The Catholic World, Vol. 03, April to September, 1866Various
Religion
The Catholic World, Vol. 03, April to September, 1866
Various
Catholic Church -- Periodicals
"I should wish to go to heaven, because I should be pleased, with
its employment. Were all my sins mortified and I rendered perfectly
holy, I think I should the happy. . . . . Sometimes I can say, Lord,
I believe; help thou mine unbelief. .... I am avaricious; and in the
present state of my family, make money my god. I strain honesty _as
far as I can_ to gain a little."
This was certainly not a satisfactory condition of things. The lust
for mammon seems strong enough, but the aspirations for heaven might
well have been rather more ardent. He goes to church and sings and
weeps, and the minister and elders crowd around him to see what is the
matter. He goes to prayer-meeting at last in New Haven, and there the
conversion--such as it is--is effected: "As the exercises closed and
the crowded worshippers rose to sing the doxology, I felt that I could
'praise God from whom all blessings flow.' Praise! praise! It was
delightful to praise him! On the 24th of April following, I united
with the visible church under Mr. Stuart's pastorate, and began to be
an active Christian."
We must say that this seems to be a very simple and easy process of
getting out of the power of the devil. Conversion, according to Dr.
Spring's idea, is simply an emotion of the mind, a spasm of sentiment.
It includes neither satisfaction for the past, nor the performance of
any definite religious duty in the present or the future. Any one who
can excite himself into the belief that he is regenerate, or tickle
his mind into the pleasant state indicated by the man who, when asked,
"How it felt to get religion?" replied that "it was just like having
warm water poured down your back"--any such one, we say, may rest
assured of his eternal safety. Dr. Spring is no more exacting with
other candidates for conversion than he was with himself. To a sick
man who inquires "what he shall do?" he answers: "Believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved."
{131}
"But will you not tell me _how_ I shall go to him?"
"Yes, I can tell you; you must not go in your own strength; for your
strength is weakness. You must not go in your own righteousness, for
you have none. You must feel your need of Christ, and see that he is
just the Saviour adapted to your wants. You must adore, and love, and
trust him. . . . . Commit to him your entire salvation, and in all
holy 'obedience live devoted to his service.'" Now in all this there
is just one practical suggestion, namely, to "live devoted to God's
service"--and that the man could not follow because he was dying. Let
our readers contrast Dr. Spring's death-bed ministrations with what a
Catholic priest would have said and done in similar circumstances. The
priest would have given definite instruction and divine sacraments;
the preacher has nothing better to offer than a few commonplace
generalities from his last Sunday's sermon.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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