RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22066, 23 September 1933, Page 7

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

By Amplxus. "God framed Mankind to be one mighty family, Himself our Father, and the world our home.” ' Coleridge. PERSONAL. At the annual meeting of the Dunedin Presbyterian Sunday .School Union the following officers wereA elected:—President, Dr J. D. Salmond; vice-presidents —the Rev. C. G. Wilcox and Mr D. S. Beath; secretary-treasurer, Miss E. M. Calder; Executive Committee—Mrs Little, Misses Dick and Moss, and Mr Kirby. MISSIONS IN; THE MODERN WORLD. The modern world is in a critical mood. Everything is being questioned and investigated. It is not to be expected, or desired, that the Christian Church and its activities should be exempted from this' universal inquiry. As a result the whole missionary enterprise is facing one of the greater crises in its history. New world contacts and new viewpoints are challenging the missionary idea. Both within and without the Church the validity of the missionary idea is being questioned. As a result of this situation, it is the apparent duty of every intelligent Christian to face fearlessly world conditions as they affect the missionary idea. .The following significant facts are indicative of the present situation. The title of many recent books and editorials on the subject of missions are such as we have not known in the modern period of missionary activity.' Dr R. E. Speer has found it necessary to write a little book entitled “ Are Foreign Missiono Done For?” while Dr C. ,H. Patton writes in a similar strain under the title

“ Foreign Missions Under Fire.” _ Two widely read Christian journals with a great circulation have leading editorials under the heading “ Can Foreign Missions be Saved?” “Will Missions Die with this Generation?” Truly these facts are startling and arresting. Another dharacteristic _ trend in modern missionary thinking is revealed in the continued demand and search for a new name for missions. There seems to be a ’feeling, trat the old name for missions needs to be either changed or camouflaged for this generation. We hear much in these days of “ world friendship” and “world service” by people who use the expression as a synonym for missions. Many missionary leaders, however, believe that the thing for this age to do is not to find a new name for missions but to put a new content into the old name. Akin to this search for a new name for missions, is the demand by an increasing number of Christian people for a modern interpretation of the missionary idea. To many earnest folk the solution of our missionary problems would consist of a more substantial support and a sturdy undergirding of the missionary enterprise as it now is. But with the growing recognition of the Christlikeness ;of socially-minded Christianity there ; is emerging for many the vision of a new type of missionary activity for the immediate future. Two schools of missionary thought are developing. No small missionary skill will be required in coming days to enable the Church to appropriate the social richness of the new while conserving the staunch religious emphasis and power of the old type of missionary

thought and programme. Another evidence of a new day for the missionary idea is the modern shifting of missionary motives and aims. Many of the motives which moved mightily the last generation fail conspicuously in this generation. Not a few objectives the attainment of which meant success yesterday are to-day either doubted ,ot discarded, but the essential things remain, and must remain in all missionary motive —the Christ-like things. This fact is attested by the Jerusalem Conference of the International Missionary Council. That was a truly modern world gathering. It was made up of acknowledged Christian leaders of the Christian forces of over 50 countries. This conference was admittedly held to meet conditions of world crisis in the extern sion programme of the Christian Church. The preamble to its statement on the Christian message is itself a description, of this world crisis. Throughout the world there is a sense of insecurity and instability. Ancient religions are undergoing modification and in some regions dissolution. Institutions regarded with age-long veneration are discarded or called in question; well-established standards of moral conduct are brought under criticism: and countries called Christian feel the stress as truly as the people of Asia and Africa.” The same new note was sounded in a Home Missions conference of North America, held quite recently. Turn for a new angle on the subject to China. Note the significance of this sentence from the minutes of a recent meeting of the General Council of the Church of Christ in China: “This conference recognises with deep thankfulness to God the rich fruits of co-operation in service between the Chinese Church and the mission body in days gone by." The Chinese Church'thinks that some days are “gone by.” Again, “ The control of the work, so far ns it;.is located in the hands of the missions, should be transferred to the church.” These official minutes are sure signs of a new day, the like of which, hag not been faced heretofore by the mis-sionary-sending churches of the West, a day for which the church has been praying and preparing. Then, . too, there is that widespread modern and just demand for the Christian to admit, the cultural and racial equality of nations before God., All of the fine things of life are not the exclusive possession of Western nations or the white .race. Dr John C. Archer, professor of missions and comparative religion in Yale University, said in a magazine article recently: “A change has come over the missionary world. The Christian message stands in need of re-con-sideration in the light of the essential character and porver of the non-Christian faiths.” Finally, there is to be reckoned with to-day in the Orient a keen and coming discrimination between Christianity and Christendom, between Christianity and Western civilisation, and, still more searching, between Christianity and

Christ. Our Western Christianity is being Weighed in the balance and found wanting. “ To-day." writes one of the great Chinese Christian leaders, “the people of the Orient find it difficult to recognise in Christianity the religion of Jesus. The Orient is asking for the wheat of the religion of Jesus, not the chaff; for its Oriental content, not for its occidental wrappings.” A new day is here—a difficult day but a glorious day. It is a day of spiritual testing. There is in it no cause for alarm, but great cause for thanksgiving; no reason for confusion, but much reason for consecration.—A.V.C. MAKES ALL MEN BROTHERS. One day a young man was returning to his home after studying at one of the colleges for the ministry, and, wishing to travel as cheaply as he could, was sharing a cabin in the steerage with six other men, whose rough jokes, loud talking, and swearing soon sickened him. “ I wonder if I am the only Christian in .the steerage cabin,” he said to himself. ’“ Certainly it sounds as if these others are not." The young man spent a good deal of time out on that part of the deck which was open to passengers of his class. There the pure ocean breezes fanned his cheeks, and the great sea stretched far away. “Perhaps I ought to try and get acquainted with my fellow travellers,” he mused. “ Perhaps I could help them. But I am lonely, homesick for someone who can talk as I talk—think as I think.” Looking across the waters to the westward, the student watched the sun sink like a great red ball of fire into the Pacific, There was just a little ripple on the waters now—just enough to make a pathway of golden glory running from the ship along the surface •of the sea away out to the setting sun. • God Who made the earth, The sky, the moon, the sun, Who gave the light its birth, Careth for me.

" How can those fellows in my cabin look at a scene like that and not think of God the Eternal, the Creator? ” thought the young fellow., “ Does not anyone see the beauty of it? ” be wondered, and stopped in his wondering. He became conscious that someone else 'was taking in the glories of; the sunset. ~ ', “He is a Japanese,” thought the young man. “He is looking toward the western sky. Perhaps he is lonely, too; thinking about his native land somewhere there beyond the ocean sky line.” Hark! The young Japanese was humming a melody—" Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide _ myself, in Thee.” .The young minister started to hum with him. Suddenly the, Japanese turned to the student and said in broken English; “That is a Christian, song. .1 am a Christian; are you?” ... . “ Yes,” answered .the. young man, holding out his hand, “ and just .standing here, lonely, wishing for a Christian to talk to."

I» too,” smiled the Japanese. young man in that moment felt that the fellowship of Christians is a very real thing; that it wipes out all distinctions of race and condition. “ Brothers,” he whispered.