Article December 19, 1908 Issue

FROM OUR EXCHANGES

with contributions from John Haynes Holmes, Oliver Lodge

[Rev. John Haynes Holmes in The Arena.]

Throughout all Christian history, correct belief has been the test of discipleship, acceptance of authorized dogma the supreme virtue, rejection of this dogma the unpardonable sin. And this, in the face of the express teaching of Jesus, as contained in the famous judgment scene of St. Matthew, wherein the Master accepts as his disciples not those who have "believed on him," but those who have given food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, clothing to the naked, etc., and rejects not those who are guilty of "infidelity," but those only who have neglected the hungry, the thirsty, and the naked! What a travesty of religion, indeed—this emphasis upon sound theology! And yet it is just this interpretation which has for ages paralyzed the church as an agent of social redemption, which has made it possible for the most hideous social ills to continue for centuries uncondemned and undestroyed, and postponed the coming of the kingdom of God upon earth to a future as indefinite as eternity. Concerned only with the problem of right thinking, the church has utterly neglected the problem of right living, and thus has left the world to welter in its sin.

[The Christian Commonwealth.]

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