Evening star., 1925-11-26
BISHOP BRISTOL
DEPL0RES DIVORCE
Declares Ideal Home" to Be
''Mighest Goal" in Vigor-
ousIy AssaiIing Its Enemies.

Declaring the ideal home" to be
the highest goal and most consum
mate achievement of the social and
political, economic and Industrial
moral and educational movements OF
humanity" Bishop Frank NJ. Bristol
delivering the Thanksgiving sermon
at Metropolitan Methodist Episcopal
Church today enumerated many fac
tors in American life blessing the
home, but vigorously assailed its enc
mics, past and present including slav-
cry, the saloon, war and especially d.
vorce
1T should be made difficult. not easy
to break the marriage bond" de-
clared the bishop. The divorce laws
of our States should at least be so
uniform as to preclude the possibility
of one State destroying the home of
another State.
rs 1t too much t. hope that the
time is not far distant when a world
wide international uniformity of di
vorce laws will make it impossible for
Paris to destroy a Washington home?
Pointing to the recent warning by
President Coolidge against the grow
ing laXitY of parental discipline and
control over children. Bishop Bristol
directed several pointed questions In
that direction and toward divorce:
Duty of Parents.
Us there a growing Indifference or
| the part of parents to the moral and
religious training of their children:
| The parents Of our country must save
the homes of our country.
rs there reason for lamenting the
decline of the oldfashioned veneratior
| for home? Is there danger of the
! home $ losing that sanctifying, revivi
! lying and preserving vitality which
| comes from a regard for the sanctity
| of marriage?
What can have more demoraliz
! ing effect upon the home in destroy
| ing the children's veneration for their
parents than the multiplying occasions
for divorce. and the inadequacy, lax
ity and unchristian spirit of our di
Vorce laws-better say divorce Ii
censes'?"
Turning to the question of prohibi
! ton. Bishop Bristol said the American
people had "prOhibited the saloon in
order that the saloon might not pro
| hibit the home"
Today, therefore, any friend Of the
! saloon is an enemy of the American
home" declared the speaker. ANY
friend of the rum traffic is an enemy
Of the Constitution. Repeal the
tuition? The people will serve notice
on future legislators, on Representa-
tives and Senators. governors and
mayor, Presidents, presidential as
pirantS and candidates. that this coun
| try has never repealed itself back
ward. and never will. The eighteenth
amendment will stand as long as the
! Constitution stands. In the name OF
| home, and womanhood. Of country
| and humanity. the demagogue must
| leave his dirty hands off the fan
! escutcheon of the Constitution, thai
| guardian angel of the American
| home"
Although the institution of slavery
was declared by the speaker to have
| passed. he asked: Has the grinding
| subjugation of labor ceased? Is no,
underpaid labor, underfed labor home
less labor "a sort of slavery? Wher
the laborer has no vine nor fig tree
under which he and his may sit with
! out fear, when his wage is too small
| for him to buy and own n comfort
| able home. is he far removed from the
! slave? There are too man,
| house renters and too few home own
| home, you may rent a house, bu
not "A home. A mans home is hi.
| by rights of property and persona
! possession. In only a limited sense
| and by pleasant fiction 4 man:
| donicile is his home. Where the fam
| lily dwells, though temporarily, tha
| is home, to be safeguarded as jeal
| ously as home of property pos
| session."
| The keynote by which Jesus Chris
would harmonic a discordant worl,