What the Church Means to Me

To me personally it is hard to know exactly what the Church has meant; it is hard to "know one's self." The attitude of practically all men's minds is to excuse their own shortcomings by attributing the cause elsewhere. Thus Paddy blames the Government for the hole in his trousers, just as he does for the typhoid resulting from the dump heap in front of his own door. When I first essayed to write on this subject, I several times tore up the manuscript, feeling that I had written that which was calculated to rend her at whose breast my own spirit had first found life-giving sustenance and afterwards wisdom, encouragement, and aid.

Yet history seems plainly to show that there have been times when the world would have been more Christian if the organizations to which men often limit the name of church had ceased to exist. I presume the experience we have all had with organizations calling themselves "the Church" has driven us, at times at least, to the same conclusions in our own day about those particular branches. But this bears no reference to the body of men who love Christ better than their own lives. They are really the Church, and mean everything to me, to the world outside, and to all aspirants to the dignity of the name of Christian.