1

Mmim## Bib?

JM. Si. HJiltztua do.

Jfflflmmtbw Kern fndt

JJufaHafjfru.





THE BUSINESS SIDE OF

RELIGION

BY

REV.
J. T. ROCHE, LL. D.

AUTHOR OF

“The Ought-to-Bes," “Belief and Unbelief

“The Obligation ofHearing Mass, ”

Our Lady of Guadalupe, ”

“Month of St. Joseph
,”

“St. Anthony of Padua, ” etc., etc.

THE M. H. WILTZIUS COMPANY
MILWAUKEE AND NEW YORK

1908



NIHIL OBSTAT,

REV. H. B. RIES,

Censor Librorum .

IMPRIMATUR.

* SEBASTIANUS GEBHARDUS,

Archiepiscopus Milwauchiensis.

Copyrigrht 1908 by The M. H. WILTZIUS CO.



-

AUTHOR’S PREFACE.

At the request of many pastors, I have collected

the following articles and put them in their present

prominent form. The subject is one which will

always be of interest. It deals with the first of all

human problems, the problem of existence. The

Church can not exist or carry on its work without

money or its equivalent. The truest test at the same

time of Christian piety is that spirit of self-sacrifice

which finds expression in the generous support of the

Church and its varied institutions. I have endeavored

to set forth catholic teaching on the duty of giving

and to apply this teaching to conditions as we find

them in this country. Imperfect as this little book is

in many ways, I believe it is the fullest treatment of

the subject to be found in any language.



The Business Side of Religion

CHAPTER I.

The Priest-Financier

Not Easy.

The average pastor nowadays has to be something

of a financier. The science of raising funds for church

purposes is not an easy one. ' It is not learned from

books, but is acquired in the great school of the world,

known as experience.

Beautiful and high-sounding theories have been

promulgated from time to time about the best ways of

procuring such funds
;
but after all has been said and

done, it is the pastor himself, who has to go out and

raise them. Ultimately the support of the whole

organization falls upon his shoulders. Peter’s pence,

the bishop’s cathedraticum and the funds wherewith

the diocesan institutions are maintained, all pass

through his hands.

In raising these moneys, theories are sometimes

forced to give way to cold, hard facts. The one little

thing which upsets most theories, is the fact that the

support of religion is purely voluntary on the part of

the people. There is, of course, a more or less in-

definite law, commanding -the~-faithful to contribute

according- to their means. This law, however, is a

good deal like the Protestant doctrine of private judg-

ment. It is sometimes very liberally interpreted and

frequently disregarded entirely bv people who would

promptly resent the imputation of being bad Catholics.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 0

It is the pastor who has to grapple constantly with

this cheap Catholicity, and who has to make the best

of a bad situation, without driving the “poor pays”

from the church through the enforcement of iron-clad

rules. To his credit be it said that he generally suc-

ceeds in making both ends meet, and the proportion of

financial failures amongst Catholic pastors is smaller

than amo'ngst any other class of business men the

world over.

Not the Same.

I have heard people from time to time grow merry

at the expense of the priest-financier; but I have seen

lay management tried and I have frequently seen it

given up in disgust and even while it lasted it was the

priest himself, who had to go out and raise the money

for necessary expenses.

The methods and principles of ordinary business

are not applicable to conditions, in which the obliga-

tion to pay is binding only in conscience. There are

too many flexible consciences and too many people

without any sense of honor or honesty, when it comes

to the payment of church debt. The priest must not

forget, at the same time, the higher considerations.

The welfare of immortal souls must remain ever and

always his dominating principle. He realizes that if

it ever comes to a choice between a man’s soul and his

money, he must endeavor to save the soul, even if he

has to look somewhere else for the money. He knows
well that there is something radically wrong with the

spirituality of a man who is willing to enjoy the bene-

fits and consolations of religion, without making any

of the sacrifices which religion entails
;
but he knows,

too, that some people have peculiar ways of forming



6 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

their consciences, so he leaves them to God and does

the best he can.

The average amount of business done, annually, by

the pastors of the country reaches a surprising array

of figures. In this age of brick and mortar, there is

much to do in the building line, and provision must

be made for future contingencies as well as for present

needs. The penny-wise and pound-foolish attitude

will not do. The pastor must be broad enough and

far-sighted enough to lay the foundations for future

growth. To do this, he must sometimes burden the

present generation with debts, but he is noted, the

world over, for his ability to pay debts. The credit

of the Church everywhere throughout the country is

of the highest order and this fact is no mean tribute

to the man whose methods and labors have made it so.

His Return.

I am not detracting from the part played by the

laity in all of this. Their turn will come later on. I

am merely striving to remove a false impression, which

exists in many quarters, to the effect that priests, as a

class, are poor financiers. I believe that it can be con-

clusively shown, that, as a class they are exceptionally

able business men, and that very many of them are

financiers of the highest order. The real cause for

surprise is, frequently, that, with such limited means

at their disposal, they have been able to accomplish so

much.

The average layman knows little or nothing about

the expenses incident to the running of a parish. He

figures from the limited cost of his own household,

and wonders why it is that a
r
parish cannot be con-

ducted along similar economical lines. He forgets



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 7

that it is a dual, and - where- there TS^’sxdrodi, a triprter

establishment, with added expenses for fuel, lighting,

insurance, diocesan assessments, repairs, improvements

and the thousand and one things which go to make

up the expense account of every institution in exist-

ence. He sometimes forgets, too, that the priest is a

tax-gatherer, not by choice but necessity.

This collecting business is the most unpleasant

part of a priest’s life. It *is so unpleasant that, if the

average pastor knew beforehand the humiliations he

would be forced to undergo, in order to contend with

this business side of religion, there would be a great

dearth of priestly laborers. It is well for the Church

that God mercifully conceals from the young levite

the mean and sordid side of humanity.

A priest-friend of mine declares that he has always
had to do two dollars worth of work for every dollar

which he has ever received. It is not the work, how-

ever, to which the priest objects. It is the grudging

spirit with which the just dues of religion are paid.

It is the lack of appreciation and the forgetfulness of

the fact that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, it

is not for himself but for the people and for their

children’s children for whom he is working and striv-

ing. He does not expect earthly riches. He set all

hopes of these aside when he became a priest. He

does expect gratitude and appreciation and even these

are frequently denied him.



8 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

CHAPTER II.

The Generous Third

A Case in Point.

A priest of Indianapolis, recently told me a charac-
teristic story. It was of four Catholic men, who came

from a small neighboring town to take a high degree

in a well-known secret society. It appears that a letter

from the pastor is one of the requirements of this

degree, as those who take it are supposed to be the

very creme de la creme of Catholicity.

They were unable, however, to produce the neces-

sary letter from the pastor and gave as their reason

for not doing so, the peculiarly cranky disposition of

that good man. He was represented as being old,

unprogressive, opposed to secret societies in general

and to this one in particular. On their united testi-
mony, he had refused point-blank and without any

cause whatsoever to affix his signature to the harmless

certificate of good character, required for the occasion.

The priest, who was himself a member of the society,

after hearing their story, concluded to investigate. He

called up the pastor by telephone and asked him the

reasons for his refusal. The old man hastened to

assure him that the aforesaid gentlemen could come

to him and very readily receive the letters asked for,

simply by paying their back pew rent in full. All four

were delinquent in their church dues and he was tak-

ing this means of enforcing payment. The old man

also took occasion to remark that men aspiring to be

considered representative Catholics ought to give' some

substantial evidence of their faith;, and that in his



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 9

opinion the societies of the Church would do well to

pay particular attention to the financial shortcomings

of their members.

It was the old story over again of the pastor, who

had suffered a sudden loss of popularity, merely be-

cause he insisted on making the payment of Church

dues a test of genuine Catholicity.

Three Classes.

I have heard it said by priests of experience and of

long standing in the ministry, that our Catholic people

can be divided into three classes, viz :—the one-third,
who pay more than their share, the one-third, who pay

as little as they can and the one-third, who pay noth-

ing or almost nothing. This general summing-up may

not be true of all localities and conditions, but my own

experience leads me to believe that, for our people

taken as a whole, it is a more or less correct one.

There is in every parish a certain percentage of those,

who, as the saying goes are “hanging on to the Church

by the eye-lashes”. They go to church rarely, seldom

or never approach the sacraments, except perhaps dur-

ing the time of a mission, and their contributions are

not regarded as playing any noticeable part in the

solution of the financial problem. The pastor is glad

to see them come to church, if only occasionally, and

he hopes against hope that the time will come when

they will realize the inconsistency of their conduct and

become faithful children of the Church and regular

contributors.

Their difficulty, in nine cases out of ten, is a finan-

cial one. They would come to church more regularly



10 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

if they were not expected to pay. It is cheap Chris-

:ianity, sometimes, almost (if possible), as detrimental

in its effects, as weak morals and decayed faith.

There is still a large percentage of those, who

scarcely ever think of missing Mass or of being remiss

in their ordinary spiritual duties. They are devout,

in their own way, and some of them approach the

sacraments frequently. When it comes to giving,
however, a chronic shyness seems to take possession

of them. They pay only under compulsion and then

grudgingly, wondering, all the time', why religion can-

not be dissociated from the eternal money question.

Some of them are honest and particular when it comes

to the payment of other debts; but they would gladly

welcome a return of the Church to the simplicity and

apostolic poverty of the early centuries, when the

pagans did not permit the faithful to build churches

and when the preachers, like St. Paul, were sometimes

forced to earn their living in the sweat of their brows.

The Old Stand-Bys.

There are lastly those who> do their share and

more than their share. These make it possible1 for the

Church to exist. If it were not for them, we might

close our religious establishments and arrange to have

services at infrequent intervals in some of the more

important centres of population. The prosperity and

growth of the Church is the result of their efforts.

They were the main-stay in the past—in the days of
the pioneer bishops and priests who laid the founda-

tions of the Church’s present wealth. They are the

main-stay today of every form of pious benevolence.

Schools, hospitals, seminaries, orphanages, academies

and every species of Catholic endeavor ultimately de-



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 11

pends upon them for support. Their names come first

on the collection and subscription lists. They are not

necessarily the most devout, but their professions of

piety bear the genuine stamp ©f self sacrifice. They

are not, as a class, those that are best-off from a stand-

point of worldly goods, but as a class they are those

that are most respected and honored in every com-

munity. “The good pay” in matters of religion is

generally a good pay in matters of business. They

strive to live within their meahs and to be just and

honorable in all their dealings. What they have to

give, they give cheerfully and ungrudgingly. They

take it for granted that the men who minister at the

altar will make the best possible use of the money that

is paid into the treasury of the Church. Their respon-

sibility ends, in a certain sense, with the fulfilment of

their own duty. If the temporalities of religion be

wasted and dissipated the fault is not theirs.' They

have seen very little, however, in the management of

Church affairs in this country to make them anxious

as to how their money is going to be spent.

They are behind the pastor too in every worthy

undertaking. Whenever property is to be acquired,

or a church or school to be built, they are there with

the sympathy and encouragement which sometimes

means more than money. They are not critical or

given to boasting as to the amount of past contribu-

tions. They, themselves, sometimes make mistakes in

business matters and they make allowance for mis-

takes when made by their pastors. If all the faithful

were of this class, the business side of religion would

be without those perplexing problems that vex and

harass the souls of pastors the country over.



12 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

CHAPTER III.
-

The Poor Pays

How He Knew.

An old and frequently told story runs to the effect
that a Western Catholic, looking about in New York,
for an apportunity to hear Mass on Sunday, wandered

into an Episcopal edifice and began to say his prayers.

As soon as the services opened, he discovered his

mistake and leaving he wandered about in search of a

real Catholic Church. He finally came to what looked
like one, but as he entered a clergyman in cassock and

surplice was mounting the pulpit. He stood at the

door and awaited developments. They soon came.

The first announcement made by the preacher bore

upon the large number of those who were delinquent

in the matter of paying Pew Rent. It was enough.

The opening announcement was one he had often heard

in his own church out west, and it was a sure sign he

was amongst his own -brethren.

The delinquent members or the poor pays are the

bane of every form of business. They create all the

problems of the commercial world, and they must be

reckoned with in every enterprise in which capital is

invested. There is no monopoly big enough to leave

them out of its calculations. There is no infant in-

dustry small enough to escape the consequences of

their shortcomings. In the realm of trade, they are

a constantly disturbing factor, in business matters per-

taining to religion they are a chronic source of irrita-

tion, anxiety and dissatisfaction. They cannot be

counted upon, when they are most needed. They

always fail the pastor at the critical moment—the
moment when bills fall due and when he needs real



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 13

cash rather than empty promises and unreliable assur-

ances of future assistance.

They pay something, of course, from time to time.

Their remittances, however, are never regarded in the

light of an available asset. They are too irregular,

too uncertain and too long delayed.

Priests Too Gentle.

The pastor of a cathedral parish in the East, told

me not long ago of a gentleman, who had held a front

pew for five long years without paying so much as a

single cent for the use of the same. He had

hypnotized the bishop with a hard luck story which

had served its purpose during all that time. When it

finally came to a time, when he had to pay or give up

his pew, he grew insolent and threatened to file a bill

of complaints against the pastor. Such people never

get their just deserts. Priests are too gentle and too

considerate for their feelings. A lusty janitor with a
strong right arm and no qualms of conscience is

urgently needed in a case of this kind.

Another priest pointed out to me, in his church,

what he was irreverent enough to call “a cheap saint”.

The “saint” in question was a widowed lady of con-

siderable wealth. She moved in high society and the

accounts of her receptions sometimes took up consider-

able space in the local newspapers. She was a fre-

quent communicant and bore all the external earmarks

of real piety. When it came to contributing, however,
she was always ready with an excuse. She was so

gentle and sweet about it too, that the pastor did not

have the heart to adopt severe measures. “She is a

pious old fraud” he said, “and we will try to get

along without her money, but I have more respect for



14 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

people who pay more and pray less”. It was a rough

way of putting a plain truth, but the pastor was

right This woman's piety was destitute of the ele-

ment of self-sacrifice. She had money for everything

else but the support of religion. She was like a good

many more of our fashionable Catholic people. They

want the Church and the pastor to be ultrafashionable,

but they leave it to the common people to pay the cost.

A Tempting Offer.

A friend of mine, who is now the pastor of an im-
portant parish in the city of Detroit, was sent in the

early days of. his missionary career, to take charge of

a little French congregation in an outlying portion of

the state of Michigan. The good old priest who had

just died, had been their pastor for many years. He

had inherited considerable wealth from his parents in

France, and, as the people knew it, their remittances

grew less and less each year. The last financial state-

ment showed that the total receipts of the parish from

all sources were something less than $200.00 for the

whole year. The new pastor determined to have an

understanding right from the start. He had no wealth

of his own to fall back upon, and he made up his mind

then and there that radical measures were necessary.

In his very first sermon he explained the condition of

things to the people, told them what he wanted and

invited the men of the parish to meet after Mass for the

purpose of devising ways and means of raising the

needed revenue.

As soon as the meeting was called to order, one of

the patriarchs of the place arose and calmly told the

new pastor that he was not wanted. They wanted, he

said, the bishop to send them a good simple, old man,



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 15

like the late incumbent, one who wanted little and was

easily satisfied. Others spoke in the same strain.

They did not want those young American dude priests,

who had to have a big salary and many other un-

necessary comforts. He could go back to Detroit and

they would ask the bishop for a priest of simpler

tastes.

The humorous side of the situation appealed to the

pastor, so he made them a startling offer. It was to

the effect that those present appoint a committee and

go to Detroit and lay the whole matter before the

bishop. If they succeeded in inducing the bishop to

change him from that to some other place, he offered to

pay their fare there and back and to donate $100 to the

church as an evidence of his sympathy with their feel-

ings in the matter. Needless to say, his offer was not

accepted. It began to slowly dawn upon them, that

the young pastor was making sport of them and that

the acceptance of his offer would place them in a

ridiculous light with the bishop,

A Vain Hope.

I have sometimes wondered if any priest has

ever encountered a case in which a poor pay has

desired to make restitution on his death-bed. 1

have prepared many of those people for death,
and I have followed the theological injunction

of not disturbing a possible good faith. The Church

has always regarded the death-bed as a very poor

place for the collection of back dues. It is a

strange fact, nevertheless, that not only do such

people never think of making reparation, but they

do not make provision for the charity of which they



lfi BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

may stand in dire need. The poor pays seldom make

provision, in their wills, for Masses, and if they make

such provision, their wishes in this matter, strange to

say, are not always complied with, as poor pays, as a

rule, are very unfortunate in the character of their

heirs.

Not long since, a pastor in a nearby city was called

into court in an action to quiet the title to some

property. He was surprised to find an old bequest for
Masses, which had never been satisfied bv the Catholic

heirs who had inherited the property. One of them

was now coming into court for the purpose of evading

this sacred debt by due process of law.

The impiety, injustice, ingratitude and unnatural

cupidity of such a proceeding seemed to have no weight

with the man who was bent solely upon clearing away

the cloud resting upon the title.

The men and women who are acquiring property

with the confident hope that their children will make

due reparation for their sins of covetousness and greed,

ought to know by this time that such reparation is

never made. The wealth of the penurious is generally

a curse to those who inherit it. The last thing such

heirs think of is that of making reparation for in-

justice, uncharity or fraud. One thing has been shown

by experience and that is that the graves and the souls

of the covetous are generally neglected by those to

whom they leave their property. It is a retribution

for the cupidity which closed its heart to the demands

of justice and religion. It is an ever-present object

lesson which has become so familiar that no one heeds

it.

Some one has said that the dead bear in their

clenched hands before the throne of God, only what



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 17

they have given away—in charity. If this be true
many will enter empty-handed.

CHAPTER IV.

Costs Them Nothing

Plain Talk.

It is not a question here of the poor, of those who

are not able to pay. From these the Church asks and

expects nothing. It is a question of those, who are

able to pay and who will not.

Let there be no mincing of words and no misunder-

standings. Vague words and gentle hints in a case of

this kind are worse than useless. They elicit nothing

but faint smiles from those for whom they are chiefly

intended. Pastors have sinned through excessive

gentleness and these people have come to believe that

they can pursue their course, with impunity. If the

shoe pinch, we want it to pinch so good and hard that

its effects will be felt in the collection-box next

Sunday, and on other Sundays throughout the

year. We have all been in the habit of treating
those people too gingerly. We credit them with feel-
ings which they do not possess. The real truth is that

they are destitute of shame; they are devoid of self-

respect. The plainest kind of plain talk is what they

need and nothing else will do.

Again, let there be no misunderstandings. I am

treating of people who still claim to be Catholics, who

frequent Catholic churches, at least from time to time,

who approach the sacraments at more or less irregular

intervals, who do not hesitate to call for a priest in



18 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION

time of serious illness, who cherish the hope of dying in

the state of grace and of being buried with the last

rites of the Church. They worship in edifices, towards

the construction of which they have contributed little

or nothing. They hear the Mass of the priest whom
others support. They enjoy all the facilities of Divine

worship for which others pay and they do this year

after year because there are enough of generous people

to bear the burdens which they should share, and be-

cause the traditional charity of the priesthood hesitates

about publicity exposing the shortcomings of any parti-

cular class of sinners.

Plainer Still.

The following extract from a letter received with-

in the past few days from a well-known pastor in the

city of Buffalo, N. Y., is very much to the point:

“Don’t mince words in the treatment of your subject.

We are entirely too easy. I have people attending
my church, the color of whose money I have never
seen. I have people occupying pews for the use of

which I have never received a dollar. I have people

coming to Mass, Sunday after Sunday, and crowding

the good pays out of their pews. They simply will

not do their duty in the matter of contributing, and

warnings and admonitions seem to be a mere waste

of words. They have no shame, no sense of justice,

no honor. I was going to add no religion, but I will

not presume to judge in so weighty a matter. Every

parish in the country has its quota of just such people

and pastors everywhere are puzzled over the problem

of how to bring them to time. I believe there is one

way. Force them out into the light. Focus public

opinion upon them and the problem is already half

solved.”



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 19

Always a Pretext.

When approached as to their reasons for not con-

tributing, these people are always found to have a

pretext. The commonest pretext is that they are dis-

satisfied with the management of the parish. It is an

ancient and a venerable one, and even in the days of

the Prophet Jeremias it was suffering seriously from

overwork. Perhaps the pastor has been imprudent

enough to contract a debt without their advice or per-

mission, or it may be that he has erected a building

which, in their judgment, was wholly unnecessary.

Perhaps he has been too frank in his money-talks and

has in this way offended their sensibilities, which are

generally very acute. Then there is the old plea of

that much-talked-about early Christian, Ananias and

his close-fisted wife Sapphira. It is the plea of pre-

tended poverty. The tragic fate of that historic

couple does not seem to have deterred penurious

Christians, in our own days, from making similar pleas.

These people like nothing better than a frequent

change of pastors. The man who remains for any

length of time in charge of a parish is their natural

enemy. He knows them and that is enough. They
are generally, however, the first on the ground to

welcome a ne'w pastor, and their protestations of

future support and sympathy are of a character to

deceive the young and inexperienced. The old-timers

are not so easily deceived. They have met them before

and they recognize them almost immediately. They

are very suspicious, too, of the critics of former admin-

istrations. They know that the old guard, the tried

and trusted friends of former pastors can always be

depended upon to do the right thing. They accord-

ingly listen and say nothing, being content to wait for



20 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

whatever the future may unfold. They know, too,

that the critics and “knockers” of a congregation are

largely recruited from this class and that their griev-

ances are, in nine cases out of ten, financial ones.

They could be really sweet and agreeable Christians,

if they were not expected to pay.

The saddest thing in connection with this whole

matter concerns the children. It is a well-established

fact that many of them fall away from the Church.

It could not well be otherwise. From the beginning

they are, in a certain sense, religious outcasts. They

soon come to understand the anamalous position of

their parents and they feel keenly many things which

have no effect upon the parents themselves. They

are taught to believe that the Church is a mercenary

institution and that priests are altogether too much

interested in the financial side of their sacred calling.

They become gradually embittered against both church

and priest, and the final step of separation is easily

taken.

Poor Parishes.

I read an article in a Boston paper, not long ago,

treating of a Protestant congregation at Plymouth,

Mass., in which it was stated that the people neither

attended church or gave to its support and that, as a

consequence, they had to have a new preacher every

year. The retiring pastor always gave up in disgust

and his successor became suddenly unpopular, as soon

as he began to demand his promised salary.

If Catholic pastors could pack up and leave, every

time their salary was not forthcoming, there would be

many vacant parishes everywhere throughout the

land. Many of them undergo positive privations and



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 21

suffer on in silence, rather than appeal to men and

women, who they know, by bitter experience, will

receive their appeal with studied indifference.

There are a few “poor parishes’', in every diocese.

They have not been termed “poor" by reason of the

poverty of the parishioners. They are poor, because

the people have never acquired the habit of giving

generously and freely. Appointment to them is re-

garded in the light of an exile, which some priests

must undergo, for a time, in order that they may

better appreciate decent parishes when the terms of

their probation have expired.

There are grave and prudent priests, who hold

that one of the best ways of making a poor pay a good

Catholic, is to make him pay. The mere fact of his

having paid creates a desire to get* his money's worth,

even in matters of religion. The real reason, however,

for the change of heart which is thus frequently noted,

lies in the added sense of self-respect and in the con-

sciousness that he is at last doing his duty. He is no

longer an intruder. He meets and mingles with his

religious brethren n terms of equality. He can now
employ, without compunction, the collective term “We"
in speaking of church affairs, and he1 feels that at last

he really belongs to the household of the Faith.

The religion too, which costs nothing generally

cost a good deal in things which cannot be measured

by a mere monetary standard. The loss of reputation,

friends, self-respect, honor in a community are con-

siderations which always have had weight with the

best elements of humanity. They cannot be overlooked

even by those who make the acquisition of the world’s

goods the chief aim and purpose of their existence
1

.

The heaviest cost of all is that which comes last. It

is the loss of that spiritual upbuilding which flows

from self-sacrifice and contributing to the support of



22 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

religion out of a pure intention is, according to all

authorities, a very meritorious form of self-sacrifice.

CHAPTER V.

Protestant Generosity

Begin Early.

My neighbor, who is not a Catholic, has a little
girl who is a faithful attendant at the Methodist Sun-

day school. During a recent visit she was telling me,

with considerable pride that she always gave to the

collections.

“We have two collections/' she said, “and I always
take six cents. Five cents is for the church collection

and one cent is for the Sunday school." “Some-

times," too, -she added, “we have three. Whenever

we have a birthday we have to give as many pennies

as we are years old, and this is for the missions."

“And do all the children give?" I asked. “Oh, yes,"

she replied. “I wouldn’t go to church unless I had the

money. I guess most of them would stay at home

too, if they didn’t have it
;
but they nearly always have

it." The attitude of this little Methodist girl has its

lesson for many of our grownup Catholics. It is a

tribute at the same time, to the character of the train-

ing which she receives at the hands of her spiritual

teachers.

Of course I know there are those amongst us who

resent the idea that we can learn anything from

Protestant methods. This, however, is the gravest



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 23

kind of a mistake. If Catholic interests suffer be-

cause of traditional slipshod methods, common sense

demands that new and better methods be adopted.

The Church possesses the sacred deposit of Faith, but

it has no monopoly upon business sagacity.

Better Trained.

I have heard it asserted time and again, that Catho-

lics, as a class, are better givers than Protestants. I

do not believe such to be the case. I believe, too,

that Protestants are more regular and systematic in

their giving, and that their methods do not leave so

many loopholes for the escape of the poor pays. The

children, too, are better trained than ours in the science

of giving, and the missionary activity of American

non-Catholics throws ours far into the shade.

These are unpleasant truths, but we have done con-

siderable boasting and a little of the plain, unvarnished

truth will not hurt. Spread-eagle descriptions of our

growth, our progress and our wealth have led many

people to believe that the Church in this Country is

getting along very nicely without their assistance.

No One Exempt.

Protestants approach the business side of religion

in a more business-like way. Amongst them the duty

of giving is always kept in the fore-front, and no one is

held exempt. We are less direct and to the point.
We hint and beat about the bush when we should come
out openly. We have no fixed rule of action, and as
a result, certain classes successfully evade all our

efforts. I will illustrate just what I mean. There are



24 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

hundreds of Catholic young men earning good wages,

who come to Church and sit in the family pew, and

still permit their parents to do all the paying. The

real truth of the matter is that they are better able to

contribute than a large class of married men, who are

supporting families on smaller wages than they re-

ceive. The same is true to a less extent of many of

our young women. This cannot happen in the aver-

age Protestant congregation, where each adult member

is expected to individually subscribe a certain definite

amount. In their dealings with the children, the same

hclds true. Every child is trained to do his or her

best, first towards the support of local interests, and

secondly towards the maintenance of missions at home

and abroad. The amount of money contributed by

Protestant children for missionary purposes is one of

the wonders of the century.

True, the sects have a certain advantage over us

in the method of church affiliation. A Catholic be-
comes a member of the Church when he is baptized.

A Protestant becomes a member when he is formally
affiliated.

When he is thus formally received into fellowship,

the obligation of bearing his share of the church’s bur-

dens is clearly set forth. There is nothing indefinite

about it. He is henceforth a member and one of the

duties of membership is that of contributing regularly

according to his means. There is consequently from

the beginning the benefit of this clear understanding.

He binds himself in black and white to give a certain

sum and the congregation knows what to expect from

its membership, taken as a whole.

Amongst us there is a general understanding that

young people ought to begin paying as soon as they

begin to be self-supporting; but as a rule of conduct,



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 25

this is very generally disregarded. We have shown
a reluctance at the same time about instructing children

as to a duty of giving, and this lack of instruction is

largely accountable for their shortcomings in these

matters in later years.

A World’s Wonder.

I think it can be truly said, too, that wealthy

Protestants, as a rule, are more generous than wealthy

Catholics. This is undeniable when it is a question

of contributions for missionary purposes. The sums

contributed for such purposes by American non-

Catholic millionaires have astonished the world. Our

Catholic millionaires with two or three honorable

exceptions, have given very little. This fact, alone, is

so remarkable that it has been commented on time and

again, but apparently without results. The same holds

true of the endowment of educational institutions.

Aside from Creighton University, Omaha, our higher

institutions of learning are badly crippled for funds

vitally necessary to carry on their work.

I would much rather under-draw than over-draw

the picture, but we have had a little too much of this

patting of ourselves on the backs, and a little too much

of the flamboyant style of jubilee oratory.

When the Methodists started a few years ago to
raise a twenty million New Century Mission Endow-
ment fund, everybody smiled. They raised it, how-

ever, within an incredibly short space of time. One

Methodist layman, from his desk at Kenosha, Wis.,

raised seven million, five hundred thousand dollars of

that fund through the medium of a type-written

appeal to Protestant men of wealth all over the coun-

try. There must be considerable love of God in the



26 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

hearts of men who give thus generously of their

means for the propagation of Christian teachings. It

is greatly to be regretted that their example is not

followed more generally by those who have the happi-

ness of belonging to the household of the true faith.

CHAPTER VI.

As It Seems to Others

Will Help Not Hurt.

“The business side of religion is a subject which

has been shirked altogether too long,” writes a Wis-

consin priest. “When we get a business conscience

formed in the laity, the scandal of money sermons and

the scolding and coaxing, that wears out the life of a

priest, will be eliminated. Business principles carried

out will not make the church more worldly, but will

allow the pastor to attend better to the spiritual.”

“Business conscience” is a good term. It means

simply that a strict sense of duty should prompt our

people to give the church debt the place of honor

among their financial obligations. Judged from every

standpoint, it ought to be the most sacred of all debts.

Too frequently it happens that it is the last debt to

receive attention. The “business conscience” of our

people certainly needs an awakening.

A woman said to me, not long ago, “Father, I had
some money saved up to pay my pew rent, but an
agent came along and induced me to buy something,

which I did not need, so you will have to wait.” In

other words, the pastor must wait to meet his financial



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 27

obligations until she finds it easy and convenient to

meet hers.

A Lame Excuse.

A wealthy farmer stopped me recently on the street
and said, “Father, I have bought a new farm, and as

I have had to go in debt to do this, I will not be able

to do much for the church during the coming year.”

“But, my dear man,” I said to him, “are you not really
richer today than you were a year ago? You have

prospered so that you feel justified in reaching out

and acquiring more property. You have put your

money in land instead of in the bank, and you make

your increased wealth a reason for economizing in the

matter of church dues. If a man, whose only in-

come is his daily wages, should come to me and tell

me his wages had been reduced, I would cheerfully

grant his request for a proportionate decrease; but

you—the richer you grow, the less you wish to pay.”
The attitude of this farmer is not an unusual one.

There is a saying amongst priests who live in agricul-

tural communities which is that “the richer the farmer

grows, the tighter he gets!” Their very debts fre-

quently represent increased wealth, but they furnish

them with much needed excuses. There is always a

mortgage, a poor crop, an epidetnic amongst live

stock or some other providential calamity to furnish

them with pretexts for refusing to give. There are

generous farmers, of course, even amongst the wealthy,

but as a class I do not believe that it can be said that

they give to the church in proportion to their means.



28 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

A Real Grievance.

“I am a poor pay,” writes an anonymous corres-

pondent, “and the shoe pinches. I sit in a rear pew,

because many of the respectable people, who sit up in

front, will not pay what they owe me. I have re-

mained away from church, I am sorry to say, rather

than be seen and not pay. Preach a few sermons on

the paying of just debts to the people, who have the

name of being generous donors, but at the expense of

grocers and butchers and bakers and business men,

who are often at their wits’ ends to obtain the means

wherewith to meet their bills.”

I believe that my anonymous friend is mistaken,

when he assumes that “respectable people”, who do not

pay their bills, are generous donors. As I asserted

once before, poor pays in the business world are gener-

ally poor givers. They are generous only when it is

a question of their own comfort or pleasure. No

priest wants the money which ought to go to the

payment of just debts. He has been taught to repu-

diate the generosity which comes before justice.

Time and again it has happened that gifts and be-

quests have been refused, because the acceptance of the

same would seem to be in violation of the principles

of justice and charity. These people, of whom he

writes, may sit in front pews, but I believe that a little

investigation will show that their pew rent, like the

rest of their bills, is long since overdue. When busi-
ness men cannot collect, it is a foregone conclusion

that the priest has failed.



BUSINESS SIDE OE RELIGION. 29

A Charge Refuted.

“I believe,” writes another, “that priests as a class,

are lacking in sympathy for the men and women who

supply the funds. They do not and cannot understand

the character of the problems, with which the contri-

butor is frequently face to face.”

I believe that nothing can be farther from the

truth than such an assertion. Priests, as a class,

know well the value of a dollar. Few of them are the

sons of wealthy parents. Before entering the sacred

ministry, many of them have worked hard for a living.

They understand well the frequency of the calls which

are made upon the wages of the average laboring

man. The only tainted money in their eyes, is that

of the poor, who can ill afford to give. It is a case

iti which every true priest would rather give than

receive. They understand, too, what it means to pay

for rent and clothing and fuel and groceries and the

thousand and one things which enter into the problems

of human existence. Their generosity and charity are

by-words amongst the tramps and vagabonds of the

world. The greater part of their scheming has for

its object the lightening of the people's burdens. The

real truth of the matter is that their excessive sympathy

leaves them easily imposed upon. Those who have

shown a disposition to meet them half-way, have

never found them wanting in that spirit of sympathy

and self-sacrifice, which have been characteristic of the

priesthood in every age.



30 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

CHAPTER VIL

The Poor in Rich Churches

A Startling Statement.

An Eastern bishop, in speaking of a famous center

of refinement and fashion, within the limits of his

own diocese, recently made the statement, in my hear-
ing, that the average Catholic millionaire of that parti-

cular place gave about as much to the support of

religion as the average servant-girl.

This simple statement was the severest possible

indictment of the fashionable, frivolous, pleasure-lov-

ing class, to whom he had reference. Let it not be
forgotten, however, that our wealthy Catholic people,

as a rule, have very little to do with what is known

as the real smart set. Fortunately they are men and

woman of simpler tastes and have no desire to engage

in the empty struggle for social honors, which occupies

the attention of the idle rich. Neither was the good

bishop’s statement so startling as it appears at the

first glance.

In reality he was not imparting any new or un-

expected information, for the pastors of many of the

so-called wealthy congregations have learned as the

result of a chastening experience, that the noble are

not always the generous. They have found, too, that

the last people upon whom they can depend, in a

financial emergency, are the reputed leaders of high

society. What is known as “a wealthy parish” is

frequently only another name for a shabby-genteel in-

stitution, which depends chiefly for its support upon

the maids and men of all work and the poor people



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 31

who live within its boundaries. It is an old saying

amongst priests, that a parish without a goodly sprink-

ling of the common people, is the poorest kind of a

parish. In the long run, it is the common people,

who do things in religion as in all things else
;
but let

it not be forgotten, again, that some of the best

specimens of the common people are those, who have

acquired wealth honorably and honestly, who live

simple lives and do their share and sometimes more

than their share towards the bearing of the Church's

burdens.

The Counterfeit Variety.

It is not these however, but the cheap imitators

of the real smart set, who have been chiefly instrumen-

tal in bringing wealthy parishes into disrepute. The

sham aristocrats, who are everywhere living beyond

their means and devoting all their efforts towards

keeping up the outward appearances of real wealth

—

these are the people of whom it can be said : “Blessed

are those who expect little, for they shall not be dis-

appointed." With them, as with their prototypes,

everything is subservient to the desire to cut a figure

in that inner circle of select mortals, whose doings

are chronicled in the society columns of the daily

papers. In their eyes even the church itself is val-

uable only insomuch as it helps in furthering their

social ambitions. As a class, they are notoriously poor

pays, along all lines. They live on the fashionable

avenues, pay high rents, and the true secret of their

being able to do all this, on a meagre annual income1,

lies simply in their ability to evade their just debts.

They go to church largely because church-going is in

good taste, in fashionable circles, but the family pew



32 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

merely serves to remind the pastor that the world is

full of disappointments and that even in religion it

can frequently be truly said that all is not gold that

glitters.

A Baltimore pastor was telling me recently of an
aggravated case of this kind. The family, to whom he
had reference, belonged to his parish, but as far as

financial returns were concerned, they might as well

have lived in Hong Kong. They occupied a three-

story rented house, kept a couple of maids, held

receptions and functions, to which the gentry of the

city were invited; but their credit was exceedingly

bad and the maids had to go to their own lowly homes,

from time to time to get what is commonly known as

“a square meal”. Their charming manners made up,

in a measure, for their financial shortcomings
;
but the

pastor pitied them, from the depth of his soul and

deplored the pathetic, but foolish vanity, which re-

duced them to such desperate straits in order to keep

.
up the outward appearances of real wealth.

There is, unfortunately, altogether too much of this

in the larger cities. Woman’s desire to be in what is

known as “Society” is largely to blame for such con-

ditions. People of limited means live in a state of

chronic financial stringency, happy in the thought that

they are aping the ways and manners of the real rich.

A New Plaint.

From the East, too, comes a new complaint. It

is to the effect that even the servant-girls are not what

they used to be, that they are more given to vanity in

dress and to those frivolities which are a heavy drain

upon a slender purse. If we remember that they

were the church-builders of the early days in many of



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 83

the Eastern cities, we will understand something of

the concern, which pastors feel, when they contem-

plate the change, which has come over this honored

portion of the Church's membership. Since they have

come to be designated as. ‘‘maids”, it is said, that they

have put on aristocratic airs and have gone so far as

to imitate their masters and mistresses in the matter of

contributing or rather in the matter of not contribut-

ing. Their good example has been badly needed in

the upper stratas of society. No matter who failed

us in the past, we were always sure of them. And

let it be candidly said here and now that they were duly

appreciated. They gave quietly, simply, without fuss

or ostentation, and not as if they were doing an act of

charity. We still need the example of their generosity
for our society buds and for those Catholic young

ladies, who consider themselves to be high above them

in the social scale.

Unfortunately the spirit of generosity has not kept

pace with our social progress. The daughters and

grand-daughters of the servant-girl are frequently very

poor givers. I have taken up collections for Church

Extension in almost every important city in the coun-

try, and I could not well help noticing the large num-

ber of stylishly dressed young women, who never gave

to these collections. As the pastors generally re-

quested that I, myself, should take
1 up the collections,

I had a good opportunity to observe certain traits of

the contributors taken as a whole. Whenever I came

with the collection-box, to a young lady dressed up,

like the proverbial sore finger, I was absolutely sure

of one thing and that was that she had nothing to

give. The more perfect the tailor-made suit, the



34 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

poorer I found her to be. The real poem in feathers

and ribbons and ruffles and lace grew suddenly devout

as I approached the pew in which she sat and with her

eyes demurely bent upon her prayer-book, she seemed

totally unconscious of my presence. She had it all

“on her back”, as they say and missionary enterprise

might languish and die as far as she was concerned.

I was always sure of an offering from the woman,

with the toil-stained hands and with the dress that

showed evidence of having seen better days
;
but from

the artists’ models I learned to expect nothing, abso-

lutely nothing. It was only another illustration of

the old saying that duty and vanity seldom go hand

in hand, another proof of the assertion, that it is not

the ornamental people, who pay the bills.

CHAPTER VIII.

About Pew Rents

Advantages and Disadvantages.

There has been a tendency in recent years, particu-

larly in the larger cities, to abolish entirely the system

of Church revenues known as Pew Rent. The migra-

tory character of the city’s population and the fact

that it is essentially a credit system have had much

to do with the change.

People move about easily from parish to parish and

from city to city and they are not always scrupulous

about bills due that intangible entity known as a con-

gregation. The books of many parishes are well cal-

culated to make pastors doubtful as to the ultimate

results of Christian teaching, in the matter of common



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 85

every-day honesty. The universal tendency to post-

pone the payment of a Church debt makes the credit

system as undesirable as it is unsatisfactory. Instead

of being, as we have already asserted the first and the

most sacred of all debts it is frequently the

last debt to receive attention. It is a fact, nevertheless,

that Pew Rent still remains the most popular of all

systems. It is simple. It involves the minimum

amount of book-keeping; It is well adapted to condi-

tions as we find them everywhere throughout the

United States. It is flexible, and accommodates itself

to the purses of poor and rich alike.

It promotes order and creates in the minds of the

people a sense of proprietorship in those things which

pertain to their parish church. It preserves the volun-

tary character of the people’s offerings and makes their

contributions a debt of honor rather than a certain

stipulated price for a seat. It makes it possible for a

large number of people to occupy a limited number

of seats, and gives these people the assurance that they

will riot have to stand or intrude themselves into seats

for the use of which others are paying. It recognizes

the principles of just taxation for Church support and

makes the tax binding whether the members be present

or absent. Above all, it possesses the advantage of

giving a Catholic a definite and particular place in his

own Church. In other words, it promotes the home

feeling. This is more important than it would seem

at the first glance. There is a tendency in human

nature to select a certain definite place and to occupy

it, whenever possible. Throughout all the hours of the

busy day and even during the time allotted to legiti-

mate rest and recreation, each of us has his or her

favorite place. The Church is, in a certain sense, the

Catholic’s home on Sunday, and the pew he occupies



36 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

represents his place in that home. His pastor, his

friends and neighbors, his brethren in religion look

for him in his accustomed place and his presence there

on Sunday is an evidence that religion occupies its

proper place in his thoughts and affections.

Historic Associations.

I have heard experienced pastors deplore the

tendency to dispense with the renting of pews, on the

grounds that seat-money imbues people with the

theatre idea, regarding Church attendance. They pay

as they go, and if they do not go they do not pay.

Pews, again, have been held in the same family, some-

times for several generations. In the old cathedral

at Baltimore, the pew of Charles Carrol of Carrolton,

is pointed out to visitors, and it is a source of pride

to all connected with the Church, that the pew is still

rented and occupied by his direct descendants. The

same is true of the pews in many of the older churches

of the country. They have been handed down, as it

were, from sire to son, and serve to show that the

children and the grand-children of the Catholic

Pioneers are still true and loyal to the faith of their

fathers.

A young man, whose home is now in the far West,
brought me to old St. Peter's church on Barclay street,

New York, to show me the pew which his family had

occupied for several generations. As he knelt in that

pew and poured out his soul to God, I felt that its

associations appealed to everything that was noblest

and best in his nature. This pay-as-you-go attitude

savors too much of the heartlessness and commer-

cialism c>f the age. It has a tendency, too, to diminish

the number of goings. I will have something to say



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 37

later on of seat-money and .of the reasons which have

made its adoption necessary. I believe that I am

correct in stating here and now, that it was the people

themselves and not the priests who were to blame for

its adoption. Priests, as a rule, prefer the old system,

for the reason which I have already given, and they

do not conceal their regret that “the family pew” as an

institution is fast disappearing from the city churches.

Hope Deferred.

In the smaller cities, towns and rural communities,

pew rent is still the rule. Every person who has

reached the years of maturity and who is self-support-

ing, is expected to rent at least a portion of a pew. It

is a general rule, too, that this rent be paid quarterly

'“in advance”

;

but these latter words seem to, have

taken on a new meaning since they became embodied

in parochial legislation. There is another general rule

to the effect, that if payment be too long delayed the

holder forfeits all claim to the seat. This rule is

seldom enforced—in fact, not nearly as often as cir-
cumstances would warrant. Hope springs eternal in

the human breast; but in the average pastor’s breast

it seems to be a perpetual and perennial fountain.

This hope deferred is one of the hardest crosses which

the pastor has to bear. I sometimes feel that if the

people could only realize what this delayed pew rent

means to the pastor, many of them would do better.

It lies at the root of nine-tenths of the worries and

anxieties of a priest’s life. It has dug an early grave

for many a poor priest and has spelled ruin and deso-

lation for hundreds of those whose souls' revolted

against this constant money-talk from the altar.



38 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

I have spent the greater part of my priestly life in
a pioneer country, and I know something of the trials

of a priest who is trying to form a business conscience

in the little disorganized, undisciplined flock com-

mitted to his care.' I have seen brave, young, hopeful

fellows driven to the verge of desperation by the

struggle to keep body and soul together. I have seen

courage and hope give place to discouragement and

despair, zeal to- indifference and high ideals brought

down beneath the level of the commonplace as a result

of pew rent, .which did not materialize when it was

needed. I have heard western priests say, time and

again, that they would rather appeal to decent Protest-

ants than they would to many of their own people.

They would be surer of a response than they would be

by appealing to that large class who are willing, as an

old priest friend says, “to give something to a priest,

provided there be anything left after all their other

bills have been paid.
7 ’

An Awkward Position.

Where pew rent is the rule in a parish, those who

do not see fit to rent pews, find themselves in a very

peculiar position. When they come to church, they

must either stand in the rear or occupy seats for which

others are paying. They cannot help feeling that they

-are strangers and intruders, and that they are being

pious at the expense of other members of the congre-

gation. At bottom, they have no excuse other than

an unwillingness to pay. The Church, like the State,

taxes the able to help the unable. If they are poor,

they will be given seats free and pastors will see that

the laudable pride of even the poor will not be put to

confusion.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 39

Perhaps the saddest thing in connection with the

whole matter is the position in which the children are

placed. They are little vagrants, stealing into the

seats to which other people have prior rights. They

are more sensitive than their parents, and the awkward

and embarrassing position in which they are placed

every time they come to church, is not calculated to

develop the church-going habit. It is a well known

fact, too, that the “Ought-to-beY
?

and the “Used-to-

be’s” of every parish, are generally recruited from the

poor pays, and particularly from those who refuse to

provide a place in church for themselves and their

children. Considered as a tax upon property or earn-

ing capacity, pew rent is generally the most just and

equitable of all taxes. It is, at the same time, the best

investment which the nation makes, for it promotes

in the most effective manner possible those things

which make for. the stability and integrity of our na-

tional institutions.

^Frequent and regular payments are the keynote

of success as far as the pew rent system is concerned.

This cannot be too strongly insisted upon. Catholics

have it in their own hands to eliminate money-talks

entirely from the pulpit. Let them contract the habit

of paying promptly when their church taxes fall due,

and they will have no complaint to make. It is stingy

Catholicity and slipshod methods that have brought the

business side of religion into disrepute everywhere

throughout the country.



40 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

CHAPTER IX.

About Seat Money

Its History.

A multitude of causes have contributed towards
the adoption of what is known as Seat Money. In

the final analysis, it was the natural out-growth of a

widespread tendency on the part of many people to

evade ever}?- form of Church dues.

In the big city parishes, new problems were con-

stantly arising and calling for a solution. The keeping

of a large number of individual accounts was in itself

a difficult and burdensome task. The Pew Rent

system, at the same time, placed a premium upon

absent-mindedness. People moved away from parishes

and left behind them unpleasant memories of bills un-

paid. Others rented pews but never fulfilled that part

of the contract, calling for frequent and regular pay-

ments—in fact many of them overlooked the payment
side of the contract entirely. It was a credit system

with all the evils of such a system, only in a more

aggravated form
;

for there was no legal redress in

case of failures to pay.

The transients, or those who were in the habit of

flitting about from church to church on Sunday, called

for a* special line of action. The tourist, too, and the

summer boarder began to arrive, and a new problem

presented itself. Pastors cast about them for some

system which would eliminate long credits, and which

would equalize the burden on the people taken as a

whole. Various plans were tried and rejected until



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 41
'

finally some pastor with a genius for business in-

augurated the custom of paying for seats at th£ church

door. # The movement, in the beginning was an ex-

tremely unpopular one. The objections came chiefly

from the poor pays. They resented the introduction

of a system which made the payment unavoidable.

The good pays, those who, up to that time, had borne

the Brunt of the church’s burdens, did not object.

They were willing to share those burdens with others

and cordially approved of anything which kept this

end in view. The advantages of the plan, wherever

it was tried, soon became apparent. At one bound, it

placed the finances of a parish on a strictly cash basis.

In some parishes, those who' held pews and paid for

them might still retain them, but the transients and the

tax-dodgers had to pay at the door or undergo the

humiliation of accepting a “charity seat.” In an in-

credibly short space of time, Seat Money became the

rule in the leading city churches. In the small toKvns

and in the country, things move more slowly, but it is

a safe prophecy to make that the time is not far dis-

tant when, in a more or less modified form, it will be

the rule in every parish of any consequence in the

United States.

Not a Burden.

There are good reasons why this should be so. It

is an ideal system for people of limited means. It

makes provisions for those small and frequent payments

which meet with so much approval in the business

world. Then again the trivial sum exacted for a seat

on Sunday can scarcely ever be regarded in the light

of a real burden. As a rule, it involves very little

self-sacrifice on the part of the giver, but then again



42 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

religion without a certain amount of self-sacrifice is

unintelligible. If it were for a luxury or a worldly

pleasure, there would be no objection. The money paid

by our Catholic people for luxuries in a single day far

surpasses the amount paid for church purposes in the

course of a whole year; but there is no complaint on

the score of extravagance, where pleasure, amusement

and vanity are concerned.

Let me repeat here what was laid down in the

beginning. The man or the woman, who is willing to

enjoy the benefits and consolations of religion without

making any of the sacrifices which religion entails, is

destitute of the true spirit of religion. “Dead-beat"

piety is only another name for dishonesty, masquerad-

ing in a religious garb. Pew rent, like the taxes, grew

while people slept, and sometimes became a heavy in-

debtedness, before they realized that it had fallen due.

Many people prefer to pay cash down and be through

with it. They readily grasp the advantages of a

system, which eliminates long credits and which pro-

vides a certain amount of ready cash for current parish

expenses. This latter feature is, in itself, a matter of

the utmost consequence. Business, done on credit

means simply business done on other people's money.

The interest on this money must be paid in some form.

Ready cash saves the interest, facilitates business, pro-

motes good feeling and engenders respect.

Nothing Free.

The lady who recently made the rounds of the Prot-

estant churches of Boston, and gave the result of her

experience in The Ladies' Home Journal, found much

cause for complaint because her presence at the Sun-

day services was generally overlooked. She would



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 43

have been shocked and scandalized beyond measure if

she had visited Catholic churches, and met with the

request to produce a little of the coin of the realm in

exchange for a seat. There is no good reason, how-

ever, why strangers and visitors should not pay for

church accommodations just as they pay for the

accommodations provided by public and private utili-

ties. The churches have been the last of the free in-

stitutions, but this freedom has sometimes been pur-

chased at too high a price. Libraries and public parks

are supposedly free, but the citizens in general are

taxed for their maintenance. The free side of religion

has been greatly abused by the very people who are

the first to complain of the commercialism of all the

churches. We have heard it said, time and again,
that there is nothing free but the air we breathe.

Even the air breathed within the cramped walls of

what is known as the world’s homes is seldom free in

any sense of the word. These homes are built and

furnished at considerable expense, because it has been

found by experience that the free air of the out of

doors is poorly adapted to the human constitution.

There are few things in the world, which are not pur-

chased by labor or its equivalent. “In the sweat of

thy face shalt thou eat thy bread” is true of the spirit-

ual as well as the material nourishment of the human

race.

Liberally Interpreted.

Perhaps the most serious objection urged against

Seat Money, is that it imposes the same burden upon

the rich as it does upon the poor. In answer to this

objection, however, it may be stated that the offertory

and the other collections of a parish give men and



44 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

women of wealth ample opportunity to display their
generosity and liberality. In all the parishes, too, free

tickets are distributed to the poor merely for the

asking, so that in the long run no one is put to con-

fusion by reason of inability to pay. Priests are rea-

sonable men and enforce even their own rules in a
charitable and liberal spirit. Whenever they see

people disposed to do what is half right, they are ready

to meet them more than half way. Every plan which

has yet been adopted for the raising of church revenues

has left a large place for those voluntary offerings

which, after all, represent the people’s real devotion

to the Church and to the priesthood consecrated for-

ever to their service.

[To the Editor]

The following letter appeared in response to a specific attack made
upon the practice of collecting seat money in a well known Eastern church.
The pastor of this church came to the defense of the practice and his letter
is well worth being produced for the benefit of my readers.

Some friend in the west, or, perhaps, some fellow

with a "grouch” against seat money, has sent me a

marked copy of your paper containing an article on

the custom of charging for seats in Catholic churches.

I had not the pleasure of, reading Father Roche’s

article on this question, but I feel certain he did justice

to the subject.

This custom is as universal as the Church itself.

In the great cathedral of St. Peter’s at Rome, if you

wish to hear Mass in comfort, I might say with

devotion, you pay for your seat and kneeling beffch.

Otherwise you stand or kneel on the cold marble floor,

without support of any kind—a very trying ordeal.
People who do this, are in doubt for the rest of the

day whether they have locomotor-ataxia or curvature

of the spine. As a rule, they pay the second time.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 45

The same rule is enforced in every cathedral in Europe,

and in all the large churches.

In this country seat-money is a question of custom

and necessity. Some years ago, pew-rent was the main

item of revenue in all the parishes of the dioceses in

the East. Seat-money was insignificant. During the

past te'n years thousands of Catholics have given, up

their pews and pay each Sunday for their seats. The

custom is growing and has the stamp of popular

approval. I know of several cases where the rectors

tried to stem the tide of this innovation without suc-

cess. At summer resorts it is not only a question of

custom, but of necessity. The rector of a seaside or

mountain parish, has to erect a large church to* accom-

modate the summer tourists. And the surroundings

must be in keeping with the place. His congregation

changes every few weeks, and there is no way of

collecting pew rent except by asking an offering for

seats. The season lasts two months, after which the

rector has a big church and a handful of people.

Some parishes on the Jersey coast have a permanent

congregation, numbering from sixty to one hundred

souls. Perhaps that “intelligent class” of Catholics

to which your correspondent, “J. J.,” belongs, might

not know these facts.

It is amusing to note the tender solicitude these

“intelligent” grouchers have for the poor and their

great fear of scandalizing Protestants. I am sure the

poor will reject their sympathy. The poor pay their

seat money, and do not criticize the. custom. They

know, money or no money, the Mass and church are

theirs. It is a mighty poor disguise to use the poor



40 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

for hiding one’s meanness. As to Protestants, I have

had a wide experience with them, and with converts

for nearly twenty years. I have yet to find the prot-

estant or convert who has taken scandal from the

custom of collecting seat-money. Many non-Catholics
attend our services here and insist on paying for their

seats. Your correspondent refers to Atlantic City,

and Asbury Park. I will answer for the Park and say

what he states is true, but he shows his venom in his

language. Mark the offering he states and on account

of seaside conditions, we are justified.

However, the offering is rarely paid in full, and

hundreds give us a scornful look, only which flashes

like their diamonds. “J. J.,” states that Col. K., was

charged $1.25 for his family. This means a family of

five adults, and certainly means an expense of nearly

$100 a week at a first-class hotel. Amusements and

the many ways of spending money here will bring it

considerably over $100 a week. I am sure all your

readers will deeply sympathize with Col. K., over the

loss of his dollar and a quarter. We have plenty of
Col. K.’s, and

J. J.’s
here in summer. People who

think very little of spending twenty or thirty dollars at

Pleasure Bay or some near resort. Others spend five

and ten dollars on Saturady night to hear Eddie Foy,

or San Toy, at the Casino. On Sunday morning they

wax indignant at the outrage of being asked to pay

for a seat.

The incident of the “money-changer” following the

person who forgot is most likely true. Quite a num-

ber of “intelligent” Catholics forget every Sunday, and

some of them use all their intelligence to devise means



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 47
/

to beat the Church. In following the person to his

seat, the usher made no mistake, and while it may have

been amusing to J. J., I am, sure it had the effect

intended. If
J. J.’s

band of intelligent Catholics were

as careful about giving scandal to Protestants in other

matters, we would not have room in our churches for

the new converts. To sum up the matter—there is a
class of people in the Catholic Church, as elsewhere,

who want something for nothing.

[Rev.] Thomas A. Roche, Rector,

Church of the Holy Spirit, Asbury Park, N. J.

CHAPTER X.

About Collections

A Bad Name.

On one occasion I took up a collection for Church
Extension in a certain eastern parish. The city will,

for evident reasons, be, for the present, nameless. I

had heard from several trustworthy sources, that the

pastor of the place was extremely unpopular. He

was a veritable “grind” it was said and exceedingly

persistent in his demands for money. He was repre-
sented, too, as being a constant nagger, so much so

that he had driven a naturally generous and well-

disposed people into a state of open defiance and

rebellion.

I went, of course, prepared for the worst
;
but

judge of my surprise on finding the pastor to be a man
s>f a singularly amiable and genial disposition. He



48 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

was kindness personified and did everything in his

power to make my visit productive of results. As I
passed from pew to pew during the course of the collec-

tion it began to slowly dawn upon me that there might

be two sides to the story. “You will find them/' he had

said the evening before, “a poor lot of givers. They

labor under the impression that they are being driven

to death, but the debt is very large and I must keep

on driving. Go ahead, however, and do your best and

the more you get the better it will please me/’

The collection was not by any means what it should

be, taking into consideration the size of the parish and

the number of people present at the services. When
he said they were poor givers, he was putting it mildly.

Not one man out of ten was a contributor on that

occasion. The women and children, too, seemed posi-

tively pained and surprised at my temerity in passing

the box in front of them.

I left that parish with a more or less distinct im-

pression that the pastor was not entirely to blame. He

had doubtless made his mistakes; but they had been

greatly exaggerated and used as pretexts by those who

were neither generous or considerate of the trying

situation in which their pastor was placed. He was

honestly striving to save the parish from financial ruin

and bankruptcy. The people, as a whole should not

have permitted themselves to be led by that unreason-

able and disturbing element, which makes for trouble

in every community. The parish rebels had evidently

triumphed for ttie time being, and the triumph assumed

the usual form of a pronounced reduction in the general

receipts but particularly in the amount of the voluntary

offerings. I felt morally certain, too, that the better

instincts of the people would in the long run, prevail



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 49

over distrust and misunderstanding and that, when

that came to pass, the pastor would be appreciated at

his real worth.

In Days of Old.

In the preceding article’, I made the statement that

the collections or voluntary offerings played an import-

ant part in all plans, thus far devised for the support of

religion. The collection in fact represents the tradi-

tional and apostolic mode of giving. The people in

the days of the apostles brought their offerings and laid

them upon the altar or in a place near the altar, set

apart for that purpose. This act was not without its

religious significance. In many of the old liturgies,

these gifts, representing the self-sacrifice of the people

were offered up to God in union with the great sacri-

fice of the new law.

In the course of centuries it was discovered that

these free will offerings were not always sufficient for

the purpose intended and not always representative of

the wealth of the givers. To remedy this condition of

things, the tithing system of the Jews was incorporated

into the laws of the leading Christian nations. The

reformation abolished tithes or diverted them to hereti-

cal uses in many European countries and voluntary

offerings again became the rule.

The state-supported church, however, had troubles

peculiar to itself. It was seldom free in any sense of

the term. The tax levied by the government fre-

quently had the effect of mixing politics with religion,

to the latter’s detriment. The church itself was some-

times forced in self-defense, to refuse the aid, proffered

by the state, burdened round as it was, with onerous

and humiliating conditions,



50 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

The Chief Objection,

The purely voluntary system of church support still

remains open to the criticism, levelled against it in the

early centuries. In leaving everything to the personal

sense of duty on the part of the giver, it opens up too

many avenues of escape for the avaricious and the

penurious. The collections, even as they are taken up

in our churches to-day, are seldom representative of

the true financial standing of those who give. It is a

reproach to religion, that such should be the case
;
but

that it is the case, no one can successfully deny. The

sense of justice, which religion is supposed to beget,

clearly dictates that, in this matter, there be a due

proportion between the size of the gift and the means

of the giver.

The trouble with collections in general, is that

people of means give very little more than those, who-

may be rightly classed as the poor. They live better,

dress better, consider themselves to be better in every

way
;
but place themselves in the same class, when it

comes to collections. A dollar or a fifty-cent piece is
a rare sight in the ordinary Sunday offering of even

our city churches. The quarters are few and far be-

tween and the nickles and dimes furnish no clue as to

the comparative wealth of their original owners. In

many places the red copper cent of commerce is ac-

corded the place of honor. There was a time iyi the

history of the west, when the popularity of the one-

cent piece or the “penny” was at a very low ebb. It

was contemptuously refused when tendered through

the regular channels of business and even the Indian

rejected it in trade and barter. I myself can remember

the time when the presence of a penny in the collection-

box on Sunday was a sure sign that there was a new

tenderfoot in town.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 51

These days have passed away, and thrifty Christ-

ians even in the West have come to regard the copper

cent as a real and genuine offering. The scriptural

story of the widow's mite has led many good people to

believe that the mite is preferable to coins of a larger

denomination. One of the strange things about

religion, too, is the large number of very pious Cath-

olics, aye even monthly and weekly communicants,

whose Sunday generosity never rises above the penny

mark. They are a trifle better than the people who

give nothing at all
;
but this is a case where compari-

sons are truly odious. The Sunday offering should be,

by rijght, a most important course of parish revenue.

That" it is nof, is due first to the fact that people of

means take advantage of its privacy to give the same

as the poor; and secondly, to the additional fact that

the penny is altogether too popular with the church-

goers of the present day.

Not Much But Often.

Human respect plays its part when it is a question
of what is known as the extraordinary collections.

Owing to the fact that the names of the contributors

are generally handed in with their contributions, the

law of proportions is more carefully observed. They

are more truly representative of the conditions of the

givers, and consequently more of a success in every

way.

A pastor of wide experience and sound common
sense said to me not long ago in speaking of this
matter: “The trouble with our collections at present

is that the head of the family gives for the whole

family. As a result, the other members of the house-

hold do not contract the habit of giving, I believe we



52 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

jc

would have much better results, if everybody gave

something were it only a little. The percentage of

non-givers is altogether too large. It is not the dollars

that usually make a collection; but the dimes and

quarters many times multiplied.”

It may be well to admit here and now that the

shortcomings of many people in such matters are

largely the result of pure thoughlessness. In shirk-

ing their duty on the occasion of this or that collection,

they proceed on the assumption that somebody else,

for the time being, will make up the deficit. They

forget that what is true of their individual attitude

may be true of the parish, taken as a whole. When
everybody is leaving the duty of giving to some one

else, the business of a parish becomes a real tragedy

to the man who is trying to foot the bills.

CHAPTER XI.

The Unpretentious Nickel

Expert Testimony.

I heard, not long since, of a Western pastor, who

went to the trouble of counting the adults present at

the different Masses on Sunday, for the purpose of

comparing the attendance with the number of nickels

in the ordinary collection.

To his surprise* he found that only about one out

of three of these adults gave a coin of any kind and

that the nickels when compared with this attendance

stood in the ratio of about one to five. An investiga-
tion of this kind seems somewhat out of place

;
but the

desirability of facts and figures becomes apparent



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 53

when we remember that people need instruction in the

matter of giving as much as they do in matters per-

taining to the other precepts of the Church. One lone

fact is some times worth a bushel of theories. The

additionl fact that it is unpleasant does not by any

means impair its value from an argumentative stand-

point.

A St. Louis pastor, in treating of this subject some
time ago, made the statement that if every adult

*

Catholic gave a nickel in the Sunday collection, there

would be no need of fairs and festivals or of any of

those extraordinary and sometimes questionable means

of raising revenue. The statement in itself, is an

extraordinary tribute to the power of the nickel. The

consummation at the same time is one devoutly to be

prayed for.

The Sunday nickel does certainly solve many pro-

blems in many of our parishes. In some places the

people have been educated up to the habit of never

giving less than this amount and the results are truly

astonishing. Some of the very poorest parishes in the

country have accomplished wonders and the root of all

these wonders lies in the constant, never-failing Sun-

day nickel. If the poor can afford it, there is no good

reason why people of moderate means' cannot give that

much and more. Spasmodic, occasional giving is sel-

dom productive of lasting results. It is constant, uni-

versal, systematic giving that counts; and this cannot

be too frequently insisted upon, when it is a question

of Church support.



Well Trained.

I know a Connecticut pastor, who has no seat

money and only a moderate amount of pew rent ; but

he has dwelt for twenty years upon the importance of

the Sunday nickel : In this way he manages to pay

all the expenses of a congregation which calls for the

services of three priests. His parochial school con-

tains almost twelve hundred children, but the never-

failing nickel pays for it all. Of course there are many

in the congregation who give more, as they properly

should. The nickel, however, is the smallest contribu-

tion expected of anyone and every adult, without

exception, is expected to give at least that much. The

foreign element at present predominates; but these

foreigners have taken kindly to the nickel habit. The

non-givers, as a result, have been wholly eliminated

and the penny as an adult contribution is deemed en-

tirely unworthy of notice. The success of this pastor's

method of training is a striking testimony to the “little

and often” habit of giving. It illustrates the power

of the nickel to solve even the gravest parish problems,

when the giving of the same becomes a universal and

constant practice. It may be well to state here too,

that the large number of people in the parish makes

it possible for this Connecticut pastor, to accomplish

what he does on this meager weekly contribution. The

same rule, however, carried into effect in other places,

would be productive of similar beneficial results.

Too Commonplace.

I know it seems rather strange that so much space

should be devoted to the consideration of so trivial

and so unimportant a matter as the unpretentious



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 55

Sunday nickel. The matter, however, is neither trivial

nor unimportant. More than fifty per cent, of the

money received for church purpose comes into pastors’

hands in this form. “Take care of the nickels and the

dollars will take care of themselves,” is a good maxim

for those, who are responsible for the temporalities of

religion. Parishes, at the same time are very much

like individuals. Bad habits are easily contracted but

the good ones require time and careful cultivation.

Even the habit of giving is dependent, to a
large

extent upon the training, which a parish undergoes.

By training, I mean, of course, thorough, systematic

instruction, delivered in the plainest manner possible.

The people must know and understand the law, before

they can be expected to comply with its
requirements.

They must know the needs of religion before they can

be expected to give. Here again, however, a
strange

inconsistency manifests itself.

Money-talks from the pulpit are a most unpopular

form of instruction. No matter how carefully de-

livered, they are regarded as being a more or
less

implicit reflection upon the generosity of those

present. The priest, as a consequence, is some-

times in a dilemma. It is clearly within
his

province to instruct his people in the duty of
giving.

In doing so, he lays himself open to the
accusation that

he is prompted by selfish and mercenary
motives.

Some people, again, have very exalted ideas of
the

dignity of the priestly office. They would have
priests’

utterances entirely free from material and earthly
con-

siderations and above all to so commonplace a
thing

as the nickel, to which they, themselves,
adhere too

tenaciously. It is only a minor detail, if you
will.

Perhaps it is undignified to descend to its
level; but

minor details play an important part in the success
of



56 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

every form of business enterprise. A parish, like any
other institution, must pay the penalty of ignoring
such details. The penalty of ignoring the nickel gener-
ally manifests itself in the annual deficit, which is a
characteristic of parishes, which place dignity before
duty.

The Idea!

But, it will be objected, the nickel in the offering

together with the usual ten cent for seat money is a
pretty heavy tax for people of ordinary means. Yes,
I admit it; a nickel is always a tax with some people,
when it is given in a collection. It is never regarded
as a tax, when it is expended for beer or cigars or
candy or chewing-gum or for the numberless luxuries,
in which people of ordinary means invest without
scruple or compunction. They never think of
economizing when it is a question of such things.
They would never think of depriving themselves
of a single gratification in order to save a
nickel for the Sunday offering. No indeed ! The idea
is too preposterous to be dwelt upon even for an in-
stant. What was the penny made for, if not to give
Christians an opportunity to give the smallest possible
amount towards the keeping up of churches and
schools and parochial and diocesan institutions? No
wonder sensitive people do not go to church ! Econo-
mize in the matter of luxuries in order to have some-
thing for Sunday

! well, what is the world coming to
any how?



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 57

Not Any Poorer.

I believe it is not unreasonable for pastors to expect

that grown-up people contract the habit of putting the

humble equivalent of five pennies in the Sunday collec-

tion. There is no evidence to show that those, who

have been doing this for years, are any less prosperous

than those, who have refused to do so. Experience, on

the contrary goes to show that the faithful, constant

giver is generally wise in his economies and so regu-

lates his affairs that his contribution makes no appre-

ciable void in his weekly assets. The poor giver, on

the other hand, is frequently hard pressed to make ends

meet. He is liberal where he should be economical

and economical where he should be liberal. The old

saying that “a man never misses what he gives to the

Church” is always true in the sense that the man,

who gives to the Church makes provision beforehand

so that his contribution is never felt to be a heavy

or unreasonable burden. The payment of a just debt

is not necessarily an unpleasant task. The doing of

one’s duty has compensations which the poor giver

can never understand. Not the least of these compen-

sations is the promised spiritual reward. Some may

doubt it, but the truth still remains that "the Lord loves

the cheerful giver”.

CHAPTER XII.

The Children’s Mite

Bend the Twig.

It is customary in all the large parishes of the

country to have a special children’s Mass on Sunday.



58 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

This custom is productive of many beneficial results.

It separates the children from the grown-up people

v and promotes regularity as far as attendance at the

Holy Sacrifice is concerned.

The sisters, who have charge of the children during

the week are present to preserve order and to note if

any of their youthful charges be missing. The ser-

mons and instructions are adapted to the comprehen-

sion of the young mind and the results, as a conse-

quence, are much more satisfactory in every way.

The collection is a regular feature of this service

and every child is expected to bring at least a penny.

The purpose of this collection is to train the children

to the habit of giving. Experience has shown that

giving, like saving, is largely a matter of early train-

ing. It is a case, too, where thorough instruction is

necessary and the sooner this instruction is given, the

better for everybody concerned.

None of these things, however, are possible in the

smaller parishes. There the training of the children

is left almost entirely to the parents, and it is not easy

to convince many parents of the importance of such

things. A Nebraska priest was telling me not long

since of the difficulties he encountered in attempting

to secure subscriptions for a little Sunday school per-

iodical. The price was a penny a Sunday, but even

this trival amount was not forthcoming. The little

paper was welcomed and eagerly read by the children,

but the parents refused to co-operate and he was

finally forced to abandon the attempt.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 59

Just Tolerated.

In farming communities, the Sunday collection,

itself, is generally regarded as a time-honored custom

without any binding force even upon the older mem-

bers of the congregation. Only the heads of families

give and the individual contribution is seldom more

than a nickel. A coin of a larger denomination is
generally an evidence that some wealthy land-

owner has not been able to “make the change”. A
penny is frequently a clue to a case in which some

close-fisted proprietor of many broad acres has had

a temporary spasm of generosity, under the influence

of which he has separated himself from one of the

pennies which go to make the dearly-loved and highly-

prized dollars. Our farmers are the wealthiest, the

most prosperous and the most independent of any class

in the country today. It is not unreasonable to expect

that their generosity keep pace with their increased

prosperity. There is an old saying that the truth never

hurts. The trouble is that it frequently does not hurt

as much as it should and the telling of it, as a con-

sequence, is barren of results. There is a traditional

belief in many parishes that children should never con-

tribute so long as they remain under the parental roof.

The term “children” is frequently stretched to include

maiden ladies of mature years and bachelors of long

standing
;
but it serves its purpose, when they are called

upon to give.

One of my clerical friends was informed, not long
ago, by a well-meaning trustee, that this new-fangled

custom of demanding a penny from each child was

destined to do a great deal of harm. “They will keep

on giving pennies”, he said, “when they grow up and

in the long run we will lose more than we will gain.”



60 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

This argument is not without its force, but we can

only wait and hope for the best. Experience, at the

same time has shown that where the habit of giving

has become universal, the results are much more satis-

factory than where the few contribute for the many.

A Mistake.

I am about to make a strange statement and it is
this. I do not believe that there is much use in bring-

ing arguments to bear upon parents, when it is a

question of children giving. I believe in going straight

to the children themselves and in treating directly with

them. Some optimist has said that he would take one

hundred children and do more with them than with

an equal number of grown-up people. It is wonderful

what these little ones can accomplish when their in-

terest is aroused. We priests frequently make the
mistake, which fathers and mothers make. We regard
them as babies until such time as they have grown to

man’s and woman’s estate. These little ones do a

considerable amount of thinking and arrive at con-

clusions which are not always complimentary to their

elders. They have an innate sense of justice, too, and

the spirit of self-sacrifice, is sure to crop out if proper

means be taken to arouse it. Protestant children every

year contribute immense sums for local and general

church purposes. The greater portion of this money

represents genuine self-denial on the part of these chil-

dren. I am sure that no one will have the hardihood

to assert that Catholic teaching dries up the well-

springs of self-sacrifice in our children’s souls. The

parents have been preached to and preached at until

they have grown callous to our appeals. The results

of appealing to the children directly cannot be much



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 61

worse than they are at present. Let us bear in mind,

too, that many of the parents need the very training,

which we are anxious to impart to the children and

that very best way to impart this training is through

the children. The child of careless parents who goes

to church of his own volition will sooner or later bring

his parents to church. The child who denies himself

some temporary gratification in order to give his little

mite is preaching a most effective sermon to the father

who refuses to give. The neglect of the children's

mite costs the Catholic Church in this country every

year many thousands of dollars. The giving of the

same will benefit the little ones in many ways. It will

teach them to practice self-denial. It will make them

feel that thty are doing their little part towards the

bearing of the Church's burdens. It will form in them

the habit of giving, a habit which is not by any means

as universal as it should be.

Keep It Separate.

Many pastors are of the opinion that the children's

collection should be kept separate and apart from that

of the adults. In the smaller parishes it can easily be

taken up during Sunday school and better results are

attained where an accounting is made to them at

regular intervals. All this takes time and trouble, but

it is time and trouble which will be found to bear im-

mediate fruits.

Children are easily interested in missionary en-

deavor, both at home and abroad. It appeals to the

heroic in their nature and it is a serious mistake not

to give them an opportunity to manifest this interest

in a substantial way. The Junior Endeavor Society

of the Methodist church gives to missions ten per



62 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

cent, of the amount contributed by the grown-up mem-

bers for the same purpose. Besides this, they bear

many of the expenses for such definite objects as coal,

light, janitor service and the like. And what is true

of the Methodists, is true of all the sects. The chil-

dren and young people are taught that they have

responsibilities to bear and duties to perform, which

they can not and must not evade.

A very important thing in this connection is this
settling of a certain, definite responsibility upon the

children. Youthful enthusiasm demands a particular

object. Let them feel that they are performing a

work which is peculiarly their own, and the means

will be forthcoming in due season. We Catholics are
to a large extent the slaves of traditional methods.

Any departure from the beaten paths, even in the

matter of raising money is resented. Our beaten

path as far as the children’s giving is concerned, is a

poor old rut, which should be abandoned at the earliest

possible opportunity. The methods of fifty years ago

are poorly adapted to an age which has outlived them

in all other matters.

CHAPTER XIII.

Rights of the Stole

Would See Him Later.

I heard an Eastern priest on one occasion regale a

gathering of distinguished clergymen with the story

of a baptism at which he had officiated some months

before. It was in his own church of course, and the

parents of the baby were of the ultra-fashionable class.



BUSINESS SIDE OE RELIGION. m

Five automobiles were drawn up before the door

of the church at the appointed hour, and the external

evidences of wealth, particularly in the matter of costly

raiment and fine clothes were very noticeable as they

gathered about the baptismal font. After a lengthy

consultation in which all participated, the name of the

baby was finally settled upon, and the ceremony was

permitted to proceed. At its close the mother informed

the good Father with the sweetest of smiles, that she

would “see him later”. The moral of the story is that

she has not seen him yet, and probably never will.

Appearances even at the baptismal font are frequently

deceptive. The expected does not always materialize,

even when backed up by an imposing array of automo-

biles.

Of course there is no such a thing as a charge for

the administration of a sacrament. Catholic teaching

is very strict on this point. The priest must always

hold himself prepared to administer these great means

of salvation at all times, and he must scrupulously

avoid everything which savors in the slightest degree

of avarice or self-interest. “If, however,” says the

Rubrics, “after the sacrament has been administered,

something be freely offered by the faithful as is

customary in many places, it can be licitly accepted.”

There is no room for misunderstanding here, and

even poorly-instructed Catholics are cognizant of the

traditional teaching of the Church on this head. The

universal custom of making offerings on such occasions

is merely a recognition of the principle that he who

ministers at the altar should live by the altar. „

It was an old pagan who said that people are

generous on occasions of great joy or grief. Births

and marriages represent the joyful periods of life;



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.04

funerals supply the element of grief. The gratuities

given on such occasions to the ministers of religion

are the natural and spontaneous expression of grati-

tude for real services rendered. They are the result

of natural as well as supernatural motives and may

easily be made the occasion of great merit when given

with the proper intention.

Could Not Stand It.

At the present time there is a particularly nasty

book being sold and distributed amongst Protestants

in many parts of the middle West. The author, as

may easily be suspected, is a renegade Catholic, and

his chief purpose is to show forth the “graft” practiced

in various forms by the clergy of the Catholic Church.

It would be uncharitable of course, to intimate that

revenue plays any part in the production of such work.

It is only the old story, however, with a new turn. In

the eyes of the man who has forcibly ejected himself
from the Catholic fold, there is no redeeming feature

in the whole system. It is graft and corruption pure

and simple from start to finish, fairs, festivals, lawn

fetes, shrines, votive candelabra, Masses, scapulars,

etc., etc., are all only different forms of the nation’s

predominant weakness—graft. The priests are bad
men of course. They are always bad in the renegade’s

book. It is wonderful how much goodness good men

find in the old church and its ministers, and how

much badness the other kind find. He would have us

believe he has left us for righteousness’ sake. Be that

as it may, he has gone over to the Baptists, of whom

it has been said that “their olefactory nerves are so

benumbed by the practice of brotherly love, that they

are no longer able to detect the odor of a bad egg.”



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. (55

We hope he is happy and that at least he is free from
the company of ministerial black sheep and clerical

scalawags.

He will still find, however, the ministerial perqui-

site very much in evidence. There is no authentic

instance on record, up to date, of a funeral or marriage

fee having been refused by a Baptist preacher. Rumor

has it, too, that there are Bible and book and mission

“grafts” and that preaching is frequently a “side-line”

practiced by life insurance agents and by other gentle-

men with a practical as well as a pious turn of mind.

It is barely possible, therefore, that the gentleman who

did not discover the old Church's shortcomings until

he had been told to reform or get out, may still find

cause for disedification in his new surroundings. It

is barely possible, too, that the poor ex-cleric who

violated his vow of celibacy, may not have been ani-

mated by purely religious motives.

Right and Justice.

Though the stipends given for Masses do not,

properly speaking, fall within the scope of this subject,

it may be well to state here, that the stipend is by no

means a price paid for the all-holy and priceless

sacrifice of the Mass. It is a free-will offering made

towards the support of the priest in the same spirit as

the offerings for baptism and marriage and similarly

sanctioned by universal custom. There are theologi-

cal distinctions and subdistinctions, but back of them

all stands out the justice of the principle, that if the

Church places a priest at the beck and call of the

people, the people in turn are bound to provide him

with a decent means of livelihood. The “Rights of



66 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

the Stole” are not rights in the strict sense of the word.

“Perquisites” is a better term. They are rights in the

sense that they have been sanctioned by the faith and

piety, and I may add by the common-sense of Christ-

ians, in every age. They are not rights in the sense

that they can be demanded prior to the ministrations

of the priest. The interests of immortal souls must

ever remain prior to all other considerations and it

has rarely happened in the history of the Church that

the ministrations of the priest have been prostituted

to personal gain.

In connection with the subject of Masses it may be

well to point out a common mistake in the matter of

bequests. People on their death-beds make testamen-

tary provision for Masses seemingly unconscious of

the fact that Probate courts move very slowly and that

many months may elapse before the provisions of the

will can be carried into effect. Charity to their own

souls ought to dictate that the best time to have Masses

said is whilst they are living. It is well to make such

bequests, but it is well also to take time by the fore-

lock and arrange to have Masses offered up for their

spiritual welfare, whilst they are alive and in the flesh.

CHAPTER XIV.

Pious Vagrants

What’s in a Name?

In one of my former missions there was a Metho-
dist minister who told a strange story of his early

religious experiences. That it was substantially true

I have every reason to believe. According to this



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 67

story, he was the son of Catholic parents and the name

bore out his statement.

Some of those Methodist clerical names are well

calculated to set us a-thinking. He had been brought

up after the usual manner of Catholic boys, had gone

to confession several times and had received his first

communion. A good old grandmother had taught him
to say the beads, and even as a minister he retained

a few lingering traces of his early devotion to the

Blessed Virgin. His parents had no sittings in their

parish church, and Pew Rent was in those days the

general rule.

When he heard Mass on Sunday, he was obliged

to stand or sit in some one else’s pew. When about
thirteen years old he was.the star performer in a little

tragedy, which left its impress upon him during the

balance of his life. On one occasion he unwittingly
entered the pew of a somewhat crusty individual. The

pew was far up in front and the owner had not yet

arrived. When he did so, he paused in front of the

pew and in the gruffest manner possible ordered the

little fellow out of the seat and bade him stay out.

Smarting under the public humiliation, the boy left the

church and no form of persuasion could ever induce

him to enter it again. The parents themselves were

rather negligent and they did not seriously object when

later on he became a regular attendant at the Metho-

dist Sunday-School. A wealthy lady of the same relig-
ious persuasion took a fancy to 1 him and offered to put

him through college. The parents were flattered, of

course, and eagerly accepted the offer. They did not

wake up to the importance of such a decision until

their son returned to his home a duly accredited Metho-

dist Minister. Vagrant catholicity had once again de-

monstrated its ability to undermine the foundations of



68 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

Catholic faith. It was a few paltry dollars -versus a

child's soul, the price of a few sittings in church versus

their boy's eternal salvation and the boy was sacrificed

on the altar of Mammon. We hear a great deal nowa-
days about the barbarism and savagery of the poor

idolators, who sacrificed their children to the cruel

gods of pagan times. They were at least animated

by religious motives, and their heroic sacrifices were

dictated by genuine if mistaken zeal. They compare

favorably with present-day parents who wilfully en-

danger their children's salvation rather than make the

few sacrifices, which duty and religion imperatively

demand.

Not Paupers.

The vagrants are the original tax-dodgers. They

attend church, as I have already asserted several times,

but bear none of its burdens. They hear Mass but

refuse to contribute to the maintenance of him who

ministers at the altar. They will do anything rather

than pay. They are not paupers, except when it comes

to contributing. They have their excuses, of course.

They do not .come to church often enough to rent a

pew. They cannot afford just now hut they will do

better at some indefinite future date. They are not

going to remain long in the parish, and it is scarcely

worth while. Then there are two or more parishes

of different nationalities and they have not arrived at

a decision as to the one with which they will affiliate.

It is a safe guess to make that they never will. When
some emergency arises, such as baptism a marriage or a

funeral they are very profuse in their promises. They

are well aware that in such cases the traditional zeal

of a priest can be relied upon and that of two evils he

will always choose the least. If the canonical regula-



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 69

tions as to parish affiliation were rigidly enforced

they would be in dire straits for a pretext but the

bruised reed is seldom broken and the smoking flax

is seldom quenched. Where the system in force is

a combination of pew rent and seat money they

will enter a pew with all the assurance of the

real owner and when discovered they will merely smile

at the collector for his pains. Sensitive ? Oh, no

!

If they were they would have given up going to church

long ago. They are simply miserable and mean and

penurious and stingy and they go through life, dodging

a financial responsibility whenever and wherever possi-

ble. They are in reality the recipients of the charity

of those who make it possible for the church to exist,

but charity has been imposed upon from the beginning

and there are nearly always enough of the generous

and self-denying to make up for the shortcomings of

those who are the reverse. The reader will please

notice that I put it “nearly always”. There have been

instances in which meanness became epidemic and the

priestly victim, bound by the vow of obedience to his

bishop lived to regard with bitterness the day he be-

came a priest. No priest would dare stand in his

pulpit and treat in plain terms of the* miserable, con-

temptible, small subterfuges to which many people will

have recourse in order to avoid paying what they

justly owe. No pastor could well put on paper all

that he has learned of human meanness in the care of

the temporalities of religion. There is a saying in the

medical profession that if epsom salts were a dollar an

ounce its popularity as a medicine would be greatly

enhanced. The cheap things are seldom appreciated

even by those who take advantage of their cheapness.

The fact that it costs them nothing has much to do

with the lack of appreciation, shown by the vagrants

for the priceless heritage of Catholic faith, known by

the generic term of “religion.”



TO BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

Sounds Fine.

We often hear it said by well-informed laymen that
if exact business principles were employed more

generally by priests, the results would be more satisfac-

tory in every way. Exact business principles mean

presumably in this case an equitable assessment made

by competent laymen, which assessment every practical

member ought to be obliged in some way to pay. All

this sounds fine but there are a few difficulties. The

chief difficulty is that the wealthy will seldom consent

to an equitable assessment. Another difficulty is it

makes the condition of the deserving poor a matter of

common parish gossip. A third and final objection is
that no system has yet been devised which can effec-

tually reach the vagrants and the bad pays. You can

assess them until you are black in the face as the

saying goes and you are as well off after the assess-

ment as you were before.

CHAPTER XV.

Nursing a Grouch

Finds Fault.

A gentleman bearing an honored and distinctively
Catholic name, writes to know if priests, even with the

approval of the bishop of the diocese can licitly refuse

the sacraments to a man “unless he contributes money

for certain definite purpose”. He is furthermore anx-

ious to learn if such a practice does not smack strongly

of what is known as simony, for after a lengthy dis-

sertion on the subject he winds up his letter with the



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 71

question “if that be not simony, then tell us what

simony, is” ?

Our friend evidently means well, but unfortunately

he belongs to that class of whom it has been flippantly
said that “they are long on theology and short on

cash”. From his letter it would appear that his pastor,

with the bishop’s approval, is trying to bring him to

time, but that he is still inclined to be rebellious. Now
as there are quite a few of his kind scattered here and

there throughout the country, it may be well to state

concisely what the Church teaches and holds on matters

of this kind. The proceeding, we will grant in the

beginning is a very unusual one. Priests seldom have

recourse to the strong arm of canon law in order to

enforce their rights.

We can conceive of cases, however, in which such
action would be not only permissible, but altogether

justifiable. Take for example a case in which the

pastor has been ordered by his bishop to undertake

the building of a parochial school. Some parishioner

of wealth and prominence, refuses to subscribe, and

as frequently has happened, does everything in his

power to keep others from subscribing. He is a

stumbling block in the way of the Church’s progress,

and it is clearly within the bishop’s power to take such

steps as will bring him to a proper sense of his duty.

The Church has placed a large measure of power in

the hands of its bishops. Disobedience, grave scandal

and irreligion, are punishable offenses. If he chooses

to make an aggravated case of this kind, what is

known in theology as “a reserved case”, he takes away

from the priest the power to absolve the recalcitrant

penitent until such time as he complies with the episco-

pal requirements.



72 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

If, at the same time, a bishop can employ punitive

measures to force priests to contribute out of the parish

revenues to his own support, it is clearly within his
power to force the laity by similar punitive measures

to contribute to the support of their pastor. This is

not simony. It is the common teaching of the Church
which is nothing more or less than codified common
sense in its application to every day Catholic life. Our

friend, has evidently not proceeded far enough in his

theological studies to realize the wide range of a

bishop's power. He will do well to pay up at once or
suffer the consequences, which from a Catholic stand-

point are not very pleasant to contemplate. Simony

as practiced by the biblical gentleman from whom it

derives its name, involved the expenditure of ready

cash. Our friend will evidently never be guilty of

this offense.

An Old One.

“The apostles as far as I can learn/’ writes another,

“paid very little attention to the business-side of relig-

ion. They were too busy preaching the word of God.”

Yes, that is right. They ordained deacons to attend

to it for them. There were no churches to keep up,

no schools or educational institutions in those days.

Established residences were not necessary, as the early

missionaries were generally on the move.

St. Paul's case was an exception. He worked at

his trade during the greater part of the year which he

spent at Corinth
;
but this has never been regarded as

being to the credit of the Corinthians. He was merely

furnishing the covetous and wealth-loving with a much-

needed object-lesson in unselfishness. The eighth and

ninth chapters of 2nd Corinthians, furnish us with a



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 73

clue as to the conditions with which he had to contend

amongst those people. Their generosity certainly

needed a spur on the occasion of the general collection

taken up for the starving Christians at Jerusalem.

His words on that occasion are an eloquent sermon on

the spiritual benefits of generous giving. It is a ser-

mon, which may be perused with profit by those who

labor under the impression that primitive Christianity

was first and above all things cheap Christianity.

The men and women who held themselves ready

to give their lives for their faith at any moment did

not place much value on material possessions. Their

comparative wealth is now a matter of very small

moment. Apostolic poverty in the priesthood has

always been a favorite cry with the poor pays. What

they really require is a priesthood, absolutely immune

to such mundane necessities as clothing, three meals a

day and a roof to cover their heads against the in-

clemency of the weather—a priesthood which can sub-
sist on water and air, and light, and those ethereal

elements which can be absorbed by the system without

the expenditure of ready cash.

The Trouble.

I have received numerous letters during the course

of these articles, and in nearly every case they are

from men and women who in one way or another are

“nursing a grouch”. Many of them are pathetic pro-

tests against harsh treatment to which they have been

subjected, but the evidences of the firm purpose of

amendment is frequently wanting. These letters are

in nearly every instance a confession that they have

not been doing their full duty and that they have been

justly disciplined. One man states that he has “been



74 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

frequently and perhaps profitably buffetted from the

pulpit, not of course by name, but so that everybody

could understand who was meant.
,,

As he is really sorry for his shortcomings in the

past and is honestly disposed to do better in the future,

he deserves encouragement, and the assurance that a

changed line of conduct on his part will bring a

changed attitude on the part of his pastor. Another

has had his name taken off his pew and his wife's name

substituted in its place. He deeply resents the public

humiliation he has been forced to undergo and humbly

asks for counsel in his difficulty. Insomuch as he

neglects to state the part which the wife has played in

the whole transaction, he has left us in the dark on

a very important phase of his present predicament.

His is certainly a genuine case of a man holding his

religion in his wife’s name. We are inclined, at the
same time, to the belief that an extreme measure of

this kind must be the result of extreme perversity on

his part.

Another has had his name posted on a “dead-beat

list” at the church door, and he writes to know if this

be an approved Catholic practice. It certainly appears

to be right and fitting that the congregation, as a

whole, should know who are paying and who are not.

Every club, every organization of any consequence,

has its delinquent list. A “dead-beat list,” as I under-
stand it, is a list of people who cannot be made to pay.

It is passing strange to find people of this kind still

possessed of sensibilities.

Another still writes to tell me that he has walked

a mile and a half every Sunday to hear Mass in a



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 75

neighboring church. He does .not like the pastor of
his own church, which, by the way, is only a half block

from his door. What this poor man really needs is

a course in mental therapeutics. Iiis children, it

appears, have more sense than their father. They

positively refuse to accompany him on his walks. We
predict that he will keep on walking during the remain-

ing years of his life. His letter shows him to be a

constitutional parish rebel, and these people die, but

never reform.

It is altogether too bad that we should have those

“grouches” and sore spots and old wounds waiting

to be healed. The Catholic who is weak enough and

blind enough to give way to a feeling of this kind, is

laying up for himself a heavy store of future tribula-

tion. The man who nurses a grouch in parish affairs,

is nursing and rearing a brood of poisonous vipers for

the future destruction of his own soul and the souls

of those committed to his care.

CHAPTER XVI.

Extraordinary Means

Cause and Effect.

I know a little western parish in which there is a

beautiful brick church, a commodious and up-to-date

school and a parochial residence which would be a

credit to a much larger congregation.

Ten years ago it was a struggling, discouraged,

down-at-the-heel mission, famous throughout the whole



76 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

diocese for its inability to pay the pastor’s humble

salary. A young priest, with a goodly amount of
western hustle, was assigned to the place, and the

affairs of the congregation immediately took a turn

for the better. The non-Catholics of the place took

a fancy to the clerical hustler and helped him, in many

ways. Fairs, festivals, picnics, lawn fetes, socials,

suppers and entertainments followed each other in

quick succession. The parochial residence up to this

time had been a reproach. It was disposed of at once

and a new and more commodious one erected in its

place.

Then it seemed to suddenly dawn upon the people

that the old church had outlived its usefulness. Steps

were taken looking towards the erection of a new one,

and before the close of the pastor’s third year in the

place, the new church was dedicated with appropriate

ceremonies. Pride begets progress and progress be-

gets confidence. It took two years more to pay the

debts, and then the parish was ready to undertake the

building of its own school. Three years more of

united effort, and the school was a reality. Discour-

agement and indifference had given place to confidence.

It was now a real Catholic parish, striving for every-

thing that is best in Catholic life and satisfied with

nothing less,

A Dignified Age.

The one great means whereby all this had been

made possible was the annual fair. I have the pastor’s

own word for it that the aggregate amount raised in

this way during these ten years of brick and mortar,



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 77

surpassed by a good round sum the total cost of the

new church with all its belongings. Minor affairs,

such as socials, suppers, entertainments and the like,

netted a sum equal to the original cost of the parochial

residence. In other words, what is known as the

extraordinary means of raising funds had paid for the

two principal parish buildings, and left a little balance

over for running expenses. And this is not the only

instance on record in which they have played a leading

part in parish undertakings.

Oh, yes, I know their popularity is somewhat on

the wane. We are growing more fashionable all the
time, and it is incumbent upon us to raise the standard

or parochial propriety. This is a dignified and

respectable age and we must really forget that these

undignified means of raising money have paid debts

and lifted mortgages and solved problems in the days

when people were not quite as fashionable as they are

today. And treating of fashionable people reminds me

that I attended a fair at Newport, R. I., some time

ago and noted that some of the real leaders of fashion

were down amongst the common people doing every-

thing in their power to make the fair a success. It

is just barely possible, therefore, that such affairs may

again become popular, and that even in the wealthier

parishes they may sometimes be preferred to house to

house collections and to those direct methods in which

the work of collecting falls wholly and entirely upon

the shoulders of the priest.

From Many Sources.

The great argument in favor of such methods is

that much of the money received through these chan-

nels comes from the people who would never contribute



78 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

'

otherwise. Much of it comes from welbdisposed non-

Catholics who patronize fairs and festivals and the

like, chiefly because they approve of the general aims

and purposes of the Church and hold themselves ready

to help and support every worthy cause. The Church

in this country, and particularly in the great West,

owes a deep debt of gratitude to the genial, kindly,

liberal non-Catholics who have come to our assistance

in every worthy undertaking. I believe I am safe in

asserting that at least one-third of the moneys received

for church purposes in this diocese has come from the

pockets of well-disposed Protestants.

I believe, too, that we Catholics are not always as

thoughtful as we should be in the matter of mani-

festing our gratitude to those good people. We feel
it incumbent upon us to keep alive the religious strife

and bitterness of an age which has, fortunately, passed

away. We are fighting over the old battles, forgetful
of the fact that if Martin Luther were to drop down

into the midst of our twentieth century American life,

he would not be tolerated for a moment in any Prot-

estant pulpit.

We really ought to relegate these historic gentle-
men to the museum of antiquities and leave them there.

It serves no good purpose to be constantly reminding

well-disposed non-Catholics of the short-comings of

some sixteenth century ancestor, whose chief theologi-

cal argument was a club. Let those brawling, fighting,

witch-burning, heresy-hating, hard-drinking, ancestors

sleep in peace. The world has moved on and the

stream of human sympathy has widened. Men are

slowly learning that abuse is a poor argument and that

sensible people resent being held responsible for the

brutality and savagery of distant ancestors.



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 79

Easily Disedified.

Many Catholics who are unable to give much, are
willing to give of the time and labor which counts for

so much in the success of such undertakings. This,

after all, is a most effective form of lay co-operation

and greatly lightens the burdens of the priest. Then

again there are those who scarcely ever contribute

except on occasions of this kind. Untold, millions are

spent every year by the American people for useless

luxuries and profitless amusements. After all has

been said and done, the Church might as well have its

share of the nation’s spending money, and the fair

offers one of the best means of getting it. Church

fairs at the same time do a great deal of good by pro-

moting the spirit of fellowship not only amongst the

members of a congregation, but also between Catholics

and their non-Catholic neighbors.

They are open to criticism in the sense that they

promote the spirit of gambling. The gambling, how-

ever, is of the very mild and much diluted kind. It

is neither sinful nor unjust and the people who pay for

“chances” as a rule, care very little about the results

of the drawing. In my own experience, it is the
people who are too mean to pay for a “chance” who

are the loudest in their condemnation of this mis-

named “gambling”. It is doubtful, at the same time,

if we Catholics are bound to conform strictly to the

Methodist Book of Discipline. These good people

have made sins of things that are not sins, and as a

result they are altogether too easily disedified.

Of course, it would be better, much better if a con-

gregation could get along without anything of this



80 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

kind. It is well to remove all possible causes of dis-

edification. It is well, too, in the management of such

affairs to conduct them on the highest possible plane

of Christian propriety to the end that our enemies be

furnished with no additional pretext for making light

of the teachings and practices of our holy faith.

CHAPTER XVII.

Young Men’s Complaint

A Surprise.

A pastor in a large eastern city recently went to
the trouble of finding out for himself the number of

Catholic young men holding membership in the local

Y. M. C. A. He found to his surprise that more than

three hundred of these young men were entered on the

organization’s register as belonging to the Catholic

Church.

Continuing, his investigation he was further sur-

prised to findThat more than thirty of them belonged

to his own parish. Instead of stopping right there,

he went to the additional trouble of endeavoring to

discover the influence for good or evil which the

organization exerted upon these members. Quietly,

but none the less thoroughly he set to* work to discover

their personal habits and religious tendencies. He'

found, as he had anticipated that at least one-third of

them never put a foot inside a church on Sunday.

Another one-third were of the class known as irregular

attendants. They came to Mass when things were

favorable and approached the sacraments at irregular



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 81

intervals. The remaining one-third were regular

attendants at the Sunday services, and were more or

less faithful in the matter of approaching the sacra-

ments.

With one or two exceptions, all were of the class

known as poor pays. They seldom gave to the collec-

tions and seemed disposed to give just what they had

to for seat-money and nothing more. Whilst this

pastor's original purpose was not to discover the atti-

tude of these young men on the question of church

support, his discovery lead him to continue his investi-

gations in order to find out the comparative generosity

of his young men taken as a whole. I will take the

liberty of putting the result of his investigation in his

own words.

A Summing Up.

“I found, of course, a certain percentage of my
young men who are doing0 splendidly in the matter of

contributing towards the support of our church and its

institutions. They are generous on all occasions and

can always be relied upon to do what is right. I

found again, that young men's salaries seem to play

no part in their comparative generosity. Some of

them receiving good wages, never give anything.

Others, again, with a moderate weekly allowance, are

what might be justly called generous contributors.

About one-third of my young men belong to this last
class, the other two-thirds can be divided again into two

classes : the one-third that never give anything for the

simple reason that they are very irregular in their

attendance at church and very careless, of course,

about everything which pertains to their duties as

Catholics. The other one-third are generous by fits



82
<

BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

and starts. They give occasionally, but are by no

means regular contributors.

“A strange thing in connection with these young
men is this: the ones who give nothing are the ones

who talk most about the mercenary tendency of the

Church at the present day. Their favorite pretext for

not coming to church is that they do not go because

we are always taking up collections. I think at

bottom it is not a question of money, but of morals,

and that if we could do something to improve their

moral conditions, the financial question would solve

itself. It is the old story repeated daily under our

eyes. They always have money when it is question

of their own pleasure. They become financially

crippled only when we ask them to aid in the solution

of our parish problems.

“We have a school with almost a thousand children.
The work done in this school reflects the highest credit

upon the parish. We have societies for the mental
and physical advancement of our boys and young men.

We are straining every nerve to fit the coming genera-
tion of men for the responsibilities of Christian citizen-

ship, and one of the chief sources of discouragement

is the indifference of those most directly interested.

We do not want those young men’s money so much as
their souls, but my investigation has shown me clearly

one thing, and that is that the Catholic young man

who is a poor pay is generally a poor Christian.”

Seems Unfair.

I do not know if this general summing up be true

of our young men, taken as a whole, but I do know

that altogether too many of them regard themselves

as having no responsibility as far as the support of the



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 83

church is concerned. It does not seem right that

young men receiving good salaries should be exempt,

whilst married men and fathers of families, receiving

the same and smaller salaries, should be required to

make real and sometimes great sacrifices in order to do

their duty in this matter. The burden ought to be

equalized. Such young men ought really to pay more

than husbands and fathers with domestic problems of

their own to solve.

Our young men frequently complain that they are

preached tp and preached at a great deal, and that

there is a general tendency towards fault-finding as

far as they are concerned. The real truth of the

matter is that they are the object of the deepest solici-

tude on the part of priests and pastors, and that those

who show a disposition to do what is half right are

treated with every consideration.

What We Want.

There is a saying amongst priests which runs to

the effect that if we look out for the young men and

boys the future growth of the Church in any locality

is hereby assured. This saying seems to be based on

the assumption that the girls and the young women

will remain Catholic even if no specific attempts be

made to keep them faithful. Experience has shown,

however, that this assumption is not always a correct

one. The mixed marriage has been “the great

destroyer”, as far as the latter are concerned, and the

young men have not by any means responded to the

efforts made to uplift them socially and morally. We
have* never yet been able to organize a Catholic young

men’s society similar in general scope and purpose to

the Y. M. C. A. That there is a real need for an

organization of this kind, no one will deny.



84 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

If we could once succeed in arousing them from

the apathy and indifference and convince them of the

necessity of standing shoulder to shoulder in the great

struggle for God and righteousness, the future growth

of Catholicity in this country would be assured.

There is a little ground for hope from this army of

careless, lukewarm, indifferent. Mass-missing young

men. At bottom we do not want their money, so

much as we want them to be true to their convictions,

to be honest, upright, sober, industrious, God-fearing

young men.

We want to cease apologizing for that form of
misnamed Catholicity which is the Church’s reproach.

We want them to keep out of dirty politics and dis-
honorable means of making a livelihood. We want
their religion to be something more than an empty

name, and when that time comes to pass, we feel that

they will have no complaint to register against the

Church of their fathers. I have found in my experi-
ence that the men and women who complain most about

the exactions of religion, are they who are striving

to trump up a pretext for not practicing that religion.

They are giving up the service of God and they are

trying to convince themselves and others that He has

been a hard Master. They have yet to learn that the

devil, whom they have begun to serve, is not by any

means an easy one.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Accountability

The Lay Standpoint.

An editor for whose opinions I entertain a good
deal of respect, has been kind enough to remind me



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 85

that no treatise on this subject can be regarded as

satisfactory which deals with the duty of giving to

the exclusion of that other and very important side of

the question which has to do with the expenditure of

the moneys received.

The laity, he gently intimates, have also a few

rights. They have a right to insist that the business

of the parish be administered wisely and economically.

They have a right to such information as will enable

them to judge just where the parish stands, financially.

They have a right to a regular and specific accounting

in order that they may give intelligently and according

to the real needs of the situation.

The editor’s stand is well taken. There is no room

here, however, for misunderstanding' or difference of

opinion. These rights of the laity every priest is will-

ing to admit Taxation without accountability has

never been productive of satisfactory results. Auto-

cratic methods in the conduct of parish affairs are

somewhat out of date in this age of intelligence and

practical business methods. Reasonable people are

entitled to reasonable treatment and it has been found

by experience that men and* women give better when

they know how their money is being spent.

In the average parish no difficult or complicated

system of bookkeeping is necessary. The ordinary

sources of revenue are few and easily understood.

Fuel, insurance, janitor’s service, incidental repairs,

improvements, interest, sisters’ and pastors’ salaries

are things which even people of limited comprehension

can easily grasp. The duty of accounting to a parish

is, after all, an easy one. It is a duty which is made

obligatory upon all pastors by diocesan and general

legislation for the reasons already given.



86 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

Our present methods of church government are the

result of centuries of experience. Whilst at the first

glance they may appear to be wanting in some of those

elements which contribute to the success of ordinary

business ventures, it must not be forgotten that the

Church is governed from above rather than from below.

Bishops are responsible to the Holy Father, and priests

to bishops. The laity, who demand the strictest busi-

ness principles in the conduct of parish affairs, are

liable to forget that the constitution of the Church

leaves it in the power of the bishops to regulate all

these matters in such a way that the real interests of

religion will never be sacrificed to purely financial con-

siderations. The supernatural must never be lost sight

of, and when people give from supernatural motives,

they are generally content with leaving the responsi-

bility for the spending to those to whom it rightly be-
longs. Thanks to the sagacity and prudence of our

bishops, the credit of the Church in this country is

everywhere of the highest order. Mistakes have been

made, but the percentage of failures is very small com-

pared with those undertakings in which “business” has

been the paramount and sole consideration.

Thoughtlessness.

I have endeavored to make it evident from the be-

ginning that the chief purpose of this series of articles

has been to reach those who are not doing their duty

in the matter of giving. I have been trying to put

in cold type those things which priests cannot very

well say from the pulpit. I hope I have succeeded in

hurting the sensibilities of the poor pays, the slow pays

and of those who do not pay anything at all. I am
duly conscious, at the same time of the fact that



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 87

thoughtlessness frequently plays a large part in the

failure of many people to live up to even the ordinary

standard of Christian duty. It is not malice
;

it is not

meanness, but just plain, common, everyday, old-

fashioned neglect. They really mean well at bottom,

but they keep putting off the doing of the right thing

until in the end their negligence really becomes a

serious matter. It is, after all, an easy matter to be

absentminded in the matter of paying out money. I

have been trying, as effectively as I know how, to

reason with reasonable people, and at the same time to

unmask the pretexts and subterfuges of the unreason-

able*

The Church of God must have means to carry on

its work. These means must come from the people.

Giving will ever and always be a burden to the giver,

and the interests of religion will always suffer until

our people, taken as a whole, have been educated up

to the duty of giving according to their means.

There is no other side to this question. No pretext
can justify any man or woman for failure to give.

Laying the blame on somebody else will not satisfy the

obligation. The disappointed little parish boss, the

constitutional crank, the born critic will all have their

say, of course, but, after all has been said and done,

the duty of giving according to their means still re-

mains. Priests will make mistakes, as they have done

in the past. Architectural freaks will be called

churches, unwise debts will be contracted, blunders will

be made in the location of churches, economy in the

administration of parishes will sometimes be lacking,

but none of these ‘things affect the force of the com-

mandment requiring us to contribute to the decent

support and maintenance of religion.



88 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

For Whom Intended.
j

I wish it were possible to use none but sweet and

pleasant words in the treatment of a subject of this

kind. I wish it were possible to point out the path

of duty without hurting the sensibilities of those who

do not walk therein. Soft words, however, as the old

saying goes, “butter no parsnips,” and they would be

misunderstood by those for whom they were intended.
I wanted the shoe to pinch, and I am glad to know it

has pinched. Money talks from the pulpit are open to

the objection that those who do well are forced to

listen to sermons intended for those who do badly.

One of the difficulties about sermons and preaching in

general is that those for whom they are intended
seldom apply the lessons to themselves. I want the

poor pay and the bad pay and those who do not pay

at all to understand that all my arguments have been
directed towards one end, namely, that of bringing

them to a sense of what is just and right in this matter,

and nothing more. I made the statement in the be-

ginning that ninety per cent, of the priests’ worries

were financial ones. I made another statement. It

was to the effect that at least one-third of our Catholic

people are doing nothing or practically nothing to-

wards the support of religion. This is my justification

for the use of words which cannot be and may not be

misunderstood.

CHAPTER XIX.

The Indefinite Commandment

Why This Silence.

When I began collecting material for this series of

articles, I thought it well to find out, in the very begin-



BUSINESS SIDE OE RELIGION. 89

ning, just what the theologians taught relative to this

subject of giving.

The Fifth commandment of the Church, as it

appears in our catechism, is rather hazy and indeter-

minate. It reads : “Fifth, to contribute to the support

of our pastors.” That is all. It is beautifully inde-

finite and its interpretation and explanation rests

with the theologians, whose views and conclusions are,

after all, nothing but common sense applied to Christ-

ian teaching. A Catholic writer is not always safe in
setting forth his own personal views. He is always

safe in following the truth as it appears in the ap-

proved teachings of the Church.

To the question “how much must the faithful con-

tribute,” St. Thomas answers: “determinatio certae

partis est reservata ordinationi ecclesiae.” By this St.

Thomas evidently means that the determination of an

exact sum is left to the judgment of the Church and

particularly of the bishop. The bishops through

synodal enactments and through special decrees regu-

late the salaries of pastors and assistants. They are

the best judges and their enactments are never op-

pressive.

Sabetti, our own distinguished Jesuit theologian,

as usual, is clear and to the point, but his treatment

of the subject is so brief that, if it were translated and

put into an English dress, it would occupy less than

half the space of this article. He quotes from Arch-
bishop Kenrick’s text-book of theology, in which it is

stated that it is necessary that each one contribute

something according to his means. So long, however,

as this duty is not defined by any special legislation,

he does not . seem disposed to condemn any one as



90 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

being guilty of mortal sin, who omits to contribute his

just share, provided, however, that there is no danger

that the pastor suffer want, or that others who con-

tribute, be, on this account, obliged to bear too great

a burden. Those, however, who out of a spirit of

avarice refuse to contribute seem, in the two cases

above mentioned, “to be guilty of mortal sin, and to

be unworthy of absolution, for they violate the Law

of Christ relative to the support of the Ministers of

religion and expose themselves and others to the loss

of eternal salvation.”

Here again, however, we have nothing but the mere

"general principle—no specific laying down of the law
relative to the support of bishops and priests, no point-

ing out of the people’s duty relative to the support

of parochial schools, diocesan colleges and seminaries,

missionary establishments and eleemosynary institu-

tions, no insistence- upon the obligation resting upon

the faithful, taken as a whole, to provide the Sovereign

Pontiff himself with the means of living up to his high

station and exalted dignity. All this particular legis-

lation is left to the discretion of the bishops or to the

Holy Father acting as the head of the Church uni-

versal.

A Summary.

The general teaching of the Church on this matter

may be summarized as follows : The duty of giving

to the support of religion rests, first, on the divine

law as is shown by the setting apart of the Levites in

the Old Law and by the institution of tithes for their
support. We have also the express words of St. Paul
that “the Lord ordained that they who preach the

Gospel should live by the Gospel/’ and that “they that



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 91

serve the altar partake with the altar”; second, on

ecclesiastical law, as is shown by the commandment

itself
;
third, on the natural law, which dictates that

"the laborer is worthy of his hire” and "the workman

is worthy of his meat.”

This common sense of mankind known as the

natural law recognizes that the men who give them-

selves up entirely to the service of God, the administra-

tion of the sacraments and the care of souls, are

entitled to a decent support. The neglect of this duty

is, consequently, a sin, first, against religion, which

cannot be maintained in the world without the ministry

of its priests, and, secondly, against justice, as the

people’s contributions are "not an alms so much as

they are a remuneration for valuable service rendered.”

By the support of religion is understood, first, the

maintenance of the clergy and the hierarchy, the Holy

Father included; secondly, the erection and preserva-

tion of church buildings; third, the necessities for'

public worship
;

fourth, schools
;

teachers and the

necessary equipment for carrying on the work of

Christian education
;
fifth, eleemosynary and charitable

institutions; sixth, missions at home and abroad.

Every law* thus far enacted recognizes the primary

duty of people to their own parish and their own pastor,

to their own diocesan and local institutions in prefer-

ence to outside interests, no matter how praiseworthy.

This duty, which begins at home does not, however,

end there. The extension of God’s kingdom in Christ-

ian and pagan lands has ever been a legitimate object

of Catholic zeal. All these forms of giving are

generally regulated by the bishops of the various dio-

ceses who are, after all, th best judges of the compara-

tive importance of local and outside needs.



92 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

No Evasion.

The Church, too, recognizes the principle of just

and equitable taxation, even in the matter of giving.

The contributions of the faithful should, as far as lies

in the power of pastors, be representative of the means

of those contributing. “Let the rich give freely,” says

a spiritual writer, “the poor more sparingly, but cheer-

fully.” “Those who cannot give money, let them give

in labor or some other form. Even the children should

be taught to give as a part of their training in good

works, to the end that when they grow up they will not

fail in the performance of this important duty.”

The sin of avarice lies at the root of many people’s

failure to contribute. Men are selling their souls to-

day for dollars and cents just as they sold them in

the days of Martin Luther and Henry Eighth. Back

of many of these pretexts for not paying lies that

baneful vice which threatens to sap the very founda-

tions of the nation’s existence. Graft and corruption

in politics, failure to pay just debts, petty theft and

public plunder are merely varying forms of the same

old vice which prompts so many of our people to

evade their just obligations as far as the support of

the Church and religion is concerned.

CHAPTER XX.

Appreciation

The Printed Sermon.

*

i
r

It is with a feeling akin to regret that I bring this

series of articles to a close. I am grateful for many
suggestions received from the clergy and laity, from

editors and even from those whose views differed from



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION. 93

mine. It was an evidence that they were reading

these articles and thinking, and an evidence too, that

they were not entirely satisfied with their own way

of looking at the subject. Wholesome discussion

clears the intellectual atmosphere. Like the five blind

men of Hindustan in Saxe’s poem, our way of looking

at things is generally dependent upon our environments

and individual circumstances.

Many have cut themselves off from the Church

under the childish impression that they were “spiting

the priest”. Others have borne resentment in their

bosom for years* because of some fancied allusion to

their personal shortcomings from the pulpit. Good

men, by assuming a critical attitude towards the

Church and its ministers have lived to see the results

of this false attitude in the lives of their children, who

could not distinguish between the personal element in

the Church and the principles at stake. Others can

always discover the beauties of their religion in strange

places, but are never satisfied with the Church as they

find it at their doors. The man with a “grouch” is

generally a man with high ideals which he expects

other people to live up to. It is quite common for

men of the lowest morals to give the lapses of the

ministers of religion as a reason for their personal

depravity. The Devil is an apt hand at supplying his

clients with excuses and pretexts. All this has been

brought home to me time and again during the course

of these articles; but over against all these stands

another principle, viz., that the truth is powerful and

will prevail.

I have been consoled, at the same time by the

thought that I have been preaching for twenty con-

secutive weeks to an audience of at least two hundred

thousand readers on the simplest and commonest of

Christian duties, viz., that of giving to the support of



94 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

religion. No preacher could desire a nobler audience.
The spoken word frequently passes in one ear and out

the other, but the printed word remains. After all

has been said and done it is the people who read

Catholic papers, who mould and form Catholic opinion.

The Catholic home without a Catholic paper is a home

with a serious spiritual and intellectual handicap. It is

a fortress without the arms and ammunition wherewith

to defend it. In this age of ideas it is as great an

anomaly as a school without textbooks, or the ordinary

means of instruction. The sooner these things are

realized by our people the better it- will be for the

future of the Church in this country.

The strength or weakness of the Church in any

country today is shown in the strength or weakness of

its press. The Devil has nearly always beaten us at

the game of printer’s ink. This mightiest human

agency for good or evil must be reckoned with at every'

turn in this struggle for God and human souls. I am

grateful to Almighty God at the same time for the

opportunity and privilege of instructing so large a

bodwof the faithful in that which concerns the material

support of His Divine Spouse, the Caltholic Church.

What I have said well, let it be said to His honor and

glory. What I have said badly, let it be put down to

my human frailty and to that darkness of the under-

standing from which no man is free.

Where Praise is Due.

I have been fearful that I might be thought lacking

in the appreciation of the generosity and self-sacrifice

of our people taken as a whole. I have been fearful

least “the edge of a naturally caustic pen” should

repell rather than attract my readers. I have good
reason to know and understand the vast amount of



BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION <)5

unselfishness in the big heart of my Catholic brethren
here in the United States. Two years ago the Catholic
Church Extension Society was started with nothing

but faith in God and confidence in the generosity of

our Catholic people. The Society, thanks to the gener-

osity of priests and people, is to-day in a position to do

an incalculable amount of good. Our confidence has

been abundantly justified. The men and women, too,

who have built up the property of the Church and

made it the most powerful organization in the world

even from a commercial standpoint deserve consider-

able credit for what they have done. Parochial

schools, hospitals, orphanages, refuges for fallen

women, old people’s homes, convents, colleges, acad-

emies and all those numerous evidences of Catholic

zeal and self-sacrifice are so many proofs that a large

proportion of our people have done their duty bravely

and well. I have been pleading with the non-givers

and the poor givers to the end that they may come

to the assistance of the good and the generous. They

who have borne the burden up to the present hour

have a right to demand that this burden shall be equal-

ized. The slow pay, the poor pay and the people who

do not pay at all are very exacting when a priest owes

them a bill. They demand prompt settlement and are

very much disedified if he copy their own methods,

in their dealings with the Church. The future welfare

and growth, too, of every parish in the land is depend-

ent, to a large extent, upon the manner in which they

learn the lessons bearing upon Church support. Re-

ligion without the spirit of self-sacrifice is inconceivable

and the duty of giving, strikes at the very roots

of this spirit of self-sacrifice. If it ever come to a

choice between the man’s money and his soul the

Church solemnly adjures him to keep his money and

save his soul, i. e., if he can, which, to say the least,

is somewhat doubtful.



96 BUSINESS SIDE OF RELIGION.

The Test.

I feel I would be guilty of a serious oversight if I

closed this series without any reference to something

which concerns very closely the business side of all

forms of religion. I refer of course to missions, to

those undertakings having for their purpose, the

preservation and propagation of the principles for

which the Church stands. We speak in glowing terms
of the great missionaries who labored amongst the

aborigines away back in the days when the country was

one vast wilderness. We take an honest pride in the
efforts of those apostolic men who have preached the

gospel of Jesus Christ in strange lands. The gospel

remains the same and the duty of spreading a knowl-

edge of its saving truths is still incumbent upon those

who believe in its efficacy to raise up and save a fallen

race. American Catholic parents scarcely ever dream

of the possibility that their boys may have a vocation

to preach that blessed gospel to those who sit in the

darkness and shadow of death. The race problem will

always remain a problem in this country until the

white and black have learned from the lips of the

church the common brotherhood of man.

Spiritual destitution should not exist side by side

with spiritual luxury. Catholics living in churchless

communities must receive more attention. It is easy

to save those who rightly belong to us if the proper

means be taken. Mission churches must be built and

priests supplied. These are legitimate objects of

Catholic zeal. We should never be so busy at home
that we must perforce turn a deaf ear to the Macedon-

ian call to “come over and help us”. The heart in

which the spirit of Christ dwells is always open to the

cry of the needy no matter whether the need be spirit-

ual or temporal.

[the end]



FOR YOUR LIBRARY.

1 . Three Ages of Progress, showing what Christianity

has done for Civilization. By the Rev. Julius E. Devos,

with preface by the Bishop of Ogdensburg. Second

revised edition, 400 pages crowded with facts, over

4000 subjects indexed. - net, $1.25

2. Christian Persecutions, being a historical exposition

of the principal Catholic Events from the Christian Era

to the present time. Written from an unprejudiced

standpoint by A. H. Craig. - - net, $ 1 .00

3. Questions asked by Protestants briefly answered

by the Rev. M. Philipps; 1 04 pages-(over 1 1 0,000

already sold) - $0. 1

0

4. Ecclesiastical Year, an explanation of Catholic

Faith, Ceremonies, etc. Translated and adapted

from the German of Rev. A. Petz; flexible cloth, 288

pages. - ----- $0.25
5. Life of Pope Pius X by Msgr. Anton de Waal—bound

in fine marine blue cloth, 1 20 illustrations, net, $1 .25

6. Catholicity vs. Protestantism. Conversation of a

Catholic Clergyman with a Protestant; cloth, net, $0.75

We furnish any book published at publishers’ lowest prices.

Catalogue free.

THE M. H. WILTZIUS CO.
MILWAUKEE NEW YORK



BUY YOUR

PRAYER BOOKS
ROSARIES

CRUCIFIXES

CANDLESTICKS

and other Religious articles from a

Catholic house. It will pay you.

Our prices are the very lowest

and the quality of our Goods unsur-

passed. A large stock always on

hand.

Write For Catalogue.

THE M. H. WILTZIUS CO.
413-417 Broadway,

MILWAUKEE
7 Barclay St.,

NEW YORK