Jane Addams says that on a Sunday night in Chicago one-sixth
of the entire population is packed into 466 places of
entertainment. Churches? No--moving-picture shows! The churches
on Sunday night in Chicago, and, we fear, in many other places,
are not conspicuously crowded. The problem is this: If the
Chicago churches had presented an up-to-date moving-picture
show, instead of a sermon, would the crowd have followed
the films? Inasmuch as the church admission is free and the
theater admission is from five to twenty-five cents, it is
a fair assumption that the churches would have been filled.
Now, if the object of the Sunday-night service is primarily
to reach the crowd on the street, and if, as has been shown,
the moving-picture is a much more vivid and attractive way of
reaching that crowd than is a sermon, why, in all seriousness,
don’t churches give us the thrilling stories of the Old
Testament, its beautiful tales of the New Testament, and its
modern illustrations of Christian heroism in this and other
lands, in the up-to-date form--in moving pictures? They may
answer that they can not get hold of the films and the machine,
but this answer is not a good answer. Excellent sacred pictures
are shown in the present professional entertainments, and many
illustrations of modern heroism, self-sacrifice, and virtue
are in every program. Moreover, a demand for films for church
use would enlarge the supply. Moving-picture machines are not
expensive and can be easily operated. You can do it in your
church. Why don’t you?--_Woman’s Home Companion._
(449)