The Manchester journal. [volume] (Manchester, Vt.) 1861-current, 1922-07-27
CHAOS RULES
AMERICAN HOMES
Without Religion, Nation viii De-
cay and Finally Perish, EpiSco-
pal Church Report Asserts

New York.-'The church must take
uote Of these facts In some way other
than merely personal exhortati0n,' de
clares report on the average Ameri.
can home and family life which is
made public here by the National
Council Of the Protestant Episcopal
Church.
The report win be presented formal
ly in September at the forty-seyenth
trlennial convention Of the Protestant
Episcopal Church in Portland, ore.
II speaks OF American home life as
'in a state of chaos-the broken dis
cordant home life OF the American peO-
ple-the frightful dissolution Of the
marriage tie going on in America and
its inevitable consequence race sui
eide. increasing throngs in the divorce
courts, weeping women, unhappy men,
children orphaned, not by Gods VIII,
but by the sefishness of parents"
Speaking further Of marriage, the re-
port says: "PrOstltuted as 1t Is in the
United States 10 a mere means for
physical union-a legalized form OF
cOncubinage-it will produce the re
suit OF increasing sterility as II has
always done In the past"
The report deplores the destructive
effect Of Industrial development on the
ideal Of the family, the impairment OF
the social and moral standard OF Chris
tian living and the loss of sufficient
leisure for mental. moral and spiritual
culture, due to speeding up OF the
Industrial pace.
II recommends that "the criminal
feeble-minded and morally vicious
ought TO be prevented from propogat-
ing their kind and recommends also
IAN lnslstence upon health certificates
AS an antecedent to marriage"
mo small part OF the problem OF the
family" according to the report, de
pends upon the enactment OF a ma
tional law providing for uniform mar
rage and divorce throughout the Unit
ed States. A bill Is now before Con
ETtSS. WHICH IL NfiiOhHlg
ed TO the convention.
The commission also heartily In
dorses the warning uttered by the
great Lambeth Conference OF Bishops
in London in 1920 against the practice
OF means for avoiding conception as
involving grave dangers to physical
health as well as TO moral Innocence
and threatening the future of the hui
man race.
"We touch the root OF the family
problem when we point to the lack
OF religion in the home. Sunday Is a
day for extra sleeping. motoring. Sun.
day papers in many volumes, comic
When the mother, lying
in bed half buried under the Sunday
paper. calls 10 little Willie to drop the
colored supplement TO go to Sunday
school. or father, on his back under
the automobile getting ready for the
DAYS outing orders Jack and Lucy to
be gone. these poor waits will wander
off TO church along with the dim
thought that when they are grown up |
they also will do as they please.
Fathers and mothers are abdlcatlng |
their highest privilege when they leave
to Sunday school teachers or more
likely 10 servants, school mates or the
chlld's own heart, the teaching OF
morals and religion.
The first seven years OF the child's /
Ilfe are a mothers unrivaled oppor-
tunlty. No power on earth can equal
he influence OF a spiritually minded
mother. Then. when the critical age
" adolescence comes, the father will
nave his day and reveal his quality
rhe boy IS no longer like plastic clay
n the hands Of a mothers love and
experience. but being OF new mysteri-
Jus passions looking eagerly for his
,wn place In life Then especially he
needs the strong hand of the par
.nts who believe that forming his boy
,haracter Is a mans job.
This nation vii decay snd finally
perish when American homes cease 70
.evere God Advanced culture did not
ave past Civilizations