The Failure of Reform Societies
Commenting upon the announcement of a call issued by the American Institute of Sacred Literature for a convention next spring in Chicago, for the purpose of forming “a national society for the improvement of the moral and religious education of the boys and girls of this country,” the Chicago Tribune says:— Whether we can bear the burden of another national society either for or against anything, our staggering mental and financial powers lead us seriously to doubt. The Reformers’ Year Book already has over one hundred pages of names and objects of reform societies, and over twenty pages of names of “social reformers.” We have bitten off about as much as we can chew.7 Reform societies the mere names of which, with a statement of their object, fill one hundred pages of a “year book,” and individual “social reformers” besides, sufficient to fill twenty pages with their names, already at work; and yet the country is not reformed! What is the matter? Is there some combination of legal and social forces not yet discovered, which will have power to accomplish the happy and long-sought results — which will eliminate the evil in society and set up the good in its place? Is it the use of wrong materials, or a faulty system of organization, that has caused the failure thus far? — A proper analysis of the situation shows that it is not. The trouble lies in the nature of the power which these organizations, one and all, are able to evolve. They cannot produce reforming power. The forces they employ are human, and are powerless to make any change in human nature. And until human nature is changed, and the people have the divine nature substituted for the human in their hearts, there will always be the same need of reform, no matter how many reform organizations may be devised. Only divine power can accomplish the result that is needed. And therefore the only organization and the only work that can reform the community are those already established in our midst by divine power and wisdom,— the Christian church and the proclamation of the gospel of “the power of God unto salvation.”