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General Research
The Richmond Christian Advocate
Pages 15 to 16
August 27, 1936
THE RICHMOND CHRISTIAN ADVOCATE
| The Richmond Christian Advocate; 27 Aug 1936 |
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| Contents |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 9 | Page 10 | Page 11 | Page 12 | Page 13 | Page 14 | Page 15 | Page 16 |
WOMAN'S MISSIONARY WORK
Mrs. C. O. Tuttle, Editor : : {address deleted for privacy}, Richmond, Va.
A PRAYER.
By Clarence Edwin Flynn.
By Clarence Edwin Flynn.
| God bless the little ones, whose feet Have still so long a way to go. Defend them. Keep them clean and sweet Grant them the best that life can know. God bless the young, who face the years So eagerly. Up from the dust. Guide them to where the dawn appears, And keep them faithful to their trust. God bless the old, the weary-eyed, Who stumble on with failing tread. Grant them sweet peace at eventide, And let the morn be bright ahead. |
As Christian citizens we must try to qualify for an important election year like 1936 will be. Being Chairman of our Committee on Christian Citizenship, I am so eager for our women to make some progress in their work as citizens. Some states require registration before a certain date. Whatever your state may require, urge your Christian women to do. Do not confine your work to our Methodist women, but ask the Federated Missionary Societies and every organization of Christian women to join in th{is effo} {paper torn} {paper torn}in{paper torn} {paper torn} state requirements, begin in earnest to become intelligent voters. Study the candidates and questions to be voted upon, and when the day comes -- vote! We have had this privilege long enough to begin to grow up, and act as adults. So few citizens use this great power, and we women, so far, have been a disappointment in the use of this privilege.
Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd has reached very high rank in his own profession and has become one of the most eminent of the world's scientific explorers. One of the most deeply moving statements of modern times came from his lips recently on the occasion of a testimonial dinner in his honor given in New York City by representatives of American industrial, professional, scientific, and cultural gro{u}ps. {H}e spoke of the dark months and sleepless hours when he lay on the very edge of life in the dazzling snow fields of the Antarctic. His chief diversion, he said, was to try to secure an "unprejudiced view of the world and civilization." His words deserve to be remembered by all citizens of America. They were as follows:
"The great folly of all follies is the
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amazing attitude of civilized nations toward each other. It seems a great madness. If this attitude is not changed, I do not see how civilization as we know it will survive.
"The well-being of a nation depends upon the well-being of its neighbor nations and fair and friendly trade relations with those nations. Therefore, it appears to me that if a citizen desires reasonable prosperity and well-being for his family and his fellow-citizens, he should strive for friendly understanding among the family of nations. That seems the loyal and efficient thing to do for his country. I feel this so keenly that if I survive this ordeal I shall devote what is left of my life largely to trying to help further the friendship of my country with other nations of the world.
"I find a growing mass fear. Nations everywhere have been swept by a nightmare, and in the resulting terror they are arming to the teeth against the day when the nightmare will come true. With so many opportunities for our new science to push out the boundaries of the unknown and build a fairer and better life for human beings, we are using our technological knowledge to prepare a cataclysm which will bring to final ruin all we have achieved in the last three hundred years."
The dedication of th{paper torn} rest of {paper torn}i{paper torn} lif{paper torn} {t}o {paper torn}e cause of international friendship is a challenge to Admiral Byrd's countrymen.
A Sunday-school teacher in a Korean church inquired, "Just three of you?" as she opened the roll book of the fifth class of boys. "What's the matter with the other boys?" for there were many vacant seats.
A boy of fourteen years who stood twisting his cap in his hands ventured timidly, "One boy has gone to his school."
"School?" . . . "On Sunday?" I wondered, for it was not the usual thing to attend school on that day. One boy in a blue coat who sat in front of me proceeded to remark that Jin-tai had gone to work. Here I began to check the attendance in the roll book. "And what about Hak Kyoon?"
The restless boy answered immediately, "He was outside with us just a few minutes ago . . . but he left saying . . . " Here he loo{k}ed around a bit and then continued, "Because a woman teacher is teaching us." At which information I unconsciously laughed, and they, too, echoed my laughter.
Nevertheless I proceeded with the teaching of the Sunday-school lesson about Abraham, the pioneer. But in
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the meantime this ripple caused the simple words, "Because a woman teacher . . ." grew greater and greater. That night on my bed I thought again of those words. Why should a woman teacher seem so inferior to a man that even a little boy has that kind of an idea? Of course, I am not blaming that boy who simply expressed simply what he had learned from his surroundings. Rather, I must be grateful to him for what he taught me, for it has actually stimulated me to do my best to help overcome such an old idea of predominance of man over woman.
Miss Anna Bell Williams, who serves in connection with the Lambuth Training School, Osaka, Japan, gives an interesting incident from the life of a Japanese Christian:
At our special meetings for the deepening of our spiritual life held at the beginning of this term, Hayashi Utako Sensei, who gives all her time working for temperance and purity, was with us. She told how God has marvelously led her through seventy-two years. As she was four when the great Emperor Meiji ascended the throne, she knows well Japan's marvelous history since her doors were opened to the world. A splendid father helped her in many ways, and she was always seeking truth so that when s{he} {paper torn} {paper torn} primary reader, which ev{i}dently bore the influence of Western books, that all things were made by heaven, she stopped worshipping before the Buddhist altar in her grandmother's home and began to worship the heavenly power which to her was embodied in the sun. Later, in Tokyo, someone suggested that she go to church, but she would have nothing to do with "that foreign religion!" Then, because she wanted money to continue her studies, she became the language teacher of a missionary's daughter and finally attended church to see what it was like. Bishop Williams, one of the pioneer missionaries, preached. Not all could she understand, but she got three things -- that God had created all things, that He is a loving Father, and tha{paper torn} all men are His children and, therefore, brothers. The teaching fitted into the longings of her heart, and she discovered that night that Christianity is a world religion belonging to both east and west. Her life since then has been full of sufferings borne and noble deeds done, for the Master's sake. Her work for peace, temperance, and purity has taken her several times to Europe and America.
The new hour of Sunday morning worship during August at the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, Onancock,
{continued on page 16}
is proving po{paper torn}ular and largely attended. The pastor, Rev. J. Shenton Lodge, is taking his sermons from his own, original verses which have been published under the title of "The Strollin' Scribe." A cordial invitation is extended to the public to participate in the service next Sunday morning at ten-thirty o'clock in the church auditorium.
-- The News
Married August 8, 1936, at the Lawrenceville Methodist Parsonage, by Dr. R. H. Bennett, Whitson LaGrand Benton, of Apex, N. C., to Marguerite Jewel Cain, of Bine's Creek, N. C.; and Charlie F. Matthews, of Holly Springs, N. C., to Lucy Elizabeth Cain, of Bine's Creek, N. C. The brides are sister {sic}. The happy couples left in their car for a Northern trip.
-- Times-Gazette.
The Lord's Acre Plan might be more properly called "The Project Plan for Financing the Country Church." The idea is to get each member of the congregation to undertake some kind of project and give the proceeds from it to the church. This may consist of the cultivation of some crop on a portion of ground, or the raising of one or more animals. A favorite project for the women has been with poultry and poultry products. Some have given Sundays eggs.
The slogan of the congregation should be: "A Contribution from Every Member Every Sunday, as an Act of Worship." Many country churches fail because the burden of the support falls on two or three families. These churches might have been saved if all of the families of the congregation had helped. The Lord's Acre Plan is a good one to enlist the unenlisted.
Three men tried to lift a log but could not budge it. When the help of the members of the community was secured the log was raised with ease.
The question has been asked, "Suppose a country church should wish to adopt the Lord's Acre Plan. What steps should it take?" We suggest the appointment of a committee -- composed preferably of young adults, both men and women -- to study the question of how the church may be supported in a community where there is not much ready cash. This committee should write to its own denominational headquarters for all available literature on the Lord's Acre and Pay in Kind Plans. The committee may also find it helpful to visit one or more churches in which the Lord's Acre Plan has been tried. The people who have tested it out should be consulted in order to find out the weak and strong points of the plan.
The committee, after thorough investigation, should report back to the officers
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or congregation. When it is decided to put the plan into operation, it has been found wise to appoint a congregation manager, and under him a captain for each commodity. Cotton has been one of the most common crops adopted in the Cotton Belt. In fact, the plan originated in the cotton area of South Carolina, but it has been found just as practical with other commodities.
An article appeared in the March issue of the Presbyterian Survey, by Rev. Charles H. Phipps, showing how a country church located outside the cotton area realized $1,000 last year. In this issue the leading article on the same subject is by Rev. Dumond Clarke, director of the religious department of the Farmers Federation, Asheville, North Carolina. Sample copies of the magazine may be secured by writing to the Department of the Country Church and Sunday School Extension, Box 1176, Richmond, Virginia.
On February 23 I attended the fifteenth annual meeting of the Farmers Federation in Asheville. About 2,000 people were in attendance and the principal address was made by Hon. Henry A. Wallace, Secretary of Agriculture of the United States. Secretary Wallace, speaking to the farmers of Western North Carolina, declared:
"Farmers in this section of the country are the poorest in the Nation, from the standpoint of material wealth, but they are unusually rich in what we term as 'life.' Profoundly moving religious activities always find their base where the material wealth is small. The faith of these people may have a profound effect in lifting the shadow cast upon the country by the development of capitalism.
"The people of the cities and rich farm lands come to have a faith that has replaced religion. They have built up false religious faiths of their own, and these are bound to come to a sad end.
"At this point I would say if the Lord's Acre movement means a more material outlook for its followers, it is a bad thing. But I do not believe it means that. The Lord's Acre Plan tends to carry us back to the pre-capitalistic days, and its followers have a sympathetic attitude toward things.
"I believe the Lord is more lord to rain, sunshine and things produced on the farm than to the factories and other products of capitalism."
I agree with Secretary Wallace that if by engaging in the Lord's Acre Plan we are going to secularize religion, it will defeat its own aims, but if by it we can spiritualize all of life and make sacred our daily pursuits it will prove a blessed boon. Moved by the profit motive we have degenerated into selfish groups. Faith in Capitalism, Socialism, Fascism, and Communism is materialistic. On the one hand, there is faith in Socialism on the part of the people who do not possess wealth, clamoring
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for its possession by re-distribution. On the other hand there is faith in Capitalism, insisting on possessing the wealth of the Nation without regard to the rights of those who have, by their labor, produced it. Both are motivated by a materialistic philosophy.
Communism is a form of Socialism in which the people have sacrificed their liberties for the selfish consideration of a new economic security. Fascism or Nazism is Capitalism in which the people have sacrificed their liberties for the sake of holding their property. The basis of all these faiths is carnal rather than spiritual.
It is heartening to have one as prominent in affairs of State as Secretary Wallace declaring that the ideals of Jesus are practical. These ideals teach that every group should recognize the rights of every other. The Lord's Acre in accordance with the teachings about Plan {sic} if rightly motivated and conducted Stewardship in the Old and New Testaments, may not only prove a practical plan for financing the country churches, but an instrument in the hands of God for the preservation of a Christian democracy by inspiring in the new generation the simple spiritual faith of the religion.
{probably end of the article as advertisements fill the rest of the column; this is the last page that I have of this issue.}
Submitted & transcribed by Susan Shields Sasek.
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