Our Position by Ellet Joseph Waggoner

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Sep 18, 1889

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 4, No. 34.

Our Position.

By Ellet Joseph Waggoner

It has been our duty in our work to criticise very severely at times the actions and sayings of certain men,—churchmen, ministers of the gospel and lay workers,—and also the action of certain religious organs, in connection with the movement to secure national enforcement of Sunday observance. It has not been a pleasant task to do this, and we have not done so because of any feeling of antagonism to the individuals so criticised; much less have we done so because of any antagonism whatever to religion; but there are some who do not distinguish carefully, and there are others, we are sorry to say, who willfully misrepresent our motives. Therefore we will make a few statements.

We do not oppose this Sunday movement because we have no respect for the convictions of those who observe Sunday. Not only do we reverence the Bible, but we have respect for every man’s belief concerning the Bible. We are perfectly willing to afford to every person the free privilege of believing as he chooses. Not only are we willing but we insist upon it for every person. We believe that the government must protect all. We believe that the government should protect the Sunday observer in his observance of Sunday, just the same as it protects one who observes another day of the week in his observance of that day.

It is only the unchristian methods of doing what professes to be Christian work, but which is in reality unchristian, that we oppose.

We oppose Sunday legislation not because we are not willing that people should observe Sunday if they wish to, and not because we are unwilling that the government should see that they are not interfered with in their observance of Sunday, but we oppose the Sunday movement because it is unchristian, and it is shown to be unchristian by the unchristian methods employed in its maintenance.

We have the kindest feelings for all religious people. We would grant them the same consideration in their belief and practice that we would ask them to show us. It is only when they claim as their right that which they are not willing to grant to those who differ with them that we oppose them. When they do that, they are doing just that which they would not have others do to them, and that very thing shows their movement to be unchristian, because it is contrary to the rule laid down by Christ.

Let this distinction be kept constantly in view. Anything that can be shown by argument to be right, the SENTINEL will not oppose. Nay, more; although we do not believe that Sunday has the slightest sacredness, or has any claim to respect, more than Monday or Tuesday, yet if they will confine their advocacy of it to legitimate lines,—namely, the pulpit, the press, the Sunday-school, the family,—the SENTINEL would never say a word against them. In fact if this were so, there would be no SENTINEL.

The advocates of Sunday have the most perfect right to go anywhere or everywhere that they can secure a hearing, and speak night and day, teaching people to observe Sunday as a day of rest, appealing to their conscience and bringing arguments to bear upon them. They have a right to publish papers and circulate them everywhere, wherever they can induce people to read them. Against such work the SENTINEL would never lift its voice. But when they advocate the use of force, when they advocate measures which they would by no means consent to have carried out toward themselves were the conditions reversed, then the SENTINEL will oppose them, and it will call upon every consistent Christian to unite with it in its opposition.

We want it distinctly understood that the SENTINEL is opposed to nothing that is Christian-like. It was not started with the idea of antagonizing Christianity or any Christian movement. With doctrinal matters it has nothing to do. Its sole work is the maintenance of religious liberty of thought and action, because under such circumstances alone can true Christianity flourish. It does not claim to be the arbiter of what Christianity is, it does not presume to say what men ought to believe, or what they are to teach, or what religious customs they are to practice;—it has only to do with efforts to propagate views by methods that tend only to oppression. Who is there that cannot stand upon the same platform?

E. J. W.