Article January 19, 1918 Issue

The News despatch, giving a Calgary [Alberta] clergyman's...

Samuel Greenwood—Nelson, B. C., Canada

The News

The News despatch, giving a Calgary [Alberta] clergyman's condemnation of Mrs. Eddy, reads like an echo of those dark ages when the thumbscrew and the rack and the fagot were the reward of men and women who dared to be true to their religious convictions. In the present instance it seems well-nigh past belief that one who has set himself apart for the profession of a Christian minister could work himself into such a state of mind as to glory in the eternal suffering of even the veriest sinner; and how much more in the case of a gentle woman whose only cause of condemnation was that she dared to follow the Master in demonstration rather than in man-made doctrines, and taught others to do likewise.

The following morning one of the Calgary daily newspapers felt it necessary to voice an editorial protest, and a member of the same denomination as the speaker publicly apologized, concluding his letter thus: "May the good Lord speedily deliver us from preachers of this type."

With all the charity possible one cannot help feeling that one who allows a sense of vindictiveness toward a fellow religionist to run riot in a Christian pulpit, has passed the point where he can claim to be a benefactor of mankind and is approaching perilously close to the point of becoming an actual enemy to human welfare. Such utterances as that attributed to this speaker are not designed to lift the thought of his hearers nearer to God, nor to fit them to become followers of the great Teacher, who said, "Love your enemies." To quote from the editorial mentioned in the preceding paragraph: "The gospel preached to us on Sunday night is strange to most of us. It is not the gospel of love that most of us associate with the life and message of the Man of Nazareth."

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