THE RUEAL PROBLEM. 33 



in the development of these institutions. In them meet the local 

 friendly society, the pig chib, the allotment association, &c. In 

 many villages they focus the local social life of a non-religious 

 character. To get in touch with the club is to get in touch with 

 many of the actual or potential leaders of village life. The organi- 

 sation of a county federation for the purpose of developing the 

 work of the clubs is an experiment which might be made by persons 

 of education and broad outlook on life. Meanwhile, the study of 

 the existing clubs, their organisation and finance, the facilities for 

 information and recreation they provide, their general character 

 and condition, would be repaid by much interesting and valuable 

 information. 



THE RURAL CHURCH.* 



* For n. convenient study of the conditions of village churches, see E. N. 

 Bennett, ' I^roblems of Village lAff,' cli. vi. (Home University Liiirar}). 



It is scarcely possible to speak of the village church in the 

 same sense as the village school or the village club. English 

 villages contain religious groups of every description, from the 

 Plymouth Brethren or Christadelphians to the Romanists. But 

 a rough division maj^ be made betAveen the Established Church 

 and the Nonconformists ; and only the social side of church organiza- 

 tion and work will be touched upon. The Established Church is 

 still regarded by most villagers as the dignified organisation for 

 religious purposes. Although they may never attend its services 

 at other times many agricultural labourers would dread to think 

 they might be deprived of its services of baptism, marriage, and 

 burial. But for manj^ village laymen who are attached to theu' 

 church its organisation has obvious drawbacks. Amongst the 

 laity of the villages evangelicalism is still strong, but the layman 

 has less power in many villages than in the to^iis. The clergyman 

 does not regard himself as a religious leader or teacher, but as a 

 religious (and too often as a social) governor and monitor. On 

 this question it may be well to let a clergyman speak. 



" The ordinary village churchman has no interest in the annual 

 Vestry Meeting, or in the business matters of the Church, for he has 

 no real share in. conducting them. Even the services awake in him 

 I little or no affection, unless he be of a pietistic turn of mind, for they 

 are not his except in the sense that they are offered to him. The main- 

 taining of the Parish House of God, the raising and expending of sums 

 of money to which he is invited to contribute, the hours fixed for the 

 different services, the Foreign Missions contributions of the parish — 

 all these are matters in which he has no voice, no control, no real part 

 to play save that of an unconsulted giver and receiver." 



" In larger villages here and tliere a more public spirit may be iovmd, 

 fostered by an exceptional priast ; but, for tlie most part, we would all 

 recognise that the picture above is, roughly speaking, true in the case of 

 most of our small rural parishes."! 



t G. Lacy May: 'A Village Experiment in Christian Fellowship.' — The 

 CommomvecUth, October. 1915. 



