CHURCH AND PARISH
THEORETICALLY, the church is a pure democracy, a mighty family. There,
if anywhere, the rich and the poor meet together on terms of absolute
equality.
In that least poetical of pious jingles,—
“Blest be the tie that binds,”—
we declare that
“The fellowship of kindred minds
Is like to that above.”
These and other Pietistic platitudes, whether tame or tuneful, are
technical, and so nearly meaningless as not to provoke debate. Every
reasonable man and woman knows and does not affect to conceal his or
her consciousness of the truth that social distinctions are not effaced
by the enrolment of rich and poor, educated and illiterate, refined and
boorish, in impartial order upon the “church books.” True religion
_does_ refine feeling and engender benevolence and charitable judgment
of our fellows. In doing this, it creates a common ground of sympathy,
as of belief. It elevates the moral and spiritual nature. Of itself, it
does not enrich the intellect, or polish manners. One may have a clean
heart and dirty flesh-and-blood hands; may be a sincere and earnest
Christian, yet double his negatives, shove his food into his mouth with
his knife, prefer the corner of a table-cloth to a napkin, and be an
alien in the matter of finger-bowls.
It is possible that two women may work together harmoniously in church
and parish associations, each esteeming the other’s excellent qualities
of heart and enjoying the fellowship of her “kindred mind,” and yet
that both should be intensely uncomfortable if forced into reciprocal
social relations that have nothing to do with church or charity.
[Sidenote: THE REASONABLE VIEW]
These are plain facts no reasonable person will dispute. In view of
them the fact, equally patent, that the Newlyrich clan sometimes resort
to church connection as a lever to raise them to a higher social plane,
is one of the anomalies of human intercourse that may well stir the
satirist to bitter ridicule and move compassionate beholders to wonder.
“When they begin to feel their oats they go off to you!” laughed the
keen-witted, sweet-natured pastor of a down-town church to a brother
clergyman whose flock worshiped in a finer building and a fashionable
neighborhood. “The sheep with the golden fleece always finds a breach
in our church-wall.”
It takes him, his ewe and his lambs, a long time to learn that pew
proximity does not bring about social sympathy. It is not a week since
I saw a girl, a thoroughbred from crown to toe, flush in surprise and
draw herself up in unconscious hauteur, when a flashily-dressed young
person greeted her across the vestibule of a concert-room with “Hello,
Nellie! didn’t we have a bully time last night?”
They had attended a Sunday-school anniversary, and, as their classes
were side by side, had exchanged remarks in the intervals of
recitations, songs and addresses. The parvenu’s clothes were more
costly than “Nellie’s;” her father was richer; _they were members of
the same church_! To her vulgar mind these circumstances gave her the
right to take a liberty with a slight acquaintance such as no well-bred
person would have dreamed of assuming.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: YOUR PEW NEIGHBOR]
First, then, I place among the maxims of church and parish etiquette:
Do not imagine that your next-pew neighbor must be your friend. If she
be a newcomer and a stranger in the congregation, bow to her in meeting
in lobby or in aisle cordially, recognizing her as a fellow worshiper
in a temple where all are welcome and equal. If you can be of service
to her in finding the place of hymn or psalm, should she be at a loss,
perform the neighborly service tactfully and graciously,—always because
you are in the House of the All-Father, and are His children,—not that
you seek to court a mortal’s favor for any ulterior purpose.
In meeting her on the street, let your salutation be ready and
pleasant, but not familiar. Don’t “Hello, Nellie!” her, then or ever,
while bearing in mind that non-recognition of one you know to be a
regular attendant at the same church with yourself, yet a comparative
stranger there, is unkind and un-Christian.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE STRANGER IN CHURCH]
The case is different if you are the stranger. Friendly advances should
come from the other side. If they are not made, there is nothing for
you to do but to content yourself with the recollection that you go to
church to worship God, not to make acquaintances. Never depend on your
church-connection for society. If you find congenial associates there,
rejoice in the happy circumstance and make the most of it. If you do
not, do not rail at the congregation as “stiff and stuck up,” at the
church as a hollow sham, and the pastor as an unfaithful shepherd.
The expectation on the part of some people that he should neglect the
weightier matters of the law and the gospel, and prostitute his holy
office by becoming a social pudding-stick for incorporating into “a
jolly crowd” the divers elements of those to whom he is called to
minister, disgraces humanity and civilization—not to say Christianity.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: PEW HOSPITALITY]
Pew hospitality has fallen into disuse to a great extent of late
years, principally on account of the usher-service. The tendency of
this partial desuetude is to make pew owners utterly careless of their
obligation to entertain strangers. Regard for the best interests of
your particular church-organization should suggest to you as a duty
that you notify the usher in your aisle of your willingness to receive
strangers into your pews whenever the one or two vacant seats there
may be needed. If your family fills them all every Sunday, you can not
exercise the grace of hospitality.
When one or two, or three, are to be absent from either service,
however, take the trouble to apprise the oft-sorely-perplexed official
of the fact, and give him leave to bring to your door any one he has to
seat. When the stranger appears, let him see at once that you esteem
his coming a pleasure. Give him a good seat, a book and a welcome
generally.
By this behavior you commend to his favor your church, human nature and
the cause dearest to your heart.
If you are the visiting worshiper, and it is evident that the other
occupants of the pew are the owners thereof, make courteous and
grateful acknowledgment at the close of the service, of the hospitality
you have received. I hope the return you get will not be the cold
supercilious stare one true gentlewoman had from the holder of a pew
in the middle aisle of a fashionable church in New York. The guest put
into Mrs. Haut Ton’s pew thanked the latter simply and gracefully for
the opportunity given her of hearing an admirable sermon.
“Who are you that dare address _me_!” said the silent stare. “It is bad
enough to have _my_ pew invaded by an unvouched-for stranger without
being subjected to the impertinence of speech!”
The last place upon God’s earth where incivility and the arrogance of
self-conceit are admissible is His house. “Be pitiful,” writes the
apostle who learned his code of manners from One who has been not
irreverently called “the truest gentleman who ever lived.” “Be pitiful;
be courteous!”
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE PASTOR’S FAMILY]
[Sidenote: THE PASTOR’S CALL]
The relations of parishioner and the pastor’s family are often
strained hard by the popular misconception of the social obligations
existing—or that should exist—between them. In no “call” that I ever
heard of is the clergyman enjoined to cater to the whims and vanities
of exacting members by visits that are not demanded by spiritual
or temporal needs, and which minister to nothing but the aforesaid
jealous vanity. Send for a clergyman when his priestly offices are
required. For the rest of his precious time let him come as he likes,
and go whither he considers his duty calls him. He was a man before
he took orders, and the man has social rights. Let him “neighbor,” as
old-fashioned folk used to say, with his kind.
The aforesaid “call” makes no mention of his family. If you like
to call on them when they come to the parish, and if you find them
congenial—your congeners, in fact—keep up the association as you would
with your doctor’s, or your lawyer’s family. That you belong to Doctor
Barnabas’ parish, that you are the wife or daughter of an officer in
his church, gives you absolutely no claim on his wife or daughters
beyond what you, individually, possess. To demand that Mrs. Barnabas,
refined in every instinct, highly educated and with tastes for what
is best and highest in social companionship, should be bullied and
patronized by Mrs. Million, a purse-proud vulgarian, unlearned and
stupid, is sheer barbarity. Yet we see it—and worse—in many American
churches.
[Sidenote: A FALSE ASSUMPTION]
Do you, sensible and amenable reader, lead the way to better things;
loosen at least one buckle of the harness that bows many a fine
spirit to breaking, and makes the church a smoke in the nostrils of
unprejudiced outsiders. Separate ecclesiastical from social relations.
Owe your right to call a fellow parishioner “friend,” and to visit
at manse or parsonage, or rectory, to what you _are_—not to the
adventitious circumstance of being a member in good standing in a
fashionable, or an unfashionable, church. Exact no consideration from
those who belong with you to the household of faith on the ground of
that spiritual “fellowship.” The position is false; the claim ignoble.
* * * * *
No matter what church one is in, one should always try to conform as
far as possible to its order of worship. Not to do this shows a want of
proper reverence.