WHY NOT TRY CHRISTIANITY?

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18761, 15 January 1923, Page 8

WHY NOT TRY CHRISTIANITY?

Christianity was blamed for not averting the war, ana it has since been blamed for not averting our economic ills and muustrial strue; but George Bernard Shaw dissipated tnis criticism in a breath, we are told, when he answered that Christianity had not yet been tried. So many appea.s, in ana out ot church, have since been made that we seek through application of the teachings of the Cospel to preach and destroy the root of the world’s troubles. Men who occupy prominent positions in political life, and who have studied the ariairs of the world, not with the eye of the recluse, but from a nracticai angle of vision, are said to declare thill esitatingly that the only' cure for our industrial ills and the only means that can bring about a cessation of our destructive economic warfare is this one recourse. And this, declares the Philadelphia Catholic Standard and Times, is, indeed, an auspicious omen, Humanity will not have suffered in yrin if, alter its sad experiences and harrowing afflictions, “it .turns to Him Who without doubt can heal its wonnu i and restore its happiness.” ft is not certain that the world is ready to receive and apply this remedy, but at least in the frank and public avowal that nothing but a sincere return to Cnristianity can save society from utter rum and stave off the breakdown of the wiioie fabric of civilization, the Standard and limes sees “a step in the right direction, and a fair promise of better things to come.” Let no one think, however, we are advised, that Christianity possesses a magic formula which will at once cure all social ills and put a stop to all existing abuses. Such a panacea does not exist, and it would be a waste of time to look for one. “Economic salvation will only be affected as a by-product of, and in connection with, the larger moral regeneration of mankind.” The Gospel, we are told, does not contain the Outline of a new system of industry ; it does not pretend to teach economics, and is not concerned with the temporary forms which the organisation of production and distribution assumes. Its scope is much wider and more inclusive. But, continues this paper, “in spite of the fact that the immediate aim of Christianity is not to leorganise the economic ■ order, its influence on economic conditions is both profound and far-reaching. ’ ; —Lghtiy understood, it is eminently true that Christianity, and it alone, can bring about a satisfactory solution of our economic problems, not, however, by establishing a new industrial system, but by producing a new spirit among men that will permeate the existing order and make it the vehicle of social justice and the expression of the sublime Meals of human neighbourliness and brotherhood. It does not give an economic formula that could only be applied once, but it furnishes a moral formula that can be applied at all times and tliat, consequently, is of permanent value. Herein lies the infinite superiority of Christianity over every system •of social reform. Those who discover in the teaching of Christ nothing more than a movement of social reform fail to do it adequate justice and miss its deeper meaning. “It is precisely because Christianity aims at moral issues, that it is able to form any economic arrangement into a medium for realising 0 f social justice and to counteract the inherent defects of every industrial order. It alleviated the abuses of slavery; it softened the harshness of feudalism ; it has the power to temper the injustice incident to capitalism. It is an active solvent of wrongs under whatever system they may occur. Practical Christianity would so transform and transfigure the existing wage system that the causes of social unrest and discontent would completely disappear. It would, moreover, so affect this system that it would gradually and imperceptibly pass into a higher and more perfect form of industrial relationships. “These remarkable and beneficent clianges Christianity achieves not by merely remodeling our economic order, but by remaking men. It does not change economic relations, but it changes the attitude of men toward one another. It makes the whole of human life oyer again, and in this reconstruction economic maladjustments vanish; for practical Christianity cannot tolerate injustice of any kind. ‘Social wrongs Co not grow out of a system; they spring out of the hearts of men. In regenerating and sanctifying men, Christianity, inevitably, regenerates and sanctifies the social and economic order.”