Article April 18, 1903 Issue

Religious Items

with contributions from Samuel A. Eliot, Arthur T. Hadley, Theodore L. Cuyler, G.H. Morrison, Thomas Guthrie

Rev. Joseph C. Allen says in The Christian Register:—

"This brings us to the point, then, of observing that the true Christian life is not one of compromises, evasions, petty virtues, or mere negative goodness of doing nothing wrong. The Ten Commandments are matter of course with it. But to be a true Christian demands more than keeping these ordinary moral precepts,—there is a law of Christ as well as a law of Moses. Too many persons have a timid, uncertain way of interpreting and applying the practical requirements of the Christian life. Too often it is made to appear as if a genuine Christian is merely one who does not do certain things which worldly persons are given to doing.

"The plea, then, is for a religious earnestness among Christians that shall make their principles felt in all their thought and life,—a Christianity without cant or weakness, a love for God and righteousness that controls the life, a love for man that does not fritter itself away in sentiment, but gives money, time, and enterprise for the good of the people, and at the same time treats every man as a brother. Such a religion as this is as possible now as at any time; for there are conspicuous examples of noble men and women who live in its spirit. They may not have much to say about their religion. They are known by their frutis. Some of them do not call themselves Christians. Nevertheless, in all essentials their life is in accord with the teachings of Jesus; and if they as outsiders (nominally), Gentiles without the law, doing by nature the things that are commanded in the law of Christ, do they not show that the spirit of genuine practical Christianity, in this age as much as in the ages that are past, has persuasive power for the race? Woe be unto the Church, woe be unto the pulpit, that does not preach this vital message! and woe be unto the people that do not exemplify it in their lives! Perhaps it is because of shortcomings in this direction that Churches in our generation have lost so much of the influence they formerly possessed."

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