430 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



It is said that the great problem of the country church is that 

 of an adequate support of the ministry. But how can the minis- 

 try be adequately supported? One obvious answer is to reduce 

 the number of churches. This is a good answer, perhaps that is 

 the easiest way ; but it is the second best way. Another way is to 

 build up the community in order that it may furnish adequate 

 membership and adequate support for all the churches. This 

 may be a harder way, but where it is not impossible, it is the best. 



Of course there should be continued emphasis, in the teachings 

 of the church and the pulpit, upon the plain economic virtues of 

 industry, sobriety, thrift, practical, scientific knowledge, and 

 mutual helpfulness ; but much more emhasis than hitherto should 

 be placed on the last two. Practical, scientific knowledge of agri- 

 culture, and mutual helpfulness in the promotion of the welfare 

 of the parish are absolutely essential, and unless the churches 

 can help in this direction they will remain poor and inadequately 

 supported. For those who think that the church should hold 

 itself above the work of preaching the kind of conduct which pays, 

 or the kind of life which succeeds, the economic law stated above, 

 is the strongest argument. 



Organized efforts in the churches for the study of parish 

 economy, for gaining more and more scientific knowledge of agri- 

 culture, for the practical kind of Christian brotherhood which 

 shows itself in the form of mutual helpfulness and cooperation, 

 in the form of decreasing jealousy and suspicion, in the form of 

 greater public spirit, greater alertness for opportunities for pro- 

 moting the public good and building up the parish and the com- 

 munity, in helping young men and young women to get started in 

 productive work and in home building, in helping the children to 

 get the kind of training which will enable them to make a better 

 living in the parish, efforts of this kind will eventually result 

 in better support for the churches themselves, because the com- 

 munity will then be able to support the church more liberally; 

 and, what is more important, it will then see that the church is 

 worth supporting. 



