The future leadership of the church

Front matter

Book, ^-M( oS '

(xm§AW

COPYRIGHT DEPOSnV

Preface

This book is addressed to the leaders of the Church, both ministers and laymen, and to all others who are deeply interested in the progress of Christianity. It is largely the result of investigations carried on during the past six years in all parts of the world. These studies were undertaken at the suggestion of several ministers who had been impressed by the successful efforts of the Student Volunteer Movement in enlisting strong men as volunteers for the foreign mission fields and who were burdened with a sense of solicitude because of the dearth of able candidates for the home ministry.

The sources of information consulted and the methods employed in the investigation may be briefly indicated. Conferences have been held with companies of the foremost ministers, theological professors, editors of religious

Vi PREFACE

periodicals, and officers of denominational societies in different parts of North America, Europe, Australasia, and South Africa, as well as on all the principal foreign mission fields. Correspondence has been conducted with hundreds of the ministers of the various Christian bodies. Discussions have been carried on at many conventions of theological students; also, in universities of different countries, with young men intending to become ministers. Even more suggestive have been the free and frank discussions with selected groups of young men planning to devote their lives to teaching, law, medicine, literature, engineering, and other lay pursuits. The thousands of interviews held, during a period of twenty years' work in colleges, with young men who have come to talk over their life-work plans have been made tributary to this investigation. With the aid of special helpers there have been examined the proceedings of the ecclesiastical gatherings, the year-books and the periodicals of all the leading denominations of the United States and Canada, as well as the reports of societies dealing with questions bearing on candidates for the ministry, cov-

PREFACE vu

ering a period of one, and in some cases, two or three generations. Similar but less extensive investigations have been made in some foreign countries. Time has been spent in libraries which possess the most complete book and pamphlet literature on the subject of the discovering, enlisting, and training of candidates for the ministry.

Comparatively little of the material accumulated is used in the book. Some may question why more of the statistical data has not been employed; but the further I proceeded in the examination of statistics, the stronger became the impression that in many cases generalizations drawn from such material would be misleading or, at any rate, confusing, and would raise more questions than they would answer. This is due to marked differences in various sections of the same country, in the character of various types of colleges, in the terminology and practices of various denominations, and in the conditions which characterize different periods in rapidly changing countries like the United States and Canada. While the minute study of the evidence obtained in such an investigation has been of distinct help both in viii PREFACE

creating and in correcting impressions, it has seemed best not to present at this time many statistical statements, because the reader, without the opportunity of going over the detailed data, might easily be led to wrong conclusions. A further reason for this course is the desire to fix attention not so much on the numerical aspect of the question under discussion as on that of the character or quality of the men needed for the ministry at this time, for while the question of quantity has a practical bearing on that of quality, it is not essential to the present inquiry.

The larger part of the material here used was first presented in lectures given during the past winter and spring at Toronto under the auspices of the five theological colleges — Knox, McMaster, Trinity, Victoria, and Wyclifife; at Berkeley, California, under the auspices of the theological seminaries of the Pacific Coast ; and at Nashville, Tennessee, under the auspices of the Theological Department of Vanderbilt University. These lectures have been completely revised and enlarged by the use of many new facts and additional considerations.

PREFACE IX

I find it difficult, in fact impossible, to express adequately my sense of obligation and gratitude to the many ministers, professors, editors, and leading laymen who by giving valuable information as v^ell as discerning criticism and generous encouragement have facilitated the work of preparation.

John R. Mott

New York, November, 1908

Contents

1 PAGE

II THE URGENCY 1/

IV V

To secure able men for the Christian ministryis an object of transcendent, urgent, and world-wide concern. It involves the life, the growth, the extension of the Church — the future of Christianity itself.

The Church is a divine institution, founded by Christ and the Apostles. It has done more to purify, enrich, and strengthen mankind than have all other movements. It is still the most powerful and beneficent agency for promoting the cause of morality and religion. It has ever been and yet is not only an ameliorating force that makes life tolerable, but an inspiring force that makes life progressive. Take the Christian Church out of society and it collapses. The Church furnishes the springs of life and power for all other beneficent institutions and movements. It is the root ; they are the branches. Its 3 work is the most enduring ; it deals with the indestructible part of man.^

It is evident that no society of men can hold together and can realize great objects without thoroughly qualified leaders. The Church of Christ is no exception. Wherever the Church has proved inadequate it has been due to inadequate leadership. If the Church is to grow, so as to meet the growing needs of the age, it must have able men in its ministry. Without such leadership there is danger that it will ultimately be reduced to a negligible force. The failure to raise up a competent ministry would be a far greater failure than not to win converts to the Christian faith, because the enlarging of the Kingdom ever waits for leaders of power. What problem of the Church is there to-day which cannot best be solved by enlisting for this calling more men of the highest qualifications? What calamity, next to the withdrawal of Christ's presence, should be more dreaded than to have young men of genius and of large equipment withhold themselves from responding to the call of the Christian ministry? And yet this is the calamity which is impending.

» J. B. Lightfoot, "The Christian Ministry," p. 2.

The statistics of ministerial candidates afford ground for grave concern. In the student year 1894-5 there were in attendance at fifty-eight leading graduate theological schools in the United States 4,004 students, whereas twelve years later there were but 3,304 students, or a falling off of eighteen per cent.^ During this period the communicant membership of the twenty-six largest Protestant denominations increased from 13,351,- 856 to 16,791,948, being an increase of twenty-five per cent. During the same period the white population of the country increased approximately twenty per cent. Between twenty and thirty other statistical studies, made in individual denominations or groups of denominations, reveal in every case either actual decline in the number of candidates or an increase not commensurate with the growth in population. In all my conversations and correspondence with leaders of the various American churches I have learned of no denomination in which there is not a demand for more men of ability for the ministry in all sections of the country.

* Statistics gathered by the Commission on the Divinity School of the University of Chicago, Professor E. D. Burton, Secretary.

This problem is one confronting the Church in all parts of the world. In Canada the situation is not as serious as in the United States. Nevertheless, correspondence with more than two hundred ministers in all parts of the Dominion, and conferences with theological professors, editors, and clergymen has made plain that this is already a very real problem in every communion, and one that is likely to become more and more acute and threatening with the rapid increase in population and the growing absorption of the Canadian people in the material development of the country.

While in Great Britain in 1905, I had a series of conferences on this subject with companies of Christian leaders. The Archbishop of Canterbury called together a group of men in the Church of England deeply interested in the matter, and afforded an opportunity to discuss it with them. The President of the Council of Free Churches brought together for the same purpose a number of leaders in the Free Churches in London. Both at Oxford and at Cambridge conferences were held with Anglican professors and tutors, and with Free Church professors and ministers. Likewise, in Edinburgh and Glasgow there were gatherings of theological professors and ministers of the different churches. A similar group came together at Cardiff in Wales. The evidence brought out in this series of discussions revealed the fact that, though the dearth of well-qualified candidates is greater in England than in Scotland and Wales, there was practical agreement among the Christian leaders of all three nationalities that more of the keenest and most gifted young men are needed for the work of the ministry.

In 1907 the Archbishop of Canterbury appointed a committee to examine into the supply and training of candidates for Holy Orders in the Church of England. According to the report of this committee there has been during the twenty-two years since 1886 a steady decline in the number of candidates ordained in the Provinces of Canterbury and York, from 814 in 1886 to 587 in 1907, aggregating a total falling off in twenty-two years of 3,124. The committee further call attention to the fact that, if the growth in population be taken into consideration, the total shortage for this period stands at 5,324. They also point out that the number of deacons ordained to every 100,000 of the population of

England and Wales was, in 1881, 2.^', but in 1901, only 1.7.^

On the Continent, with the exception of Holland and parts of Scandinavia where I was told by the leaders with whom I consulted that no difficulty was experienced in securing an adequate number of well-qualified men, the supply of satisfactory candidates for the ministry by no means equals the demand. In Germany there has been for some time a steady falling off in the number of theological students. In 1881 there were attending the Protestant theological faculty of the German universities nine young men to every one hundred thousand of the population of the country. Twenty-five years later, that is in 1906, there were but five to every one hundred thousand. The following table ^ shows the marked decline in the number of Protestant

theological students in the German universities:

1890-1 1906-7

Protestant theological students 4,190 2,208

Catholic theological students 1,232 1,708

Law students 6,670 12,146

Medical students 8,381 7,098

Philosophical students 7,886 17,219

Total number of students 28,359 4°, 3 79

1 " The Supply and Training of Candidates for Holy

Schneider, p. 337.

During my visits to Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa within the past six years, I made it a point to investigate this question, and discovered that in each one of these countries one of the greatest needs was that of having more of the ablest young men devote their lives to the service of the Church. Everywhere the fact was deplored that the colonial churches had been unable to recruit a ministry of their own, and that they were so largely dependent on the unsatisfactory plan of looking to the churches in the mother country for ministers. The only exception is the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa, which for many years has had a remarkable record. In no part of the world, in fact, not even in Scotland, have I found a church which in recent years has succeeded in attracting to the ministry so many of the finest type of its young men.

In conferences of missionaries and native Christian leaders conducted during the past six years in foreign mission fields of Asia, Africa, and Latin America there was universal testimony that the most difficult and important problem in the evangelization of the world is that of securing an able native Christian ministry.

lo FUTURE LEADERSHIP OF THE CHURCH

Therefore, let it be reiterated that the question of securing a sufficient number of well-qualified recruits for the ranks of the Christian ministry is of world-wide interest and concern.

While in almost every land and church there is a demand for larger numbers of ministerial candidates, even more imperative is the appeal for men of strength to consecrate themselves to this calling. Even in the comparatively few denominations where there are apparently enough ministers, it is conceded that there is need of more ministers of large caliber and possessing gifts of leadership. As the progress of the Christian religion is of the most fundamental and vital interest, it must not be committed to the charge of incompetent hands. The work of the ministry is so comprehensive that it requires strong men to carry it on. As the Rev. Ozora S. Davis, of New Britain, Connecticut, expressed the point : " I do not conceive my work as that of a professional teacher, preacher, visitor, organizer, comforter, priest, reformer, or even prophet. It is something of all of these; but is something more than the sum of all these." Such a work calls for all-round, symmetrical, thoroughly furnished men.

THE PROBLEM II

The distinctive emphasis is placed, therefore, on the need of men of ability rather than upon the need for greater numbers. What is meant by men of ability? Men of personal force or strength of personality. Men of sound physical constitution who have the requisite common sense and self-control to care for the body, thus insuring its best working efficiency. Men of mental power and proper habits of study, determined not to stagnate intellectually. They should have the ability to appreciate and the will to employ the best methods of study ; this is more important than the most coveted university degrees. They should be men possessing the ability to express sympathy and friendship. They should have a genuine religious experience. Ministers who do not know Christ at first hand, who do not have a clear and vital faith, cannot speak with that tone of authority which should characterize the pulpit. They must have a message and the consciousness of a mission. They should be able to give effective expression to their passion for Christ and for men. They should be men of intense moral enthusiasm. Men with hearts aflame with the passion of the Cross and ready to stake everything on their cause will succeed.

The modern ministry requires men of heroic spirit like Knox, by whose grave it could be said, " Here lies one who never feared the face of man." ^ They should also be able to organize, lead, and inspire others to work. The growing lay forces of the churches need to be marshaled and guided. Above all, ministers should be great in character — men whose lives are modeled upon the life of Christ and are yielded unreservedly to His sway. ** The only profession which consists in being something," said President Woodrow Wilson with fine insight, " is the ministry of our Lord and Saviour — and it does not consist of anything else. It is manifested in other things, but it does not consist of anything else." ^ This point is more important now than ever before, because the world is losing respect for the ministerial office, though not for the man who ministers. The age has produced a new viewpoint. The minister is respected not because he is a minister, but because he is a man who answers to the test required of the representative of the Christ. "If our religion is to

* James Stalker, "John Knox: His Ideas and Ideals," p. 94.

2 From an address at a Conference of students of Eastern

colleges, held at Hartford Theological Seminary in April, 1906.

be great and to do great things, it must be in the care of great souls, — souls great in illumination and in intense and pure desire," ^

^ George A. Gordon, "The Claims of the Ministry upon Strong Men," in "The Ministry as a Profession" (addresses delivered before the Divinity Club of the Harvard Divinity School), p. 6.

II

" I WANT to live/' said Phillips Brooks, shortly before his death, and gave as his reason that the next twenty years would offer greater opportunities for the Christian minister than any other like period in history.^ As one contemplates even the regular functions of this calling, one must be convinced that in vital importance there is no work comparable to the Christian ministry: to preach Christ; to lead men to become disciples of Christ as their Divine Saviour and Lord; to build them up in Christian faith and Christian character; to minister to them in the deepest experiences as well as in the ordinary needs of life; to enlist, train, and energize Christian workers; to organize and administer the varied activities of the Church. But to appreciate fully the scope and possibilities of the

1 " The Congregationalist;' Vol. LXXVIII, p. 246. 17 ministry, one must keep in mind some special considerations emphasizing the reasons why more young men of abiHty should enter this calling. The stronger the man the greater the obligation to heed the claims of this high calling in the Church, because weak men or even men of average ability cannot meet the requirements of able leadership. For men who are really capable there are more great openings in this service of the Christian Church than in any other department of our modern world. If the Church is to meet successfully the momentous problems which press upon it now with great insistence, there must be an increase in the number of competent men forthcoming for the Christian ministry.

Men of talent and consecration are needed to guide the religious thinking of the people and to help meet their intellectual dififiiculties concerning religious subjects. It is a time of theological readjustment and restatement. It is a period of uncertainty and unrest with reference to religious truth. The critical spirit is asserting itself with great vigor and is calling in question fundamental doctrines and even accepted rules of conduct. Many Christians who do little or no real thinking for themselves on such matters need to be enlightened and confirmed in regard to vital points of faith. This must be done with wisdom, or more questions may be raised than answered. Others within the churches, including some of the most intelligent and thoughtful, are perplexed and troubled by serious doubts and questionings. They need competent and sympathetic guidance in thinking, reading, and investigating, and above all in the spheres of personal experience and service — ^the great solvents of so many doubts. He that doeth shall know.

Neither ignorant and blatant infidelity nor more or less ably reasoned skepticism and agnosticism can be ignored by the ministry, but must be understood and met with scholarly thoroughness and fairness and always in the Christian spirit.^ Such an alliance as one finds on the continent of Europe between the socialist propaganda and current unbelief must be averted in North America, or the consequences will be most serious to the nation as well as to the Church. The widespread rehgious indiffer-

1 D. S. Cairns, in "Preparation for the Christian Ministry in View of Present-day Conditions," pp. 9, 10.

ence which is more largely due to uncertainty about Christian truth among Christians themselves than is generally reaHzed, must be dealt with at the sources. Large service can be rendered by all who help to restate the old facts and unchanged truths in terms that will make them vivid and vital to others; and who assist in the work of theological restatement which is a requirement of every age. It should be added that such restatement is needed and demanded at no other time so much as in an age dominated by the scientific spirit.

It requires men of constructive ability to grapple successfully with such conditions, to think clearly through the problems and to guide the Church safely past the rocks and rapids. " A time when people in an unprecedented degree are thinking, can be guided by those only who can think straight and can report their thought with power.'' ^ Men who ignore or minimize the existence and gravity of the intellectual unrest in the realm of religious thought, and who are not ready to do the hard, constructive, and courageous work necessary to

» Francis G. Peabody, "The Call to Theology," The Harvard Theological Review^ Vol. I, p. 4.

meet the need, are not qualified to be guides and leaders. It is encouraging to note that never before have men longed more for confident spiritual guidance and reHgious leadership; but only those can actually guide and lead who themselves know what men are questioning and suffering, who understand the point of view of those whom they would help, and who can speak to them in the language of their day.^ While it is essential now as always that men in the ministry should be men of integrity of character, of real spirituality, and of practical working efficiency, there is imperative need that in addition to these qualities they shall be men of intellectual authority and leadership.^ In the United States and Canada, where we are so bent on being practical and are so prone to magnify external agencies and great activity, there is special need of men of very thorough intellectual equipment. We need more men in positions of leadership in the Church who can show that a full intellectual equipment is not inconsistent

^ P. T. Forsyth, " Positive Preaching and the Modern Mind," p. 179. •

2 J. R. Illingworth, "The Church and Human Thought in the Present Day," in "Pan-Anghcan Papers" (being problems for consideration at the Pan-Anglican Congress in 1908).

with deep Christian experience and with fervor in promulgating positive Christian truth.

Thoroughly furnished men are required in the ministry to develop the teaching and training side of the work of the Church.^ The teaching function of the ministry must be emphasized, for it constitutes in some respects the most enduring and satisfying work that the minister does. But even more should the fact be emphasized that each church is an institution of learning and a training school. If large and lasting results are to be secured, attention must be concentrated more than ever upon the religious instruction of the youth. Modern psychology is emphasizing the first importance of bringing the influence of the Church to bear during the age of adolescence. The discussions of the Religious Education Association have made plain that the Church should devote more attention to her duty as teacher, both of the youth and of those of mature years.

The minister has the responsibility of supervising the religious education of the entire parish. He may guide the home in its plans of moral and religious culture. He may inspire

» J. B. Lightfoot, "The Christian Ministry," p. 22.

parents with higher ideals in child-training. He may make the Sunday school a real school, conducted with such modern methods and such thorough spirit as not to suffer in comparison with the best secular institutions of learning. This is all the more necessary because of the absence of religious instruction in our common secular schools. He may organize and stimulate home and foreign mission study classes, and clubs for the consideration of various other problems and opportunities of his church. He may conduct normal classes for the training of teachers and leaders of different classes, clubs, and activities. He may increase greatly the faithbuilding and character-building effectiveness of his preaching by making it conform more fully to the principles of modern psychology and approved pedagogy. The pulpit that teaches has always commanded respect, and in this age, when education and the work of the teacher are more exalted than ever, it cannot fail to hold its place secure. This applies particularly to expository preaching which should be given greater prominence in the modern pulpit. This intensive work, this building work, this highly multiplying work of teaching and training, if it is to be sound, that is, if it is to be in accordance with the settled principles of psychology and pedagogy, both as carried on by the minister himself and as promoted by others through him, requires that he be a man of capacity and that he himself be thoroughly equipped for the task. Strong men are needed in the ministry to-day to lay secure Christian foundations for the new states and provinces in the great West. This undertaking calls loudly and imperatively for Christian leadership. It is one of our most pressing tasks. New American states and Canadian provinces have been formed within half a generation and are still plastic. Others are actually being created. The opening in the United States of nearly, if not quite, a score of reservations, beginning in 1906 and still in process, offers millions of acres of good land for settlement. Improved means of agriculture are making available for profitable cultivation immense tracts between the Missouri and the Rockies, as well as in the older sections of the country.^ The redemption of waste places by

^ The reports by S. A. Knapp on " Farmer's Cooperative Demonstration Work," as carried on by the United States Department of Agriculture and by the General Education new and extensive schemes of irrigation is creating out of the very wilderness the equivalent of entire states.

President Frank K. Sanders has shown in his document, " The Newest West," that the situation caused by these new conditions is extremely urgent. He insists that in less than half a generation the stamp will have been given to the character of the civilization of this important part of the country. The influence of Christianity should be brought to bear upon these new, and especially upon these newest, territories before they become set or crystallized. What ideals shall dominate them — those of materialism, greed, pleasure-seeking worldliness, and irreverence, or those of righteousness, unselfishness, and godly fear? The answer concerns not only these states and provinces, some of which at no distant date will exceed in population and productive power entire European nations, but the whole United States and Canada, of which they form organic parts. On grounds of patriotism it is a matter of profound concern to the citizens of these nations

Board, suggest the vast undeveloped agricultural possibilities of the country.

whether the religion of Jesus Christ shall actually determine the character of their civilization, practices, and life. Christians should be stimulated by the zeal and activity of the Mormons in their efforts to extend their influence in the new territories and states.

The minister as a Christian preacher and teacher can do more than anyone else to influence their civiHzation and life. The work of Christian foundation laying is difficult and demands the wisest men. None are too good for this work of constructive statesmanship. May a sufficient number of young men be forthcoming to accompHsh the task! The efforts put forth during the next two decades will be vastly more productive than those during the subsequent two generations if we neglect to improve the immediate opportunity. One realizes the great importance of this work as he recalls the influence exerted by the Puritan ministers, including scores of graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, at the formative stage of New England.^ The itinerant preachers of early Methodism profoundly influenced the civilization of the frontier settlements. Bishop Asbury and other

1 John Fiske, "The Beginnings of New England," p. no.

traveling ministers of his day inculcated respect for law and held up high ideals of Christian citizenship in the new states which they visited. What does not Ohio owe to the fact that in its plastic period men like Lyman Beecher, Charles G. Finney, and James Hoge identified themselves with its life. Think of the influence wielded by the band of eleven Yale men who in 1829 went out to plant Christian civilization in northern and central Illinois; and of the impress of the Andover Band of nine men on the commonwealth of Iowa in its early history. Recall, also, the wonderful work accomplished by Marcus Whitman in the Pacific Northwest, by Bishop Whipple in Minnesota, and by James Robertson, Alexander Grant, and George Mc- Dougall in the Canadian West. Nor should we overlook the service rendered the nation by those devoted men, chiefly ministers, who built up the Christian colleges of the Eastern, Western, and Southern states without which no sufficient ministry could have been provided for these sections.

It will require in the ministry more young men possessing the qualities of true leadership, if the Church is to do her part in assimilating the increasing immigration. There are in the United States to-day nearly thirty millions of people who are either foreigners or of foreign parentage. The immigration to both the United States and Canada is increasing, and with more rapidity during the past decade than at any time in the history of these two countries. More have come to the United States in the past seven years than in the first seventy years of the life of the Republic. Many more people were added to Canada during the past two years than were to be found in all Upper and Lower Canada at the end of the fifty years following the French and Indian War. Canada added last year nearly enough immigrants to make a new Toronto ; and the United States has been adding enough every two years to make a new Chicago. Although during the past year there has been a marked check in immigration into the United States, the causes of the arrest are transient, while those of the previous influx are constant. In Canada while the Anglo-Saxon element still largely predominates in the immigration, the streams from other parts of Europe have begun to set in, and it may be safely predicted that they will constantly increase. Already over fifty nationalities and countries are represented in this immigration. That of the United States is vastly more varied and representative, being drawn as it is from all of the primary racial groups of the world. In 1882, Western Europe furnished eighty-seven per cent of America's immigration ; in 1902, only twenty-two per cent. In contrast, notice that in 1882, Southeastern Europe and Asiatic Turkey furnished only thirteen per cent of the immigration, but in 1902, seventy-eight per cent. In other words, the sources of our immigration, which were once chiefly Protestant, have become predominantly Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, and Jewish.^ This new immigration is obviously composed of classes not easily assimilated. In far too many cases these people come to us unprepared to absorb readily our national and religious ideas or to sympathize with our characteristic traditions and ideals. Different sections of this immigration are massing together in our large cities, and in some cases in rural districts, thus constituting, as it were, states within the state, having languages, customs, and ideals differing from those of the surrounding