Devoted to the Propagation and Defense of New Testament Christianity
VOLUME 10
January 29, 1959
NUMBER 38, PAGE 11

The Church And Charity

E L. Flannery, Bedford, Ohio

A specific problem in the "brotherhood" today is the permanent institutions of charity among us through which the congregations are attempting to "do benevolence". A number of good brethren have written much on the practice and example of New Testament churches as concerns charity. It might be well for all of us to gain a fresh point of view — from one who was never a member of the New Testament Church, but who was passionately interested in the problem of organized charities. The following quotations are from an article entitled "The Church and Charity", written by Samuel H. Bishop, who at the time was head of the Brooklyn Bureau of Charities in New York City. This article appeared in the American Journal of Sociology in November of 1912. The author was making an earnest plea for churches to remove themselves permanently from the field of organized, institutional charity. He directed his comments at the Catholic and Protestant churches of his day; but they apply with overwhelming appropriateness to Churches of Christ today. He wrote:

"Ideals and methods of the administration of charity were those which grew, not out of the study of charity as a science, but out of religious feeling. The practice of charity was a kind of influence from the Christian duty of love for one's neighbor, and was regulated and controlled by no specific conception of charity — indeed, by no principles of judgment or knowledge other than those of the individual practice of charity. Church charity took no official cognizance of those causes of pauperism and poverty which lie outside the realm of religion, and in the realm of the political, or social, or economic. It seems fair to say that the practice of charity in the church was not primarily for the benefit of the recipient of charity, but was primarily for the benefit of the doer of charity.

"To be sure, the benefit of the recipients of charity was aimed at in the lazar houses, the hospitals, the homes for the defective; but it seems to me absolutely fair to say that that was not the primary thought, the primary purpose; the primary purpose was to comply with the command of religion: "thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself!' How can a man love his neighbor without doing him good?

"It is one of the deepest of the world's thoughts that love and service to one's kind, personal and social morality, are a result of the religious principle, which is love of God. But, it is also an unquestionable fact that the rise of ideas and methods of charitable administration other than the church's ideas and methods was due to the failure of the church to realize the nature of the problem of charity, and to deal with pauperism and poverty according to terms of their origin and of the realms to which they belonged. There would have been and could have been no such movement in history as the "modern charity movement" except as a result of the discovery that to be effective charity must be primary and not secondary activity; its reference must be relative to the causes of its problem and to the improvement and well-being of its human objects. This is where the church failed.

"But is the church a charitable society? In an important sense, yes; in an equally important sense, no. It is a charitable society in a derivative sense, because it is a community of people brought together by their devotion to the ideals and methods of Jesus Christ. The real function of the church is an intellectual or a spiritual function. What it inspires will find its way into personal character and activity, into civil statute, and into economic and social practices. No other institution can do its work. No institution but the church can open the spiritual eyes of men so that they view live from above; no other institution can give to them spiritual inspiration and power which shall be the mainspring of all social and moral activity.

"The modern church has fallen victim to the idea that spiritual inspiration needs exemplification and illustration in concrete activity (i.e. in organized church activity), but it does not. To be practical, what is the function of the church with respect to charitable activity? It is to preach and inspire that disposition out of which all charitable activity grows, not itself as an institution, to engage in concrete practices of charity as a permanently organized institution. It is the business of church members as individuals to practice all forms of charitable activity in accordance with those laws of charity which grow out of the principles of religion . . . .and also out of the principles of economic and social well-being. It is an important distinction we are making between the activity of a church as an institution and the activity of the members of the church as individuals."

The author went on to conclude his article by emphasizing that charity is more than love, it is intelligent love. Real charity makes an attempt to make a man or a family "equal to the economic and social battle of life." An individual sustains not just a church relationship, but a community, an economic (business), family, and governmental relationship. Much of the work of charity reaches into these other areas. The author stresses the church's part in charity, but points out that the church is neither designed, organized, nor adapted for permanent charity work. "Charity," he says, "is a compound effort. The necessity of charity results from a violation of, or a failure to comply with, laws which are not necessarily religious, but which may be economic and social." It is in these areas, he points out, that "the prophet or preacher, or the church as an institution" is not adapted to function well. He urges the church to let specialists operate the hospitals, the homes for the defective, programs of rehabilitation, etc. And let the church concentrate on its special function in spiritual matters, inspiring her individual members to charitable and other social and benevolent undertakings. The church's charity, he believes, should be only of a temporary and emergency nature — and never the permanent, sustained, and organized activity which our modern society requires.