New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1921-04-27
As 1t Is In Heaven.

AS 1t Is In Heaven.
"Our father which art in heaven,
Hallowed by thy name. Thy king
dom come Thy will besdone on earth,
as it is in heaven.
What do men mean when they pray
this prayer? Do they even begin to
relaize the mighty import of it?
Jesus, who gave this. prayer to his
disciples as a model, told them they
were to pray that Gods will be done
on earth as in heaven. What is Gods
will, that now prevails in heaven, and
that men are taught to pray should
prevail also on earth?
Mems conception of heaven varies.
No one knows what the after-life will
be like. We cannot even prove scien-
tifcally that there is an after-life. We
only know that somehow it has been
given our finite souls to picture an in
finite life, in which the wrongs of this
life are righted, and men are dealt
with justly.
But we all have our idea of that i'm
mortal life to which we all, openly
or secretly, look forward, And every
mans conception OF heaven, it is safe
to say, embraces these ideals: Love,
perfect Justice, no poverty or sickness
or sin. This is the heaven, indeed,
that Jesus pictured. 1t is Gods will
according to Jesus that heaven be
ordered along these lines.
If, then, it is Gods will that love
reign in heaven, that perfect justice
be done, that there be no poverty, no
sickness, no sin, in heaven, it is equally
his will that these same conditions pre-
vail on earth. Jesus taught us to
pray that his will be done on earth as
in heaven. Day after day we utter
the prayer. But do we actually pray
it?
Gods will isn't done on earth; that
we all admit. We would also, probab-
ly, all admit that, under the present
system of industry, it can't be done.
Men who pray that Gods will be done
on earth as in heaven assert in every
day life that this is an impossible
prayer, because, they say, only the
hope of getting ahead" will make
men work-and getting ahead" is the
exact antithesis of what happens in
heaven. There, as Jesus taught his
disciples, men don't try to get ahead
Of other men; there the greatest among
men is he who serves most.
So the getting ahead" spirit, the
system of business competition of
which sometimes we hear men boast,
is something utterly at variance with
the Lords prayer. 1t prevents the
doing of Gods will on earth as in
heaven. AS long as fit is maintained
it will make impossible the coming of
Gods kingdom. The man who prays
that Gods will be done on earth as in
heaven, and then insists on the main
tenance of an industrial system based
on competition, denies his own prayer.
For see what this anti-C Christian, I'M
Cody system does. 1t ddestroys all
possibility of brotherly love, leading to
strife among men and classes, and
finally to bloody war. 1t banishes
justice, since it's effect is to give to
those who have, and to take from them
that have not, all that they possess.
And instead of banishing poverty and
sickness and sin it breeds all those
uniovely conditions.
Time was when men thought power
ty and sickness and sin were alike UNI
preventable. We know better now.
We know that poverty exists because
society wills it. We know that most
sickness can be banished We have
not yet conquered sin, and we do not
know that we shall ever be able to do
so, but we do know that the Danish
ment of poverty and sickness, and the
doing OF justice, and the replacement
of competition by cooperation, would
go far to uproot the causes of sin and
crime.
"They will be DONE" If we want
to make earth like heaven-it we really
mean what we pray-isn't it our duty
to use our voice, our energy, our bal
lots, to bring about conditions easily
within the reach of modern civilization,
and which will, if not make the earth
entirely heaven, at least Danish for
ever some of the most hideous and
most hellish of our present fauntings
of Gods will? Fargo, N. D., CurrSer-
News.
Plow, plant and prosper runs the
latest slogan of the anti-farmer crowd
in North Dakota. The farmers plowed
and planted last year and many years
before, but prosperity is bird that
roOsts in Wall C+roo+ D,E4:.: