=The Makers of Things Outside the Churches.= Communities in which the church has failed are the communities where may be found most of the workers who are the actual producers of the things that go to make up our life. The men who run the lathes and other machines, the day-laborers on the street, in the factory, and on the railroads; these men and their families are the ones untouched by the church. The foremen, the better class of skilled mechanics, and those workers who are doing the more congenial kinds of work are the ones found in the churches. I asked one of the leading labor leaders of the country why it is that the laboring man is opposed to the church. “Opposed?” he answered. “He is not opposed. The average laboring man living under average conditions does not know that there is a church in town.” In other words, the church moves in an orbit that is totally removed from the life of the mass of the workers.
=When Nineteen Men Last Went to Church.= During the last year I took occasion to ask different men that I met at various times what they thought of the church. I have the record of the conversation of nineteen men on this subject. Not one of these men had been to church with any degree of regularity during the past five years; three of them had attended the Billy Sunday meetings in the various cities. They went to see the evangelist, however, just as they would visit Barnum & Bailey’s circus, and they professed to having come away from the meetings in the same frame of mind as if they had been attending such an entertainment. Five of the men were Jews, nine were Roman Catholics, and five were Protestants. They gave various reasons for not going to church, but all agreed on three things: they had no especial criticism or complaint to make regarding the church; it was easier to stay at home on Sundays than it was to go to church; the church had very little to do with the things that they were interested in. One of the men said, “The minister stands in a pulpit over my head and talks down to me about things that I am not interested in.” They also agreed that they could see no special reason why they should be influenced or moved to live according to the requirements of the church.