(The Christian Century, July 13, 1955) It is this mantle of respectability that many religious faddists find expedient to wear.

But the use of religion as a cloak of respectability does not conceal the world’s moral rottenness. The greatest morals decline in history brands the present religious revival as “hollow.” Though church membership in the United States has grown faster than the population the grim fact remains that crime has grown faster than church membership. Thus Dr. Blake writes: “Today in our country, it is a cause of worry that morality seems to be on a decline at the moment when there appears to be a religious boom.” Then he declares: “Religion without morality is no religion at all.”

So using religion as a blind for moral badness is another of the instruments used by faddists. Of course, there is nothing wrong with such things as the desire for health, the desire for success and the desire for peace. But when they are “made into objects of man’s ultimate concern,” declares Dr. Blake, “then they become idols and their devotees fanatics. Then religion is just a fad, the ‘thing to do.’ Then our faith is but a shadow, a spiritual bust.”

What the modern world is experiencing, then, is a boom all right, but it is a boom in false religion. This in itself is most significant. For a boom of false religion, an precedented number of religious faddists—all this constitutes further evidence of the “last days” sign: “Know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here. For men will be lovers of themselves, . . . having a form of godly devotion but proving false to its power.”—2 Tim. 3:1-5, NW.

“Something Radically Wrong”

Back in 1879 a noted pastor wrote about the lack of mental alertness on the part of a large number of parishioners. Why this mental stagnation? Pastor T. Dewitt Talmage gave his answer in the Christian Herald of January 23, 1879; the answer is enlightening today: “When I was a layman, worshiping in the pews, I noticed that religion was very often associated with dullness. . . . I noticed what every layman notices and remarks, that there is something radically wrong in the Church of God at this day. In our boyhood days we tried every kind of art to keep awake in church. We ate caraway-seed, and cloves, and cinnamon, and held up one foot until it began to ache, and pinched ourselves until we were black and blue. Or we got stimulus from an older brother who stuck us with a pin. . . . What is the use of hiding the fact that there is much sleeping done in the churches? Many of our churches are great Sunday dormitories. Men who are troubled at home with insomnia and cannot sleep on the pillow at night, find in churches sometimes the needed anodyne. If we do not keep our audiences awake, it is the fault of us, the clergy, and not the fault of the people.”

Insight into the Spiritual Famine

Under the heading “Wanted—Good Jokes” a publication called Bowman’s Facts and Fun for Farmers recently contained the following request: “I want all the new, clean, mild or hilarious jokes I can get. I cannot get too many of them.” The request was signed “Rev. R. B. Fisher, Medina, Ohio.”