THE WAR AND THE CHURCHES

BY

JOSEPH McCABE

[ISSUED FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED]

WORKS BY THE AUTHOR

Modern Rationalism (Watts), 2nd ed. 1/-
Peter Abelard (Duckworth), 2nd ed. 3/6.
Saint Augustine and his Age (Duckworth), 2nd ed. 3/6.
Twelve Years in a Monastery (Smith Elder), 3rd ed. 6d. and 1/-
Life in a Modern Monastery (Grant Richards). 6/-
Life and Letters of G. J. Holyoake (Watts), 2 vols. £1/1/-
Talleyrand (Hutchinson). 14/-
The Iron Cardinal (Nash). 12/-
Goethe (Nash). 15/-
A Candid History of the Jesuits (Nash). 10/6.
The Evolution of Mind (Black). 5/-
Evolution (Twentieth Century Science Series). 1/-
Prehistoric Man (Twentieth Century Science Series). 1/-
The Principles of Evolution (The Nation's Library). 1/-
The Decay of the Church of Rome (Methuen), 2nd ed. 7/6.
The Story of Evolution (Hutchinson), 2nd ed. 7/6.
The Empresses of Rome (Methuen). 12/6.
The Empresses of Constantinople (Methuen). 12/6.
Church Discipline (Duckworth). 3/6.
Can we Disarm? (Heinemann). 2/6.
In the Shade of the Cloister (pseudonymous—Constable). 6/-
The Bible in Europe (Watts). 3/6.
The Religion of Woman (Watts), 2nd ed. 6d.
Woman in Political Evolution (Watts). 6d.
Haeckel's Critics Answered (Watts), 2nd ed. 6d.
From Rome to Rationalism (Watts), 4th ed. 4d.
The Origin of Life (Watts). 1/-
Secular Education (Watts), 2nd ed. 1/-
The Martyrdom of Ferrer (Watts), 2nd ed. 6d.
The Religion of the Twentieth Century (Watts). 1/-
A Hundred Years of Education Controversy (Watts). 3d.
The Existence of God (Watts). 9d.
Shakespeare and Goethe (Cole). 6d.
George Bernard Shaw (Kegan Paul). 7/6.
The Religion of Sir Oliver Lodge (Watts). 2/-

PREFACE

The searching crisis through which the nation is passing must have the effect of securing grave consideration for many aspects of our life and institutions. We have already traversed the acute stage of suspense, and are gradually becoming sensible of these wider considerations. It was natural that for a prolonged period the disturbance of our economic conditions, the anxiety for the safety of our nation in face of an appalling menace, the personal concern of millions about the lives of sons or brothers who have bravely responded to the call, should keep our thoughts enchained to the daily or hourly fortunes of the field of battle. Now that the initial disorder has been allayed and we have attained a quiet and reasonable confidence in the issue, we turn to other and broader aspects of this mighty event of our generation. How comes it that the most enlightened century the world has yet seen should be thus darkened by one of the bloodiest and most calamitous wars that have ever spread their awful wings over the life of man? Where is all the optimism of yesterday? Must we reconsider our reasoned boast that our civilisation has lifted the life of man to a level hitherto unattained? Is there something entirely and most mischievously wrong with the foundations of modern civilisation?

A dozen such questions will press for an answer, but it will be granted that one of the most urgent and most interesting of the many grave considerations which the war suggests is its relation to the prevailing creeds and standards of conduct. The war coincides with an advanced stage of what is called the spread of unbelief. In each of the nations of Europe which are engaged in this awful struggle complaints have been made every year for the last two or three generations that Christianity is losing its moral control of the white race. In the cities, especially in the capitals, of Europe there has been a proved and acknowledged decay of church-going; and, however much we may be disposed to think that these millions who no longer attend church retain in their minds the beliefs of their fathers, the slender circulation of religious literature makes it plain that the vast majority of them do not, in point of fact, receive either the spoken or written message of the Christian Church. In the great cities—and it is undoubted that the life of a nation is mainly controlled by its cities—there has been an increasing reluctance to listen to the authoritative exponents of the Christian gospel.

A number of the clergy have very naturally noticed and stressed this coincidence. Prelates of high authority have, as we shall see, even declared that the war is a scourge deliberately laid on the back of mankind by the Almighty on account of this spreading infidelity. As a rule, the clergy shrink from advocating a theory which has such grave implications as this has, and they are content to submit the more plausible suggestion, that the decay of the Christian standard of conduct in the mind of a large proportion of our generation accounts for this tragic combat of nations. A distinguished Positivist writer, Mr. J. Cotter Morison, commenting in the last generation on the decay of Christian belief, expressed some such concern in the following terms:

It is true that in the work from which I quote[1] the learned, if somewhat nervous, Positivist does not, by his masterly survey of the moral history of Europe, afford us the least reason to think that we have really deteriorated from the standard of conduct set us by earlier generations, but his words do tend to press on our notice the claim of many writers, clerical and non-clerical, that we are returning from Christianity to Paganism, from a settled moral discipline to an unhealthy moral scepticism. Can one entirely and safely reconstruct the bases of personal and national conduct in one or two generations?

This very plain and plausible theory is, however, exposed to criticism from other points of view. The clergy as a body are not at all willing to concede that the decay of belief has spread as far as the theory would suggest. In order to suppose that the life of Europe has, in a matter of the gravest importance, been directed by a non-Christian spirit, one must assume that at least the majority in each nation have deserted the traditional creed. It is by no means conceded or established that the fighting nations have ceased to be predominantly Christian.