REQUEST FOR INFORMATION We want to form a Mission Study Class on the text book "Christian Democracy for America" In our Church and desire the "Suggestions for Leaders" and other material that will be of help in organizing and con- ducting it. Very truly yours, Name Street and Number City or Town State Church . MISSION STUDY ENROLLMENT Conference District Name of Local Church State Town or City State We formed a Mission Study Class of Members on (date) Under auspices of Leader of Class Address Second Vice-President of the Epworth League Address . If the class is organized in the Epworth League, please send the above request to the Central office of the Epworth League, 740 Rush Street, Chicago, Illinois. If organized in the Sunday School, send to The Board of Sunday Schools, 58 East Washington Street, Chicago, Illinois. If organized under other auspices send to The Joint Centenary Com- mittee, 111 Fifth Avenue, New York. o s I ri 9) O - E o : u U to > c - a Christian Democracy for America BY DAVID D. FORSYTH and RALPH WELLES KEELER THE METHODIST BOOK CONCERN NEW YORK CINCINNATI Copyright, 1918, by THE METHODIST BOOK CONCERN Flni Edition Printed July, 1918 Reprinted November, 1918 CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE FOREWORD 11 I. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 15 II. THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 39 III. OUR FUTURE CITIZENS 67 IV. "WHERE CROSS THE CROWDED WAYS OF LIFE" 91 V. THE CHURCH AND THE NEGRO 119 VI. CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY POWER PLANTS 143 VII. VARIANTS OF THE TASK 165 VIII. THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 191 BIBLIOGRAPHY 211 APPENDIX .... . 213 ILLUSTRATIONS "We're Going Over" Frontispiece FACING PAGE The Old Frontier and the New 19 Grandfather 's Rural Church 45 A Modern Church in a Rural Community 45 Mohammedan Children at Johnstown, Pennsylvania ... 69 Children of the Nations at Ellis Island 69 A Negro Neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio 125 Sunday School at East Calvary Methodist Episcopal Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 125 An Alaskan Family 165 A Daughter of Hawaii 165 The Water Wagon in Porto Rico 165 The Gospel in the Open Little Italy, New York City. . 191 For Country and for God Flag Raising at Bethel Ship, Norwegian-Danish' Methodist Episcopal Church, Brooklyn, New York 191 CHAETS AND MAPS PAGE The Frontier of the Methodist Episcopal Church 21 Land Available and Bate of Acquisition 23 United States Government Irrigation Projects 25 Ten-Year Study of Methodist Frontier Work , . 29 Membership of Methodist Episcopal Church Compared with State Population 41 Rural Industrial America 43 Why Ministers Leave the Country (White) 50 Why Ministers Leave the Country (Negro) 51 The "Supply" Problem in the Rural Methodist Epis- copal Church 56 Protestant Population by States 72 The Immigrant Zone ....'. 75 Rapid Growth of Cities 94 Where the Cities Grow 99 Some Figures That Talk 131 Where Leaders for Christian Democracy May Be Trained 157 Frontier Variants of the Task 171 Alaska "Seward's Folly" and Our Opportunity 178 The Halfway House of the Pacific 181 Porto Rico, Showing Points Where the Methodist Epis- copal Church is Teaching Christian Democracy . . . 184 FOREWORD Two men stood in the Colosseum at Rome. " Think of the men who have stood here !" said one. " Think of the men who will!" said the other. That is the Christian outlook in all ages. It fronts the dawn. Its word of command is ' * Eyes Front ! ' ' The one hundredth anniversary of the beginning of Methodist Missions in 1819 is not being celebrated by a history of the past but by a program for a future. The Centenary World Program of Methodism is an expression of the only answer which the Christian Church can make to a world at war a vigorous and world-wide extension of the kingdom of God. Two volumes dealing with the place of Christianity in the world situation are published as part of the observance of the Centenary of Methodist Missions. The present volume considers the place of the Church through its home missions, in strengthening the forces of Christian democracy in our own land. A companion volume, The Christian Crusade for World Democracy, deals with the relation of Christian missions to world democracy. The books are designed for use in Mission Study classes in Epworth Leagues, young people's societies, church groups, and Sunday schools, as well as for general reading. The authors of Christian Democracy for America desire to acknowledge the helpful suggestions made by the superin- tendents of the several departments of the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church. They wish also to give credit to Miss Edith M. Williamson, for the research work done and her careful work upon many of the maps used, to Eev. Crawford Trotter for writing the immigrant chapter as it appeared in the summer edition, to the Rev. Paul Barton, for work done on the preliminary draft of the chapter on The Challenge of the Christ, to Dr. I. Garland Penn, corresponding secretary of 11 12 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA the Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, for material and suggestions for the chapter on "The Negro and the Church," and to Mr. Carl F. Price for his careful reading of the manuscript and helpful criticism. America will be what we make it. May the words of Katherine Lee Bates be our song as we labor to make it a land of Christian democracy. "0 beautiful for spacious skies, For amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties Above the fruited plain. America ! America 1 God shed his grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea ! "0 beautiful for pilgrim feet, Whose stern, impassioned stress A thoroughfare for freedom beat Across the wilderness! America ! America ! God mend thine every flaw, Confirm thy soul in self control, Thy liberty in law! "O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife, Who more than self their country loved, And mercy more than life. America ! America ! May God thy gold refine, Till all success be nobleness, And every gain divine! "O beautiful for patriot dream That sees beyond the years Thine alabaster cities gleam Undimmed by human tears! America ! America ! God shed his grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood. From sea to shining I WAS listening to the most wonderful narrative I had ever heard. Or, no, I did not listen. The low-ceiled room, lined on every side with books, vanished. I sailed across uncharted seas with a band of men and women who were daring unknown dangers to be free. I saw them in their winning struggles with the wilderness and with the Indian-. In the same cause of freedom I boarded a boat with them in the night, and watched them fling casks of tea into the dark waters about them. I rode with Paul Revere, and heard the shots of the minute men at Lexington and Concord. I heard the deathless words of Nathan J! ali- as he waited his doom. I cheered a dashing man named Arnold as he turned the tide of victory at Saratoga, and, with sinking heart, saw him turn traitor afterward. I suffered with Washington at Valley Forge and marched beside him on and on, until I stood before Yorktown, and saw freedom again win its victory. . . . He had magically swept open the door into an undiscovered land my undiscovered land where men dared all for freedom with a red-white-and-blue flag waving above them. Arthur Goodrich, in The Sign of Freedom. The hand of destiny has prepared us for this day. From the day when the Puritan fled from the thraldom of autocracy to find a new home in a new West, the hand of the Omnipotent has guided us. With the building of the home went the establishment of the churcli and the schoolhouse, to guide us in the free and open worship of our God and in the teaching of our youth the fundamental principles of democracy. A great continent developed before us. The rich coal deposits and vast forests of the North, the mighty steel industries and the numerous manufactories of the East, the great cotton fields of tin- South, and the full granaries of the West all these were developed to make us the wealthiest nation in the world. At last the hour has conic, in the world crisis, when resources shall weigh the scale for autocracy or democracy. R. Lawrence Covghlin, in The Star of the West. The only kind of Christianity that is going ultimately to succeed anywhere is the kind that works here in America, for sooner or later all the objections, philosophical, commercial, and otherwise, which an met in America must be faced elsewhere. What the world has been waiting for through the centuries is a sample Christian nation. America has the best chance of being that sample. Consequently, every move- ment which better expresses Christian ideals in American life makes easier the task of the missionary abroad. On the other hand, any custom that is unjust makes more difficult the task of our foreign work- ers. Edward Laird Mills. CHAPTER I DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS A SPOKESMAN FOR WoELD DEMOCRACY AMERICA has become spokesman for world democracy. The experiment expressed in the Declaration of Indepen- dence has proved a dream worthy the acceptance of all people. From the national capital of the United States of America has gone forth the challenge which is to change the status of human relationships the world over. On the streets of Bombay and in the tea houses of China men are discuss- ing the meaning of a democracy for which the world must be made safe at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives. An ideal of human brotherhood, economic justice and social fair play is being interpreted by folks who gave it scant heed a few months ago. The minds of men are aflame with the the fires of a new day. And America, only a short time ago a handful of colonists with a new idea, but now a nation one hundred and four millions strong, is leading the way to a practical application of all that the term "democracy" means. And what does "democracy" mean? It is not a mere rhetorical catchword. Wrought out in the rough school of a nation's development, it is a part of the life of a people seek- ing the highest form of self-government, both as individuals and as a nation. For only as individuals prove the theory of personal self-government are they able successfully to apply its principles nationally to affairs which concern the larger group. In demonstrating ability for self-gove*rnment one best learns what democracy means. But statements brought to utterance by the world war give a firm foundation for democracy's interpretation. President Wilson pleads for "fair dealing, justice, the freedom to live and be at ease 15 16 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA against organized wrong, . . . the right of those who sub- mit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free." Such a statement implies a background of national life capable of bringing to fruition the ideals which it embodies. It suggests a development which has forced into practice the theories upon which it is based. It calls up the struggle to clear the forests. It sees the prairie schooner lumbering along the rough and tiresome trail. Log cabins in the wilderness, the fight to maintain existence, the efforts to raise and educate a family under adverse conditions, all come to mind. Communities take the place of stockade forts. Commonwealths with citizens striving for the good of all multiply. And suddenly, out of the apparent lack of a national consciousness, men are seen marching to battle for the ideals of "my country." In an hour of world chaos the nation has risen to declare by every form of sacrifice that it believes implicitly in all that it has taught and sung. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS This manifestation of sacrificial devotion speaks elo- quently for the foundations upon which our democracy rests. As a nation we have not reached perfection. There is still a long road to travel. We may even ask ourselves if our nation has become so righteous, so filled with the spirit of economic and social justice, so alive to the real content of the term "brotherhood," so keen to worship God and do his will, that we are ready to give to the world a form of religion that will make possible the practical applications of all that democracy involves. But the fact that religion of a practical character enters into the most fundamental aspects of our thinking of democracy cheers the heart of the world to expect great things from us, for the foundations of our na- tional life are rooted in faith in God. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 17 A seeking to know God has been a part of the whole adventure of settling the United States. Along with the growth of the nation has gone the growth of the Christian Church. Many of the early pioneers carried with them not only the dream of new communities but also the purpose to make these communities Christian. The preacher went along with the pathfinder and homesteader. As railroads pushed their way over the mountains and across the plains the church sent out its home missionaries in order that the people might not forget God in their new environment. The same folks who toiled in the forest or in the field during the week gathered on Sunday to hear the message of the Christ. Only in those settlements where no minister was provided did the ardor for the kingdom of God disappear. And the people from such communities have had to take cognizance of the Christian idealism of those who held to the worship of God when it has come to the formulating of the larger policies of government. What a tribute to the faith of our fathers is the work which has been done by the public schools ! They believed in an intelligent knowledge of God and provided for the train- ing of the young so that they might have a faith that would endure. Here the story of the stars and stripes was woven into the lessons of the day. Patriotism was taught. The atmosphere of learning had in it a devotion which would last through life. It was all a part of the larger ministry of the church, because churchmen were always the first to recognize the need of education and most eager to help pro- vide it. They felt it essential to the establishment of the right kind of homes. Around the open fire at night it was possible to give practical application to the principles of democracy learned in the log school during the day. The public school, the home and the church have worked as one in promulgating the principles which now are the rock-bed foundation of our national ideals. Every denomination has contributed to the great ad- venture of settling the country and providing the settlers 18 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA with high ideals of thought and life. The very hugeness of the task has demanded the best that every expression of reli- gion could give. It is not the job of any one denomination. The very idea of democracy would exclude such a thought. And to-day, more than at any time in the history of the reli- gious bodies of the United States, is there a tendency toward Christian unity of effort and practical cooperation. How this will hasten the day when Christian democracy will be the ruling practice of the land ! The nation is looking to the Church for greater leadership than has been furnished. In the story of what one denomination has done and is plan- ning comes the challenge for all denominations to recognize the fact that to-day is the hour of the nation's need. Now may service be rendered that will count forever. METHODISM A FORCE FOB DEMOCRACY In the task of Christianizing the democracy of America the Methodist Episcopal Church has had a worthy part. The circuit rider was an early arrival in the history of our country. From hamlet to hamlet he ministered as he found opportunity. Nor was he a recluse of the study. One of those to whom he preached, he was as concerned as were they over the material development of the country. When Jason Lee discovered the great possibilities for the United States in the Oregon Country he counted it as much a part of his ministry to plead with national leaders to acquire this valu- able land as *he did to present the doctrine of Christian brotherhood among those who were then living in the Wil- lamette Valley. The first Protestant sermon preached west of the Rocky Mountains was delivered in 1834 by Jason Lee near the present site of Blackfoot, Idaho. When the Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church was organized in 1819 there were only three white, Anglo-Saxon, permanent settlements in all the territory now comprised in the frontier States and South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Minnesota, Iowa, and Missouri. Saint Louis, on the THE OLD FRONTIER AND THE NEW DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 19 Mississippi, was an outfitting point for the western fur trade and was more French than English. Vancouver, on the Columbia River, was under the control of the British Hud- son Bay Company. Astoria, one hundred miles farther down the same stream, had been feebly touched with Amer- ican influence by John Jacob Astor. Yet it was this section of the country which decided the issues of the Presidential election of 1916, and which is destined to become more and more influential in political affairs. It is now the most purely and intensely American section of the country, and the intrepid and adventurous Methodist circuit rider had much to do with making it so. To these Knights of the Saddlebag is due in no small degree the deeply embedded ethical sense which now flowers out so beautifully in wholesome habits and beneficent statutes. Nine of the twelve frontie'r States now are ''dry," while Nevada and Wyoming are to vote on prohibition in the fall of 1918. Most of these States also have woman suffrage and laws for workmen's compensation, regulation of public utilities, the abolition of child labor, the minimum wage, the limitation of hours of service for women, and the initiative, referendum, and recall. Christian democracy! The circuit rider could not have dreamed of the results which would thus come in part from his arduous labors and ministry. A TRIBUTE TO THE CIRCUIT RIDER In addressing the delegates to the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1908 President Theo- dore Roosevelt said : ' ' The Methodist Church plays a great part in many lands ; and yet I think I can say that in none other has it played so great and peculiar a part as here in the United States. Its history is indissolubly interwoven with the history of our country for the six score years since the constitutional convention made us really a nation. Meth- odism in America entered on its period of rapid growth just about the time of Washington's first presidency. Its essen- tial democracy, its fiery and restless energy of spirit, and 20 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA the wide play that it gave to individual initiative all tended to make it peculiarly congenial to a hardy and virile folk, democratic to the core, prizing individual independence above all earthly possessions, and engaged in the rough and stern work of conquering a continent. Methodism spread even among the old .communities and long-settled districts of the Atlantic tidewater; but its phenomenal growth was from these regions westward. The whole country is under debt of gratitude to the Methodist circuit riders, the Meth- odist pioneer preacher, whose movement westward kept pace with the movement of the frontier, who shared all the hard- ships in the life of the frontiersman, while at the same time ministering to that frontiersman's spiritual needs, and see- ing that his pressing material cares and the hard and grind- ing poverty of his life did not wholly extinguish the divine fire within his soul." THE MODERN FRONTIER The rapidity of settlement of any country depends in part upon the amount of tillable land available. This ac- counts for the vast stretches of land passed over by early settlers pushing westward. The rush to the Pacific Coast wiped out the frontier in a technical sense. In reality it left a great frontier in between more settled sections of the country. Because of this the frontier still remains for the church. Twelve great States comprise the frontier as de- fined for the home mission work of the Methodist Episcopal ChuFch. While there are a few strong cities within this boundary, for the most part the land is but sparsely settled. By actual census the State of New York has a larger popu- lation than the combined States of Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, North Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. Five peo- ple to a square mile does not crowd anyone very roughly. The abundant resources of this frontier have been and will be utilized only as the increasing pressure of population forces development. Our geographies long since ceased to 22 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA mark a portion of the map with the romantic term "fron- tier. " But there will be frontier conditions and problems until the population becomes much more dense than it is to-day, and that time is a long and indefinite period in the future. During this interim the church must continue to make sure that the foundations of our democracy are cemented together by the teachings and principles of Jesus Christ. AVAILABLE LANDS FOB SETTLEMENT New settlers are constantly crowding into the frontier section. The land to be obtained is plentiful. And as they come to build new homes and lay out new communities the Methodist Episcopal Church, in common with other de- nominations, must meet the developing religious needs. On account of the general impression that the frontier has passed away hundreds of towns and villages have been left without any Protestant church whatever. The seriousness for democracy of such a condition is seen when it is noted that the total number of homestead patents issued in fron- tier territory by land officers in these States for 1917 was 43,727, a number exceeded only in 1913-14. Over 100,000 original homestead entries were made in the same time. In one of these States four out of ten land offices registered at the rate of over 100 homesteads a week. In Montana alone over 3,000,000 acres were appropriated and still there are 11,000,000 acres to be disposed of in this way. The 60,000,- 000 acres given to the frontier States for educational pur- poses are also finding their way into the hands of intending settlers, either by rental or sale. In one instance, in 1917, $1,250,000 worth of such land was sold for an average price of $17.84 an acre. Some of it brought $40 an acre. All of this land was unirrigated. The sale of railroad land is making available for settle- ment other opportunities for the adventurous homesteader. In these same States the government, in order to secure the building of the great transcontinental railroads, gave them 24 t'HKMSTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA over 60,000,000 acres of land along their right of way. The Canadian Pacific Railroad sold in 1917 over 750,000 acres of the land which it secured in this way. The irrigated land sold for $46 an acre, the unirrigated for $16. Most of this land lies directly north of our frontier and is similar in natural characteristics to our own. There are also hundreds of thousands of acres of "logged-off" lands in the North- west, owned by lumber companies and at present held at dis- couraging prices. As the population pressure increases the high prices demanded will be paid. The fact that over a mil- lion acres of Indian lands were sold in 1917 indicates the rapidity with which people are occupying these present-day opportunities of the West. The great private grants, given in the days of Spanish and Mexican domination in California and New Mexico, must also be taken into account. Nearly one half of the coast land of California for twenty-five miles inland was given in such grants. The Maxwell grant near Cimarron, in New Mexico, is 35 by 55 miles in extent and contains 1,714,- 764 acres. Only 5,000 acres of this land was farmed while the original owner was alive. The Beale Ranch of 170,000 acres in the San Joaquin Valley, in California, was divided for sale as late as 1912. These grants tend constantly to be broken up and sold in smaller lots. Finally there are the numerous large private ranches, variously acquired, all over the frontier. A striking ex- ample of this sort of possession is the Miller and Lux ranches in California, which extend from San Diego to Oregon. It is said that the owners could drive their cattle or sheep from Mexico to Oregon without having to camp over- night on any land not owned by the firm. The acreage of these ranches runs into the millions and it has been conserv- atively valued at $30,000,000. Recent scientific studies and experiments, by which careful preparation of the soil in dry- farming areas produces crops with an annual rainfall as low as ten or twelve inches, lead to the assumption that most of this land is potentially agricultural. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS IRRIGATION 25 Irrigation is adding to the acreage available for culti- vation. In a literal sense it is making the desert blossom and bear fruit. By a process of dams and canals or ditches, Lake ,-^Walcof MilkR. ["DaC \ >_ Huntley / . 7 /*5hoshone I R .|| p _ * Res S DAK i Res I FburcheV WYO. NEV. i 'Trucke /Slrawbery R Carson i Vallev <** / UTAH L_. iNorth -. NEB. \ 1 I j - I ^Valley I OKLA. > ARIZ. ima N.IY1. .Hando Salt River .Res. ,Res ,. *+* I \R 10 ^ Res \ ' ^r.nd VCarb-l L. J \ - J V ! "M. TEX. \ water is provided the thirsty land as the need requires. This makes possible the cultivation of land for years considered to be useless for agricultural purposes. In 1915 there was 26 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA an irrigable area of 1,405,000 acres on irrigation projects owned by the United States. Eight hundred and fifty thou- sand acres were actually "cropped" or cultivated, while a million acres were actually irrigated. The accompanying map shows only the irrigation projects under the control of the United States Reclamation Service. Extensive use has been made also of the Carey Land Act, in which the States participate. Moreover, all along the water courses of the Rocky Mountains irrigation to the extent of the then avail- able water resources was practiced for many years by pri- vate individuals before the national government became interested in it. The irrigated acreage of all sorts is now 15,000,000. This is ten times the area shown on the map; 40,000,000 additional acres could be irrigated if sufficient capital were expended in constructing dams, reservoirs, and ditches. The Truckee-Carson project in Nevada has 200,000 acres of irrigable land, only one sixth of which is actually irrigated and cultivated. It will be some years, therefore, before this project and others like it reach their full develop- ment. The irrigation projects with the small-sized farm and intensive cultivation present opportunities for a complete and fine community life. Four or five thousand acres of cultivated land will sustain a good-sized town, where the farmers may live together and enjoy good social and edu- cational advantages. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FRONTIER The newness of the frontier is what makes it an urgent challenge to the church. So far as its Anglo-Saxon and Protestant civilization is concerned it is mostly less than two generations old. This newness means that financial re- sources for the development of the country must come from outside. When the land -is taken up by homesteaders it is but the beginning. Everyone is obliged to begin from the ground up. Each settler must build a barn instead of inheriting one from his ancestors. Houses to live in, school- houses for the children, courthouses, public business build- DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 27 ings, churches, parsonages, roads, fences, bridges, culverts everything must be provided at once. It is a staggering task, but it must be done. Public buildings may be built out of the proceeds of bond issues and the cost passed on to another generation. Mercantile houses, elevators, and banks may be built on credit. And the local church is at a great disad- vantage unless the church at large can be drawn on for sub- stantial assistance. This is the raison d'etre for home mis- sion and church extension aid. Modern methods of communication and transportation have caused increased rapidity in frontier development in recent years. The map is ever changing. The town of Richey, Montana, is an illustration. The secretary of the Chamber of Commerce writes that "lots were sold on August 18, 1916, and our town is only eighteen months old. We have a population of about 450, with forty business places divided among every possible enterprise. There are five grain elevators, two steam-heated hotels, three poolrooms, two garages, four hardware stores, four restaurants, three lawyers, three land officers, two banks with over $120,000 each, two drug stores, four general stores, two blacksmith shops, a bakery, a dentist, a bowling alley and shooting gallery, a brick moving-picture theater, five lumber yards, a confectionery, a shoe-repairing shop, a theater and dance- hall combined, a two-room and concrete basement school with about fifty pupils and two teachers, two butcher shops, and one church with a very small attendance. ' ' It is the last item which sounds a challenge to Christian democracy. The very rapidity of modern frontier growth accentuates the need for promptness. And Methodism must be alert to hear the cry. Help for the adequate presentation of the message of the Christ must be given from outside the community. The church which renders largest service will be the church which is on hand with its ministry of inspira- tion and help when the community is just starting. Material development must have first call with people in new com- munities. But as soon as the first stress is over they are able and willing to support their own church enterprises. The church problem is therefore urgent. With the rapidity of material development due to railroad and telegraph facil- ities the urgency increases. Shall the church hold back? Has it not as adventurous a spirit as investors in Western stocks and bonds? Adequate leadership to mold the life of the community in the ways of Christian democracy while still plastic is needed. Shall not some of the money sent East from the enterprise of the West be returned in the form of leadership of this character? The failure of the church to be prompt in its statesman- ship decreases the power of the nation to lead the people of the earth in the finest ways of life and thinking. It also ac- counts for some of the church and national problems which will have to be met by succeeding generations. There is rea- son to believe that the failure of the evanglical church to enter Northern California in force and with adequate or- ganization in the decade 1849-59, when social life was in flux, is responsible for the slow growth of Christian idealism there during the years since. And had home missionaries been sent in adequate force to the moving population of the Mississippi Valley in 1830, there would doubtless be no Mormon problem such as exists to-day. Along with the newness and rapidity of development of the frontier goes the element of chance. The adventurous spirit still has an opportunity to try his luck. Uncertainty shadows every dream of success. In fruit sections there must be unceasing warfare waged against insects. The diffi- culties of marketing have to be overcome. Often irrigation engineers underestimate the cost of a project. This means that the settler must pay much more than he had anticipated. Ditches may break or the dams go out through faulty con- struction. The building of a proposed railroad may be de- layed for years. Drought may come in dry-farming sec- tions. Even in agricultural communities the settlers learn to take a chance. What a place for the church to build its foundations into the lives of men and women! Inasmuch as 29 CALIFORNIA a 31% c 31 % d 49% - 33% COLORADO 17% b -547. C 73% a 13% zor. SOUTH UFORNIA a 77% b 675S c d I09* 6 NEW MEXICO a 7a% b 10 1 % C (07% d I34K 47% GROWTH OF FRONTIER ENGLISH-SPEAKING WORK PERCENTAGES OF INCREASE DURING TEN YEARS I907-I9ir IN FRONTIER CONFERENCES A NUMBER OF CHARGES B FULL MEMBERSHIP OF CHURCH C SUNDAY SCHOOL MEMBERS VALUATION OF PROPERTY E DISCIPLINARY BENEVOLENCES - DESIGNATES DECREASE A TEN- YEAR STUDY OF METHODIST EPISCOPAL FRONTIER ENGLISH-SPEAKING WORK the world is the parish of the Methodist Episcopal Church, what matters it that here and there an enterprise is started and the people have to give up and move away ? These folks are going to live somewhere. They will take the Kingdom with them. A CHALLENGE FROM THE MINES This element of chance and the worthwhileness of tak- 30 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA ing it is particularly true in mining communities, especially those where high-grade ores are found. There is a town in Utah which illustrates this. At one time it was fourth in size in the State. In 1900 it had a population of 2,351. In 1910 there were but 1,047. To-day the population numbers two, and they are hired watchmen. For a number of years the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension maintained a Methodist church there, and still owns the church property. Shall the word "failure" be painted on the church door and across the record of the men whose judgment fathered the enterprise ? The field moved away. But the influence of the ministry of that church is to-day blessing other commu- nities. And two of the laymen who once worked in this church are now district superintendents in other Western States a thousand miles away. Even when the community does not move away it is difficult to build up strong and stable churches in mining centers. For one thing, the spirit of restlessness is prev- alent. Some are leaving and others coming all the time. The nature of the miner's occupation contributes somewhat to recklessness and a lack of regard for conventional and time-honored institutions. Regular habits of church-going are interfered with by the changing hours of labor. With such systems as the triple shift, where the miners work eight hours a day (an excellent thing in itself), the shift moving forward to a different eight hours each week, the preacher can have only one third of his congregation present at any one time, and that one third different every two weeks. The household habits of the miners are effected by the shift on which they work, as are also the habits of their wives and children. Moreover, as physical conditions become more difficult there is a tendency for American, English, Irish, and Welsh miners to go to work "on top," or to leave mining altogether. The places of these are taken by Italians and Fins or any one of half a dozen Slavic groups. These peo- ple are very hard for the evangelical church to reach. So the challenge to adventure for the Kingdom increases. The DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 31 opportunity for propagating Christian democracy, while more difficult, becomes more necessary. Labor troubles become frequent with the change of per- sonnel of the miners. The old-time miners were marked by individualistic thought and action. The newcomers, mostly non-English speaking, are easily moved by leaders speaking their native tongue. The gradual passing of the mining in- terests under the control of large corporations, with all the evils of absentee ownership and frequently of tactless man- agement, has resulted in serious trouble in the labor field. Strikes in Colorado a few years ago in the high-grade mines had serious consequences, duplicated by the more recent troubles among the coal miners of that State. An ex-gov- ernor of the State of Idaho was blown up in his home as an incidental result of these same troubles. Such conditions are a concern of the Christian Church. A democracy that is rife with struggles between classes of any character will not bring comfort and encouragement to people of other lands. It is decidedly un-American, to say nothing about its being unchristian. Who has failed at this point in the under- taking to bring practice up to the ideals cherished ? In Rock Springs, a small mining community in Wyoming, twenty-six different languages are spoken* Who has neglected the task of Americanization? How will democracy get a chance in such a place? Has not the spiritual commonwealth where all men meet as equal before God a decided mission right here? Unless our democracy is Christian at heart labor troubles will continue forever. In Utah labor unions have little standing or influence. The lot of the laboring man there is not what it should be. In Montana the passing away of the Western Federation of Miners was followed by a period of industrial anarchy. This has only recently settled down to a certain extent. In Bisbee, Arizona, in the summer of 1917, the miners were forbidden to join the American Fed- eration of Labor. The I. W. W. saw the open door, quietly organized the men, and a strike followed which seriously 32 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA handicapped the government in its task of winning the war. The town officials, many of them influential in mining com- panies, took a hand. They loaded more than eleven hundred of the strikers and some supplies on cattle cars and shipped them into the desert of New Mexico. This illegal and un- democratic action not only embittered the laboring men of Arizona, but also had deleterious effects upon the morale of the shipbuilders and lumber workers of the Pacific Coast. The finding of indictments against those responsible for the deporting of their fellows does not lessen the responsibility of those who failed to make such a proceeding impossible. Shall the problems presented in such communities be labeled "A difficult task," or shall the forces of Christianity be marshaled in a great adventure for Christian democracy! What is the adventure? A field to be made Christian and American where families are broken up and have to leave ; the strengthening of sadly interrupted social and community work ; the putting of the ideals of social, moral, and religious life into terms of everyday living; the creating of a situation where the unfettered message of Christian truth may be uttered. For in practically all mineral sections the title of church property is given by mining companies only in the form of a lease. Hence if the message and policy of the church does not suit the mining officials, they could close the church doors and force the preacher to depart. Is there not a task worthy the mettle of the fathers here ? Why boast of our advance over their day unless we make Christianity count where so much needed? WHERE MEN ARE ALONE And what of the cowboy and the sheepherder! For they come in between the day of the buffalo and the day of the plow. More than 400,000,000 acres are still available for stockraising purposes. The largest section of this sort is in central Oregon, where one may travel for two hundred miles without crossing a railroad. In regions wholly given to stockraising it is difficult to establish and maintain churches. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 33 Few cowboys or sheepherders are married. Where there are no families there is no settled community. And where there is no community there can be no normal church. But the needs of these men are as great, if not greater, than those of men in favored communities. The traveling missionary has here his opportunity. And he must be busy at his task as long as stockraising sections exist. The tendency is for these sections to pass over into agriculture. Then the regu- lar ministry of the church will have an opportunity to prove its usefulness. Nor must the lumber camp and sawmill town be for- gotten. Here the work is seasonal and the workmen tran- sients. Many of these men are unmarried. Not a few of them come to think that they are without standing in society and thus offer a fruitful field for I. W. W. propaganda. The Methodist Episcopal Church has a few churches in lumbering communities, but up to the present very little special work has been done among the lumber workers. At the present time there are 350,000 men engaged in the lumber industry in the West. The amount of timber still standing is so great that it will take many years to cut it down and work it up. One denomination has realized the need of church workers for these men and has ten missionaries in the lumber towns and camps. But what are ten missionaries for 350,000 lumberjacks ? Shall we say that the obligation is being met and pass it by? A SUMMONS TO THE CHURCH* There are other variants of the frontier task. For pur- poses of administration the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church in- cludes in- its frontier work the Indian, the Mormons, the Spanish- American, Porto Rico, Hawaii, and Alaska. But of these a little later. Their needs vary. The general problem for the frontier is the securing of larger initial gifts for the building of churches and parsonages, and larger rooms where they are needed. The rectangular church used purely 34 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA for purposes of worship is not much in demand these days. With no special facilities for religious education or social life it makes but small appeal alongside of the modern, well- equipped, consolidated public school. The Centenary of Methodist Missions gives the opportunity to install equip- ment that is adequate from the beginning, and thus control community life in a dignified way. Such a thing has been dreamed for years by those who have seen the need. Have we come to a day when dreams of the Kingdom come true! Social service is a dream materialized. It must be more and more a part of such ministry as the church gives to the families of railroad, mining, and smelting settlements. Here and in the lumber camps a considerable part of the popula- tion is foreign-speaking and the intellectual and religious background either sacerdotal or agnostic. Structures which offer unusual opportunities for community service must be erected in these places. Staff workers of peculiar fitness must be provided. There is practically no limit to the needs of this character in the church's great frontier. The good old days of the pioneer preacher are gone. But the task has not vanished with him. The bustling Ford has taken the place of the trusty nag. A college and semi- nary training must supplant the knowledge gathered along the journey from one community to another. The sod church and the log meetinghouse no longer suffice. There is practically no community in the United States but what needs a more efficient ministry of the Word of God than it now has. And when it comes to the vast sections which are called frontier the need is alarming. But it takes a goodly amount of money suddenly to equip the church for its real task of Christianizing the democracy of the country. And the church has no private purse. It is dependent upon its membership for those funds which it may use to spread its ministry into those places where there is at the present time no adequate ministry, and to make more efficient its ministry where for years it has existed along the lines of the ex- pressed needs of the times of our fathers. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS 35 But what is the question of money in a time like ours I In celebrating the Centenary of Methodist Missions the leaders of the Methodist Episcopal Church are seeking to discover what its obligation is in the stupendous task for making the world safe for democracy. The nation is asking the church that it help to develop a democracy that is worth fighting for to make safe the world over. This cannot be done in any small retail way. There must be a steady and rapid advance. Equipment and men must be provided in large quantities. Such advance must be made that there will be a definite realization on the part of those who do not yet accept God as their God, that the Church of Jesus Christ is desperately in earnest. The challenge must be met so that people everywhere shall understand that so far as its part of the undertaking is concerned, this nation shall of a truth have a democracy of the sort that will be worth dying for in order that it may not perish from the earth. QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1. In what sense has America become the spokesman for world democracy? 2. How does the background of our national life em- phasize the necessity of this democracy's being Christian? 3. In what way has Methodism been a force for Chris- tian democracy? 4. Discuss President Roosevelt's tribute to the circuit rider. 5. What is 'comprised in the modern frontier? 6. What lands are available now for settlement? Dis- cuss the part played by irrigation in the settling of the West. 7. What are the chief characteristics of the modern frontier? 8. What challenge to the church comes from conditions in western mining sections? 9. Discuss the obligation of the church to the cowboy and sheepherder, the lumberjack and sawmill operative. 10. How important is the sumpions which comes to the 36 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA Methodist Episcopal Church on the one hundredth anniver- sary of its missionary work? 11. Why must the church make democracy worth the terrible sacrifice of lives being made to preserve it! 12. In what way does the spreading of Christian de- mocracy become our personal concern? It has been assumed by many students of social phenomena that the relations to be found in rural life are relatively simple; and that urban life presents much more serious problems for solution as well as a much richer field for the study of the play of social forces. Those most familiar with the social reactions in rural life agree that, while the problems they present may be of a somewhat different type, they are no less rich in the contribution they promise to the solution of some of the greatest practical questions of social theory. They also pre- sent a strong appeal to the student of social science because the jsmall community, well organized, promises to become a very important factor in future social organization because of its firm foundation in the inherited instincts of the race. No problems of social relationships present a better source for study than do the associations to be found in village and rural life. Paul L. Vogt, in Introduction to Rural Sociology. Why blame the village poolroom because the boys and young men spend their evenings there? They enjoy the click of the pool balls and the ragtime music of the player piano. Why find fault at the swap- ping of unseemly stories at the general store at Hank's Corner? The men have a good time and it is a great treat for the small boy. Why raise a howl at the opening of a dance hall at Peters Creek or a "movie" theater at Bensons? The people who back these enterprises in response to the social needs of rural life have scored against the Church of Jesus Christ at an important point; they have catered to human interest and have gotten results. The Church at the Center. Next to war, pestilence, and famine, the worst thing that can happen to a rural community is absentee landlordism. In the first place, the rent is all collected and sent out of the neighborhood to be spent somewhere else; but that is the least of the evils. In the second place, there is no one in the neighborhood who has any permanent interest in it except as a source of income. The tenants do not feel like spend- ing any time or money in beautification, or in improving the moral or social surroundings. Their one interest is to get as large an income from the land as they can in the immediate present. Because they do not live there, the landlords care nothing for the community, except as a source of rent, and they will not spend anything in local improve- ments unless they see that it will increase rent. Therefore such a community looks bad, and possesses the legal minimum in the way of schools, churches, and other agencies for social improvement. In the third place, and worst of all, the landlords and tenants live so far apart and see one another so infrequently as to furnish very little opportunity for mutual acquaintance and understanding. Therefore class antagonism arises, and bitterness of feeling shows itself in a variety of ways. Thomas Nixon Carver* CHAPTER II THE EUEAL OPPOETUNITY A CHALLENGE TO CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY DEMOCRACY knows no local boundaries. It thrives wherever people grasp the significance of its meaning. Free discussion of its doctrines stir the people of rural commu- nities just as it does the men and women on the busy city streets. And in the rural sections is one of the greatest op- portunities for making democracy Christian that the Church of Jesus Christ has before it, for to-day the bulk of the popu- lation of the United States is in the open country, the village, and the small town. These communities have not yet reached the fullest development in community consciousness. The mind of the people has been more centered on the indi- vidual struggle for existence than is the case in larger towns and cities. The opportunity to have a part in the rapid de- velopment which is now bound to come not only presents an opportunity, it also speaks in terms of a challenge which must be met for the larger interests of the national life. For out of the 53 7/10 per cent of the folk power of the land will come thousands of the youth who will be determining factors in the policies which our country will adopt for years to come. Shall their vision be built entirely on the teachings of statesmen, or shall the message of the prophet also enter into the conceptions of democracy which shall drive them to action? It is for the rural church to answer, and back of the local rural church the great denominations which the local church represents. METHODISM 's RURAL HERITAGE The rural church has been a part of the life of Meth- odism from its very beginning. Following the little groups 39 40 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA of pioneers westward across the Alleghenies and the Rocky Mountains, and finally to the coast, the Methodist Episcopal Church has pitched its tent wherever a handful of settlers have made a clearing and built them homes. The great number of these little hamlets which had to be ministered to made the circuit system of the Methodist Episcopal Church one of the important living links between these people. We are accustomed to speak of these settlements in the West as frontier communities. They are both frontier and rural. Into the life of such communities both East and West the circuit rider went preaching a kingdom of God which could be exemplified in a practical Christian democracy on earth. Many of these rural communities of other days have re- mained rural. The village store has been the public forum. The local lodge has been the fraternal tie which has united the people. Many of our rural communities have not yet a church building wherein they may worship God. Hundreds of such communities, having a church building or a school- house where preaching is conducted, do not have a resident pastor, and the number of rundown and ramshackle rural churches throughout the land is a cause for shame. While the farmer has been replacing his ancient farm tools with modern farm implements he has not always used the same wisdom with reference to his church. In many places he has been satisfied to drive to church in an automobile and wor- ship God in a building whose condition would disqualify it for either garage or stable. Religious conditions which have resulted from the failure of the church to keep pace with other forms of advance have already caused a decay in rural life in some sections of the country. And where the general life of a community is lowered the dream of democracy fades away. The evidence of neglect of the spiritual foundations of democracy in rural communities is appalling. When a community erects a $3,000 church building alongside of a $50,000 schoolhouse it is apparent that true perspective of life's realities is lacking. The decline in church membership 42 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA and attendance at religious worship speaks for itself, while the gradual abandonment of the observance of religious wor- ship in the home indicates unmistakably that other things have taken first place. The implication is that other agencies than the church are fitted to meet the demands of rural people. The school becomes the center of social and recrea- tional activities and farm associations assume the leadership in the advancement of rural civilization. NOT ALL AGRICULTURAL The same general conditions prevail whether we think of the rural section only in terms of agriculture or in the more accurate broader sense. To many the term "rural*" is synonymous with "agriculture." But the village, which is the center of all rural life, is not restricted to farming com- munities. There are the coal mining sections of Pennsyl- vania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and the West; the iron mines of the South and the North ; the copper mines of Michigan ; the oil fields of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas ; the coke vil- lages and many other types of small industrial communities engaged in the extraction of minerals. Over 1,000,000 miners in America, more than half of whom are foreign born and who represent a population of at least 3,000,000, do not have the adequate religious services to help them in the great adventure of becoming assimilated to the practice of Chris- tian democracy. In the coke fields of western Pennsylvania alone there are over 100 mining and coke villages with a population of over 70,000 which have no church of any de- nomination, and in some religious services can be held in schoolhouses but four months in the year. The gospel of social justice has small chance under such conditions. The incentive to wholesome living and the support of the institu- tions which minister to them is lacking. The occasional out- bursts of irrational thinking and violent action are not to be wondered at. Attempts to Americanize these men and women by the agencies of the State must be augmented by a continuous application of the message of the church. THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 43 THE SOUTHERN MOUNTAINEERS The quiet hamlets of the Appalachian Mountains, inhab- ited by people so frequently referred to as Southern moun- 44 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA taineers, are another type of rural community. The world has rushed by many of these folks. They are not familiar with the ways of the now. Many of their homes are the shacks of long ago. Style does not disturb the women, learn- ing is not grasped at. But these people are also a part of the future of the nation. And their views, if belated, will hinder the onward march toward a day when intelligence char- acterizes the democracy of -the land. NEGROES IN RURAL COMMUNITIES The majority of the Negroes of the United States live in rural communities. Much of the religious ministry which they receive is preaching once a month by an absentee pastor. Can illiteracy and immorality be overcome in this haphazard way? Will the handicaps of superstition, poor health, lack of thrift, poverty and debt be pushed aside through such intermittent teaching? Shall the effects of political and economic discrimination be left for them to wrestle with alone, or shall such leadership be provided as will gradually create a more just attitude of mind on the one hand and a better fitting for the solution of problems on the other I WHAT A RURAL SURVEY REVEALED A concrete putting of the rural problem is found in a survey made of a Conference district by a competent student of rural life. It demonstrates the fact that the larger wisdom of the Church as a whole must be put at the disposal of the local community. The existence of dilapidated old schoolhouses, plasterless shell or log huts is no more condu- cive to live economic and religious conditions than is the announcement of nine church bells on Sunday morning within a radius of a mile and a half that the community is all split up in its thinking. But the chief factor found is the indifference to the religious problems of the community as a whole. This is due in some cases to isolation and in others to the individualistic tendency of rural life. Here religion is GRANDFATHER'S RUBAL CHURCH A MODERN CHURCH IN A RURAL COMMUNITY THE BUBAL OPPOBTUNITY 45 strictly individualistic. To many of these people it is still in the near-primitive form of superstition. It is something which should act as a magic help to individual life rather than as a practical uplifting agency for the community. There is no conception of social perfection. A list of the varieties of religion found in this district indicates that individualism is more than a theory: Apos- tolic Holiness, Baptist-Free Will ; Baptist-Missionary ; Bap- tist-Begular ; Baptist-United; Catholic (Roman) ; Campbell- ite; Christian (often same as Campbellite) ; Christian Order; Christian Union; Church of Christ in Christian Union; Congregational (Welsh); Disciples; Dunkard; German Beformed; Lutheran; Mormon (few); Methodist (Episcopal) ; Methodist (Protestant) ; Methodist (Calvin- istic) ; Nazarene; Presbyterian; United Brethren; United Brethren (Badical) ; Gravel Grinders, sometimes identified as Campbell ites ; Dumb Tonguers (who speak in an unknown tongue); Holy Boilers, sometimes called Christians; Bus- sellites ; and Friends. It is very evident that here religion is a personal affair. Too often such faith has the only sure way of salvation. This places one of a different denomina- tion in an embarrassing position. SOME CONTRIBUTORY CAUSES OVERCHURCHING AND LACK OF SUPPORT The particular section of country has apparently Ifttle to do with conditions existing in many rural communities, for on another district, in a section that in general is alive to all that is best in rural life and welfare, are found churches which are dying out or have been abandoned. In some in- stances it is purely the case of ancestral mistakes in building too many churches in small communities in the years past. Time has not yet sufficiently reduced the number. To this might be added the failure of those whose duty to the church is to support it adequately. There is on this same district a Methodist Episcopal church that has steadily declined for 46 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA more than ten years. The building erected in 1870, with a seating capacity of one hundred and twenty-five, is quite large enough to accommodate the thirty people who meet on alternate Sundays to hear the Word expounded. The forty- five members who represent twenty families contribute one hundred dollars a year to pastoral support. This sum ap- pears to be as fixed as the laws of the Medes and Persians. LOST CONSTITUENCY : TENANTRY Then there is the small country church which for vari- ous reasons has lost its constituency and cannot replace this with another strong and virile enough to continue its life and work. Other rural churches have been closed or are about to be closed as a result of the absentee landlord system. Tenant farmers are but temporary dwellers, and in a dis- tressingly large number of instances have not actively identi- fied themselves with religious work. The owners of the land, while getting their living from the farm, have usually seen fit to support the church in the town or city where they reside. This leaves the old and unpretentious church building near the farm to fall into disrepair, and the rapidly disappearing membership to meet the bills for current expenses and min- isterial support as best they can. At length, for lack of people and lack of funds, the doors are shut and the church which once pointed the wayfaring man and woman heaven- ward becomes but an unsightly landmark or a storehouse for some farmer's grain. TOO NEAR THE TOWNS Still other rural churches are adjacent to a town which has larger and better houses of worship, and since a few miles more make little difference in these days of good roads and automobiles, families gradually drift to these centers of population and so desert the country church. THE NEED OF RURAL, VISION The Methodist Episcopal Church has all through the THE EURAL OPPORTUNITY 47 years been at work in these rural communities. That it has not accomplished all that it might is not a matter for utter condemnation. Evolutionary processes are slow. The gen- eral acceptance of modern farm machinery was not brought about in a day. And since the church in years past held its mission to be that of calling men and women from the things of this life to preparation for a life beyond, any change of conception is slow of acceptance. That the church in the rural community should be the center of the life activities of the community is a somewhat new idea. Rural sociologists have touched upon it and some church leaders have held it as a dream, but its actual acceptance by the people who are "the problem" is only of to-day, and this not in any wide- spread territory. Yet yearnings for it are now seen in the longing of farm men and women for a better type of life. When farm women are asked directly about their prob- lems they generally reply in one of three ways. The first group, those who have been fortunate in environment and opportunity for broader living, are well content with the sweet, joyous country life. The second group, and by far the largest one, are women who by labor and strictest economy raise their children, help their husbands in the monotonous task' of wresting a living from the soil, who ' l stay by the stuff" night and day and grow prematurely old in a hand- to-hand struggle with a situation far too difficult for the indi- vidual to master. The third group of women are helpless and despairing over a lot which seldom can be changed. They would like to have change and enjoyment, excitement and life, but they do not know how to go about getting what they want, nor do they realize that fundamentally the solu- tion rests with themselves. The day of vision is far off for these last. What joy or hope does the farmer's wife receive on Sun- day morning as she tries to keep a pew full of children quiet the while the minister discourses on the delights of the New Jerusalem? All week she has prepared three meals a day for hungry men, washed the dishes, washed and ironed the 48 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA clothes, kept the house clean and orderly, fed the pigs and the chickens, helped with the milking, churned, gathered the eggs, pumped the water, taken care of five heating stoves besides the kitchen range (with two of the stoves upstairs). The poetic quotation from "The Old Oaken Bucket" (fifty feet down a well, waiting to be drawn up with a windlass and rope) is all lost on her. She is tired and will be glad when service is over and she can talk with the other women about storage tanks, hot-water boilers, windmills, hot-water or furnace heat, home lighting plants, gasoline-run washing- ing machines, wringers, separators, churns, and vacuum cleaners. She wants to know the possibilities of sending Bill and Mary to college on the egg money she does not want them to have the drudgery of the farm. What, besides the sermon, is the church going to give her that she may look to the church for guidance? THE RURAL CHURCH MEMBER CHALLENGED Here and there there have been rural lay leaders who have seen the need of what the new day in rural life and wor- ship is bringing. But the vision of church leaders, a few rural pastors and an occasional rural layman, will not bring to pass the full promise of the hope for a rural life center- ing in the worship of God and the teachings of Jesus Christ radiating out from the church into all the community, a service to the last individual according to his need. Along with the new vision and the present helpful developments in rural religious life comes a sharp challenge to every rural church member. The intense group spirit must be broken up. What odds is it to the Kingdom that we are Norwegian or Greek! That the Jacksons, Burns, and our family all came to Beaverville from Layton's Point back East! Will the Master give us rating as landlord, tenant, or laborer? Are the Baptist or Congregational ists or Episcopalians or Methodists each to have a special consideration when they listen to hear it said, "Well done?" Shall the non-church- goer be classed outside the pale as we pray God's blessing on THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 49 our family, our land, our stock, our church? Must the new- comer into the community establish a social status before we welcome him to God's house? Are we as keen to have as well-qualified rural religious leadership as we ask in our industrial leaders ? Do we aim to have a church thoroughly equipped for service to the en- tire community ? Are we asking for a first-class ministry and paying for second and third class ? Do we make it necessary for our pastor to put in half time at carpentering, farming, or shoe-cobbling in order to provide for the legitimate needs of himself and his family? Are we making our church plant available for community use? A SENSE OF RURAL WORTH A sense of rural worth must be developed. Rural lay- men as well as rural pastors must have a clear view of the fundamental aspects of the rural problem and broadly de- fine the relationship of the church to that problem. With rare exceptions the rural church has given of its best to the leadership of city and suburban churches and has fallen so in the scale of public estimation that church officials and ministers alike look upon the appointment out of rural work as a promotion. The people themselves tacitly accept this estimate of their own institutions by allowing their best pastors to be taken from them, and by moving from the country to the city themselves when seeking better condi- tions of life. Loyalty to rural life is a present-day essential. The sources of supply for the great enterprises of the land must be kept alive to the best things in life and thinking. Rural work must be put upon a plane of equality with all other work in dignity and influence. And the rural church must share in this self-estimate as to ability for service that is worth while doing well. SALARY AND LEADERSHIP Without doubt the question of adequate remuneration for the rural pastor is a large item in the problem of bring- 50 ing the best sort of rural ministry to the rural community. A recent study shows that out of a total of 18,307 Methodist Episcopal churches in America 12,004 are rural, in commu- nities of less than 2,500 inhabitants. Of the total number of rural charges, 2,308 have salaries under $400; 1,499, $400 to $600; 1,905, $600 to $800; 2,093, $800 to $1,000; 1,799, WHY MINISTERS LEAVE THE COUNTRY WHITE RURAL MINISTERS' SALARIES INCLUDING PARSONAGE UnderieOO A , per Year $800-1200 perYear 41200 or more per Year $1,000 to $1,200; 2,027, $1,200 or over. On 373 charges no figures are available. These statistics include colored and foreign-speaking as well as English-speaking Conferences. A significant fact brought out is that there are more pastors in the $400-a-year group than in any other salary classifica- tion. This situation creates an almost insurmountable diffi- culty. A college- and seminary-trained young man, who has some educational obligations to meet after the end of his days of training, cannot afford to go into a rural community, for he must have books : he must have some opportunity for THE EURAL OPPORTUNITY 51 seeing other sections of the country besides his own village. His wife enjoys pretty clothes as much as do the wives of the trustees of the church. Frequently she is a college girl with all the vision of the dreams of college days, but this is what she actually sees : Four hundred dollars a year and a square, bandbox-shaped parsonage, with a parlor carpet that WHY MINISTERS LEAVE THE COUNTRY RURALCOLORED MINISTERS' SALARIES INCLUDING PARSONAGE Under$400 per Year $400-$600 per Year $600-$800 per Year over$800 per Year shrieks at you the minute you open the door ; a kitchen stove that gasses so that she must cook her meals with a wet towel tied around her mouth and nose ; cracks under the front door that let in snow in the winter ; a squeaky pump outside of the house which groans an occasional bucketful of water up from the cistern ; ice to break in the washbowl in the morning of a winter's day and the four hundred dollars paid in such dilatory manner that even the joy of spending this small amount is lost. Can we ever hope to have the rural minister paid an adequate salary? On the same district where such dismal 52 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA conditions were found a statesmanlike district superinten- dent has already brought to pass a considerable increase of salary for his ministers. This whole living problem involve* an equity in rural and urban standards of living, the consid- eration of the rural pastor as in service equally as important as any other in the church by bishops, district superintend- ents, and ministers. LIVING ON THE JOB The Knight of the Saddlebag and the circuit system of the Methodist Episcopal Church have been praised in song and story, and rightly so, for the combination was the great power of early Methodism. It is to-day in some places. Yet theoretically, no man can handle a community effectively if he spreads .himself out over other places, and a circuit is always a stretched-out ministry. But the circuit system to- day is not nearly as widespread as some might think. An average of the Conferences shows the circuit charges to have two to four preaching points. A Methodist Episcopal minister in central Tennessee serves twenty-one points, while in Oregon a retired minister between seventy-five and eighty years of age has a circuit of sixty-four school- houses. In many places the circuit system can be abolished to advantage. Many of the circuit points could support a man if they were alive to the opportunity and challenge which the community offers to the leadership of the church. The rural pastor who is solving the problem of the rural community, which differs from that of his city brother fundamentally in the matter of organization rather than in the people, lives on the job. He is making the church a vital- izing and fundamental agency for rural redirection. The rural religious problem has responded so finely to the steady leadership of a wise settled pastor that the challenge is com- manding the attention of the church. There are sections of the country, however, where the circuit system must be en- couraged. Larger results will accrue when the community rather THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 53 than the ministry is the first consideration in making ap- pointments at the sessions of the Annual Conferences. Of course this involves an esprit de corps among the leader- ship and ministry of the church developed on the assurance of a democracy of talent in the matter of appointment, pro- motion and similar relationships. If a man feels that the acceptance of a $400 rural appointment places him in the $400 classification forever, he very justly might object to taking such appointment, and could not be blamed if he spent some time thinking how he might get an opportunity to "move." The Board of Home Missions and Church Exten- sion must aid in supporting pastors serving charges now paying low salaries because of former poor service or of undeveloped resources, until they can be brought to self- support. The best ministers in Methodism should be found in the hardest places. A great deal is written and said these days about the necessity of a long pastorate in city churches. The need is no less urgent in the rural community. A minister must be in a place long enough to become known, to know the people, to become a part of the community life, to be trusted in matters of judgment concerning community affairs, before he can grow into a place of leadership which will be recog- nized and followed. There are some places where men have stayed a lifetime in a rural parish. They have thus become a dominating influence in the lives of most of the people who have been a part of the community during the years. The development of the missionary spirit among the ministry in rural work is essential, and this in order that they will work for those things which they recognize as lack- ing in rural life which they believe other communities enjoy. This raises the question as to whether rural work is really missionary work in so far as it has the task of bringing the whole of life to the rural community. It is the task of the Board of Home Missions and Church 54 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church to aid rural communities in the efficient development of the religious life they need to conserve the best elements of a safe civiliza- tion. It must help to stimulate that love for the best things which unrestrained economic life is apt to lose. It must pre- serve that recognition of man's dependence upon a divinity which is so essential an element in any civilization and with- out which civilization is apt to be hollow, false, and without an abiding hope, to protect it from the deterioration which has marked pagan civilizations throughout all history. One cause for failure on the part of the rural church in the past has been its lack of emphasis upon life as a whole. It failed to recognize that a wholesome religious life will not be found in an inferior economic and social environment. All must be developed together. The church should be recognized as the great community leader in civilization. The business of the church so far as rural life is con- cerned is to aid in bringing rural folk back again to that standard of dignity and importance they once held, and to bring to the uttermost corners of the open country those con- ditions which make possible the purpose of the Master when he said, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. ' ' The economic problems of the farmer have been largely solved. But the enrichment of rural life with wholesome forms of expression still awaits the leadership of the church. And, unless the church per- forms its duty, increased wealth may come to mean de- terioration of the American people instead of becoming a blessing. SOME NECESSARY ADJUSTMENTS Better organization to meet changed conditions result- ing from shifts in population must be instituted. Over- churching and interdenominational competition must be overcome. Lay leadership must be again encouraged. In meeting the interdenominational situation it is found that the union church is not favored by any denomination. It is THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 55 self-centered and has no missionary viewpoint. Trading off that is a Baptist and a Methodist Episcopal church ex- changing the field in two different places, the Baptist to give up the work entirely to the Methodist Episcopal congrega- tion at A and the Methodist Episcopal church to give up the work entirely to the Baptist congregation at B, has proved successful. Federation is desirable where trading off or merging into one denomination is not possible. The weak- ness in this form of meeting the problem from the Methodist Episcopal point of view lies in the conflict between the principle of connectional organization represented by Meth- odism and the congregational polity resulting from federa- tion. The affiliated membership plan now in use on the Rock Island District is proving to be very successful. It appears to be specially suited to all communities in which Methodism has the predominant responsibility but which contain mem- bers of other churches who do not care to give up their mem- bership in their own denominations. It is a distinct contri- bution to the solution of the problem of interdenominational competition because it does not destroy the connectional or- ganization. TRAINING A RURAL MINISTRY When all is said, the success of a rural pastorate de- pends upon the rural pastor. He must be rurally trained for his task. The sending of young ministers to rural commu- nities for their first parishes as a sort of training for city work has gone on almost indefinitely. The young preacher has gained some experience, the church in the country has learned the virtue of patience, but it is doubtful if successive pastors of this sort have left anything very definite in the life of the rural community. To-day the need for a specially trained rural minister is seen. To meet this demand an ade- quate system of recruiting and training for the rural min- istry is necessary. This is being met in part by the chairs of rural sociology in our theological seminaries and the rural THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY 57 institutes and conferences held by the Department of Rural Work of the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church. But the need is greater than the supply. Hundreds of leaders must be trained for the complex task of present lead- ership. "Supplies" must be displaced by trained men in full standing in Annual Conference relationships. The vision of the great task to be performed by the minister in the rural community must be given to those who are still thinking in terms of church life of a generation ago and a challenge must be given to the youth of our colleges to enlist themselves in the service of rural people. The service ren- dered by the rural pastor is as necessary to American civil- ization as that which is done in any other part of our social organization. With the proper recognition of the oppor- tunity for both Kingdom and community service in the rural pastorate, he will enter the rural community with that same enthusiasm that has characterized thousands of volunteers for foreign service. The challenge is a commanding one. The church is beginning to create the motive, the spirit, and the power of leadership in the rural church. It is not only preaching, but is also equipping its Sunday school for a modern religious education. It is also cooperating sym- pathetically with every movement for scientific home mak- ing, for lightening the work in the farmhouse, for the bring- ing of music and literature, the right kind of recreation and social life, within the reach of every member of the com- munity in terms of his or her own special needs. A RURAL CHURCH PROGRAM It is the rural church with a program that wins. In response to repeated calls for a program for rural churches, the Department of Rural Work of the Board of Home Mis- sions and Church Extension, in cooperation with bishops, district superintendents, and pastors, has pre|>ared the fol- lowing outline. 58 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA 1. Survey of at least one point on charge. Point to be sel< ! .i are possible evangelists to their fellow countrymen in Asia if the economic, social, and political problems involved in their presence in the United States can be worked out in a Christian way. This statement is easily demonstrable by the number of native preachers in Japan and China who were converted in Pacific Coast missions of the evangelical church. Spanish-Americans, two million strong, are in Colorado, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. They are found in the sugar beet fields of California, in the copper mines of Arizona, and as section men and sheepherders in the States farther north. Dealing with their manner of thought and habits of life is a problem as great as one wants to tackle. In addition large numbers of them are found in Porto Rico. One of the most difficult and perplexing problems in the home mission field is Mormonism, which has an exten- sive missionary propaganda of its own. Had Protestant home missions been well organized and liberally supported in the Mississippi Valley in 1830, this problem would not have arisen. The root of the trouble here is theological and it must be solved by the church and not by politicians. Then there are the Indians, of whom there are three hundred and fifty thousand, only one half of whom are affiliated with any church. There is certainly enough problem material to make it worth while getting down on the other side of the wall and taking a hand. R. W. K., in The Transformation. So we have the three outer possessions of the church's domestic missions. Porto Rico, full of its love and devotion to America, may be likened to a warm and glowing ruby. Hawaii, full of the possibilities for future Christian living, is its pearl of the sea. But Alaska, with treasures buried deep, and yielding the best to those that seek, is its diamond in the rough. Ralph Welles Keeler and Ellen Coughlin Keeler, in The Christian Conquest of America. AN ALASKAN FAMILY A DAUGHTER OF HAWAII THE WATER WAGON IN PORTO RICO CHAPTER VII VARIANTS OF THE TASK IT is easier to grasp the theory of Christian democracy than it is to establish its practical operation. This is due to the varying types of people who must be taught to accept its principles as a basis of daily living. They are in some cases shut off from its benefits by barriers of race, religious train- ing and customs which have been inherited for generations. Others are a part of a definite antagonism to Christian de- mocracy itself. These variants of the task of making Chris- tian democracy nation-wide increase the urgency for a thor- oughly equipped forward movement on the part of the Church of Jesus Christ. It must be wide-awake to the pe- culiar sort of ministry that is necessary for the planting of the ideas which will bear fruit in such development of mind and heart. It must be of such character as to assure ac- ceptance of the world challenge for a democracy safe for all peoples everywhere. THE MORMONS The Mormon Church, or so-called " Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, ' ' has been a thorn in the flesh of American democracy for many years. Accepting only its own interpretation of the theory of life and government, it has thrived in that part of the country where everything has been in the process of development, and where the Christian Church was not awake to the insidiousness of what it was permitting to grow. True, 450,000 members is not a large following. Its progress since its start in 1830 has not been rapid. But when we take into account the fact that its propaganda is of the sort that keeps sex-consciousness uppermost in the minds of the people, its influence is incal- 165 166 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA culable. The distribution of the membership of the Mormon Church is significant. It has never been able to get a foot- hold in the Eastern States. Utah, its center and great stronghold, boasts of 293,000 members. Idaho comes next with 78,000. Arizona and Wyoming have 15,000 each, while there are not more than 5,000 in any other individual State ; 10,000 a year is about the average rate of increase. GROWTH OF MORMONISM The chief growth of Mormonism after reaching Utah, for many years was among the immigrants from Great Bri- tain and Scandinavia. Nearly one fourth of the present population of Utah was born in these two countries. The success of the Mormon propaganda among these people was due, first, to the concealment of the non-Christian aspects of Mormonism; and, second, to the promise of material suc- cess, such as securing better wages, or obtaining free farms. In recent years these two factors no longer operate to the same extent, and Mormon propaganda is not so successful. As a rule, Mormon converts are not now to be taken to Utah, but are expected to remain where they are. Thus Mormon- ism seeks to take its place as a world-wide and not a localized religion. At the present time a temple one hundred and sixty-five feet square is being built at Cardston, Alberta, for the use of the Canadian Mormons, and another seventy-eight feet square is being constructed in the Hawaiian Islands for the twenty-two thousand Mormons who live there and in New Zealand and the South Sea Islands. Doubtless later other temples will be erected in Europe. Mormon houses of worship have been built in a number of American cities and a beautiful structure for this purpose is now being erected in Brooklyn, New York. POLYGAMY Polygamy has been the outstanding curse of this cult of the West. Probably more people know of Mormonism through hearing of men with several homes, several wives, VARIANTS OF THE TASK 167 and several sets of children than through any other item of the Mormon faith. It has been the issue around which battles for democracy and Christianity have raged for years. The pressure against polygamy became most acute in the early nineties. Up to that time the Mormons questioned the power of the United States government to enforce its own laws. In 1890, however, a new light dawned upon the Mormon leaders, and Wilford Woodruff, president of the Mormon Church, signed a manifesto permitting the discon- tinuance of the practice of multiple marriages. This gave them a breathing spell from the persecution directed against them. Six years later Utah was admitted to the Union as a State. Was the manifesto bona fide? It seems not to have been. Practically all the then existing marriage relation- ships have been maintained, and it is estimated on good authority that some two thousand polygamous marriages have been consummated since the manifesto was issued. But polygamy is doomed. What Christian propaganda has failed to accomplish the forces of economic and social evolution are bringing to pass. Polygamy belongs to the patriarchal period of human development. It has no part in an age of commercial and manufacturing activity. The influence of Christian culture has had a part in emphasizing this fact. So too has the rise of feminist doctrines. The fact that woman is now recognized as an individual suffi- cient unto herself is the very antithesis of the whole theory and teaching of Mormon theology. There is little reason to believe that polygamy is a force to be reckoned with prac- tically in the United States in the future. But how soon the deeply embodied theological basis for polygamy may be eliminated from Mormon thinking by the pressure of evan- gelical effort and public opinion it is difficult to prophesy. EVANGELIZATION SLOW It is always hard to win against counter-propaganda. The evangelical church has missionaries to the Mormons in Utah and the Mormon Church missionaries to the Christians 168 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA in Boston. The 1,400 Mormon missionaries who are con- stantly in the field give two years of free service, their ex- penses being paid by themselves or relatives. The work of the evangelical church as represented by the Methodist Episcopal Church receives its support from the church at large, and expands or contracts as available funds permit or necessitate. In Utah, for instance, the Methodist Epis- copal Church has twenty charges, only two of which are self- supporting. And after all the years the membership is only 1,712. One of the chief reasons, however, for the slow growth of the evangelical church in Utah lies in the fact that the majority of the non-Mormons going, there are not connected with any church, are indifferent to religion, and in too many cases indifferent to morality. The minority who are church members and exemplify the virtues of evangel- ical faith have not been sufficiently numerous to give a cor- rect impression to the Mormons of what the Christian Church really is. Here is where the appeal comes strong. A well-supported, thoroughgoing advance, equipped with creditable property and a well-prepared personnel sent forth by all of the Home Mission Boards, would do the task much better than the much speechmaking and woeful presenta- tions which are so common. Utah is "a foreign missionary field at home" and must be approached in the same attitude as that taken by Christian missionaries in other lands toward religions which we consider inadequate. SOME RESULTS ATTAINED Tardiness, rather than failure, is the word to apply to the evangelical church with reference to its attempts to Christianize Mormonism. The gradual results have been hopeful, even though not resulting in positive conversions. The results of the evangelical missionary work in Utah thus far have been largely the modification of Mormon principles and practice in certain important points rather than in the conversion of individual Mormons to evangelical faith. The changed attitude of the Mormon Church toward education, VARIANTS OF THE TASK 169 toward the United States government, toward the Bible, and toward Christian doctrine has been due largely to the efforts of evangelical missionaries. With the changed attitude toward these things there has come in each instance a change for the better in Mormon teaching. As in foreign lands, many of the people have lost their faith in their former reli- gion through the influence of this same Christian teaching, but they have not accepted evangelical Christianity. They remain nominal members of their church, while in reality they are agnostics, or atheists. Because of the social, com- mercial, and political power of the Mormon Church in Utah they do not change their technical relationship to the church, but they have little or nothing to do with it. They occupy a "No Man's Land" where democracy makes no appeal to them one way or another. Their children, however, are open to the appeal of evangelical Christianity. These young peo- ple are like the young people of any other part of the coun- try. They have imbibed some of the spirit of the age. They are alert to the broader opportunities of which they read and hear. The broadened outlook which they receive when they go into the world on missionary ventures has more effect upon them than does their propaganda upon the people whom they visit. A PROBLEM FOR DEMOCRACY Mormonism is a real problem for democracy. It can- not sing the songs of the people of the land with the same spirit and enthusiasm that characterizes the newly citizened immigrant of the lower East Side in New York city. The strong utterances of the President of the United States do not receive the same unquestioned response from the leaders of this church. They are on the defensive when it eomes to the great idea which is dominating the thought of all peo- ples everywhere to-day. Practical Christianity alone will break down the remaining barriers. By the use of states- manlike vision the Church of Jesus Christ can render service in this section of the church's remaining frontier that will 170 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA count for all time, for the dislodgment of prevailing ideas by the planting of Christian ideals will here set a half a mil- lion American citizens well on the road to that democracy for which many of their sons are fighting to make the world safe. THE AMERICAN INDIAN Who has thought of democracy for the American In- dian? The manner in which his land was schemed for and stolen away from him surely did not give him any high ideal of the Christianity which actuated the despoilers of his hunt- ing grounds. That he struck back, and in a way cruel and barbarous, does not justify the method used in separating him from his possessions. Nor has the placing him on reservations added any to the record of our nation in dealing with these people. To-day the Indians are raising their war whoop in the trenches in the fight for the very principles which were withheld in dealing with them. That the first Methodist Episcopal missionaries were sent to the Indian is an interesting fact historically. That the church did not follow up this work in a Christian statesmanlike way is de- plorable. INCREASING IN NUMBERS The Indian has furnished more than one essayist and public speaker with material on "The Vanishing Race of Redmen." But he has not vanished. Undemocratic and unchristian treatment has had the opposite effect. To-day the Indians are increasing. Scattered over the country are over 350,000 of them. What an opportunity for Christian democracy! The 70,000 children who are under ten years of age will have incalculable influence on the next gen- eration. The church has done something for the Indian, but not all that it should. Some 90,000 over ten years of age are adherents of the Roman Catholic Church, while 60,000 are members of the evangelical churches. Of the 130,000 who are not identified with any church, 60,000 are in tribes VAEIANTS OF THE TASK 171 where there is no opportunity to learn of Jesus Christ from either Protestants or Roman Catholics. * Number Methodist Episcopal Missions, etc INDIANS 2 JAPANESE OL SPANISH A. CHINESE MORMON. MONT. WY. fefroi \ / UT. / COL (D \\ tt\ ^ / ^ (1 \ J (j; ^ %^r^ \ A R ,Z. j^ A Ad/ A / ^ fr A / A N.M, A A/A A JLj cr- 1917 Report Members Probationers Scholars Paatora Property Support tenevobncea SPANISH 1.420 554 2,615 2O $14^000^2^04 J>884 INDIAN 600 596 12 19,700 CHINESE 344 -45 548 7 I7$000 2,644 812 JABVNESE; 1,227 522 848 20 160,000 9497 1.985 UTAH 1,704 I 19 3200 16 230000 13000 2,966 FRONTIER VARIANTS OF THE TASK CONDITIONS VARY The condition of life of the Indian varies. Location and the property he may have had are the chief factors of differ- ence. Sometimes he is very poor, while again there are large amounts of money to his credit invested by the govern- 172 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA ment at Washington. Which of these classes is most diffi- cult to reach? It is not easy to determine. The possession of wealth is not unmixed blessing. It has a tendency to pauperize. It curtails the development of industry. More- over, the government treats the Indians too much as wards, not recognizing their fitness for citizenship when that fitness exists. THE ROAD TO DEMOCRACY One of the great hopes for firing the Indian with the modern dreams of democracy lies in the public school or reservation day school. The children are gradually re- ceiving this opportunity. This brings them in close contact with all the other elements of the population. It prepares them for the future responsibilities of citizenship. It in- spires them with the hope of having a part in the future greatness of the land which once was the sole possession of their fathers. College training is also having its influence. The evolution from the days of paint and feathers and the red trail of the massacre to educated men and women who are a surety of what the years may bring for all has been more rapid than we realize; 78,000 Indians are already citizens of the United States, and instead of following the hunt they are cultivating nearly 700,000 acres of land. WHEN THE CHURCH AWAKENS What a day it will be when the people from whom this great land was taken come into their own ! And how differ- ent will be their estate than was their fathers ! Already the Methodist Episcopal Church, in common with other denom- inations, is at work on the task of bringing that day to pass. What if the church should suddenly awake to the possibility of hastening somewhat in this respect, and take on its full share of this most fruitful venture! The tribes which at present receive the ministry of the Christian Church through Methodist Episcopal agencies are the Oneida, Onondaga, Ottawa, Saint Regis, Seneca, Mohawk, Chippewa, Black- VARIANTS OF THE TASK 173 feet, Klamath, Lake Modoc, Nooksak, Paiute, Porno, Pot- awatomi, Siletz, Shoshoni, Washo, Yukaia, and Yuma. In several of these tribes the work is done by the Woman's Home Missionary Society. Methodism has been asked by the Home Missions Council also to assume responsibility for the giving of the gospel to some 15,000 Indians scattered in small tribes in California. While it is encouraging to read the list of tribes just given, in general it must be said that the Methodist Episcopal Church has not yet assumed its fair share of the task of supplanting the heritage of the wigwam with the Christian home. THE LATIN- AMERICAN One soon awakens to a sense of provincialism when tak- ing a trip through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and California. And it is not the scenery alone that stirs. It is the sudden recognition of the fact that our great South- west is peopled with nearly 1,500,000 folks who speak Span- ish and live the customs of centuries ago. Probably 750,000 of them were born in this country. They possess American* citizenship and are proud of it. But they are poorly edu- cated and do not speak the language of the nation of which they are a part. Their ideas of democracy are translated through a language which has not a democratic flavor. Their religious views are all tinctured with the Roman Ca- tholicism of centuries ago. These people were well repre- sented in the Civil War and thousands of them are in the trenches in France to-day, fighting to make the world safe for our democracy. And we have not taken the trouble to give them our language in order that they may interpret our ideals as we do. The fathers of many of these men were in this country when the United States took the territory from Mexico in 1848. Others were in Texas when that State seceded from Mexico. THE WISDOM OF THE WISE How shall the ideals which we prize be given to these 174 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA people? And to the million who have come swarming over the border as refugees during the more recent days? Cer- tainly the church cannot deliver a message that will be lis- tened to when it sets up halls and shacks in disreputable and inconvenient sections of the community as mission centers. Anarchists are pushing their propaganda among them. Socialists are diligently spreading their doctrines. And these use the poverty of the Spanish- Americans as a point of contact. They bring their message in terms of the peo- ple's illiteracy. They recognize the seasonal shifting of the population and follow it. Much is made of existing antip- athy to American life and citizenship. The prevailing blind atheism or ignorant loyalty to the Roman Catholic Church is seized upon. In New Mexico alone does such propaganda fail, for here is found a love for American cit- izenship. A CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY OPPORTUNITY Many of these who have come in the later immigration, refugees from the troubles in Mexico, are employed as un- skilled labor. There is great demand for them as sheep- herders. They make good section hands on the railroads. The copper mines welcome them ; and a goodly number toil in the beet and cotton fields. They have no trouble with the climate. Some have gone as far north as Idaho and Iowa. Others have gone as far east as Philadelphia and New York. Education and evangelization must grasp hands in the task with these folks. They are not likely to leave us. They must be made like us. The Portuguese, likewise Latin- Americans, must be ministered to in the same way as are the Mexicans. They do not become a part of the community into which they come, but drive out the other groups. In California they are displacing the American population in great valley and ranch sections. More work like that being done by the Spanish- American Institute at Gardena, California; Albu- querque College, Albuquerque, New Mexico ; and the schools for girls at Tucson, Arizona; Albuquerque, New Mexico; VARIANTS OF THE TASK 175 and Los Angeles will advance the dawn of a new day for these people, for they must have a leadership from among their own people, who know their ways and habits of thought. A NEW TYPE OP CHURCH Churches must also be provided of the character of the Plaza Community Church for Latin-Americans at Los Angeles, California. This church, modeled after the Morgan Memorial Church, Boston, has all of its excellent institu- tional features and in addition those peculiar things essen- tial to securing contact with the Latin- American mind and needs. It looks like an uphill process to lead unpoetic Don Juans into the fullness of the aims of Christian democracy. Apparently all that they have left of their picturesque her- itage are the superstition, the vices, the language, the igno- rance, the immorality, and the religious beliefs of the Spain of Philip the Second. But it is this fact which gives zest to the enterprise. "New ways for old" is the motif of democracy's song. And Christianity adds, "and a life that knows God. ' ' What a chance to prove the song by training these two millions of people to sing both the words and music as an expression of something which they know ex- perimentally ! THE ORIENTAL, A DIFFERENT PROBLEM The Oriental differs from every other comer to our shores in that the State has said that he is not welcome. To the Chinese and Japanese the Goddess of Liberty dims her torch. Herein is a strange hiatus in America's speech of welcome to the children of all nations. Of course there is a reason. But does the reason harmonize with Christian democracy's song of each for all and all for each? Years ago a large Chinese immigration set in. They were em- ployed in building railroads, in the mines, as domestic servants, and as laundrymen. Some even went into mer- cantile establishments. Then arose a cry in the land. 176 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA American labor unions objected to the presence of these men in American industries. So strong was the agitation that Chinese immigration was prohibited. A little later the Japanese began to arrive. Coining from a higher class than did the Chinese immigrants, they made rapid progress in agriculture and commerce. Again a cry arose in the land, and from the same quarter. The result was a "gentlemen's agreement" between the governments of the United States and Japan. Accordingly, no more Japanese laborers are coming. But what of those already here, caught between the welcome and the withdrawing of democracy's oppor- tunity! THEIR NUMBERS There are now about 80,000 Chinese and 100,000 Jap- anese in the United States. Have not these men, women, and children a claim upon the church! And has not the Christian Church here an opportunity to inculcate by prac- tical demonstration those ideals and aims which the nation is anxious to diffuse among the kindred of these people in their homeland? The task is made difficult by the govern- mental restrictions mentioned. But the spirit of the Christ knows no national boundaries. Moreover, if the Chinese and Japanese in the United States are convinced of the prac- tical character of Christianity, its acceptance will be made more easy in both China and Japan. THEIR DISTRIBUTION I New York, Philadelphia, and a few other large Eastern cities have a "Chinatown" among the various race colonies which make up their cosmopolitan population.' By far the largest number of the Chinese, however, are on the Pacific Coast. The States of California, Colorado, Washington, and Oregon claim most of the Japanese in this country, very few except the student and merchant class having gone farther east. The tendency of both the Japanese and Chinese to live in exclusive colonies makes the task of Chris- VAEIANTS OF THE TASK 177 tianizing and Americanizing them a difficult one. The un- friendliness and suspicion created by the attitude of certain publications and labor organizations makes the barrier the more difficult to penetrate. And the presence of a Buddhist temple in every large city on the Pacific Coast has a partly neutralizing effect on every effort made in this direction. HELPING JAPAN The difficulty of the task only intensifies the urgency of the challenge. For years the Methodist Episcopal Church has realized the value of a favorable verdict for Christianity on the part of those who return to their homes in the Far East. Many of the Japanese preachers who are doing effi- cient work in Japan were converted to Christianity in the Methodist Japanese Missions on the Pacific Coast. Whether in their stores or in other places of business, these people are getting a first-hand knowledge of our ways. Hundreds of the young Japanese men and women are in domestic service. On the ranches and among the orchards they are serving diligently. Is it worth while to send itinerant missionaries to teach them, as is done for their fellows abroad? The op- portunity in Sunday school work increases with the rapidly increasing birth rate. Here the processes of Americaniza- tion may be speeded up to almost any desired point. A CHINESE CHALLENGE When we give ourselves in all seriousness to the estab- lishing of Christian democracy in the United States we will give more heed to the Chinese among us. The older men, who came to this country years ago as laborers, and who are firmly fixed in their habits of thought, are not much con- cerned about Christianity. They are migratory in habit and are widely scattered. But if they listen to the street preacher disseminate doctrines other than those of Chris- tianity, it is reasonable to conclude that the gospel message will reach them in this same manner, as well as through tracts. The Chinese who have established themselves in the 178 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA centers of population are more accessible, especially through the children. What a chance the family church has in demonstrating its creed among these little folks from the land of the Dragon ! And the student class ! When future leaders come right into our midst, who is at fault if they do not have a fair presentation of the very principles which are the foundation of our best national life? Ambitious and eager to learn English, they are here to-day and to-morrow they are directing the affairs of state in China. Some of them are unable to enter the public schools until they have had a preparatory course in a mission school. They not only have to be taught, they also must have lodgings. The Chris- tian Church has the first chance to make its impress upon minds desirous of getting those things which account for the type of civilization which has made America a household word the world around. In China there is a considerable number of Christian churches, the origin of which can be traced to home missionary work among the Chinese in Cali- fornia. Together with the Hawaiian Missions these Oriental ALASKA "SEWARD'S FOLLY" AND OUR OPPORTUNITY VARIANTS OF THE TASK 179 missions in the United States may be made to serve as one of the very best wedges for the introduction of Christian de- mocracy into the Orient. ALASKA The sky pilot of the dog sled and gasoline launch in far-off Alaska has much the same problem as the home mis- sionary in New York or Chicago who ministers to the pass- ing throngs. For Alaska is a land of transients ; the lure of business opportunity is in the air and men move from the mining camp to boom town. But the missionary in Alaska is far from the base of supplies. The people back home have no adequate conception of either his task or his needs, to say nothing of the opportunities which he is obliged to pass up because of limited resources. A EEAL MAN'S LAND * Ecclesiastical statesmen have been as shortsighted with reference to Alaska as those statesmen who in 1867 opposed Secretary Seward's plan to purchase this territory of 586,- 400 square miles of inexhaustible riches. The fabulous re- turns to the United States on its investment of $7,200,000.98 have long since convinced those concerned with the material affairs of the nation that Secretary Seward was wiser than his generation realized. Wealth in agriculture, furs, copper, coal, petroleum, marble, and gold, and a $20,000,000 annual yield from the fisheries is now evidence enough for them. But what of the folks who are engaged in these industries ? Not all of them are Indians or Eskimos. Alaska is a white man's country. True, the population is scanty and the towns are small. But the average man in Alaska is shrewd, dar- ing, and educated. He is possessed of the spirit of a land that knows no discouragement. No ordinary "sky pilot" will reach him. The minister must be a man of the North. He is obliged to be a committee of one on self-help. After his title of the Rev. John Brown he must be able to add C.M., D.T.D., G.B.C., C.B., G.U.M. All this dignity is conferred 180 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA upon him as rapidly as he qualifies as campmaker, dog-team driver, gas-boat chauffeur, cabin builder, and general utility man. And he must qualify, or his ministry fails. It is a gigantic task to put up to a man. But how the elements of democracy thrive in such a preacher ! What a hearing of the teachings of the Man of Galilee such a man of Alaska can secure ! He has the punch which comes from being one of the selfsame reliant fellows as those to whom he ministers. If necessary, he can sit down with Eskimos at their annual dance and eat heartily of their menu of strings of dried fish served with seal oil, boiled seal meat, slapjacks served with seal oil, frozen berries, hot tea and doughnuts served with seal oil. And he can preach to the wanderers of the North, college men from nearly every big university in the States, in the language of both their heads and their hearts. METHODISM REPRESENTED The contribution of the Methodist Episcopal Church to the Christian democracy of Alaska is now being made at Nome, Juneau, Seward, Fairbanks, and Ketchikan. This work is financed by the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension. The work among the Eskimos is done by the Woman's Home Missionary Society. With Alaska "dry" the church should see to it that the wild vices of an untamed land are curbed by the restraining power of Christian fel- lowship. The next trench should be taken for the kingdom of God! HAWAII The ukulele and the popular song have done much to give us our impression of Hawaii. Comfort, ease, and moon- light nights spent on the beach listening to native music are the dominating features. But underneath this table d'hote conception of this possession at the crossroads of the Pacific is another strain. American democracy here comes to close grips with the civilization of the Far East. Those ideals VARIANTS OF THE TASK 181 which are multiplied most rapidly will decide the dominat- ing influences of the future. And the ideals which are held precious on the mainland can be multiplied only by such a recognition of the situation as will provide for a force and equipment adequate for the task. A NEW HAWAII Native Hawaii is not democracy's problem. The mis- sionaries of the American Board (Congregational) who went there in 1819 did their work so thoroughly that a broad THE HALFWAY HOUSE OF THE PACIFIC A strategic field for Christian Democracy 182 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA type of Anglo-Saxon civilization was early established. But the native Hawaiians are disappearing, there being only 20,941 of them left in the islands to-day. In their place are found Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, Portuguese, and Americans. Here at the halfway house of all trans- Pacific travel will be worked out the philosophy of life and government that will react upon both the nations of the Far East and the United States. Hawaii is ''where the West begins" to the Oriental. Here the East and West meet in stern reality. It is America 's great immigration experiment station. Will the results be beneficial to those who are in the process of the experiment? THE JAPANESE QUESTION The Japanese number four to one against any other na- tionality in Hawaii. The Hawaii-born Asiatic will soon hold the balance of power. He cannot be denied the right to the ballot and will not tamely submit to any movement for his disfranchisement. In a few years all the important offices will be held by an alien people. Will American-born Asiatics make good American citizens? The answer rests with the Church of Jesus Christ. They must not be left alone in their day of awakening. They must be guided in the hour of their prejudice. Now is the time to determine whether they will look to Washington or to Tokyo for direction as they ap- proach the ballot box. The $100,000 Buddhist temple in Honolulu and the thirty-five large schools which the Bud- dhists have established throughout the territory are the watchman's cry from the tower. For here 14,000 American- born Japanese children go each day before and after the regular hours of public school. With two conceptions of God, of home, of government, of the relation of child to par- ent, and of men to women, what a confusion awaits the child as he grows to maturity! Which conception will have the stronger hold upon his thinking and life? Is Christianity to prevail in the type of democracy developed? VARIANTS OF THE TASK 183 NOW IS THE TIME The Filipinos are more adaptable to American ways, while the Koreans lend themselves readily to our form of church life. The need of trained Christian Japanese, Filipino, and Korean leaders who speak English is apparent. The need of their being at their task to-day is not so easily recognized. If the Hawaii of the future is to be American, we must prepare for the day when all religious exercises will be conducted in English. The church should not demand less for the stars and stripes than the public schools demand. In meeting the task of Americanizing and Christianizing these peoples of the mid-Pacific, a comity arrangement has been made whereby the Methodist Episcopal Church does no work among the Chinese and the Congregational Church does no work among the Koreans. The city of Honolulu is a joint responsibility among the Japanese and Filipinos. All the rest of the territory has been districted and assigned to different denominations. Thus the Methodist Episcopal Church has a definite responsibility laid at its door. Why wait for ten years and then look about for some place to lay the blame for lacking the far look 1 Ten years will see the tendency for the future of Hawaii settled. What is done to-day will help to decide what that future will be. PORTO Rico Porto Rico, an island consisting of a series of hills and valleys, is our Spanish possession in the West Indies. Since its discovery by Columbus, November 19, 1493, until twenty years ago its history has been a sad one. The gradual inter- mixture of Spanish, Indian, and Negro, and later of white people, has left a race indolent and easy, content with their poverty and illiteracy. For the most part dwellers in rural communities, the people live close to nature in a very real sense, the need of much clothing not being felt, and shoes not being worn by three fourths of the million and a quarter inhabitants. 184 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA EVANGELICAL TRANSFORMATION Until Porto Rico came under the guidance of the United States as one of the results of the Spanish-American war, in 1898, Roman Catholicism dominated the life of the people. In every community the church of this faith is the most prominent building and the one most advantageously lo- cated. Evangelical Christianity has been warmly welcomed, however, and is gradually transforming the lives of the peo- ple. The church is beginning to have a vital relationship to life. The marriage ceremony, for which there was little re- gard, because of the exorbitant fees charged by the priests, is coming into repute again. Concubinage is being done away with. The public school system introduced by the United States is showing results in the type of ambition manifested by the rising generation. A greater desire for Americanization is being manifested. But the task of trans- forming the mass of the population has only been begun. The lighthearted irresponsibility of a people governed for generations by others is not quickly overcome. The cock- sureness and satisfaction in self is not eliminated in a day. The dignity of labor gains a foothold only slowly. The heritage of slavery and peonage gives way to democracy in a grudging way. PORTO RICO, SHOWING POINTS WHERE THE METHODIST EPIS- COPAL CHURCH IS TEACHING THE PRINCIPLES OF CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY VARIANTS OF THE TASK 185 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY TAUGHT The sweet songs of the evangelical church are singing the truths of Christian democracy into the hearts of these poverty-stricken people. Divided among the several Home Mission Boards of eight denominations, the evangelization of the island is being carried on effectively under a comity agreement which prevents waste of money and effort. The present Protestant population is about 50,000, the rest of the people being nominally Roman Catholic or else indifferent to any form of religion. Those who are related in some way to the Protestant churches get with their religious teaching a training in the best things in Americanization. The fellow- ship of Christian faith leads naturally to a common footing in democratic ideals. The soldiers who left the Island for service overseas received some of their technical trench war- fare training in community houses attached to a Methodist Episcopal Church. A CHANCE TO MULTIPLY INFLUENCE When Porto Rico is thoroughly Americanized it will be under the local administration of Porto Ricans. The policy of the administration at Washington is to fill with natives all offices left vacant by Americans from the States. This means that to-day is the time to be giving these folks the high idealism of Christian democracy. They will practice it as officials to-morrow. Thus the work done now will be multi- plied many fold through the influence of those in high posi- tion in the state. Just as the government trained hundreds of native young women for positions in the public schools in the Island, so must the church train native leaders for its part of the task. We are past the time for halfway mea- sures. The increasing intelligence of the people will not accept any leadership but the best. And the message which the church has for them demands that it is delivered by men so trained as to command a respectful hearing from the best-educated people, as well as from those to whom it comes as the first sign of the dawn of a new day of hope. Shall the church become the community center while things are in a process of development? Or will it let some other institu- tion which it will later have to displace creep in while it hesi- tates to meet its obligation and opportunity? OUR OWN UNITED STATES It grows increasingly difficult to write a national hymn for the United States which will include its many diverse variants. When there were but thirteen colonies on the Eastern seaboard this might have been done with ease. To- day, however, the song would become a catalog or guidebook. But there is a song which the various peoples of our land can sing with a feeling that it unites them in one common bond. Its music is written in the high idealism of the Chris- tian faith. Its words are caught from the practical work- ing out of a democracy which knows no distinctions. The song in its entirety is the song 'which we are endeavor- ing to teach to the nations of the earth. Our immediate task is to see that it is so well sung by every individual within the bounds of our own country that no discord will jar the rendering when we finally get the ear of the other peoples. For after the days of battle are over a careful analysis will be made of this democracy for which men are dying in order that the world may be a safe place for its demonstration. In that day may we be able to say, "Our democracy is Chris- tian and will stand the test!" QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1. What constitutes the "menace "'of Mormonism? How is the church meeting it? 2. Discuss the changes that have taken place in ]\!<>r- mon attitude because of the teaching of the evangelical church. 3. What has democracy for the American Indian ? 4. To what extent has the Christian Church failed in VARIANTS OF THE TASK 187 meeting its obligation to the Indian? The Methodist Epis- copal Church? 5. What are the things which make the Latin- Amer- ican situation in the Southwest an urgent challenge to Chris- tian democracy? 6. Discuss some of the methods of Christian work now being done there. 7. What gives the task of Christianizing the Oriental a different character from those just discussed? 8. Show the value to foreign missions of evangelizing the Chinese and Japanese in the United States. 9. Why do we hear so little about Alaska in our churches ? 10. What sort of a proposition is the task of the mis- sionary in Alaska? 11. Discuss democracy's problem and opportunity in Hawaii. 12. Why must the Christian Church do its best work there immediately? 13. How does the background of Porto Rican thought affect the acceptance of the evangelical Christianity ? 14. How has the evangelical church gone at its task there? 15. ' What must be the content of our national song in order that it may be sung by all ? A church which is not gripping the life of its own community is simply bluffing, however zealous it may be in sending to the uttermost parts. An unsaved America, zealously saving the nations beyond the seas, simply shows its incapacity even to comprehend the saving mission for anybody. A program which permits a so-called missionary church to welter in the reek of its own community's moral disease, cheapens distressingly the gospel it presumes to preach, and at the same time casts disgraceful reflections upon the distant community to which it presumes to bear its gospel message. Joseph Ernest McAfee, in Mis- sions Striking Home. It is no longer physical nature about which our whole thought world swings, it is humanity. Eugene W. Lyman, in The God of the New Age. Education for democracy means the development of each indi- vidual to the most intelligent, self -directed and governed, unselfish and devoted, sane, balanced and effective humanity. Edward Howard Griggs, in The Soul of Democracy. We must go further than mere service, or even mere contact in service. There can be no real success unless Christian people are possessed with the right spirit and approach and with the right attitude of mind and heart. The thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians must be imbedded in the very soul of the worker. The greatest social service or individual service that one can render is sympathy. Programs, how- ever, good, will be nothing more than "scraps of paper" unless this spirit vitalizes the plan. There must be created a Christlike thoughtfulness, carefulness, sympathy, concern for those about us that need our help. This cannot be accomplished by any force from, without, for external force cannot mellow and soften and purify the spirit of man. A new heart must be given him, he must have a new conception of what a man is, a creature just a "little lower than the angels," or, as one of the versions puts it, "a little lower than God." In every man is a God- deposit and in a measure in him we find again God in human flesh. When the significance of this thought sweeps in upon the Christian it will convert him as it did me when I faced it o'ne day. Whatever 'we think of the color of a man's skin, the shape of his eyes or the size of his body, we must respect the spirit in him, that deposit of God, or may we not again crucify the Lord of Glory? "Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these, my brethren, ye did it unto me." George B. Dean. THE GOSPEL IN THE OPEN LITTLE ITALY, NEW YORK CITY FOR COUNTRY AND FOR GOD FLAG RAISING AT BETHEL SHIP NORWEGIAN-DANISH METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, BROOKLYN, NEW YORK CHAPTER VIII THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST OUR PRESENT RESPONSIBILITY How shall the multitudes be taught the truth the prac- tice of which makes Christian democracy possible 1 It is use- less to survey communities, study conditions, plan for equip- ment, and summons leaders unless that which all this leads to is determined. People are transformed by the new ideas which they receive and whose validity they accept. New ways of life are not tried without adequate motive. What is the motive which we are giving to those who are seeking the best? What is the plea that we put before those who are un- concerned about the things which are uppermost in the minds of Christian leaders? How do we go about getting others to accept our conception of a democracy which shall be synonymous with the kingdom of God on earth? Across the centuries comes the challenge of the Christ to make him known to man, woman, and child. His voice summons to such endeavor as will leave no question as to the sincerity of our purpose. He calls with no uncertain voice to those who wander in uncertainty ; and they will be able to hear him only as we make plain to them the message which he speaks. War has clouded the sky and added to the inability of the people of our own and every land to hear the voice of God in the affairs of men. Questionings which had lain dormant are now active in the thinking of countless hun- dreds of thousands. Does God still exist? Has Christianity utterly failed? Does God hear the prayers of opposing armies when they plead for his assistance ? Is he mindful of the men slain on the field of battle? Is he concerned over the homes made lonely by the taking away of their men? 191 192 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA Will the church ever be able to answer the new demands made upon it? The list is long. The questioners are many. No superficial answer will satisfy. It must be an answer that will vitalize faith and stimulate to service. Every phase of human living is involved. Every human relationship is affected. Who shall rise to give assurance to the people! There is but one institution whose experience and faith are equal to the task. The Church of Jesus Christ must recon- secrate itself to the needs of to-day. As in times past it must be the steadying force of the nation. Its message must be proclaimed in every place where men and women are to be found. It must talk the language of the people. Through its ministry the Master must be privileged to walk where need is great, where faith is wavering, where hope is dim. The evangel of the Son of God must be proclaimed so that people will behold him. Out of the horrors and devastation of war a new day must dawn. The character of that day de- pends upon those who claim Jesus Christ as their Saviour and Lord. METHODISM ALWAYS EVANGELISTIC This is no new challenge to the Methodist Episcopal Church. The purpose of her ministers and missionaries at home and abroad has ever been to lead folks to see and ac- cept the way of life lived and advocated by the Master. From its very beginning it has been an evangelistic church. The fervor of its preaching has been a symbol of its min- istry. Salvation has been the most prominent note in its song. Class leaders have toiled to make its message effect- ive. Exhorters have added their plea to the minister's word of guidance. Pastors and itinerant evangelists have stirred the people to consider their way of life, if it be in accordance with the will of God. The challenge to-day is more complex than it has been. Its demands are for greater sacrifice and harder service. But the church which for several genera- tions has adapted itself to the changing needs of the times will respond now with full-hearted loyalty. It is awake to THE CHALLENGE OP THE CHRIST 193 the needs of our national life. It recognizes the Kingdom's necessities. It has called its ministry and membership to service which is adapted to the conditions and needs. It i pointing them to the way they may best help in a task the doing of which will bless not only our own land, but also every land where our boasted democracy gains foothold. NEW POINTS OF CONTACT Meeting the religious needs of any day necessitates a recognition of the new points of contact. The increasing complexity of American life emphasizes this very strongly. Our sudden plunging into world responsibilities adds to the importance of this recognition. We are no longer mere indi- vidualists. Even the isolated farmer is to-day tied up to the rest of the nation by his contribution of war food for the na- tions. Into every home in the United States has gone the call for men. We have been welded together in a few short months in a way in which the years failed to unite us. At every point where we rub elbows is an opportunity for inter- preting the message of the Christ. The upheaval in our^ economic life forces an interpretation and application of the gospel which demonstrates the justice of its appeal. Labor unionism is becoming a religion which must be met at the point where practical righteousness is demonstrated. The industrial world has felt the heavy burdens which Chris- tianity offers to remove and is waiting for an utterance which will bring relief. The educational interests of the country want the message translated so as to meet the needs of the developing minds of the student body. A presentation is needed which has the same intellectual adequacy as has the presentation of those philosophies at which the world has grasped during the centuries." An evangelism is needed that knows no distinction between people. It must be tireless in its efforts. It must know people as well as its message. Fired by a desire to help the people to whom it goes, it must put the counting of heads in the background. If the effort is to save the church it would better be put into other direc- 194 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA tions. Is it the church that must be saved, or the people who must be helped! This question finds ready answer in a form "of ministry now being performed by the church, which did not exist before the war. FOR OUR BOYS IN KHAKI AND BLUE The evangelism to the soldiers and sailors of the United States is a fine illustration of the church unmindful of itself. In hundreds of cantonments and smaller camps the men of our homes have been training for service overseas. Thou- sands of them have already gone over. Hundreds of tlu-m are buried beneath the soil of a land they had never seen until a few months ago. To these men in camp the church has carried the message of the Christ. Ministers have served in the huts of the Y. M. C. A. Others have manned the churches just outside the camp and have devoted all of their time to ministering to these men from every part of the country. In such service the Methodist Episcopal Church, through its Board of Home Missions and Church Extension, has invested its money. Where there was no church near the camp one has been built. In some instances federations have been effected with other denominations. Whatever way seemed to be most effective for the welfare of those min- istered to has been adopted. The soldiers and sailors have crowded into the preaching services. They have accepted Christ at the altars of these churches. The social functions have had all of the home atmosphere that could be put into them. When the summons to embark has come our boys in khaki and blue have entrained for a port of embarkation with the happy consciousness that the church which they were taught to love in childhood has manifested its love for them in their hour of peculiar need. And those who had never known its blessings until the days in camp have sailed overseas with the new asset in life of fellowship with the One above all others who can sustain in the day of battle. Nor has the church stopped at the camps. It has sent its ministers as chaplains with its sons to the very front. THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 195 Equipping them with the things essential for ministry in the trenches, the church has gone with them to supply whatever need they might have which the government does not supply. Churches have released their pastors to serve with the Y. M. C. A. abroad and to go as Eed Cross chaplains. And every one of these men has taken with him the evangel, to interpret it in the strange, new terms of bloodshed and horror. The old terminology is obsolete so far as these men are concerned. But the vital saving power of the gospel re- mains as effective as ever. The great privilege of these chaplains on the field of battle is to make this point clear and to help the fighting men under their guidance to demon- strate it. In so far as the fighting force of the nation is con- cerned the Church of Jesus Christ is awake. The Methodist Episcopal Church has accepted this unexpected point of contact and is serving mankind in a new way. Will the church accept the opportunities of usefulness afforded by the new points of contact in the groups of people at home? Will the Methodist Episcopal Church retain her heritage of being "all things to all men" and bring the evangel to the particular needs of men in terms which are intelligible to them, with a force which convinces that faith in Jesus Christ is the way of the world's salvation! THE DEPAKTMENT OF EVANGELISM It is for the doing of this very thing that the Depart- ment of Evangelism of the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church was organized. It does not pretend to have the open sesame for all of the religious problems of the day, or to stand as the sole wisdom of the church in matters pertaining to evan- gelism. It was organized in order that the church might have a clearing house on this vital matter. It exists in order that every minister and local church may have the benefit of the tried experience and practice of the entire church in lead- ing men to actual fellowship with Jesus Christ. The task of such a department is multiplex. The church looks to it 196 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA for guidance. Its field is almost limitless. Its opportunity is beyond estimating. Its value depends upon the coopera- tion of the constituency which it was organized to serve. ' WHAT Is EVANGELISM ? When evangelism is mentioned it often brings to mind only the more spectacular of the evangelists who have trav- eled the country during the past quarter of a century. All that the cartoonists have pictured and the newspaper para- graphers have written are remembered. Too frequently the entire matter is dismissed by the man in the street without further thought on this account. But evangelism is more than this. It is the presenting of the message of the Christ so as to secure its acceptance. It includes every form of effort to put the practical righteousness of the kingdom of God into the affairs of daily life. It meets the strange con- ception that evangelism and social service are two diverse things, and aims to show that they are but the reverse side of a practical experience. Evangelism is the call to the ac- ceptance of an experience which demonstrates itself in com- munity service. It recognizes the value of the camp meeting, but urges the addition of a training which will give practical value to the camp-meeting blessing. To the prayer for for- giveness for sin it would add that other prayer : "O Master, let me walk with thee In lowly paths of service free. Tell me thy secret; help me bear The strain of toil, the fret of care. "Help me the slow of heart to move By some clear, winning word of love; Teach me the wayward feet to stay, And guide them in the homeward way." Because thought and life are so closely related the church cannot use any halfway measures in its evangelistic efforts. Who.le-heartedness must characterize every ven- ture. No opportunity must be lost, no matter how far it may THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 197 be from the beaten path of ecclesiastical custom. The ap- proach to the Italian may be by one method, the approach to the Spanish-American by another. Because the life of the lumberjack in the far West differs from the tran- quillity of a New England village, both the type of min- ister and the form of message must be different. The strenuous deliverance of the gospel to men of ''big busi- ness ' ' in 'the city 's busy marts of trade will not suit either in terminology or application the little country church at the crossroads. University students demand a very dif- ferent type of evangelism from that employed at a noonday shop meeting. The challenge to a crowd of human derelicts at a Bowery Mission is not adapted for a gathering of thoughtful mothers. It is this diversity of opportunity and the necessity for recognizing the proper approach that stim- ulates the modern minister to preparation not contemplated by our fathers. It is this need of knowing the best ways and the most efficient training that makes possible a unique serv- ice by the Department of Evangelism. The battlefields of Europe are testifying to the fact that vital religion is a profound necessity to every man. Through letters and story and poem the men in the trenches have let it be known that they are fighting for a spiritual ideal. No vision of aggrandizement for the land of their love blinds them. They see before them a day made pos- sible for the establishing of a Christian democracy worth dying for. As they write back home, many of them for the last time, their mind is on the condition of things here. The sight of their fellows slain in a ruthless slaughter has altered their viewpoint. What of the democracy at home? Is it feeling the influence of the unifying of the nations at the front? Will the same petty politics mar the records of the state? Will men defraud, cheat, deceive as they did before the flow of the blood of their sons began? Will the x poor still be oppressed? Will class distinctions still hold? Their 198 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA anxiety is not for themselves. They are glad to die for a cause that will make this world better. Their concern is as to whether or not those left will finish the task that they have begun. Will the old ways be discarded for new and better ways? Will America the beautiful become America the righteous? The agony of it reaches back across the ocean with a prayer for the establishment in fact of the ideal for which they are sacrificing everything. And woven into every such appeal is the suggestion and insistence that a democracy that is worthy the acceptance of the entire world cannot exist unless its foundations are religious. Not religious, however, in the sense of formal creeds alone, but religious in the way in which Jesus Christ himself exem- plified Christianity. The need of religion is frankly ex- pressed. Are we equal to meeting the need in the terms of the need itself? This is the question not only for the Depart- ment of Evangelism, but for every member of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States. When we forget the content which the term " evangel- ism" has come to have in many sections of the country, and remember only our obligation as disciples of Jesus Christ to make him known to those about us, our path seems more clearly defined. Our chief difficulty then becomes one of discovering how best we may serve in the matter. This phase of the advance of the kingdom of God has received careful thought by both the Department of Evangelism and those leaders of the church who have been peculiarly useful in leading people into the active service of making attrac- tive to others the way of Christian democracy. The world cannot be made over by spasmodic attempts to change its viewpoint. There must be a concerted siege participated in by all the forces of Christianity. It is not a denominational sally tha^ will win the day. The Church of Jesus Christ as a whole must be united in the fight. But the individual de- nomination must train and marshal its own forces. Its methods must be those which are best adapted to its peculiar form of church government. This fact brings a challenge to THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 199 the Methodist Episcopal Church to outline ways and means for making its forces most serviceable for the day's needs. To this challenge the Department of Evangelism offers some suggestions as an answer. Church membership statistics show a gain one year and a loss the next. Various explanations are offered for this rise and fall. But not yet has there been made a local study of the causes which enter into the results. Every Annual Conference in the Methodist Episcopal Church should have an active Committee on Evangelism. It should be a work- ing committee composed of men of various ages so as to get the viewpoint of more than one generation and type of train- ing. Each district in the Conference should be represented so that no charge will be overlooked. Once organized, this committee has for its task the study of the conditions and needs of the Conference as a whole. It should endeavor to see that a proper type of evangelism is being promoted. It should recommend to the Conference plans which are adapted to the various kinds of communities where the Meth- odist Episcopal Church ministers. Many a prayerful effort to stir the people on a Confer- ence district to a season of concerted effort to lead men to Christ has failed. Frequently the failure has been due to lack of knowledge of what should be done. In other in- stances there has been no goal. The prayers, the enthusi- asm, and the sacrifice have been swept away after a week or two because those participating did not know where their efforts were to lead. This is avoided when a district has a definite goal. Where specific plans are worked out before- hand it is easier to have the cooperation of one church with another. The right sort of organization will be effected. Men and women will recognize that results are expected. Pastors will realize in a new way personal responsibility in the matter. The additional power which comes from a con- sciousness that others are busy at the same definite task will be great. The idea that our local church is doing it all will vanish. The prayer, "Thy kingdom come," will have in it the thought of neighboring communities as well as our own. The vision of a Christian democracy for the world will grad- ually sweep away the barriers which prevent us from mak- ing certain a Christian democracy for our own community. This will necessitate dividing the district into smaller groups. But this very necessity will provide for the more personal study and making of plans. The local church will receive greater attention. Its needs, the sort of people to whom it should give it message, its resources in evangelistic workers will all be better discovered in this smaller group. The plans outlined by the Conference Committee on Evangel- ism and brought into concrete form as a goal by the district may here be further adjusted to the actual churches in which they are to be used. For when it comes to the local church, cognizance should be given to the plans which churches of other denominations have under way or are contemplating. This makes local cooperation possible and opens the way for simultaneous endeavor and more widespread effort and results. EVANGELISTIC COACHING CONFERENCES In order that every minister in the denomination may have the benefit of the best experience of the church in this matter coaching conferences are held by the Department of Evangelism. Ministers and selected laymen from a specific area are gathered together for a quiet discussion of evan- gelism with leaders in the church. Those who bring a mes- sage to these gatherings are men who have demonstrated in their own communities the effectiveness of what they say. Methods are compared and criticized. Problems peculiar to individual churches are discussed. A spirit of reconsecra- tion is sought in prayer. Reasons for failure are pointed out. Overwhelming needs are made concrete. The form of message for to-day is outlined, and the content of that mes- sage is made plain. It is a time of careful preparation by THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 201 those to whom the churches look for guidance in the task for which they were established. These men in turn take what they have received to smaller groups in the Conference dis- tricts until the message of the coaching conference is brought to the active workers in every local church. WHEN LAYMEN ARE TRAINED FOR EVANGELISM It is in the local Methodist Episcopal church where the intensive training for making the gospel message practical to the community must be carried on, for the church at large does not make much of an appeal to those needing the min- istry of the local church around the corner. We have had study classes in Bible, missions and social service, why not training classes for personal workers? The plaint of many laymen when urged to do definite evangelistic work is that they do not know how. Here is an opportunity to develop its forces that the church has too long neglected. Every church should have at least one training class for lay work- ers. They are the ones who come into closest contact with the very people to whom the church seeks to give the prin- ciples of Christian democracy. And they are desirous of serving in this way. The great numbers of gospel teams composed entirely of laymen, and usually of laymen recently converted, evidence this desire. Were these men properly trained for the service which they are now rendering with- out direction, their usefulness to their fellow men would be increased many fold. As it is they are teaching others first- hand the new way of life which they have been helped to dis- cover by some one else who knew about it. The possibilities of service by both men and women are beyond estimate. And what a stimulus such training would be to the young men and women who, loving their Master, know not just how to share their fellowship with others ! With a corps of men and women definitely trained for evangelistic service how different the community looks ! No urging is needed to make a canvass of the community to find out the dwellers in the parish to whom their church has said 202 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA it would exemplify the Christ. With a new enthusiasm every living soul would be enrolled, whether they have any rela- tionship to the church or not. New points of contact will be established. People will suddenly realize that the church has an interest in them of which they were unaware. Reli- gious needs will be discovered. Opportunities will be pre- sented for talking about the Saviour. People are more in- different to religion than antagonistic to it. They are un- able to understand the church's interpretation of the Christ. Their thinking is for the most part in terms of the struggle to earn bread, provide a place of shelter, and raise their chil- dren in accordance with their conception of what is right. Unjust working conditions nullify what they think the church stands for. Unfair business dealings cause them to question the sincerity of church members. They have learned to symbolize the church by the one member of it who has failed to practice its teachings as they understand it. So they have passed the church by, wondering where the spiritual help which they need will come from. All this comes to light in a community canvass. And what a chance to clear the thinking of those thus found ! Whatever may be the value of crowd-enthusiasm, people accept Christ for themselves individually. And individual by individual is the Kingdom built up and Christian democracy spread. A constant state of revival may well be expected with such a preparation of both the community and the members of the church. The conviction will grow within and without the church that there is a ceaseless business upon which the church of Jesus Christ is bent. ''Power" will be more than a word to such a church. Genuine work for Christian de- mocracy will result. Spiritual things will become the topic of daily conversation. The church on the corner will be- come the center of the community in a new sense. But is not this what ought to be the normal condition? Is there any other institution that should have a more definite place in the heart and mind of every individual who helps to make up the population? If there has been a failure to have such a 203 condition exist, now is the time to change things. With the world trying to express its spiritual need, there should be such an enlivening of the church that there can be no ques- tion in the mind of anyone but that the Christ has the answer to every need. ACCREDITED EVANGELISTS Does this mean that the day of the vocational evangelist is past? Has the man specially trained and experienced in leading men and women into the light of gospel truth no more place in the program of the church? Must the local church, no matter how inefficient it may be, do its task all alone ? The evangelist is still needed. His work is to go on. But it is hoped that the local church will more and more fit itself to carry on its own work. For those churches which still are obliged to call in a vocational evangelist help is pro- vided. A Eegistration Bureau of Evangelists is being estab- lished by the Department of Evangelism. Here will be filed a record of the qualities and abilities of accredited Methodist Episcopal evangelists. When a church needs an evangelist it may write to the Department of Evangelism for help. By stating the local needs and problems, it is possible to have recommended an evangelist adapted to the community which the local church serves. In this way the evils attendant upon the ministry of the wandering evangelist will be overcome. The men recommended will all be Methodist Episcopal min- isters in good standing, whose evangelistic work in the past has stood the test of practical fruitfulness. It is a new ven- ture in providing the best in the presenting of the Christian message to those who must be won to its acceptance. PREACHERS NEEDED AT " SOAPBOX UNIVERSITIES" Preachers of Christian democracy must be provided also for the numerous 1 1 soapbox universities ' ' of our large cities. Nearly every other type of religion, economic thought, and life-philosophy has provided "professors" for 204 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA these street-corner chairs of learning. They have recog- nized the value of presenting their claims where the people are. No moment of the day is "out of season" for them. As the crowds go to and fro at the lunch hour, voice after voice challenges their attention for a few minutes. And in that brief moment they receive something to think about for a long time. Many of the doctrines promulgated by these teachers of the people are openly destructive of the best in life. Some strike at the very foundations of our national life. Others deride the spiritual ideals for which the church stands. All manner of teaching prevails. Nor are the teach- ers untrained for their task. They know their subject. They are familiar with the psychology of public speaking. They understand what the people who make up. their audi- ence want to hear. They speak the language of the streets. The result is that they are planting destructive ideas in the minds of thousands. These must later be dislodged by long and painful effort on the part of those who would build the life of the nation on the ideals that gave us our present leadership. Shall the church not be among those with a message for the passer-by? It is no easy task to preach the gospel with another speaker twenty feet away on either side urging alien doctrines. But where is there a better chance to meet the questions which the people are seeking concerning life? They are not backward in objecting to dogmatism. They are alive to every weak point in the speaker's discourse. He must be sure of his message and of himself. This he ought to be anywhere. This he must be, here. The church must equip and support a large number of men for this work. It will aid the task done by the local church. It will set in mo- tion influences which will react without being checked up. The city and the State will be blessed by the new ideas hastily planted. And the nation itself will have cause to re- joice that the church is busy on the same corner where de- structive doctrines are weakening the faith of the people in the institutions of the land. THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 205 A MESSAGE FOE THE TOILER And what of the thousands in our industrial centers? They are unable to go outside of the factory at the noon hour. The message must be taken inside the factory to them. Much has been said of late about church and labor. But the man meant by "labor" is just as much a part of the national life as the man meant by ' ' church. ' ' If the latter has some- thing of value which the former has not, he should give it to him. But he will not come to church? Then take the message and ministry of the church to him. He needs it. He is made like all other men. The problems of earning a living and providing for his loved ones are the same in kind as those of everyone else. The joys of life appeal to him. Life's sorrows and misfortunes strike at his home. He is ambitious for his children. He would have his wife enjoy the best that he can provide for her. And he wants the min- istry of the church. When he does not receive it he accepts the ministry of the labor union in its place. The lodge be- comes his church. Its ministries, based upon the practice of the teachings of Christ, satisfy him. Thus he loses the in- spiration and helpfulness of the fellowship of the constituted church. His noon hour may be filled with a brief message of Christian hope. His doubts and misgivings as to the prac- ticability of the church may be explained away. He may be led to active fellowship with Christ and his family to a home in the church, by this simple factory service. Already it is being done in many shops. But the number of places where it is not done opens the way for nearly every local Meth- odist Episcopal church to have a part in this task. EVANGELISM OF THE EYE A most important form of evangelistic work is that carried on by means of the printed page. All great move- ments spread their message broadcast in the form of liter- ature. There are some who teach vagaries of faith who have the page of information so distributed as to catch the eye in all places. The best writers are employed to put the message into form and style that will appeal to the casual reader Hundreds of devotees become voluntary distributors of it People read it on the street cars, in waiting rooms and in their places of business. It is found everywhere. And its in- fluence is so great that one meets countless people who are ready to quote from it and defend it people, too, whose knowledge of the subject is limited to the stray leaflet which accidentally fell into their hands. Evangelism of the eye often has a more lasting influ- ence than the evangelism of the ear. People forget the exact statement made by the speaker. It becomes confused with their own thinking or something heard or read at another time. There is no' way of checking it up. With the printed page it is different. It may be read several times. It is al- ways on hand for reference. Careful study may be made of it. As a people we are rapidly becoming eye-minded. The best reports of important events are those which we see in print or through pictures. Many public speakers distribute the gist of their message in printed form so that those hear- ing it may go over it again in their homes. The day of the leaflet for purposes of promulgating ideas is not yet past. Possibly the reason for thinking that leaflet literature belongs to a past age is the failure of many religious organ- izations to keep their literature up to date. Printed in funereal form with sermonic style, there has been no great demand for it. When given all the advantages of good print- ing and forceful style it is another story. People want to know. Many of them are unable to go where they may learn. The printed page comes into their home with all the famili- arity of an old friend. It is read and discussed. More of the same sort is sought. Has the church a message which can go to the people in this form? There is no question as to that. The question is, "Will the church arise to this chance to further the work which it is trying to do ? " There are those who can write the message. There are those who would scatter it broadcast THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 207 were it available. It remains only for the church to provide funds for this purpose. Already some of this literature is in process of preparation. It is varied for the people by whom it will be read. Some of it will be used to counteract rabid socialistic doctrines. Some will go to those upset by anarch- ism. The foreigner, with his little knowledge of the English language, will have a message on Christian democracy in his native tongue. Those who scorn the church will have an appeal in their own terminology. The program is long and varied. Will it be worth while? There is hardly another channel through which the Christian message will flow more easily and to greater advantage to those who receive it. We are entering upon a day when the church must increase its output of the printed message many times. It will be in ac- cordance with the printing used in modern advertising. It will be read in the terminology of daily life. It will be on fire with the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It will take him to places where his disciples are unable to go. It will plead the cause of the kingdom of God by firesides where any other messenger of the cross would be refused. The doctrines of Christian democracy will be repeated again and again in daily conversation. The day of our hope will be wonder- fully advanced. THE SUNDAY SCHOOL AND THE EPWORTH LEAGUE This broader vision of Christian service is being taught to-day in the Sunday schools of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Through the labors of the Board of Sunday Schools there has been gradually introduced a curriculum of Bible study which relates the principles and teachings of Christianity to the problems of everyday life for all ages from childhood to old age. By means of institutes held throughout the country, Sunday school officers and teachers are being instructed both in the processes of religious edu- cation and the intelligent leading of boys and girls into fel- lowship with Jesus Christ. Thus, early in life the practice 208 CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA of Christian democracy is given actual relationship to Chri3- tian experience. The Epworth League likewise is training its members for Christian service and evangelistic endeavor. The summer institutes of instruction and recreation are the training schools of thousands of young men and young women. Here they learn the meaning of Christian life in terms of relationship to the problems of Christian demo- cracy. As leaders for Bible and mission study classes they take with them to their local chapter both knowledge and in- spiration. From the counsel received they become winners for Christ of the intimate friend called "chum." By com- parison of methods they learn the first lessons in the task of church leadership for the days ahead. Loyalty to country and to God Is the foundation of their enthusiastic effort to make the appeal of Christian fellowship attractive to those of their own age. From the camps, the trenches, the battle- ships, and the air fleet, comes the assuring news that the work of the Sunday school and the Epworth League has been so well done that it is counting to-day as a helpful force with our boys who are now fighting for the ideals of Christian democracy as a world proposition. THE SIGN OF A GREAT HOPE A new note has been struck in our national life. Born of the sorrow and suffering of war, it sounds alike in the market place and in the home. It is extremely personal in its expression. Hearts break in sounding it. Strong men give way to emotion at hearing it. But with it has come the sign of a great hope. America, in cooperation with the Allies, sent her armies forth in response to the demands of a spiritual ideal. To demonstrate/ that right is greater than might, her sons lie buried in France and at the bottom of the sea. Men are asking what it all means. An interpreter for the age is asked for. The Church of Jesus Christ is respond- ing with the message of the Master ph rased in terms of the day in which we live. THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST 209 In order that this message may be so interpreted that every man, woman, and child shall understand, the Meth- odist Episcopal Church is pushing its missionaries into every nook and corner of the land. In order that they may be properly equipped for their task it is furnishing them with material means beyond anything it has ever undertaken be- fore* In order to secure this money the church is asking its entire membership to share with its leaders in making pos- sible the new conquest. What a response to the conditions prevailing in the communities of the land! In city, town, and village, the people are being summoned to do big things for the sake of the kingdom of God. And this not that a denominational church may be glorified, but in order that Christian democracy may be the dominating force in the life of the people. Young men and young women are being called to carry our democracy to the ends of the earth. World responsibility is being recognized in a large way. And the first essentials are being provided for by an ade- quate teaching and practice of Christian democracy at home. THE DAY DAWNS ARE WE AWAKE ? What of the morrow? The outlook is fair and hopeful. When the church teaches the principles of Christian de- mocracy so that the common spiritual needs of every citizen are met in Jesus Christ, we may send forth the news to all the earth that American democracy is the answer to their cry for national foundations which will not only endure, but make better the nation from year to year. The church is at its task. The Methodist Episcopal Church is on the quest for $80,000,000 to help in doing its part of the task at home and abroad. Its celebration of a hundred years of its mis- sionary activities is in the form of an advance to even greater things. Four million members of the church are back of the movement. Some of the success of the new day depends upon the securing of the money needed to do the task. This success depends upon the individual who wants the world to have the privileges and blessings prized by him. 210 > CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY FOR AMERICA Christian democracy will guide the affairs of America just as soon as you practice it and make possible its teaching to your fellows along the way ! QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1. What is our present responsibility with reference to Christian democracy! 2. Discuss the religious questions which war has brought to the surface. 3. Show in what ways the Methodist Episcopal Church has always been evangelistic. 4. What are some of the new points of contact, from a religious viewpoint, to which evangelism must give heed I 5. In what ways has the church ministered to our boys in khaki and blue ? 6. What is the Department of Evangelism? What is its task? 7. What do you understand evangelism to embrace? . 8. Discuss the new vision which has come to us from the trenches. 9. How may an Annual Conference be organized effec- tively for evangelistic work ? A district ? 10. Discuss the value of training laymen for evangel- istic work. How may this training be done! 11. What is an accredited evangelist? 12. Discuss the "soap-box university" and its need of strong preachers. 13. How may industrial toilers be ministered to in their shops? 14. Discuss the evangelism of the eye. How may its usefulness be increased? 15. What new note has been struck in our national life ? 16. Discuss Methodism's great movement for world- democracy. 17. What is our personal responsibility for making America a Christian democracy? BIBLIOGRAPHY The Soul of Democracy. By Edward Howard Griggs. $1.25. Ann ..ca Here and Over There. By Luther B. Wilson. 75 cents. Trad Tales. By J. D. Gillilan. 75 cents. Frontier Missionary Problems. By Bruce Kinney. $1.25. The Frontier. By Ward Platt. 60 cents. Brother Van. By Stella W. Brummitt. 60 cents. Introduction to Rural Sociology. By Paul L. Vogt. $2.50. The Church in the City. By Bishop 'Frederick D. Leete. $1.00. The Rural Church Serving the Community. By Edwin L. Earp. 75 cents The American Rural School. By Harold W. Foght. $1.25. The Study of a Rural Parish. By Ralph A. Felton. 50 cents. Sons of Italy. By Antonio Mangano. 60 cents. Immigrant Forces. By William P. Shriver. 60 cents. The Immigrant and the Community. By Grace Abbott. $1.50. Leadership for the New America. By Archibald McClure. $1.25. The Challenge of Pittsburgh. By Daniel L. March. 60 cents. The Challenge of St. Louis. By George B. Mangold. 60 cents. The Redemption of the South End. By E. C. E. Dorion. $1.00. The Gospel for a Working World. By Harry F. Ward. 60 cents. Your Negro Neighbor. By Benjamin G. Brawley. 60 cents. Methodism and the Negro. By I. L. Thomas. $1.00. A Short History of the American Negro. By Benjamin G. Brawley. $1.25. The New Country Church Building. By Edwin de S. Brunner. 75 cents. The American Indian on the New Trail. By Thomas C. Moffett. 60 cents. The Klondike Clan. By S. Hall Young. $1.35. Advance in the Antilles. By Howard B. Grose. 60 cents. Down in Porto Rico. By George Milton Fowles. 75 cents. Social Evangelism. By Harry F. Ward. 50 cents ; postage, 8 cents. Educational Evangelism. By Charles E. McKinley. 50 cents; postage, 10 cents. Every Church Its Own Evangelist. By Loren M. Edwards. 50 cents. Letters on Evangelism. By Edwin H. Hughes. 25 cents; post., 3 cents. Religious Education and Democracy. By Benjamin S. Winchester. $1.50. In Our First Year of War. By Woodrow Wilson. $1.00. The New Democracy. By Walter E. Weyl. $2.00. Our Democracy, Its Origins and Its Tasks. By James H. Tufts. $1.50. The Oregon Missions. By James W. Bashford. $1.25. Brigham Young and His Mormon Empire. By Cannon and Knapp. Leaflet literature on all phases of Home Missions and Church Extension work may be secured, without charge, by writing to the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 1701 Arch Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Blazing the Trail. By W. W. Van Dusen. 75 cents. The Missionary Pioneer. By John Stewart. 25 cents. The books here listed may be purchased from The Methodist Book Concern. APPENDIX / THE CENTENARY OF METHODIST MISSIONS IN A NUTSHELL. 1 A Celebration of the One Hundredth Anniversary of the organiza- tion of the Methodist Missionary Society. 2 A World Program based on careful surveys of need and opportunity. 3 A campaign to release the prayer power of the church by enrolling tens of thousands in the Fellowship of Intercession, and training them as prayer helpers. 4 A stewardship drive to secure the enrollment of a million Method- ists who will acknowledge their stewardship by the payment of the tithe. 5 An appeal for life service to recruit a large number of new workers for the ministry, home and foreign missions, and for service in the local church. 6 Special Centenary activities in the Epworth League, featuring stew- ardship, prayer, and mission study, with a thorough presentation of the Centenary message and methods at all institutes. 7 A movement to make the Sunday school missionary in spirit, and to insure a very definite expression of this spirit threugh prayer and offer- ings of money and life. The Sunday school financial goal is $10,000,000. 8 Unprecedented publicity through the church papers, Missionary News, World Outlook, the Centenary Bulletin and the secular press. 9 A church-wide educational campaign with mission study, mission- ary instruction in the Sunday school, and the use of lantern slides, charts, posters, and other pictorial materials. 10 The enlistment and training of at least one hundred thousand leaders to carry the Centenary message and methods to the last member and adherent of the Methodist Church. 11 A nation-wide organization of the country by territorial divisions, conferences, districts, groups, and local churches. 12 An allotment of financial goals to be voluntarily accepted by every district and local church in Methodism. 13 A national simultaneous ten-day financial drive to secure pledges for eighty million dollars, to be paid during a period of five years. 14 A series of great meetings throughout the church to inspire and inform the membership. 15 A central patriotic Centenary Celebration at Columbus, Ohio, in June, 1919. The general theme of the program to be, "The Christian Crusade for World Democracy." 16 World-wide extension and conservation to sustain and surpass the standards of devotion and giving set by the Centenary. 213 214 APPHXDIX HOME MISSIONS AND THE CENTENARY OF METHODIST EPISCOPAL MISSIONS In celebrating the Centenary of Methodist Episcopal Missions, as authorized by the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Saratoga Springs in 1916, the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church plans the following program. Full details may be secured by writing to the Joint Centenary Committee, 111 Fifth Avenue, New York city. The items are here given in the order which corresponds to their treatment in the text of the book. The first figure in each instance Is the number of projects, the second the amount needed to finance them. This figure is the Centenary asking for a period of five years. CHAPTER I. DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATIONS The building of more and better churches and the aiding in the sup- port of ministers of high caliber in the frontier. Equipment 874 $1,039,800 Maintenance 795 950,085 Total $1.989.885 CHAPTER II. THE RURAL OPPORTUNITY The carrying out of all the rural projects included by district superin- tendents in their Centenary statements; a campaign for increasing the efficiency of the rural ministry; cooperation with other agencies in estab- lishing effective training for rural leadership. 1. FAVOUAIH.K RURAL COMMUNITIES Equipment UH> $1,889,050 Maintenance 1,101 1.245.275 Total $3,134,325 2. ISOLATED RURAL COMMUNITIES Equipment "2 $383,550 Maintenance 367 Total * 965 ' 730 3. INDUSTRIAL RURAL COMMIMTIKS Equipment ** ^28,850 Maintenance. 152 484,740 Total $1,013,590 APPENDIX 215 4. HIGHLANDERS OF THE SOUTH Equipment 158 $294,050 Maintenance 115 203,150 Total $497,200 CHAPTER III. OUR FUTURE CITIZENS ITALIANS The strengthening of certain Italian centers where successful work is being accomplished. Building churches suitable for the Italians' need of color and life. The inaugurating of the program on page 71. Equipment 50 $961,800 Maintenance 131 636,300 Total $1,598,100 EASTERN EUROPEAN GROUPS The Christianizing and Americanizing of the Eastern European groups. The establishment of churches and missions. The betterment of their social life. The circulation of good literature. Strong, well-organized evangelistic campaigns. These peoples include the following groups: Slav, Lettic, Finno-Ugric, and Semitic. Equipment 33 $487,300 Maintenance 72 318,190 Total $805,490 MISCELLANEOUS FOREIGN-SPEAKING GROUPS Social service and welfare work is planned for these people by means of language pastors, directors of religious education, women workers, visiting nurses, and deaconesses connected with English-speaking churches. Evan- gelistic campaigns, classes for speaking English, efforts to lift the stand- ard of living, and movements to Americanize are part of the program planned for these Finns, Syrians, French-Canadians, Armenians, and Greeks. Equipment 7 $76,500 Maintenance 26 122,250 Total $198,750 CHAPTER IV. "WHERE CROSS THE CROWDED WAYS OF LIFE" INDUSTRIAL GROUPS IN THE CITY Initiating a program of evangelism, religious education, and social uplift. Building neighborhood churches in polyglot industrial communities. 216 APPENDIX Establishing community churches in neglected sections. Adding parish houses to the equipment of old family churches for general institutional work. Providing a personnel to consist of the modern type of social service expert Equipment 230 $4,799,950 Maintenance 434 1,962,850 Total $6,762,800 DOWNTOWN-TRANSIENT-POLYGLOT MASSES The building of new and well-equipped churches which can supply facil- ities for religious education, lectures, classes, clubs, and general recreation. Remodeling family churches in such neighborhoods so that they can con- form to their new program. Establishing dormitories as a step in solving the lodging-house problem. Establishing downtown clinics; supplying special workers. Organizing classes in religious education, English, hygiene, domestic science, and industrial crafts. Making the church a center for Americanizing influences and training in citizenship. Equipment 51 $5,945,000 Maintenance 178 863,750 Total $6,808,750 STRATEGIC CITY AND SUBURBAN FIELDS Furnishing a stimulus to building churches in promising fields by giving part of the cost Building new churches in fields already occupied, but where the present plant is totally inadequate; keeping the standard of church buildings up to mark set by municipal and private buildings; improving and enlarging churches where the growth of the district requires it; giving pastoral aid so that able men may be secured for the critical years following the founding of a new church; and making the church a center for community life, especially in the suburbs, by organiz- ing clubs, social affairs and lecture courses. Equipment 755 $5,827,650 Maintenance 511 935,250 Total $6,762,900 CHAPTER V. THE NEGRO AND THE CHURCH THE NEGRO IN THE SOUTH The developing of a better-trained ministry. Church buildings adapted to community service. Typical community centers in agricultural dis- tricts. Model parsonages in selected places as demonstrations of home APPENDIX 217 life. Cooperation with other denominations. Study of conditions in all Negro communities as to industrial, social, moral, and religious needs. Etc. Equipment 808 $1,684,850 Maintenance.. . 600 903,825 Total $2,588,675 THE NEGRO IN THE NORTH The immediate building of more churches. Enlarging of those already built. Supplying the pulpits with men able to guide the newcomers in readjusting their lives. Furnishing community centers for lectures and recreation. Giving the young people wholesome amusements. Providing temporary quarters for Negro girls and women just entering the city. Organizing domestic science courses so that women who were plantation laborers in the South may learn a new means of livelihood. Equipment 125 $1,164,250 Maintenance.. 116 219,350 Total $1,383,600 CHAPTER VI. CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY POWER PLANTS Church extension work is listed in all of the tabulations placed under the other chapters. It is a part of practically every phase of the Centenary Program. We list here only THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHRISTIAN LEADERSHIP Strengthening regular churches located near student groups, by help- ing to get special equipment and better leadership. Providing a student building or Wesley foundation in State and independent institutions attended by large numbers of Methodist students. Appropriating $125,000 to be expended in fellowships and scholarships for students who show promise of becoming effective leaders. Providing special conferences and limited training for ministers already in the field who cannot leave their pastorates. Establishing training schools for Christian leadership in con- nection with the following institutions: 1. Boston University, using Morgan Memorial as the laboratory. 2. The Church of All Nations, New York city, in connection .with Columbia University. 3. Smithfield Street, Pittsburgh, in connection with the University cultural group of Allegheny County. 4. The Chicago Training School. 5. A program of training for Rural Leadership in connection with State Agricultural Colleges. 6. The Mid-Pacific Institute, Hawaii. 7. Furnishing enlarged educational facilities in Porto Rico and in 218 APPENDIX the Pacific Southwest for training leaders to work among Latin- Amercans. Equipment 51 $2,195,800 Maintenance 74 498,650 Total $2,694,450 CHAPTER VII. VARIANTS OF THE TASK MORMON TKKKITORY Building new churches, and strengthening old ones, so that Meth- odism can continue to stand for Christianity, education, and patriotism in the heart of the Mormon territory. Creating a strong evangelical pro- gram to hold those already affiliated with the church; influencing the Mor- mons into laying more emphasis on the Bible, and attracting both dis- satisfied Mormons, and those with no religion. Making a special effort to reach the young people in the colleges and universities. One of the pro- jects which the Centenary is asked to help is the building of a $100,000 church and student center near the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. Aiding in pastoral support so that capable men may be obtained. Equipment 46 $122,250 Maintenance.. 32 87,300 Total $209,550 THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN The appointment of more resident missionaries speaking an Indian, language. The training of nati/e Indian preachers. The establishment of more Sunday schools. The appointment of Indian women workers, to bring Christianity to the women and children on the reservations, to teach sanitation and domestic science. Greater cooperation with other Protes- tant denominations. Equipment 5 $5,950 Maintenance . . 30 122,500 Total $128,450 LATIX-AMEBICANS The evangelization of Latin-Americans by large-visioned pastors, and directors of religious education of their own nationality. Providing trained and capable women workers, besides American religious directors with administrative ability, who can plan community programs. Lifting the standard of the gospel appeal by better facilities in buildings, location, and equipment. Americanizing the Latin-Americans and making citizens of them. Adapting Morgan Memorial ideas to Latin-American needs. Relieving cases of physical need through constructive and mutually self- respecting social work. Recruiting leaders in community uplift by pro- APPENDIX 219 viding a complete course of practical industrial work, such as is given at Hampton Institute. Promoting friendly relations on the border by counteracting efforts to embroil Mexico and the United States. Equipment 115 $733,450 Maintenance 123 568,950 Total $1,302,400 ORIENTAL MISSIONS OF THE PACIFIC COAST THE CHINESE Greater efforts to reach the Chinese in population centers. The open- ing of new day schools. Further development of the Sunday school. The appointment of traveling missionaries to reach the Chinese in scattered rural communities. Equipment 6 '$24,000 Maintenance 20 64,750 Total $88,750 THE JAPANESE The establishment of supplementary day schools to provide what our public schools cannot give. Aid in reestablishing the Japanese Christian press. Increasing dormitory accommodations for single men. Greater efforts and efficiency in Sunday-school work in order to keep pace with the rapidly increasing number of Japanese children. Special stress is laid on the proposed new Japanese Church at Los Angeles. Equipment 7 $33,800 Maintenance.. 33 67.410 Total $101,210 THE ALASKAN MISSION The appointment of more pastors and a general missionary to cover the whole field. Equipment 3 $22,500 Maintenance 10 54,000 Total $76,500 THE HAWAIIAN MISSION The appointment of more Japanese, Korean, and Filipino pastors who have been trained in America, and. who speak English. The establish- ment of a minimum salary of $900 a year for married pastors, so that the Church will secure an adequate working force for this difficult field. Extensive development of the Sunday school to keep pace with the rapidly growing Oriental birth-rate, especially the Japanese and Filipino. Equipment 15 $433,275 Maintenance 61 208,150 Total "$641,425 220 APPENDIX THE POBTO RICAN MISSION The establishment of more churches and chapels throughout the coun- try districts. The appointment of more native church workers. The pro- viding of these leaders with a higher education than offered by the public schools. Special attention in both the schools and churches to training in citizenship. Cooperation with other denominations in non-sectarian educational work. Equipment 68 $118,220 Maintenance 24 96,660 Total $213,880 CHAPTER VIII. THE CHALLENGE OF THE CHRIST The program of the Department of Evangelism as discussed in this chapter furnishes the types of projects for the Centenary. Maintenance of Evangelists 48 $201,000 Total $201,000 CENTENARY PROGRAM TOTALS SUMMARIZED BY SUBJECTS MATERIAL TOTAL CENTENARY EQUIPMENT NO. COST ASKINGS New buildings 2,506 $53,038,950 $24,277,295 Remodeling 1,035 5,594,700 2,794,900 Parsonages 1,188 2,560,700 983,650 Special 43 813,000 716,000 Total 4,772 $62,007,350 $28,771,845 MAINTENANCE CENTENARY Ministers NO - A- KINGS a. Missionary 1,344 $2,487,525 b. Self-supporting in 5 years 2,220 2,428,435 Language Pastors 250 1,037,260 Directors of Religious Education 258 1,563,850 Women Workers 486 1,587,610 Deaconesses 131 270,835 Superintendents 46 396,650 District Missionary Aid 156 632,900 District Evangelists 48 168,600 Others 116 772,000 Total 5,053 $11,265,565 GRAND TOTAL, $40,037,410. 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