole
communities where it was not re-
spectacle to miss divine service.
The changes in this regard, if
quiet, have been tremendous.
Smith, of The Atlantic Monthly, is
we'll represented in cities of America.
In rural communities, where, on first
thought, we should look for. other con-
ditions, the story is the same. Men
do not go to church; attendance at
church Is alarmingly on the decline.
A booklet entitled A Rural Survey
in Maryland, tells that in one county,
taken as a fair sample of others, out
OLA total white population of 10000,
nominally Protestant Christians,
Hardly IS per cent are in the
Churches" that "the mortality rate
among humans is hardly as great as
that among country churches" And
only a few years ago, in Kansas, a
conference of pastors and teachers di-
rected attention to the thousand aban-
doned churches In the state, one OF
the reasons believed to account for the
lamentable fact being the passion for
motoring on Sundays.
Today to stay away from church is
rather the fashion, the up-to-date
style. We need not travel far to meet
men who would blush before their
comrades il reminded that they had
been in church, there, on Bonded knee,
with downcast head, adoring the eter-
nal and Almighty cd. Sc far, women
n children are more guiItless than
men. But, in the course of time, the
example set by men will prevail:
gradually, In silent tribute to what is
believed to be their superior thought,
women and children conform to the
mental and social practices of men.
Where today 1t is said men do not go
to church, tomorrow it will be said
few there are of men, or Of women and
children who still go to- church. The
question is surely the issue of the day
Whittier the drift of men and women,
whittier the drift of society and Of
country?
IL take the evil as it is. The evil is
not that cd lis denied; He is forgotten.
left aside, exiled from the world Of hui
man thought nj action.
1-&&HCtn1 III ,.ary1Jgsxyo ,4hasS., 49, 4f.-