E-text prepared by Stacy Brown Thellend, Kevin Handy, John Hagerson, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN THE FAMILY by HENRY F. COPE General Secretary of the Religious Education Association The University of Chicago Press Chicago, Illinois Copyright 1915 by The University of Chicago All Rights Reserved Published April 1915 Second Impression September 1915 Third Impression March 1916 Fourth Impression June 1917 Fifth Impression August 1920 Sixth Impression July 1922 Seventh Impression September 1922 Composed and Printed By The University of Chicago Press Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. The University of Chicago Press Chicago, Illinois The Baker and Taylor Company New York The Cambridge University Press London The Maruzen-Kabushiki-Kaisha Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Fukuoka, Sendai The Mission Book Company Shanghai PREFACE In the work of religious education, with which the present series of books is concerned, the life of the family rightly occupies a central place. The church has always realized its duty to exhort parents to bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, but very little has ever been done to enable parents to study systematically and scientifically the problem of religious education in the family. Today parents' classes are being formed in many churches; Christian Associations, women's clubs, and institutes are studying the subject; individual parents are becoming more and more interested in the rational performance of their high duties. And there is a general desire for guidance. As the full bibliography at the end of this volume and the references in connection with each chapter indicate, there is available a very large literature dealing with the various elements of the problem. But a guidebook to organize all this material and to stimulate independent thought and endeavor is desirable. To afford this guidance the present volume has been prepared. It is equally adapted for the thoughtful study of the father and mother who are seeking help in the moral and religious development of their own family, and for classes in churches, institutes, and neighborhoods, where the important problems of the family are to be studied and discussed. It would be well to begin the use of the book by reading the suggestions for class work at the end of the volume. With a confident hope that religion in the family is not to be a wistful memory of the past but a most vital force in the making of the better day that is coming, this volume is offered as a contribution and a summons. The Editors New Year's Day, 1915 CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. An Interpretation of the Family 1 II. The Present Status of Family Life 10 III. The Permanent Elements in Family Life 27