Evening star., 1925-01-28
Brotherhood at Home Called
Background Required for
Foreign Mission Work.
CRITICIZES UNWORTHY
IN GUISE OF CHRISTIANS
Spread Best of Which Society Is
Capable, Farley Delegates
Told by President.

Christian churches and govern
ments were declared by President
Coolidge today to have no greater
responsibility than TO make sure that
the best, and not the worst, of which
Christian society is capable, shall be
given to the other peoples"
This with other views on the for
eign missionary question were pre-
sented by the President in an ad-
dress to the meeting here OF the for
eign missions conference of North
America, an interdenominationa
gathering of the foreign mission in
tereSts of the Protestant churches
of the United States and Canada.
Scores False Christianity.
Not everything that the men of
Christian countries have carried to
the other peoples of the world has
been good and helpful to those who
have received it," the President said.
We know that the missionary move
ments have repeatedly been ham,
pered, and at times frustrated, because
some calling themselves Christians.
and assuming. to represent Christian
civilization, have been actuated by
un-Christian motives. Our mis-
just in proportion as we shall render
them in the same spirit of brother
hood and charity which marked the
earliest Christian missions"
Mr.. Coolidge emphasized that the
Christian nations had become in a
practical as well as a spiritual sense
charged with great trust for
civilization. In the discharge of this
trust. particularly in it's spiritual
ha
could be rendered only under the
inspiration of a broad and genuine
liberalism"
His speech in full follows:
Delegates Are Welcomed.
at is a pleasure to receive and
welcome here the members of this
international conference in the in
terest of Christian missionary work
throughout the world. One of the
most Christian things / have OBJ
served about organized Christianity
is the missionary spirit which per-
vades it. 1t was this spirit which
from the beginnings gave to the
gospel of Christ its power over the
hearts of men. For it is of the es-
sence of Christian ethics and spirit
uality that those who have once felt
their full inspirations are thereafter
enlisted in carrying these blessings
to all who need them.
Whoever will study that wonder
full story of the spread of Christian
tty throughout the Roman world in
the early centuries of our era must
get from it a deep conviction of the
service which was rendered. In a
time when the old pagan systems
were breaking down, when civiliza-
tton was falling into decadence and
corruption, the Christian
faith came, with it's new and better
of life. 1t revealed a real
justice and real mercy. 1t brought
promise of Immortality, a vision of
man as the possessor of a soul that
should not perish. To a world in
which the vast majority were born
to lives of hopelessness and misery,
1t brought realization of a new des-
tiny. The basis of this new concept
was brotherhood. Its essence was an
which, towering into
the wonderful missionary movement
of those early centuries, sought to
carry the new dispensation to all
mankind.
Animated By Faith.
Those early Christians, living so
near to the time of the apostolic mis-
"Aoii' aiiiihdISu ny d zeal ana q
simple faith which, If they could be
revived in all their early power. would
bring to our world a great blessing.
We have come upon a time which men
often compare to the later generations
of Roman history. Just as, in that
older time, there was need for the
spirit of Christianity in the world, so
now there is need for revival of
faith, dedication to the works which
that revived faith would show to us
as the need of the race, and a renewal
of the spirit of brotherhood at all
times and in all places.
THE Christian nations have become.
in an intensely practical as well as
a highly spiritual sense. charged with
a great trust for civilization. What
ever misgivings we may sometimes
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