SUGARCOATING THE CHURCH

However much churches may be accused of not having kept their doctrines up to date, it cannot be denied that they use all available modern devices for enticing unwary sinners to their souls' salvation. On Sundays, the atheist must have a radio of high selectivity to keep hymns and homilies from intruding on the more secular programs which he, in his darkness, prefers to hear. Church fronts are everywhere decorated with lame aphorisms which a well-meaning pastor has composed after the pattern of happier advertising slogans. Long before the Babbitts had dreamed of luncheon clubs, church suppers, preceded and followed by prayer, were a universal institution.

Yet the baiting of the religious trap may be carried to still greater lengths. Last Sunday evening the First Methodist Episcopal church of Lynn managed to gather three thousand people within its walls through the admirable device of showing movies to the congregation and advertising the affair beforehand with electric signs and a trumpeter in fancy dress.

One would like to know the subject matter of the picture shown which bore the non-committal title. "Problem No. 1." Some tendencies in the movie industry seem admirably adapted to church use: for instance, the fondness displayed by deMille and Griffith for such parts of the Bible narratives as are capable of conventional interpretations. "Intolerance", "Salome", "The Ten Commandments" to mention only a few, are on sufficiently scriptural subjects, and, in addition, have other features which, admission gratis, would pack the Basilica of St. Peter itself to the doors. And if the progressive pastor of this Lynn church wishes to extend his new idea to cover ethical and social problems, only animated cartoons will be found unsuitable. It may be assumed that at least a few of the Lynn Methodists did not approve, last Sunday evening: and the curator of the local cemetery might afford an interesting interview on how much he was disturbed by the tumbling and tossing of the church's founders in their century-old graves.