1925

The new parish organization seems to be working splendidly. The congregation is divided into nine sections, each with a man and woman as parish leaders. Each section meets twice a year in cottage meetings, and meanwhile the leaders and their assistants visit the various families, particularly the new members and those who are sick. Some splendid new leaders have already been developed by this plan. Since I must be absent from the city so much, the plan is all the more valuable.

Last Sunday we discussed in the class whether a church ought to develop fellowship for its own sake or whether fellowship ought to be the inevitable by-product of unifying convictions. I suppose a small church in a hostile environment would not have to worry about fellowship. If people fight shoulder to shoulder they will be brothers. But even the most heroic church is not so definitely in conflict with the society in which it lives that you can really count on that kind of fellowship. A local congregation is, after all, a social organism in which heroic idealism is expressed in an occasional adventure, if at all, rather than in a constant tension between its principles and the moral mediocrities of the world.

Meanwhile, it seems to me to be worth while to cultivate the graces of neighborliness merely for their own sake. This is particularly true in the large city where life is so impersonal and where the church has a fine opportunity to personalize it a little. What surprises me is the readiness with which people give themselves to various forms of mutual aid once they are prompted to engage in them.

Most people lack imagination much more than they lack good will. If someone points out what can be done and what ought to be done there is usually someone to do it.