Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

there was a flood tide of readiness for action, which we were unfortunately unable to utilize.

4. Each convention has made a distinct and permanent contribution to the literature of religious education, partly through its program and more fully through the valuable report of its proceedings.

A great convention has at least three distinct objectives:

I. The missionary aim. It is worth while to go where an interest is to be aroused.

2. The educational aim. It is worth while to get together, in order that the thinking of our very brainiest men may be brought to bear upon our problems.

3. The inspirational aim. A convention formulates in the most impressive way the ideas for which the Association stands.

There is no question, therefore, of the necessity of such great gatherings, nor of their value. Without them we can neither hold nor increase our constituency. Without them we cannot properly impress the country with the significance of

our movement.

We need to consider the frequency, the location and the character of these gatherings. It was originally declared by the Executive Board that it would be wise to hold four or five great annual conventions until the country had been thoroughly interested in our work. Then they expected to consider with care the question of biennial conventions. They also considered in a general way the geographical limits of such conventions. It must be remembered that the great bulk of our supporters are in the East, and it may be that for some time no convention should go west of Ohio. Geographically the most available part of the country would be eastern or central New York.

The question of the character of a convention has been frequently discussed. Is it for the presentation of a theme, or for the discussion of practical methods? It will be remembered that the Philadelphia Convention discussed the Bible in practical life, and the Boston Convention the aims of religious education. The plan of these conventions produced in the report of the proceedings a very thorough and adequate treatment of these subjects. It would seem advisable to continue this general plan so far as the conventions are concerned. It is keenly

felt, however, by those who attend our conventions that we devote too large a portion of available time to set addresses, giving too little opportunity for suggestions from the floor.

On the whole, it is my judgment that we should hold at least two more annual conventions-one in 1907 and one in 1908; that they should be located where they will bring together the largest number of our own membership, and will serve to increase popular interest in the work we have undertaken; that a program should be arranged by the president on the same general principles which have hitherto obtained, but that great care should be taken to reserve as much opportunity as possible in the morning sessions for free discussion.

During these two years it will be feasible and wise to hold many subsidiary gatherings, one in each district, which will be gatherings specifically for the purpose of consultation. After these two years have elapsed, I should be definitely in favor of a biennial convention, it being understood that in the year in which no convention is held there shall be held at least two or three gatherings of the type which we are finding useful today -gatherings for consultation, for the review of the work actually done, for surveying the future and for adopting working plans of proved efficiency.

The Annual Convention

Discussion, opened by

REV. WILLIAM C. BITTING, D. D.
Pastor Second Baptist Church, St. Louis, Missouri

It is worth while to consider present reaction against the annual convention habit, due to the problem of hospitality, the demands on the time of participants, and the question as to the need for annual emphasis. Do conventions make adequate return for the various kinds of expenditure? Perhaps the time is not yet ripe for us to abandon yearly meetings. Conventions should either sum up experience in popular scientific form, or create propaganda, or do both. Places of meeting should be selected with reference to the purpose of the convention, and in all cases should be strategic. Programs should be concrete in general meetings, and both expert and concrete in departmental sessions. They should be arranged about a single theme, to secure both unity and some specific contribution to the work and literature of religious education. Some general sessions should be given, in part at least, to departments that have done work justifying such general interest. These selected departments should rotate in the honor of occupying general sessions. The Council should get to work on something practical. The chief immediate function of the Association is to inspire interest in Religious Education, and its conventions should be energetic in that purpose. Any one of the four great themes of President King's last book on "Rational Living" would make a timely topic. A discussion and investigation of "The Place of Emotions in the Religious Life" is sorely needed now. Since the departments are differentiated along various lines it is perhaps impossible to find a theme that will enlist the investigating energy of them all. Since we wish to interest every person in our work, our convention subjects should be concrete, and we should not avoid the missionary idea in selecting either places of meeting, topics or speakers. Perhaps a chain of topics closely related, covering three or four years, would be advantageous. Departments could then have time for work and the results of their work would be worthy of publicity. Several could make contributions each year. Continuity of purpose and accumulation of effect would result.

Methods of Work of the Departments

MRS. ANDREW MacLEISH

Executive Secretary, Home Department, Glencoe, Illinois

As regards methods of work, there is a distinct line of cleavage between those departments of the Religious Education Association which are working in organized territory, as schools, colleges and theological seminaries, and those whose field is entirely unorganized, pre-eminent among which is the department of the Home. In the first class there are definite lines through which work may be done, existing bodies to which and through which appeal may be made. In the second, the field is the world, but it is as trackless as was the world in the days of Herodotus. Some homes of course are reached by religious and denominational papers, but they are those in which the importance of religion is more or less recognized, and some form of religious life is already maintained. The great mass of non-. Christian homes are open to no one influence, unless it be that of the public press. The problem, then, of such departments as the Home becomes not only to prepare material for its work, but also to secure a channel through which that material may be made effective.

I am sure I can contribute to this discussion nothing more helpful than an account of the experiences of the Home Department during the past two years in its attempt to arrive at some line of work which would be feasible.

As to the matter of organization: After trying for a year to manage our affairs with an executive committee scattered all the way from New York to Minneapolis, and with consequent delays of from one to three months between the writing of letters and the receipt of their answers, we have reorganized upon a more workable basis. We now have an executive committee consisting of five beside the chairman and executive sec

retary living in Chicago or its suburbs. Of this number three are women and two men. With these committee members all in one city it is possible to have fairly frequent meetings. In addition to this central committee, we have what we call an advisory committee made up of specialists in child study and psychology and those particularly interested in the religious education of the young. These advisory members are scattered all over the country and we not only expect that they will serve in an advisory capacity, but we hope that, as the work of the department develops, each one may become a center of interest, and to some extent a new working center in his or her part of the country. Moreover, they can keep us in touch with conditions. and needs in different sections, and also with existing organizations working along similar lines with which we can affiliate, or which we might persuade to study with us the problems of better religious and moral training in the home.

This last suggestion leads us at once into the second division of our subject, Departmental Membership. We hope that as we are able to interest individuals and clubs in the work of our department we may succeed in persuading many to join the Religious Education Association as members of the Home Department. Also when we have really done something that seems to us in some small measure worthy, and have definite and practicable plans to set forth, we would like to publish a short and simple statement to circulate through the membership of the Association, asking those who are interested, and willing to give some help, to join us in our special line of work.

Coming to our third sub-head, that of Finance, we reach the really vital point. This Association has been in existence. long enough to convince all its workers that its opportunities are boundless. From all over the country is rising a cry of need for just what the Association ought to be able to offer, for just that for which it exists. There has been no difficulty in enlisting the help of able and earnest workers. Indeed the wonder has been that earnest and far-seeing men and women of every shade of religious belief have so quickly ranged themselves in the ranks of the Religious Education Association. Truly the harvest is great and the laborers are not few, but at this stage of civilization the labor of the individual workers cannot be rap

« AnteriorContinuar »