Reformed Presbyterian Minutes of Synod 1929

REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH 39Lovers of gain rather than of God organize to make merchandizeof it. And lovers of pleasure more than of their Lord andMaster, or even of their own souls, while away its hours inidleness or sinful indulgences. Well may we humble ourselvesbefore God and pray over this.Nor less to be lamented and prayed over is the indifference,and in many instances the opposition, particularly of those inhigh governmental and in some instances ecclesiastical positions,to the use of God's Word in our influential system of free publiceducation. Well may we entreat God to stay the hand of thelegislator, judge, governor, attorney general, school superintendent,rabbi, Catholic or mistaken Protestant who would robour youth, and particularly the half and more of them who neverdarken a church door, of so good a book as the Bible.Our continued irrational system of marriage and divorcelaws with all their train of evils is also a matter for humiliation,confession and prayer. To say nothing of our marriage lawsother than they are the very worst in all occidental civilization,the constantly increasing grind of the divorce mill is a significantsymptom of unrest, dissatisfaction and unhappiness in familylife. And the great disturbing element in connection withit is the steady increase year by year for the past three quartersof a century of the number of divorces granted—mostly unscriptural—overand above the increase in population and especiallyin the number of marriages performed, until that proportion hasnow reached one divorce to every six and twenty-five hundredthsmarriages, as against one to every fifty or more a half centuryago. To every thoughtful person it must be plainly manifestthat unless some remedy be provided to check this disruption ofthe family, our future as a people is anything but bright.The war lords rn our own and other countries keep up theirhue and cry for more and larger navies and armies, and the sumtotal of it all is that the nations of the earth—sad to say—maintaina larger fighting force today than at any previous time inthe history of the world. Nor will the restoration of the pope'stemporal power, whatever else it may or may not do, have anytendency whatever to check this war mania.The general prevalence—world-wide—of the spirit of lawlessness,until in our own country it has claimed the attentionspecially of our chief executive, is a matter of concern to everylover of law and liberty.Furthermore, a great basic evil of all that we have named isthe continued and persistent neglect if not indeed refusal of ournation openly to recognize and acknowledge Him who is therightful Lord and ruler of all nations as its supreme head andto accept His will as the rule of national life and the standardof national conduct in dealing with all its problems internal andexternal, national and international.of better that heritages Christian many And for a the thousand of last, forbears. of the sake truth but churches of times by that mere Desirable no seem over means have outward that to and come least, be the all and ready down the as churches formal present-day to to surrender them remain union the from indicationsis the separate leaders it great their were