Society: Its Origin and Development Part 21

303. =Evangelism and the History of Religious Conviction.=--A second function of the church is to exert spiritual and moral suasion. It is a social instinct to communicate ideas; language developed for that purpose. It is natural, therefore, that a church that has definite ideas about human obligation toward G.o.d and men should try to influence individuals and even send out evangelists and missionaries to propagate its faith widely. Those churches that think alike have organized into denominations, and have arranged extensive propaganda and trained and ordained their preachers to reason with and persuade their auditors to receive and act upon the message that is spoken.

Several of the large cities of the United States contain denominational headquarters where world-wide activities receive direction, veritable dynamos for the generation of one of the vital forces of society.

The convictions that prompt evangelism and missionary zeal are the result of centuries of race experience. The Catholic, the Protestant, and the Jewish churches have all grown out of religious experience and religious thinking that have their roots in early human history. The very forms of worship and of creed that const.i.tute the framework of religion in a modern city church date far back in their origins. The religious instinct appears to be common to the whole human race. In primitive times religious interest was prompted by fear, and the early customs of sacrifice and worship were established by the group to bring its members into friendly relations with the Power outside themselves that might work to their undoing. Temples and shrines testified to man's devotion and stirred his emotions by their symbols and ceremonies. A special cla.s.s of men was organized, a priesthood to mediate with the G.o.ds for mankind. Children were taught to respect and fear the higher powers, and their elders were often warned not to stir the anger of deity. As the human mind developed, impulse and emotion were supplemented by intellect. As man ruminated upon nature and human experience he was satisfied that there was intelligence and power in the universe, divine personality similar to but greater than himself, and his reason sanctioned the religious acts to which he had become accustomed. He added a creed to his cult. He did not a.s.sociate his moral ideas and habits with his religious obligations; these ideas and habits grew out of the customs that had been found to work best in social relations. Pagan religions were slow to develop any kinship between religion and morals. It was among the Hebrews that the loftier idea of a G.o.d of holiness and justice, who demanded right and kindly conduct among men, came into prominence, and a few religious prophets went so far as to declare that sacrifice was less important than conduct. The fundamental teachings of Christianity were based on the same conception of social duty and on the religious conception of G.o.d as benevolent and loving, calling out loving fealty of heart rather than external rite and sacrifice. In Christian times religion has become a spiritual and moral motive power throughout the world.

304. =Church Organization.=--Throughout its long history society has adjusted the organization of its religious activities to social custom and social need. The church in any country is a name for an organized system, with its nerve-centres and its ganglia ramifying into the remotest localities. In the local community it binds together its members in mutual relations, even though they live on different sides of a city, or even in the suburbs. It has its relations to young and old, and plans for the spiritual welfare of human beings of every age through its boards and committees, cla.s.ses and clubs. It presents a variety of group types to match the inclinations and opinions of different types of mind. One type is that of a closely knit, centralized organization, claiming ecclesiastical authority over individual opinions and practices on the principle that religion is a static thing, a law fixed in the eternal order, and not to be improved upon or questioned. Another type is that of loosely federated ecclesiastical units, flexible in organization and creed, cherishing religion as a dynamic thing, suiting itself to the changing mind of man and adjusting itself to individual and social need. It is a social law that both theology and organization conform in a degree to the prevailing social philosophy and const.i.tution, and therefore no type can remain unchanged, but relatively one is always conservative and the other always liberal, with a blending of types between the two extremes. Denominational divisions are due partly to variety of opinion, partly to ancestry, and partly to historical circ.u.mstance; some of these divisions are international in extent; but through every communion runs the line of cleavage between conservatism and liberalism in the interpretation of custom and creed. The tendency of the times is to minimize differences and to bring together divergent types in federation or union on the ground that the church needs unity in order to use its strength, and that religion can exert its full energy in the midst of society only as the friction of too much machinery is removed.

305. =Religious Education.=--A third function of the church is religious education. This function of education in religion belongs theoretically to the church, in common with the home and the school, but the tendency has been to turn the religious education of children over to the school of the church. The minister, priest, or rabbi is the chief teacher of faith and duty, but in the Sunday-school the laity also has found instruction of the young people to be one of its functions. Instruction by both of these is supplemented by schools of a distinctly religious type and by a religious press. As long as society at large does not undertake to perform this function of religious education, the church conceives it to be one of its chief tasks to teach as well as to inspire the human will, by interpreting the best religious thought that the centuries of history have handed down, and for this purpose it uses the latest scientific knowledge about the human mind and tries to devise improved methods to make education more effective. Education is the twin art of evangelization.

306. =Promotion of Social Reform.=--As an inst.i.tution h.o.a.ry with age, the church is naturally conservative, and it has been slow to champion the various social reforms that have been proposed as panaceas. It has been quite as much concerned with a future existence as with the present, and has been prompt to point to heavenly bliss as a balance for earthly woe. It has concerned itself with the soul rather than the body, and with individual salvation rather than social reconstruction.

It is only within a century that the modern church has given much attention to promoting social betterment as one of its princ.i.p.al functions, but within a few years the conscience of church people has been goading them to undertake a campaign of social welfare. Other inst.i.tutions have needed the help of the church, and in some cases the church has had to take upon itself the burden that belonged to other organizations; moral movements, like temperance, have asked for the powerful sanction of religion, and the church has used its influence to persuade men. What has been spontaneous and intermittent is now becoming regular and continuous, until a social gospel is taking its place alongside individual evangelism. The Biblical phrase, "the kingdom of G.o.d," is being interpreted in terms of an improved social order. Religion, therefore, becomes a present-day force for progress, and the church an agency for social uplift.

307. =Adapting the Church to the Twentieth Century City.=--The church in the country has a comparatively simple problem of existence. It fits into the social organization of the community, and in most cases seldom has to readjust itself by radical changes to fit a swift change in the community. It is different with the church in the city. Urban growth is one of the striking phenomena of recent decades; local churches find themselves caught in the swirl, grow rapidly for a time, and then are left high and dry as the current sweeps the crowd farther along. Often the particular type that it represents is not suited to the newer residents who settle in the section where the church stands.

It has the option of following the crowd or attempting a readjustment.

To decamp is usually the easier way; readjustment is often so difficult as to be almost impossible. Financial resources have been depleted. The existing organization is not geared to the customs of the newcomers. Forms of worship must be improved if the church is to function satisfactorily. The popular appeal of religion must be couched in a new phraseology, often in a new language. Religious educational methods must be revised. Social service must be fitted to the new need. Small groups of workers must be organized to manage cla.s.ses and clubs, and to get into personal contact with individuals whose orbit is on a different plane. The church must become a magnet to draw them within the influence of religion. It finds itself compelled to adopt such methods as these if it is not to become a mere survival of a better day.

If, however, a locally disabled church can call upon the resources of a whole denomination, it may be able to make the necessary adjustments with ease, or even to continue its spiritual ministry along the old lines by means of subsidies. It is reasonable to believe that society will find a way to adjust the church to the needs of city people. It cannot afford to do without it. The church has been the conserver and propagator of spiritual force. It has supplied to thousands of persons the regenerative power of religion that alone has matched the degenerating influence of immoral habits. It has produced auxiliary organizations, like the Young Men's Christian a.s.sociation and the Young Women's Christian a.s.sociation. It has found a way, as in the Salvation Army, to get a grip upon the weak-willed and despairing.

Missions and chapels in the slums and synagogues in the ghettos have carried religion to the lowest cla.s.ses. These considerations argue for a wider co-operation among city people in strengthening an inst.i.tution that represents social idealism.

READING REFERENCES

TRAWICK: _The City Church and Its Social Mission_, pages 14-22, 50-76, 95-99, 122-160.

STRAYER: _Reconstruction of the Church_, pages 161-249.

MENZIES: _History of Religion_, pages 19-78.

RAUSCHENBUSCH: _Christianizing the Social Order_, pages 7-29, 96-102.

MCCULLOCH: _The Open Church for the Unchurched_, pages 33-164.

COE: _Education in Religion and Morals_, pages 373-388.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX

THE CITY IN THE MAKING

308. =Experimenting in the Ma.s.s.=--The modern city is a gigantic social experiment. Never before have so many people crowded together, never has there been such a close interlocking of economic and social and religious a.s.sociations, never has there been such ease of communication and transit. Modern invention has given its aid to the natural effort of human beings to get together. The various interests that produce action have combined to make settlement compact. The city is a severe test of human ability to live peaceably and co-operatively at close quarters. In the country an unfriendly man can live by himself much of the time; in the city he is continually feeling somebody's elbows in his ribs. It is not strange that there is as yet much crudeness about the city. Its growth has been dominated by the economic motive, and everything has been sacrificed to the desire to make money. Dirty slums, crowded tenements, uncouth business blocks, garish bill-boards and electric signs, dumped rubbish on vacant lots, constant repairs of streets and buildings--these all are marks of crudity and experimentation, evidences that the city is still in the making. Many of the weaknesses that appear in urban society can be traced to this situation as a cause. The craze for amus.e.m.e.nt is partly a reaction from the high speed of modern industry, but partly, also, a social delirium produced by the new experience of the social whirl.

Naturally more serious efforts are neglected for a time, and inst.i.tutions of long standing, like the family, threaten to go to pieces. A thought-provoking lecture or a sermon on human obligation does not fit in with the mood of the thousands who walk or ride along the streets, searching for a sensation. The student who looks at urban society on the surface easily becomes pessimistic.

309. =Reasons for Optimism.=--This new experience of society will run its course. Undoubtedly there will go with it much of social loss, but there is firm ground for believing that there will be more of social gain. It is quite necessary for human beings to learn to a.s.sociate intimately, for population is steadily increasing and modern civilization makes all cla.s.ses and all nations more and more dependent on one another. The pace of life will slow down after a time, there will be less of social intoxication, and men and women will take their pleasures more sanely. Eventually they will listen to a message that is adapted to them, however serious it may be. One of the most hopeful factors in the situation is the presence of individuals and organized groups who are able to diagnose present conditions, and who are working definitely for their improvement. Much of modern progress is conscious and purposeful, where formerly men lived blindly, subject, as they believed, to the caprice of the G.o.ds. We know much about natural law, and lately we have learned something about social law; with this knowledge we can plan intelligently for the future. There is less excuse for social failure than formerly. Cities are learning how to make constructive plans for beautifying avenues and residential sections, and making efficient a whole transportation system; they will learn how to get rid of overcrowding, misery, and disease. What is needed is the will to do, and that will come with experience.

310. =Reasonable Expectations of Improvement.=--Any soundly constructive plan waits on thorough investigation. Such an organization as the Russell Sage Foundation, which is gathering all sorts of data about social conditions, is supplying just the information needed on which to base intelligent and effective action.

On this foundation will come the slow process of construction. There will be diffusion of information, an enlistment of those who are able to help, and an increased co-operation among the numerous agencies of philanthropy and reform. The most obvious evils and those that seem capable of solution will be attacked first. Intelligent public opinion will not tolerate the continued existence of curable ills. Pure water, adequate sewerage, light, and air, and sanitary conveniences in every home will be required everywhere. Community physicians and nurses will be under munic.i.p.al appointment to see that health conditions are maintained, and to instruct city families how to live properly.

Vocational schools and courses in domestic science will prepare boys and girls for marriage and the home, and will tend to lessen poverty.

Undoubtedly the time will come when it will be seen clearly that the interests of society demand the segregation of those who cannot take care of themselves and are an injury to others. Hospitals and places of detention for mental and moral defectives, and the victims of chronic vice and intemperance, as well as criminals of every sort, will seem natural and necessary. Larger questions of immigration, industrial management, and munic.i.p.al administration will be studied and gradually solved by the united wisdom of city, state, and nation.

311. =Agencies of Progress and Gains Achieved.=--An examination of what has been achieved in this direction by almost any one of the larger cities in the United States shows encouraging progress. Smaller cities and even villages have made use of electricity for lighting, transportation, and telephone service. The water and sewerage systems of larger centres are far in advance of what they were a few years ago. Bathrooms with open plumbing and greater attention to the preservation of health have supplemented more thorough efforts to the spread of communicable diseases. Increasing agitation for more practical education has led to the creation of various kinds of vocational schools, including a large variety of correspondence schools for those who wish specific training. There are still thousands of boys and girls who enter industrial occupations in the most haphazard way, and yield to irrational impulse in choosing or giving up a particular job or a place to live in; similar impulse induces them to mate in the same haphazard way, and as lightly to separate if they tire of each other; but the very fact that enlightened public opinion does not countenance these practices, that there are social agencies contending against them, and that they are contrary to the laws of happiness, of efficiency, and even of survival, makes it unlikely that such irrational conduct can persist.

As for the social ills that have seemed unavoidable, like s.e.xual vice, current investigation and agitation, followed by increasing legislation and segregation of the unfit, promises to work a change, however gradual the process may be. Numerous organizations are at work in the fields of poverty, immigration, the industrial problem, reform of government, penology, business, education, and religion, and thousands of social workers are devoting their lives to the betterment of society.

312. =Conference and Co-operation.=--Improvement will be more rapid when the various agencies of reform have learned to pull together more efficiently. It is frequently charged that the friction between different temperance organizations has delayed progress in solving the problem of intemperance. It is often said that there would be less poverty if the various charitable agencies would everywhere organize and work in a.s.sociation. The independent temper of Americans makes it difficult to work together, but co-operation is a sound sociological principle, and experience proves that such principles must be obeyed.

If the principle of combination that has been applied to business should be carried further and applied to the problems of society, there can be no question that results would speedily justify the action. Perhaps the greatest need in the city to-day is a union of resources. If an honest taxation would furnish funds, if the best people would plan intelligently and unselfishly for the city's future development, if boards and committees that are at odds would get together, there is every reason to think that astonishing changes for the better would soon be seen.

Suppose that in every city of our land representatives of the chamber of commerce, of the city government, of the a.s.sociated charities, of the school-teachers, of the ministers of the city, of the women's clubs, of the Young Men's Christian a.s.sociation and the Young Women's Christian a.s.sociation, of the labor-unions, and of the agencies that cater to amus.e.m.e.nt should sit together once in two weeks in conference upon the interests of all the people of the city, and should honestly and frankly discuss the practical questions that are always at the fore in public discussion, and then should report back for further conference in their own groups, there can be no doubt that the various groups would have a far better understanding and appreciation of one another, and in time would find ways and means to adopt such a programme as might come out of all the discussion.

313. =The Crucial Test of Democracy.=--World events have shown clearly since the outbreak of the European war that intelligent planning and persistent enforcement of a political programme can long contend successfully against great odds, when there is autocratic power behind it all. Democracy must show itself just as capable of planning and execution, if it is to hold its own against the control of a few, whether plutocrats, political bosses, or a centralized state, but its power to make good depends on the enlistment of all the abilities of city or nation in co-operative effort. There is no more crucial test of the ability of democracy to solve the social problems of this age than the present-day city. The social problem is not a question of politics, but of the social sciences. It is a question of living together peaceably and profitably. It involves economics, ethics, and sociological principles. It is yet to be proved that society is ready to be civilized or even to survive on a democratic basis. The time must come when it will, for a.s.sociated activity under the self-control of the whole group is the logical and ethical outcome of sound sociological principle, but that time may not be near at hand. If democracy in the cities is to come promptly to its own, social education will soon change its emphasis from the material gain of the individual to co-operation for the social good, and under the inspiration of this idea the various agencies will unite for effective social service.

READING REFERENCES

HOWE: _The Modern City and Its Problems_, pages 367-376.

GOODNOW: _City Government in the United States_, pages 302-308.

ELDRIDGE: _Problems of Community Life_, pages 3-7.

ELY: _The Coming City._

_Boston Directory of Charities_, 1914.

PART V--SOCIAL LIFE IN THE NATION

CHAPTER XL

THE BUILDING OF A NATION

314. =Questions of the Larger Group.=--In any study of social life we have to find a place for larger groups than the family and the neighborhood or even the city. There are national units and even a certain amount of international unity in the world. How have they come to exist? What are the interests that hold them together? What are the forms of a.s.sociation that are practicable on such a large scale? Is there a tendency to stress the control of the group over its individual members, even its aristocracy 01 birth or wealth? These are questions that require some sort of an answer. Beyond them are other questions concerning the relations between these larger groups. Are there common interests or compelling forces that have merged hitherto sovereign states into federal or imperial union? Is it conceivable that such mutually jealous nations as the European powers may surrender willingly their individual interests of minor importance for the sake of the larger good of the whole? Can political independence ever become subordinate to social welfare? Are there any spiritual bonds that can hold more strongly than national ambitions and national pride? Such questions as these carry the student of society into a wider range of corporate life than the average man enters, but a range of life in which the welfare of every individual is involved.

315. =The Significance of National Life.=--The nation is a group of persons, families, and communities united for mutual protection and the promotion of the general welfare, and recognizing a sovereign power that controls them all. Some nations have been organized from above in obedience to the will of a successful warrior or peaceful group; others have been organized peacefully from below by the voluntary act of the people themselves. The nation in its capacity as a governing power is a state, but a nation exercises other functions than that of control; it exists to promote the common interests of mankind over a wider area than that of the local community. The historic tendency of nations has been to grow in size, as the transmission of ideas has become easy, and the extension of control has been made widely possible. The significance of national life is the social recognition at present given to community of interest by millions of individuals who believe that it is profitable for them to live under the same economic regulations, social legislation, and educational system, even though of mingled races and with various ideals.

316. =How the Nation Developed.=--The nation in embryo can be found in the primitive horde which was made up of families related by ties of kin, or by common language and customs. The control was held by the elderly men of experience, and exercised according to unwritten law.

The horde was only loosely organized; it did not own land, but ranged over the hunting-grounds within its reach, and often small units separated permanently from the larger group. When hunting gave place to the domestication of animals, the horde became more definitely organized into the tribe, strong leadership developed in the defense of the tribe's property, and the military chieftain bent others in submission to his will. As long as land was of value for pasturage mainly, it was owned by the whole tribe in common. When agriculture was subst.i.tuted for the pastoral stage of civilization, the tribe broke up by clans into villages, each under its chief and advisory council of heads of families. So far the mode of making a living had determined custom and organization.

Village communities may remain almost unchanged for centuries, as in China, or here and there one of them may become a centre of trade, as in mediaeval Germany. In the latter case it draws to itself all cla.s.ses of people, develops wealth and culture, and presently dominates its neighbors. Small city states grew up in ancient time along the Nile in Egypt, and by and by federated under a particularly able leader, or were conquered by the band of an ambitious chieftain, who took the t.i.tle of king. In such fashion were organized the great kingdoms and empires of antiquity.

Social disintegration and foreign conquest broke up the great empires, and for centuries in the Middle Ages society existed in local groups; but common economic and racial interests, together with the political ambition of princes and n.o.bles, drew together semi-independent princ.i.p.alities and communes, until they became welded into real nations. At first the state was monarchical, because a few kings and lords were able to dominate the ma.s.s, and because strength and authority were more needed than privileges of citizenship; then the economic interest became paramount, and merchants and manufacturers demanded a share in government for the protection of their interests.

Education improved the general level of intelligence, and invention and growing commerce improved the condition of the people until eventually all cla.s.ses claimed a right to champion their own interests. The most progressive nations racially, politically, and economically, outstripped the others in world rivalry until the great modern nations, each with its own peculiar qualities of efficiency, overtopped their predecessors of all time.

317. =The Story of the United States.=--The story of national life in the United States is especially noteworthy. Within a century and a half the people of this country have pa.s.sed through the economic stages, from clearing the forests to building sky-sc.r.a.pers; in government they have grown from a few jealous seaboard colonies along the Atlantic to a solidly welded federal nation that stretches from ocean to ocean; in education and skill they have developed from provincial hand-workers to expert managers of corporate enterprises that exploit the resources of the world; and in population they have grown from four million native Americans to a hundred million people, gathered and shaken together from the four corners of the earth. In that century and a half they have developed a new and powerful national consciousness. When the British colonies a.s.serted their independence, they were held together by their common ambition and their common danger, but when they attempted to organize a government, the incipient States were unwilling to grant to the new nation the powers of sovereignty. The Confederation was a failure. The sense of common interest was not strong enough to compel a surrender of local rights. But presently it appeared that local jealousies and divisions were imperilling the interests of all, and that even the independence of the group was impossible without an effective national government.

Then in national convention the States, through their representatives, sacrificed one after another their sovereign rights, until a respectable nation was erected to stand beside the powers of Europe.