184 



Missouri Agricultural Report. 



A deserted church. 



found most of the people open-minded. A great many were 

 willing to enter at once into active work for the betterment of 

 the community, and while our church is known as a Methodist 

 Church we have as many Baptists and Presbyterians in our 

 church as we have Methodists — in fact, the majority lies that 

 way. The reason that this community church is Methodist is 

 because this was the established church in the community. 

 Therefore we did the only rational thing — we used the institu- 

 tion that we already had to work with. I feel with considerable 

 satisfaction this success. But, of course, you know there were 

 some who would not do it — you find folks like that — and they 

 said "No, we cannot do that; that church would be all right if 

 it were our kind." They were not willing to co-operate or 

 correlate their interests with us. I did not consider this as 

 defeat, for don't you know I am just optimistic enough to con- 

 cede that these people serve a good purpose, because some of 

 us, you know, get into the altitude of the clouds and we need 

 something to keep us down to earth, and these people serve that 

 purpose. 



Now in this community service, when a church's good inten- 

 tions become known you may lose a certain element of the Chris- 

 tian people who are not broad enough to realize the importance 

 of the situation, but the church is not the loser. This is true 



