Article April 23, 1932 Issue

The activities of the world will be intrusted tomorrow...

Hon. C. Augustus Norwood, Committee on Publication for The First Church of Christ, Scientist, Boston, Massachusetts,

Boston Evening American

The activities of the world will be intrusted tomorrow to those who are the young people of today. Then these activities will be administered for good and for real progress in proportion to the moral and spiritual growth which the educational and religious institutions of today have been able to cultivate in these young people. Credit is due, therefore, to the Boston Evening American in its endeavor to awaken the churches of Boston and vicinity to the need of reaching the young people of their communities, in order that thought and action will be turned from the improper channels which seem to be open to them on every side, and toward the goal which is to be reached only on the basis of a pure mind and a sound character.

The pitfalls of today are probably no more numerous than were those of other periods, but the great advance in human inventions has brought about so many activities and interests that are diverting not only the youths of today from serious religious thinking, but also the older persons upon whom the churches must rely for the teaching of these youths both by precept and example, that new methods must be employed if the youths are to be reached. The churches in seeking a new method should not enter into competition with the entertainments of today, but should rather endeavor to offer the young people something which cannot be found elsewhere; that is, a knowledge of the Principle behind the teachings of the Bible, which Principle will enable those understanding it to repeat, in small degree perhaps, the great works which God-fearing or God-loving men have accomplished down through the ages. The youths must indeed be offered something which will enable them to draw close to God as their omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent Father-Mother. They must be given a religion which they can demonstrate in their everyday lives, a religion which will enable them to go forth from the churches to their secular tasks, whatever they may be, that the problems and adversities of the world are not made by God to interrupt the progress of any of His children, but that God made the world good, even as He pronounced it, and that its problems and adversities are the products of wrong thinking and wrong living which may be overcome by a realization that man is in truth created in the image and likeness of God.

All church workers will themselves gain a higher knowledge of God as they present to children something which will effectually appeal to them. The fact should not be forgotten that these workers have something to gain from the children. Pertinent to this thought is a helpful statement by Mary Baker Eddy: "Beloved children, the world has need of you,—and more as children than as men and women: it needs your innocence, unselfishness, faithful affection, uncontaminated lives. You need also to watch, and pray that you preserve these virtues unstained, and lose them not through contact with the world. What grander ambition is there than to maintain in yourselves what Jesus loved, and to know that your example, more than words, makes morals for mankind!" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 110.)

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