Is Christianity practicable? lectures delivered in Japan

Front matter

L^visiua 1

IS CHRISTIANITY PRACTICABLE?

BOOKS BY

Contents

PAG B

I. The World Crisis as Challenge and

as Opportunity 1

Chapter I The World Crisis As Challenge And As Opportunity

Two friends were recently conversing about the war. “I do not see how I can go on living,” said one. “It seems as if I had lost God out of my world.” “Strange,” answered the other, “it seems to me as if I had just found Him.”

The conversation is typical. Amid all the questions which the war has brought to the surface — questions economic, political, racial — the moral question has claimed the centre of attention. Appalling as has been the loss of human lives, colossal as has been the destruction of capital, men have been conscious of a danger even greater for the life of [ l I

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the spirit. What will the war mean for the higher life of man? Are we on the eve of a permanent relapse into barbarism, or are we witnessing the birth throes of a new and higher social order?

To every thoughtful man this question is of interest, but to the Christian it comes home with peculiar closeness. For Christianity in all its forms believes in a moral government of God in which all nations and races are included, and judges all experience, social and individual alike, in its bearing upon this supreme issue. It is not strange then that in every country of Christendom, those which are at war and those which are participants only by their sympathy, men are asking themselves what bearing the events we are witnessing will have upon the religion to which they own allegiance. How far has the Christian claim been confirmed, how far disproved, by the war? Of the two judgments [2]

quoted at the beginning of this chapter, tested by the Christian standard, which has most evidence on its side?

In the pages that follow I propose to raise, and so far as I can, to answer this question. I wish to ask what lessons we may learn from the present crisis as to the nature and validity of Christian faith, and what contribution Christians can make to the tasks of spiritual reconstruction which must be undertaken after the war is over?

One of the most striking features of the last two years has been their revelation of the failure of the churches to exercise any controlling influence upon the national policy of the so-called Christian nations. In an age when unity was the dominant note of Christian preaching; when the barriers that divided the denominations, in sympathy if not in action, were everywhere being overpassed; when the Christian consciousness of

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world responsibility and world opportunity had voiced itself in such gatherings as the Edinburgh Conference, and such calls as that of the Conference on Faith and Order; when in every country of Christendom the older individualistic conception of Christianity was giving place to one more conscious of its social responsibility, and more sensitive to the appeals of universal need, we might have expected that when the issue of war or peace had to be faced, the Christian conscience would have been alert enough, and the protests of the churches sufficiently powerful and effective to have called a halt in time. Whatever may have been true of other ages and of men of other faiths, in this age at least, and among nations calling themselves Christian, war on such a scale should have been impossible.

But as a matter of fact this expectation has been disappointed. Not only were [4 ]

the churches powerless to prevent the war* but they made no serious attempt to do so. And now that the war has come, and the nations on either side are committed to the contest, the Christians within each are found heart and soul in support of their respective governments, not only in the physical struggle in which they are engaged, but what is more significant, in their interpretation of the moral issues at stake. With all recognition of the unselfishness of purpose that has animated Christians as individuals, it must yet be confessed that with reference to international relations the Christian sentiment of the world has failed to make itself felt in this supreme crisis in any unified and effective way. Individual Christians have said and done many noble and unselfish things. The church as a whole has shown no consciousness of independent responsibility. It has committed 15]

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itself to no definite constructive programme.

In this, to be sure, Christians do not stand alone. What is true of the church is true of every one of the idealistic agencies in whose activity we were wont to take pride. When put to the supreme test, science and art, literature and law have proved as impotent as religion. The Palace of The Hague is deserted. Where two years ago we found business men investing their capital with equal impartiality in Russia and Austria, Germany and England, to-day we see the nations organizing their economic resources on lines determined by the present conflict, and what is more menacing, promising themselves the perpetuation of this divisive policy after the war is over. Socialism, the one political creed already definitely committed to an international programme, has seen its organization disrupted by the strain of [ 6 ]

opposing patriotisms, and its members, with a heavy heart, abandoning their dream of the world war against capitalistic oppression for the more pressing, if repugnant, task of killing their brother Socialists who, like themselves but in opposing ranks, have obeyed their country’s summons to arm in her defense. Even science, the most objective and unimpassioned of all human interests, has caught the prevailing contagion, and, abandoning all pretense of impartiality, committed itself in the persons of its most distinguished representatives to a propaganda of partisanship.

What we seem to see therefore is the bankruptcy of internationalism in all its forms. But of all these failures, signal and discouraging as they are, none is more surprising, and none more disheartening, than that of the Christian church. For no other organization represents in a more unqualified way the

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higher interests of mankind, and none is more definitely committed to the ideal of brotherhood, of which war is the explicit denial. It becomes incumbent, therefore, upon us who call ourselves Christians, to inquire into the reason for this failure; to discover whether it is irremediable, and if not to learn what we can do to make its recurrence in the future impossible.

The question thus raised is not an academic one. It is not one which has to do simply with our private satisfaction and reassurance in faith, important as these may be. It is forced upon us by the social situation. For we are not simply thinkers, but actors. When peace comes, whether it be sooner or later, and the work of reconstruction has to be faced, we shall have to do our part in determining the policies to be adopted, and the methods to be followed in realizing them. And what we do will be determined by what we believe. Shall we yield to the prevailing scepticism, and abandon our hope of the realization of the Christian ideal of brotherhood on earth? Shall we seek compensation for Christianity’s failure here in the millenarian’s dream of a triumph of righteousness in some other world than ours, or in the mystic peace which follows the abandonment of all earthly ideals for the higher bliss of communion with the ineffable God? Or, is the fault not in our ideal, but in ourselves, a fault which may be remedied if we do our part, and which in fact it is our most pressing duty, as it is our supreme privilege, to remedy ?

It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of this question. When the initial shock of the war was over and men awoke from the numbness of their first surprise to face the problem of adjustment to the new and strange world in which they found themselves, the [9]

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first effect was a certain exhilaration of spirit. The very magnitude of the crisis had in it something inspiring, almost ennobling. Small concerns were forgotten, petty interests no longer attracted. Men were solemnized, uplifted, carried out of themselves by the enthusiasm of a great loyalty. Religious men especially were quick to respond to the ideal elements in the situation. In their country’s appeal to sacrifice and devotion Christians found a natural outlet for the instinct of consecration which had been bred in them by their religion. They did not doubt that in serving the nation’s cause they were at the same time promoting God’s kingdom on the earth.

But as time went on this early enthusiasm gave place to a different mood. As the magnitude of the struggle has become more apparent, and its cost not only in human life but in faith and hope and love, it has become less easy [ 10 ]

to maintain the optimism which characterized the early days of the war. Face to face with the grim reality of modem warfare, with its ruthless brutality and shameless cynicism, the ideals of peace which we associate with Christianity seem unreal and remote. What had at first been regarded as unthinkable has come to be taken as a matter of course; and even those Christians who still cherish the ideal of world brotherhood and peace despair of finding any sphere in which it can be made practically operative for generations to come. Such a situation is full of danger, for a faith which cannot find appropriate expression in action is held by a precarious tenure. From every point of view, therefore, the inquiry which is here proposed becomes of commanding importance.

What then is the issue which the war has raised for Christian faith? It is in [ ll 1

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briefest statement whether Christianity is a practicable religion for society as well as for the individuals who compose it?

There are two different angles from which the question as to the practicability of the Christian religion may be approached. It may be approached from the point of view of the individual, or it may be approached from the point of view of man’s social relations. We may ask how far Christianity is a practicable religion for the individual man and woman; whether it offers a reasonable creed, a satisfying object of worship, a worthy ideal of conduct, and motives adequate to insure its realization; or we may ask whether Christianity is socially practicable, a religion which in such a world as this, with its complex relationships, economic, social, and political, we may reasonably expect to become the accepted standard for the common faith and life of man.

It makes a great difference in which of these two senses we understand our question. From the point of view of the individual, few would be found to deny the practicability of Christianity, for the evidence to the contrary is accessible on every hand. There are men and women all the world over who believe in the Christian God, accept the Christian standard, and realize that standard in their own personal conduct to a remarkable degree. They are unselfish, trustful, brotherly, forgiving, hopeful, pure. They face calamity with courage, sin with repentance, opportunity with consecration, and persecution with selfcontrol. They may be mistaken in their belief, and their hope may be destined to disappointment, but no one can deny that, so far as their personal experience is concerned, Christianity has proved and is still proving itself not only a practicable, but a satisfying and ennobling religion.

IS CHRISTIANITY PRACTICABLE?

For men of this type the war has introduced no essentially new element into their religious experience. It has immensely deepened and intensified it. It has provided a new challenge for faith, a new opportunity for service, but it has not made it appreciably harder to believe in God. Indeed, for many it has become far easier, for the very shattering of earthly ideals and the new revelation of the transitoriness of material possessions has served to set in clearer perspective the unseen reality, and removed, as it were, a veil which seemed to hang between them and God. For many it has meant a readjustment of standards and a reinforcement of the tendency present in every religion which, like Christianity, makes much of personality, to postpone the consummation from this life to another. Where so many of the young and the strong have been cut off in the flower of their youth, it cannot but [ 14 ]

be that thought should turn to the life after death for the solution of the problems that baffle us here. But this, too, is not a new faith, only the re-emphasis in a new setting of what has been present in Christianity from the first.

But with the other phase of the question it is different. When we ask whether Christianity is socially practicable, we ask whether the standards which have been accepted and in a measure realized by selected individuals here and there, are valid for the race as a whole; whether nations and the rival classes within each nation, whose dealings one with another are now conducted on purely selfish principles, may be expected to abandon their present rivalry in favor of the more generous and inclusive methods advocated by Christ.

For such a question the war is of momentous significance. For war in the boldness of its affirmation of the su- [ 15 ]

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premacy of self-interest as between social groups is, in its essence, the denial of Christianity. If war, and what war means, is a permanent social necessity, then Christianity in the sense in which we are interested in it here is socially impracticable, and our question must be answered in the negative.

There are many thoughtful people who believe that this is the case. Regretfully but none the less explicitly, and with full consciousness of the significance of their action, they have abandoned any hope that the principles and ideals which inspire the life of the best Christians can ever be made dominant in the life of society as a whole. They look upon the interpretation of Christianity which has been so much in evidence in the last generation as a spirit of brotherhood and tolerance which was gradually to leaven society as a whole — which, indeed, was actually leavening it so rapidly and so [ 16 ]

successfully as to make war in any such sense, and on any such scale as it had been known in the past, morally impossible— they look, I repeat, upon such a conception as this, a conception made familiar to us by the theology of the last thirty years, as a delusion, beautiful, if you will, as any dream of an ideal social state is beautiful, but wholly unrelated to the matter-of-fact world in which we live, and full of danger, as all unreality is dangerous which blinds men’s eyes to the perils of the existing situation, and leaves them unprepared to meet it.

And it cannot be denied that there is much to be said in support of this view. Tested by each one of its cardinal principles, Christianity seems hopelessly to have broken down. Whatever else one may or may not include in Christianity, this at least it has meant to those who have accepted it in the past; the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, [ 17 ]

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redemption through Christ, the leadership of the church. And yet how unreal and far away seems each of these when measured by the grim realities of the present ! How can one speak of the fatherhood of God in any universal and all-embracing sense in the light of the terrible calamities which have fallen upon so many innocent sufferers all over the round world 2 How can one believe in the goodness of God when one contemplates this unexampled harvest of agony, of bitterness, and of death? How the whole dilemma that in every age has haunted the imagination of man, the dilemma: either God would not, and then He is not good, or He could not, and then He is not in control— how this dilemma has been intensified until it seems as if it could not be evaded. For the individual here and there, the man of strong faith and heroic courage, it may be possible now as in the past to [18]

fight one’s way through the storms of doubt up into the clear skies of faith, but for the world at large, surely if what we see is to be the measure of the future, it is vain to talk of the fatherhood of God with any expectation of being believed.

The case is still more disheartening when we pass to the second great article of the Christian faith, the brotherhood of man. For what we seem to see to-day is a colossal denial on the part of that portion of the human race which has been longest under the influence of Christ, and which alone definitely calls itself Christian, of this central and cardinal conviction. Whatever else Christianity may or may not be, it is an international religion. It began as a protest against the doctrine which identified the Kingdom of God with any single nation. It broke the barrier between Greek and Jew, and proclaimed the coming of a [ 19 ]

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new social order which should include both. But now we see the revival in the most brutal form of the very barriers which it was the mission of Christ to break down. The outstanding factor in the situation is the factor of race; the final unit, it is declared over and over again, must be the nation. The Christian claim to reach beyond the individual life and prescribe laws for the state is explicitly repudiated, not simply by politicians and by statesmen, but by Christian theologians who tell us that Christianity has to do purely with the fife of the individual, that the unselfishness which it prescribes and the sacrifices which it inculcates are valid only for private persons within the limits of the present life. As for the state itself, that, we are told, is the ultimate unit, knowing no law but that of its own existence, and recognizing no authority, human or divine, which has the right to ask of it [ 20 ]

the self-abnegation which is the supreme law of the individual Christian.

Nor is it otherwise with the third great Christian tenet, that of redemption through Christ. Characteristic of Christianity as an individual experience is the consciousness of the forgiveness of sins, humility in the presence of the holy God, penitence because of the memory of past wrong-doing, sympathy with others who are involved in the same legacy of sin and are heirs to the same blessing of redemption. The willingness to forgive as one has been forgiven, to bear and to forbear, to think no evil, to trust where one cannot see— -all these qualities so characteristic of the finest Christian experience — where shall we look for them to-day in this world of suspicion, enmity, and hate? How can we believe in the social practicability of the Christian religion when we find each of the warring nations repudiating all [21 ]

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blame from itself and attributing all responsibility for this world tragedy to its opponents? What concord is there between the spirit of Christ and the pride and self-satisfaction that are the dominant notes of the age in which we live?

And if it be said that these are but local and transitory symptoms, the evidence of a world-spirit which for the moment has slipped its leash and run wild without control; that within organized Christianity at least we may count on a protest against these unchristian tendencies and the reaffirmation in the face of a challenging world of the great ideals and principles of which we have been speaking — we face this further and most discouraging fact of the all but complete abnegation of leadership on the part of the Christian church. In every country that is now at war we find the forces of organized religion mobilized with army and navy in defense of [ 22 ]

the particular contention of the state in question. The consciousness of world citizenship so characteristic of the church of Christ in its great days is for the moment eclipsed, and one wonders whether it will ever be possible to revive it.

It may be said— it will no doubt be said-— that in principle there is nothing new in what we see. In one form or another the problem of evil has always been with us. But there is something in the size of the present crisis that staggers the imagination, something which forces home the issue even upon those comfortable and sheltered lives which have hitherto managed to elude it; while for those who are already hostile to Christianity it seems as if here at last a weapon had been thrust into their hands to drive home their case with a logic which could not be resisted.

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There are some Christians indeed who try to evade the difficulty by denying the relevancy of Christianity to the present life, or at least to those phases of human life which concern the relations of men in society. According to their view Christianity is purely a religion of individual salvation. It is concerned with the soul of man, not with his body, and with this life simply as a preparation for that which is to come. To those who hold such a view there is nothing surprising in the present situation. It involves no failure of Christianity, for the simple reason that Christianity has never proposed to be a religion for this world. Not transformation, they insist, but escape, is the Christian message; not leadership but protest the true function of the church.

There are two forms which this other-worldly Christianity may take. One is premillenarianism. This abandons the [ 24 ]

present world to the power of evil. It expects no improvement in society until the great cataclysm at the end of the age when Christ is to return in person to establish his kingdom. In the meantime it confines the duty of the church to preaching repentance to individuals, and warning them to be ready to welcome their Lord when he comes.

It is easy to understand how this view arose. During the first decades of Christianity no one anticipated the long duration of human history. The disciples believed that Christ would come again within the lifetime of men then living in order to establish his kingdom upon earth and to realize the social ideals of justice, brotherhood, and love. And when this expectation was disappointed and men faced the prospect of a period of waiting indefinitely long, the old habits of thought still persisted and the social consummation unattain- [25]

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able, or at least unrealized here, was awaited in the undiscovered country that lay beyond death. In the meantime the energies of Christians found sufficient outlet in the preparation of the individual for the life after death, and the winning of new candidates for the citizenship of the future kingdom.

So there grew up a conception of Christianity which, while it still cherished the social ideal, and phrased its faith in terms of social fellowship, was yet in principle largely self-centred and individualistic.

I would speak with the greatest respect of those who hold the premillenarian view. In an age which is tempted to compromise for the sake of immediate success they have held aloft the ideal of personal purity and of unswerving loyalty. To the sorrowful spirit they have offered comfort; to the sinful, hope, and to those who despair of any outcome of [26]

life here adequate to the demand of the Christian ideal, they promise in another world a new sphere of activity, and a better guarantee of success.

But for many Christians, and these not the least sincere, such a restriction of the sphere of Christianity presents difficulties. They believe with all their might in the gospel of individual salvation, but they believe, too, that Christ has a message for society as well which cannot be neglected with impunity. They remember how much of the Bible is concerned with questions of social righteousness, and feel that such a situation as faces us in Europe to-day would, if accepted as permanent and normal, be in effect a denial of the gospel. To hold fast the Christian ideal for society, while at the same time denying that it is capable of realization in the present world seems to involve one in a fundamental contradiction which, if clearly [ 27 ]

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perceived, must paralyze the will. It gives us an ideal which we can do nothing to realize, and in the midst of events which are shaking the world to its foundations, assigns us the position of irresponsible spectators.

The other form of other-worldly Christianity is mysticism. This is even more radically antisocial.1 It regards our relation to our fellow men in any possible world as of only temporary and transitory significance. To the mystic God is the only true reality, and God can brook no rival in the allegiance of the soul. From the vain quest of social betterment with its divided allegiance, from the false

1 It is hardly necessary to say that I use mysticism in this connection in a technical sense to denote a type of religion which concentrates attention upon the relation between the individual soul and God, and regards all other factors as irrelevant if not positively disturbing. The term is often used in a wider sense, as a synonym of vital as distinct from traditional religion, and those are called mystics who unite with ethical devotion to their fellow men a vivid sense of the presence and fellowship of God. It is with mysticism in the former sense only that we are concerned here.

hope of human progress with its inevitable disappointment, he would recall us to the inner world where alone God is to be found.

When I was in England during the early months of the war I remember hearing a distinguished writer, herself a mystic, give a lecture on mysticism and the war. She denied that there was anything in the present situation which could disturb the calm of the mystic’s life with God, for the simple reason that this life was lived on a level where all such questions as were involved in the present struggle in Europe were irrelevant. All the passion and agony, the struggle and rivalry which fill the days and nights of the contestants at the front belong to the region of mundane interest, from which it is the function of religion to free the soul. In the untroubled peace which God gives to his saints they have no place.

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It is not my purpose here to consider the relation of mysticism to Christianity or to debate the question how far the Christian religion may rightly be called mystical. It will be sufficient to say that, to the extent to which the mystic’s definition of Christianity is accepted as correct, it loses the marks which distinguish it from the contemplative religions of the East, and the teaching of Jesus is emptied of its natural and hitherto all but universally accepted meaning. When Jesus spoke of God as a Father, he used words borrowed from the most familiar of social relationships, and committed his disciples to an ideal incapable of description in terms of purely individualistic and self-centred religion.

There are two reasons why it is difficult to be satisfied either with the premillenarian or the mystic creed. The first is psychological, growing out of the per- [30]

sonal religious experience; the second, historical, based upon observation of the experience of others.

The first reason why we find it hard to be satisfied with a purely individualistic religion is that we know that we ourselves are more than individuals. The more we try to be our own best selves, the more earnest we make with the Christian ideal of personal consecration and self-sacrifice, the more, in short, we try to do the things that individualistic Christianity requires of us, the more inevitably we find ourselves led beyond the sphere of individual interest to the common aspirations, ideals, and endeavors which make up the life of men in society.

The second reason is historical. As we retrace the story of mankind in the past and ask ourselves who are the heroes whom we most admire, and the benefactors in whose achievements we [31 ]

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take the most pride, we find they are those who have given themselves with the most complete devotion to the service of their fellows, and to whose sacrifices, however fruitless at the time they may have seemed, we can trace some forward step in the upward march of humanity. Unless we are to renounce all hope of human progress and, like the Eastern sage of whom Kipling writes in “Kim,” reduce history to a series of cycles in which generation after generation retraces with unseeing eye the pathway already traversed by its predecessors, we must believe that God has some purpose in the movements of nations as well as of individuals, some satisfying goal to which, by however arduous and painful a path, he is leading the peoples.

Such, at least, is the conviction which has inspired the present inquiry. I am writing for those who, with me, believe that Christianity has a social message, [32 ]