Category — Evangelization

 
In the days before the Academy it was generally considered that the main natural function of the Church was to extend itself to others by means of external evangelization, or missionary work. Finally, this use began to fail, and it was found that, due to the fact that there were relatively few children being born in the Church and relatively few of these remained active in the Church, in spite of some new members coming to the Church, the Church was decreasing.

The Academy strove to correct this deplorable condition by educating the children of the parents of the Church, and this for a time with apparently considerable success.

The education of the children of the Church, like the education of children by parents, is the primary natural function in times but is not an end in itself, for the children are to be educated for fulfillment of a use in society, particularly a use in a spiritual society, and if the education of children, whether by the Church or by individual parents, is looked on as an end, instead of a means towards a use in society, it becomes selfish and, in time, fails; for the love of children, because they are one’s own, without regard to the welfare of society, is a selfish love”

While the “Words for the New Church” (the first publication of the Academy) looked forward hopefully to the results of education of the young in the New Church, it looked, primarily to the growth of the Church among the gentiles nor could it do otherwise, for the teaching of the Latin Word is that the Christian world has nearly totally perverted itself, – all but a few, mostly among the simple, have turned aside.

The following principles were set down in the “Words for the New Church” supported by copious quotations from the Word.

Read the full paper of Rev. Theodore Pitcain on the Church and its Use.