The Decline of Protestantism
By L. A. S.
THAT there is something serious the matter with Protestantism in this country is a conviction which has forced itself upon more than one observing person in the Protestant ranks, as we know from utterances that these have made from time to time upon this subject. One of these, the Rev. Robert Morris Raab, of Buffalo, speaks his mind in a recent issue of The Homiletic Review, and says that “the present policy of Protestantism in this country, if persisted in, must wreck it as a system.” Some of the present-day evils of Protestantism as he sees them are as follows:— Looking at our spiritual condition from the level of history and of experience, taking a most human view of our status, to what conclusions are we forced? Is the prospect of religion in this country bright? Take any group of laymen from any city church; take any body of ministers from any denomination, and put this question to them; what answer will you get? Some, of course, who always indulged in a sort of optimism, as a means of being agreeable, will tell you that the prospect of religion is bright at this time; but the majority of laymen as well as of ministers will present you the opposite view. It is natural for us, when we suffer embarrassment, to look for the cause outside of ourselves. The first thing we are tempted to do, in view of a moral failure, is to locate the cause of that failure outside of ourselves. This is precisely what Protestants are doing at this time. The adverse conditions now confronting Protestantism are traced to agencies outside of Protestantism. . . . The truth is, Protestantism is itself to blame for its own involved condition. The ministry of to-day is largely made up of a body of weak apologists. It is truly pathetic to note the large number of cultivated men in the pulpit who really have no message for the people; that is, no distinctively religious message. And yet it would not be just to attach unqualified blame to these ministers; for you should always bear in mind that the influence of a church over its minister is highly directive of his work. . . . The church’s opposition to dogma has almost wrecked the ministry; for if there is one thing religionists of our time object to, it is hard thinking on religion. And dogma calls for just that thing. The moment a church or a minister takes the attitude of apology, as the one appropriate to its message (or to his message), that moment marks the beginning of defeat. The widespread contempt for religion is due, in large measure, to the temporizing, apologetic attitude of Protestantism. Mr. Raab next notes that “Protestants are seeking to atone for a vanishing faith in the supernatural by relying on the material.” Formalism, “the device of a dead faith,” is being called into requisition. “Splendid church buildings, fine organs, cultivated voices, faultless sermons, make up for the lack of religion among multitudes of Protestants.” Of the loss of faith in prayer he says:— “Is Protestantism losing faith in prayer? This is a delicate question. For my own part, I positively believe that Protestants are losing faith in the efficacy of prayer. This, of course, slants toward atheism. The man who deeply believes in God must believe in the efficacy of prayer, or suppose God bound. But there is a theory gaining considerable currency among Protestants that prayer is not valuable for any favor it brings from God, but valuable only for the beneficent reflex influence it has on the soul. This, of course, is a practical surrender of the Bible doctrine of prayer, and evidences a loss of faith in the supernatural.” The disastrous effect of the higher criticism is not overlooked by Mr. Raab. On this point he says:— Radical higher criticism, which is German rationalism, is entrenched in several of the leading Protestant universities and theological seminaries. What is such criticism doing with the Bible? To answer that question intelligently one must keep in mind the significance which Protestants have generally attached to the “inspiration of the Bible.” By “inspiration” Protestants have meant that the Bible is more than a human production; they have meant that God has revealed himself, his will, our condition, our possibilities, our obligations, and our future destiny in the Bible. To the Bible, Protestants have assigned a unique message, a unique authority. They have held that the Biblical message is final and infallible. It now appears that this ground must be recanvassed, and that radical criticism is a theory by which men must work in recanvassing the ground. That criticism7denies the inspiration of the Bible, in a distinguishing sense; it denies its inherent authority, it denies its finality, and, of course, rejects the infallibility of the Biblical message. From all this Mr. Raab draws the following conclusion:— A worldly, half-paralyzed church, led by ministers who do not know what to preach, will fall short of changing the moral complexion of the world. The weakened condition of the ministry is quite as pathetic as that of the churches. We may really indulge the hope that men will so sicken of this surface trickery in the name of religion as to hasten a strong reaction in favor of religious certainty and depth. Our times are morally very weak; there is much breaking-down in the best of us. But the nerveless resistance, which has withstood the declension of American religious life, will be forced to take the path of positive reform. If so, Protestantism may fall into two distinct bodies,—one holding strictly to the Biblical message, and the other pursuing a speculative life,—one grappling with the hard facts of life, and relying, for the religious improvement of all conditions of men, upon God; and the other devoting itself to the ceaseless round of intellectual guessing. We reprint observations of this kind from representative Protestant writers for two reasons. First, we desire to give them the widest possible publicity, in the hope that they may arrest the attention of the people, and lead such as desire to know the truth to sober reflection over the situation, and to a search for a more solid foundation of their faith and hopes than the popular Protestant teaching of this day affords; and second, such utterances confirm the soundness of the position taken by those who are proclaiming the third angel’s message. Protestantism, as represented by the popular churches of the day, has indeed declined, and there is a plain reason why it is so. It is not at all mysterious. Mr. Raab touches the vital point in the difficulty when he says that the Protestant churches of to-day have no definite message to give to the world. How can a church hope to prosper spiritually when it has no definite message for the people? It was not so when Protestantism began its career. Then it had a definite, earnest message to the world, calling the people to separate themselves from the errors and sins of Rome. To-day, Protestantism is reaching out the hand to Rome, and has almost ceased to protest. The Protestant churches are without a definite message to-day because they rejected the definite message that came to them from heaven sixty years ago, “Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come.” Rev. 14:6, 7. That was a very definite message indeed, and one of very great and solemn import. No more definite or important message was ever committed to man. But the churches turned from it, rejected it, and they have been on a decline ever since. If they had received the message, they would have taken an advance step in Protestantism, because the message calls mankind to “worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” He who created these things set apart a day as a memorial of that work, and this is stated in the fourth commandment, which specifies the seventh day as the Sabbath of the Lord, who made heaven and earth. Rome has set aside this day, and instituted the first day of the week in its place, and points to the act as the sign of her spiritual authority. The call came from heaven to renounce this badge of the papacy, as other errors of that church had been renounced under the Protestant movement. That would have added mightily to the protest against Rome. But the Protestant churches refused to take the step; and right there they missed the pathway, and their Protestantism began to decline. Seventh-day Protestants are the only ones whose Protestantism has not declined, and who have a definite religious message for the world. They believed their message when they began its proclamation, because it was based upon Scripture; and now the condition into which the Protestant churches have fallen that rejected it, gives added evidence that it is the message of God for this time.