Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1914-05-28

IN CONVENTION
CONTINUED from First Pase9

usefulness, to win for itself a place
of respect and good will, to make it's
contribution to religion greater The
church is here, not to glorify itself.
but to spend itself in the service of
men; to find it's life in losing it's life,
to be like its Master uncalculating in
its ministry. In too many places we
are allowing the church, in maintain
ing a negative position of protest
against what is going on in the world,
to be a negligible quantity. In our
narrowness and tirnidity we do not
give the church a chance to show
what 1T can do. We are afraid OF
being irregular, or of departing from
some ancient custom or precedent
which has nothing whatever to do
with our life today. The church is
struggling for life and begging for a
chance to live. and complaining of the
prejudice and Indifference of the
community, when it is wholly un-
necessary. We get ourselves IN be-
tween men and the church, and the
distrust is not of the church but of
ourselves and of our Indifferent way
to presenting the church and the way
of the Christ.
Time to Plead.
ut is a time to plead with Chris
tan men in public positions. in the
direction of the worlds affairs, to
have a special sense of responsibility,
not allowing their names to be USED
without an understanding OF such use
of their names VIII approve anu
commend, There is a disposition to
give to officers of companies and to
agents authority, without holding
them to strict account for being at
once honest and merciful. There are
men willing to have things done by
their representatives which they
would be ashamed to do themselves.
The good name of the church should
be regarded by all it's members in
their conduct and in all the tran
sactions with which they are as
ISOLATED.
Recent Labor Strikes.
Men given authority over en-
ployes by those higher up, are very
often like the Egyptian Task Masters
very hard upon those. under them,
and the responsibility is with those
who appoint them as well as with
themselves. The three great strikes:
in Lawrence, Northern Michigan and
Colorado, which from their magnl-
tude and results may be called in
dustrial wars, have recently caused
serious loss of life, great suffering,
and bitterness of feeling which will
last for a generation. They are of
national significance, and all intelli-
gent and right-minded citizens ought
to have knowledge of the facts and
pass Judgment on them l think my
self, that large companies of new
corners have been exploited and mis-
used for the profit of persons who
have seemed to know little and care
little for the conditions under which
they were living.
absentee ownership, without sense
of responsibility for men in their SER
vice in hard places in life is largely
responsible for this warfare. Men
and women ought to know how the
people who serve them live and be at
once Just and merciful. A new sense
of moral responsibility is needed in
the management of the worlds bust
ness today, and the church is suffer-
ing reproach because such sense of
responsibility is lacking in many of
its members.
There is also needed strong APP
peal under new conditions, to men
and women who bear Christ's name
morals, which we all feel. I suppose
that the neglect of religion in the
home accounts for the lowering of
moral standards. Our congested
cities filled with newcomers are given
as an excuse, but the report in rural
districts seems no better. Evil living
is excused as the expression of
natural desires, as If training and
discipline and self-restraint were not
n, oh
the theatre. conversation, dress, all
show this departure from the highest
moral standards of clean living and
thinking. The church must go back
and take up the old fight for decency.
good morals, good manners, and call
all its members down to the battle
There are public places of amuse-
ment which ought never to be
patroniZed, authors whose books
ought never to come into the house
or the public library. men of unclean
speech whose companionship ought to
be avoided rnd the strongest possible
contentics - made for clean living"