Richmond daily register. (Richmond, Madison County, Ky.) 1917-1978, 1922-09-01
CARPENTER GIVES
STIRRING MESSAGE
To international Convention of
Disciples-Richmond Preach
er Strikes High Notes
(By Associated Press1

economic ills of the world and
the minister of the local church
is the key tc the success of the
whole missionary enterprise, DR..
! Homer w. Carpenter, pastor of
the First Christian church of
! Richmond, Ky, today told the
| International Convention of Dis
ciples of Christ. His subject
was "For Such An Hour as
f; This" He sDkoe as follows:
"For Such An Hour AS This"
J At the heart of dramatic
conversation between Mordecai,
an ancient Jew. and beautiful
Esther, queen OF Ahasuerus, is
! this significant question, "Who
knoweth but that thou art come
into the kingdom for such an
hour as this?" This question Of
the hong ago is still vibrant with
meaning in our modern world
and must seem peculiarly person
al to every religious leader OF
Cur day, said DIR. Carpenter. For
Sueh an hour as this What time
is it i'll history? In the ongoing
OF Gods great plan, what is the
| hour striking now on the dial?
Ask General Smuts, South Afri-
can statesman, and he answers
back, at is Gods great creative
hour" ASK Rabindranath Ia
gore, mystic of the east. and in
musical words he replies, "Be-
hind the patient dawn of the
east, the morning waiteth, meek
and silent Ask Fletcher Brock
man and he will say, "Here today
all the past finds its focus and
all the future finds its begin
ming" Ask Hamilton Holt and
Lis answer is this, "Today is the
beginning of a modern world" y
Whatever these may mean by
such mysterious and prophetic
phrases. without any sort of
doubt-they~ interpret sthe mind of
our day as it senses the unusual,
the urgent and the strategic.
There are certain facts in con
nection with Our present day
which cannot have escaped even
the casual observer Of currei
eltns. The first is this, that the
world order in which we live IS
one of desperate extremity A
metropolitan newspaper of few
months ago carried on the front
page of the same issue two
strange and significant headlines.
The one said Millions Starving
in the East" On the same front
page there was another head
line Farmers Burn Corn for
Fuel in the Middle West" You
will agree that an economie or
der in which millions die for
want of food, while on the other
side of the world men burn food
for fuel. because there is no mar
ket or ii is one of desperate ex-
trenity. America was startled
few DAYS ago as the cables eli k
ed back from Genoa the declara
ton Of Lloyd George that a
great war involving the leading
nations of the world was not only
possible but probable in Europe
at an early date. 1t was the
declaration not of lurid news
paper reporter but Of the most
powerful statesman of our day
and this with the battlehelds of
three continents scarcely cleared
OF their millions of dead, and
with these same nations still
staggering under the burden OF
the late war. There are many
other facts such as these that
would add their witness, facts as
startling as they are inescapable.
The clock of history is striking
the hour of desperate extremity.
The second fact is this, that
the religion of Christ is the only
way out. In the presence of the
tragic and colossal failure Of
the philosophy of materialism
and in the light of the nations
history of these thousands of
years, the better minds of Our
time almost unanimously bear
witness to the fact that the prin-
ciples of Christianity alone can
heal our social and economic /,
ills, save the nations from saw
agery Of war and build a world
order which shall be for the COM
mon good of the total race.
Bergson declares that the need
of the hour is the recovery of
spiritual control. He says that
our bodies have become too big
for Our souls. Bernard Shaw,
CONTINUED on page a /