Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2017 with funding from Columbia University Libraries https://archive.org/details/roadoflovinghearOOunse The Road of the Loving Heart and Compelling Consider- ations for the Care of Retired Ministers INTERCHURCH WORLD MOVEMENT OF NORTH AMERICA III Fifth Avenue, New York City Price, 5 cents each, 50 cents per dozen; $2.75 per hundred The Road of the Loving Heart By Mildred Welch ^ J^'HAT is what they called it, those simple Samoan Islanders who built the road for their friend, Robert Louis Stevenson — “a name that brings us a breeze blowing off the shores of youth.” The Road of the Loving Heart was cut through the brush with much labor and toil, in order that, unhindered, the beloved story-teller might come and go between his house in the woods and the beach. Along this road there came at sunset all his “friendly helpers in a foreign isle,” to join with him and his family in the simple worship that bound all hearts together beneath the peace of his roof. Fame, honor, wealth, and the love of unnumbered hearts, followed him. Life had given him what he asked: “That he might awake each day with morning face and morning heart, eager to labor, eager to be happy if happiness should be his portion and, if the day were marked for sorrow, strong to endure.” The day came at last when the Samoan chiefs carried him out by The Road of the Loving Heart to the crest of the hill that looks ever to the restless sea and the storm-swept reefs. There they laid him to rest, and on the stone engraved his own sunny-hearted words: 5 “Glad did I live and gladly die And I laid me down with a will. Home is the sailor, home from sea, And the hunter, home from the hill.” The Road of the Loving Heart! How good it is that it was granted to one man, at least, to go home that way! But do we ever think of the men whom we are sending to their Father’s House bv The Road of the Sorrowful Heart? Men who, lacking perhaps the special genius of Robert Louis Stevenson, lack nothing of his courage, his patience, his sunny-hearted sacrifice and devotion. / Instead of fame, wealth, honor, they had long years in destitute fields, long watches by the bedside of the sick and the dying, long rides in heat of summer and storm of winter. Have you seen them — that thinning line of old ministers, their shoulders stooped, their hair white, their eyes dimmed, their faces marred with others’ sorrows? One of them went home not long ago by The Road of the Sorrowful Heart. When he died, his praises were sounded far and wide, but while he lived he was in ab- ject poverty and often in humiliating need. “I am sorry,” he wrote, when he acknowl- edged the receipt of his last pittance from the Relief Fund, “to have caused so much trouble, but ere another collection comes around I will be where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest.” 6 Soon afterward the old minister entered in “where beyond these voices there is peace.” The days are slipping by and our old ministers are going home. It is for us to choose the path they shall tread. Shall it be by The Road of the Sorrowful Heart? Or shall they enter the land where none shall ever say “I am old” — by The Road of the Loving Heart ? We too must build a Road of the Loving Heart. The Samoans encourage us to fulfil our obligations to the old ministers. Prompted by gratitude for Stevenson’s kindness, with their own hands they built The Road of the Loving Heart, so that the steep hill from the sea to his home might be more easy for his feet. > How many steep hills have been made easy for our weary feet by the ministers of Christ! How many spirits in prison have been liberated by the ministers of God! How many in sorrowing, suflFerlng and need have been aided by them! They married the living, buried the dead, comforted the sorrowing, led us to Christ, started our feet up the everlasting stairs and did for us a thousand deeds of mercy and kindness. We owe to them a debt of gratitude that we can never pay; and we will not deny the debt. Our gratitude must become so practical that we shall be willing to sacrifice time and money, and with our hands build the loving way on which they may climb up 7 to the eternal City cf God, and thus prove to them that — “The Road’s last turn will be the best.’’ Then, perchance, we shall hear the tender voice of Him whose bleeding feet were bruised on the Via Dolorosa: “Well done! Inasmuch as ye have built it for these. My brethren, ye have built it unto Me.” 8 Compelling Considerations for the Care of Retired Ministers By Willis P. Odell and Others - 1. Love: The faithful minister greatly endears himself to the people he serves and gets a strong grip on hearts, because of his ministries. It is impossible to forget him. While memory lasts, affection for him should prompt a retiring competency for his old age. 2. Gratitude: The man who helps a soul at the hour of conversion and assists him in getting a right start in the Christian life is a genuine benefactor. Many owe all their prosperity to the man of God who guided them in a great crisis. Every consideration of thankfulness calls for an attempt to pay the debt thus created. What have you done to discharge your obligation? 3. Honor: The material prosperity of churches is largely due to the pastors, who have known how to organize victory. They have laid the plans and pushed the campaigns out of which have come fine edifices and commodious parsonages. It would be a shame for the people who have profited by their diligence and wisdom to let them suffer in old age. 4. Wisdom: Mr. Carnegie established a pension fund for retired teachers and called it the “Carnegie Foundation for the 9 Advancement of Teaching.” That was fine! The movement to take care of re- tired ministers can be just as fittingly called the “Church Foundation for the Advancement of Preaching.” Provision for the proper care of the veteran preachers will be a potent stimulus to the best endeavors of the ministry. 5. Social Justice: Great corporations are providing pensions for faithful em- ployees. Many states provide widow’s pensions and have provisions for assisting retired teachers, and cities look after re- tired firemen and other public servants. Where there has been an inadequate wage for genuine public service, the sense of justice requires that there be provision for comfortable retirement. 6. Efficiency: Rarely does a preacher receive an adequate salary or a reasonable compensation. The amount paid is gen- erally small, and he cannot hope to lay aside an old age competency from his income. To relieve him from anxiety for the future by providing a reasonable re- tiring pension, is to give steadiness to his service, so that he can use all his energy for his one task. It will forestall the necessity of his adopting a “side-line,” and will help him to engage whole-heartedly in spiritual enterprises. 7. Absolute Equity: The laymen call the ministry into the service of the church, and expect them to vow to “devote them- 10 selves wholly to God and His work.” Commissioned by God and cut off by their vows from gainful occupations, it is only fair that the preachers be supported through their entire life by those who are partners with them in the common task. That veteran minister was right when he challenged a great body of laymen: “You took us for life! Then see us through!” The care of the retired ministry is not a charity. It is a duty. 8. Necessity: If the church crowds her ministers to the wall, they will be com- pelled to enter secular callings in order to care for their families, lest they fall under the condemnation of St. Paul as being “worse than an infidel.” The average income of preachers in America is less than nine hundred dollars. Spirited young men, fresh from college halls, are chilled by the prospect of inadequate support and of inevitable poverty, and halt at the door- way of the church. Does the church that fails to take care of the men who have worn out their lives in its service deserve to have anyone decide to wear out his life in such an ungrateful task.? 9. Loyalty: “If we wanted to under- mine* religion, we would not waste our time- attacking the Bible. We would starve the preachers.” So saying, the Globe is right. Christianity is at stake. The prosperity of the kingdom of Christ on earth is bound up with the steadiness of ministerial service. To unsettle the min- II istry is to strike viciously at the whole enterprise. There must be preachers if the gospel is to be proclaimed. Loyalty to the Great Head of the Church is the ultimate foundation on which the treat- ment of the preacher must rest. Those who really love their Lord and are con- cerned for the success of his program will get into close touch with the Interchurch World Movement, which aims first of all to deal in honest fashion with the Christian ministry, including the retired ministers who have fairly won a comfortable support in old age. 10. The Earned Increment; Men of wealth recognize an “unearned increment” in their property due to favorable condi- tions which are not the result of their own energies, and by liberal benefactions are returning to the community a part of their earnings. Wise and thoughtful business men are recognizing also the “earned increment” which the minister has added to property values — for morals and religion are a financial asset — and are meeting such obligations by providing endowments for ministers in their old age. 11. Sane Thinking: The principal change in the thinking of the church con- cerning the support of retired ministers has been the substitution of the idea of a moral, religious, and financial obligation for that of a charity. The usual helpless financial condition in which the average clergyman finds himself in old age is not 12 due to lack of business judgment, or of rigid economy, but to the very conditions under which he must work. 12. Willingness: The willingness of the people to give to the cause of the retired minister is measured by their under- standing of the principles involved. Hence the necessity of a campaign of education. As Bishop Lawrence said: “The more you think, the more you will give. A man who will say ‘Yes,’ and give fifty dollars today, will give five hundred dollars if you wdl take time to kindle his imagination.” I No. .30O. I. Jan. 10^0.