* .3 ,s / 
 
 Var* W.w, 
 
 Association Meetings 
 
 By Oolooah Burner 
 
Association Meetings 
 
 By Oolooah Burner 
 
 National Secretary for Colleges 
 
 Published by 
 
 National Board 
 
 of the Young Women’s Christian Associations 
 
 600 Lexington Avenue, New York City 
 
 1916 
 
It is suggested that this leaflet on Association Meetings 
 might well be put into the hands of those asked to lead such 
 meetings, as a part of their preparation. Additional copies 
 may be ordered from the National Board. See last cover. 
 
Association Meetings 
 
 By Oolooah Burner 
 
 “After some days he entered into Capernaum, and it soon 
 became known that he was at home; and such numbers of 
 people came together that there was no longer room for 
 them even around the door. He was speaking his message to 
 them.” Mark 2:1-2. 
 
 Is the message of Jesus Christ any less powerful to-day 
 than it was then? 
 
 What did He talk about save living every-day life with 
 God at the heart of it? Were people so hungry to hear that? 
 Are they different to-day? 
 
 What is the business of the meetings of a student Chris- 
 tian Association to-day save to do the same kind of thing 
 He did? Failing in that they ought not to be. 
 
 If they are a regular part of the program of an or- 
 ganization existing for a specific purpose, then every meet- 
 ing ought to forge toward making that purpose a fact in- 
 stead of words. There is no other excuse for their exist- 
 ence. The mere fact that “there always have been meetings” 
 is no reason for continuing to have them. 
 
 The whole Association is constructed for the purpose of 
 moving a body of people in experience from one point to an- 
 other, from self-centered existing to God-centered living. 
 Therefore, the meetings of the Association must actually 
 move in that direction. 
 
 If in a large group organized to accomplish something, it 
 is necessary, or even worth while, to gather regularly to 
 
 3 
 
think of the things the group is working for; if gripping 
 the truth at the foundation of the work leads into a new 
 sureness of attack and new methods; if companionship in 
 such thinking generates new courage, new enthusiasm, new 
 strength, then regular meetings are a vital part of a work- 
 ing organization. 
 
 Since the purpose of the student Association is to bring 
 the kingdom of righteousness into the very life of the cam- 
 pus until every student there is living a student’s Christ- 
 like life, the challenge through the public meetings dare be 
 nothing less than tremendous. 
 
 What is the actual work of that group of girls set apart 
 for the distinct purpose of seeing that the meetings do 
 things that justify their existence — the “Meetings Com- 
 mittee”? 
 
 What the Work of the Committee Is Not 
 
 Certainly it is not haphazard, loose-edged, lack-a-daisical ; 
 following always the lines of least resistance; picking up any 
 stray subject that may blow along and finding some one who 
 is more willing than capable to lead that meeting; prevailing 
 upon some bored girl to get up and read a paper on “just 
 anything she wants to;” nor depending always upon out- 
 side “stars” to draw a crowd from curiosity alone. An 
 artist when he starts to paint a picture might as well pay 
 no attention to subject or line or color, but think as he wan- 
 ders up to the canvas, “I’ll draw an old fashioned girl here 
 and an airship there, a submarine and a circus yonder, and a 
 snow storm and violets in this comer. This is a pretty 
 color — I’ll just splash some of it on, and I do like curved 
 lines, so I’ll draw a few, and green is popular this season so 
 I’ll scatter that around promiscuously!” Or a group of au- 
 thorities responsible for the whole question of the curricu- 
 lum for a new college, might as well say, “War is a popular 
 subject of thought, we’ll have some work on war; and people 
 
 4 
 

 are always interested in music, we’ll have plenty of music; 
 and athletics — we must have athletics or nobody will come to 
 school here ; and a library — every college has a library, so we 
 must have one, too.” Nonsense! The artist chooses a sub- 
 ject and makes every line and every tint, every bit of shadow 
 and light, add to the whole effect he plans to produce. And 
 the college builders make a program with balance carefully 
 planned to give a student firm foundations for life. Just so 
 guardedly, judicially, comprehensively, constructively, 
 thoughtfully, ought the Religious Meetings Committee to 
 plan and work. 
 
 Primary Work of the Committee 
 
 First, last and all the time the committee is to think. If we 
 as a group are to help make real in life the purpose of the 
 Association, what is that purpose, clause by clause? We 
 must work our way through it, thought by thought, until 
 it comes into terms of our own campus. 
 
 What can the Meetings Committee do to make such a pur- 
 pose a living thing in the life of the college? 
 
 What are our actual campus conditions? Do girls connect 
 religion with the way we live? Does religion make a dif- 
 ference? Do we know what we believe and why? Or have 
 most of us shut up childish conceptions of religion into 
 watertight compartments of otherwise open minds? Do 
 some girls think themselves too “progressive” to be relig- 
 ious? How many are trying to substitute social service for 
 religion? Are girls indifferent to the ordinary appeals for 
 becoming Christians? Why? Are we formal Christians, or 
 radiating Christians? 
 
 Such thinking as this is very much enlightened by going 
 out into the highways and hedges of the campus and frankly 
 asking all sorts of “uninterested” girls just why the meet- 
 ings as they are do not interest them. When they find that 
 
 5 
 
the purpose of the asking is not to preach to them, but to 
 get honest information, they will be honest. A frank, square, 
 personal “truth” discussion in cabinet and committees on 
 the present type of meetings may also bring many things 
 to light. 
 
 Blocking Out the Year 
 
 Having discovered honest opinions and actual conditions, 
 how shall we build up a year’s program to combine the 
 things that naturally have to come into the consideration of 
 any Association with the things that have been found to need 
 emphasis on the particular campus? It can be done, with 
 clear thinking, a calendar, and diagrams. Suppose the meet- 
 ings come on Wednesday. Suppose college begins the third 
 week in September and closes the second week in June. 
 Omitting Wednesdays lost in vacations and holidays, that 
 leaves at the most, thirty-five meetings to plan for through- 
 out the year. One of those will probably be needed to ex- 
 plain the Association to new girls, one to present the Vol- 
 untary Study program, one for the week of prayer, one on 
 the summer conference, one each for Thanksgiving, Christ- 
 mas, and the New Year, one, if not a series, for Easter, and 
 one senior meeting. To-day when there is an awakening 
 realization of the place of the church in the life of the pres- 
 ent day world, of course at least one meeting should be spent 
 in considering the questions that bother college girls, or 
 that ought to bother them, along the line of what their place 
 is in such a movement. At least eight should go to the 
 working of the Kingdom to-day in other lands. And others 
 will be taken as a matter of course according to tradition on 
 the local campus. That would leave eighteen for the spe- 
 cific needs of the women of any particular college.* 
 
 •See leaflet on "World Fellowship," listed on last cover for 
 material for meetings on world-wide interests. 
 
 6 
 
Precious little time that, when you remember that in no 
 meeting will the speaker have over one-half hour, frequently 
 less, for the actual presentation of the things that ought to 
 change lives and bring in the Kingdom upon that campus! 
 Nine short hours at the most! That means two things: that 
 if the purpose of the Association, which goes to the very 
 foundation of life, is to be made livable in any way through 
 the regular meetings, every one of those half hours must be 
 planned for jealously; and it means, too, that every one of 
 the meetings seemingly unrelated to the whole, yet provided 
 for by accident of the calendar, must through the interpre- 
 tation given to it by the leader be made to fit into the build- 
 ing up of the whole. Every meeting must count. Not that 
 every one shall be a “sermon” in the accepted use of that term, 
 but that every one shall arrive somewhere worth arriving at, 
 on the road that leads toward the goal of the year. 
 
 What to emphasize in any particular college must be de- 
 termined by the “peculiar conditions” of the college. If the 
 students “have gone social service mad,” the Association can 
 well put its emphasis on the fundamental Christian spirit back 
 of such service, and the need for the individual server to be 
 able to give something more than just things to needy peo- 
 ple. If, however, the whole college and community empha- 
 sis has been upon personal religion and getting one’s self 
 “saved,” then the Association needs to supplement with an 
 interpretation of what Jesus taught as to “loving one’s 
 neighbor as well as one’s self,” seeing that be he “rich man, 
 poor man, beggar man, thief,” factory hand, sweat shop 
 child, southern mountaineer, Alaskan, or a native of the in- 
 nermost province of China, he has the chance to “get 
 saved,” too. In such a college, it is needful to put in a lot 
 of work upon the actual translating into campus terms of 
 one’s personal religion so that it will make a difference in 
 the kind of room-mate one is, the kind of class room work 
 one does, the kind of popularity one has, etc. 
 
 7 
 
The conception that God can enter into a college girl’s 
 life with power and actually work through her in natural 
 ways is foreign to many a girl who has talked words 
 about it all her life. And the idea of God himself is in many 
 cases hopelessly without foundation and foreign to the con- 
 ception that Jesus Christ came to give. God must be 
 brought into the language of students so that they can feel 
 acquainted with Him, instead of his seeming vaguely far 
 off where many-syllabled theological terms have left Him. 
 And they must see that He is a reasonable God, one in whom 
 a student can believe without insulting her mind. Prayer 
 must be recognized as a power instead of a formula, and life 
 a powerful thing that has God at the heart of it instead of a 
 detached, irresponsible or selfish drifting. 
 
 Perhaps a series would be possible in which some one 
 who knows both God and students, will clear up many things 
 about the kind of God Jesus Christ revealed; the kind of 
 living book the Bible is, in which we can find the answers to 
 live problems to-day in ways that our intelligences can ap- 
 prove; the kind of force prayer is and can be, etc. In short, 
 perhaps some one could be found to take students through 
 their thought-ways into the clear light of a living faith that 
 will make a difference in what they are and what they do 
 every day. 
 
 Perhaps the need is to start students to thinking definitely 
 about becoming Christians, and single meetings or series 
 could be planned with that in mind, taking up what it means 
 to be a Christian and exactly how to go about it. Perhaps 
 there is need of helping them to think toward a sane and 
 right choice of where and in what kind of work their lives 
 shall be spent, and so there is opportunity for a “Vocational 
 Series” or “Life Work” meetings. Perhaps there is some 
 vital need of changing conditions on the campus through a 
 steady campaign for the right kind of public opinion, and it 
 could be met by meetings. Perhaps there is need to turn 
 
 8 
 
the regular meeting of the Christian Association into an 
 open forum for discussion of burning questions that have 
 to do with the coming of the Kingdom of righteousness in 
 the modern world. Perhaps the need is great that the stu- 
 dents should learn the habit of reverence in religious meet- 
 ings, and the Association is the place to cultivate that, both 
 by discussing the subject openly and by living it out. 
 
 A real preparation for spending Christmas in the spirit 
 in which Jesus came to live in the world is a very vital con- 
 tribution to the whole living out of the purpose of any As- 
 sociation. And a real preparation for Easter can mean new 
 life. Even the reporting of a summer or sectional confer- 
 ence can build up toward the whole, because of the deeper 
 underlying spirit of such conferences, which exist to give 
 girls a grasp on life and such work as they have never had 
 before. Whatever the subject chosen as most important for 
 any meeting, it must fit into the whole and do something. 
 
 With the whole year’s program planned to meet the 
 needs of many kinds of girls, single meetings should in min- 
 iature seek to do the same things. The girl who wants to 
 worship quietly, the one who can worship best in song, the 
 others who want to hear something worth working on in 
 their lives, and often enough that girl also, who is so full of 
 something worth telling that she must have a chance to pass 
 it on, — all these should the Association meetings plan to meet 
 on their own ground. 
 
 Policy 
 
 With all this in mind, how can we get it into usable shape 
 in order not to leave some edges ragged while finishing 
 others? That is what the “policy” is for: to get into concise 
 form the things the committee sets out to do, and to use it 
 thereafter as a measure, a pattern throughout the year, to 
 be sure it is keeping to the standard it has set for itself. 
 Many so-called policies are lifeless because they are worked 
 
 9 
 
out by the chairman and handed over to the committee to 
 carry out instead of being worked out point by point by the 
 committee members themselves, and voluntarily adopted with 
 eyes wide open as to all they are committing themselves to. 
 Or the policy is copied bodily from last year’s, empty of per- 
 sonal interest or responsibility self-assumed. The more 
 members working out an original policy, the more who will 
 afterwards work at it. 
 
 Leaders 
 
 Because a girl is “always willing to do what she can” is no 
 sign that she is the best one to lead a meeting! Or because 
 a girl is hard to get is no reason for giving her up after 
 the first trial. Perhaps she sees no reason to lead a meet- 
 ing; perhaps she never has, and thinks she never could. 
 Perhaps she is shy and needs just that to draw her out of 
 herself. Or she is “too busy” because no one has made her 
 see for herself what it might count for if she were to put 
 in a fair amount of time on that particular vital subject, 
 and later share with other girls the thrill of what she has 
 discovered. Or she thinks she would have to “do it just like 
 some one else.” Or “she can’t preach.” Or she hasn’t time 
 to look up all the material necessary but would be glad to 
 do it if she were given a card catalogue list of the material 
 available on that particular subject in the college library, 
 so she could be sure of having enough real things to say. Or 
 the wrong subject was suggested to her, something upon 
 which she never would be interested, while maybe the very 
 next one would be thrilling to her in its possibilities. It 
 would be well after choosing which meetings of the year 
 could best be handled by students and which students could 
 probably do them best, regardless of whether they have ever 
 spoken in public religious meetings before, to go over all 
 the excuses possible for any student to make, and find out 
 how many of them are well founded and how to meet each 
 excuse or objection honestly. When a girl knows that she is 
 
 10 
 
asked to lead a meeting that is meant actually to accomplish 
 something worth while, she is much readier to work at it 
 than if she thinks it doesn’t make much difference whether 
 she does it or not. And if a girl has been chosen wisely 
 with the whole year’s program in mind and knows that 
 people believe she can do the big thing they ask of her, and 
 have given of their best in the way of preparation, she finds 
 it hard to resist doing her best in response. 
 
 As to the number of faculty and outside leaders, that al- 
 ways depends upon the particular college. But we should 
 never lose sight of the fact that it is a student organization, 
 and as such should be wide-awake to the development of 
 student leadership in meetings as well as in other work. 
 
 Sometimes a girl who could not speak well to begin with 
 can learn to preside at a meeting acceptably with some one 
 else to speak. Where it can be arranged both types of girls 
 should have their opportunity. 
 
 Undergraduate leaders often make the mistake of try- 
 ing to speak on subjects which are far beyond them without 
 adequate preparation for such speaking. Or they introduce 
 a first cousin of a graduating essay on some abstract theme 
 and wonder that the hearers are not enthralled. Or they 
 try to talk always out of the same old “experience” with- 
 out seeking to grow in the meantime. If they have been 
 reading or thinking much along lines that have vital con- 
 nection with life, whether life in the dormitory, in the class- 
 room, on the campus, at home, in cities, mountains, in the 
 country, or across the seas, and if they are coming to be- 
 lieve something so absolutely that it makes a difference in 
 their own thinking and willing and living, then they have 
 something to say to other students. Not that any speaker 
 has “already attained,” but every one should be honestly 
 “pressing forward” along the line of which she speaks. A 
 girl can never carry much weight with what she says, unless 
 it means something real to her own life. 
 
 11 
 
Publicity 
 
 Next, how are we to get people to our meetings to hear 
 what has been worked out for them? Too often the attend- 
 ance is monotonously made up of the same old people from 
 month to month and year to year. If one of the “other 
 kind” should appear at a meeting, it would be the talk of the 
 campus! And the reason the Association in so many col- 
 leges remains confined to the people who need it least is 
 not that the type of student who would rather go for a 
 tramp than a prayer meeting is degenerate, but — poor ad- 
 vertising! “It pays to advertise” is a truth to which multi- 
 tudes are just opening their eyes to-day. And if a cause is 
 one that can be promoted honestly, because of its ultimate 
 goal, then the more effective methods of advertising, the 
 more quickly and surely will the public respond. There is 
 no intelligent reason for presenting the biggest, most chal- 
 lenging, most irresistible proposition in the world in clothing 
 that fails to interest the very people for whom it is intended. 
 For instance, the girl in college who is wasting her oppor- 
 tunity for living most fully is the very one who would never 
 stop running, from a meeting blatantly advertised as on the 
 subject of “opportunity!” To the girl who has not yet 
 thought her way into following Jesus Christ, words like 
 “opportunity,” and “responsibility,” and “spirituality” are 
 alive with discomfort; and never voluntarily will she go 
 where they can get at her. She has been “preached at” too 
 much already. The idea in such words is all right but be- 
 fore she will listen interestedly to them, before they will 
 appear tangible to her, they will have to speak her own 
 language. 
 
 Therefore, once the subjects have been chosen for the 
 year’s program comes the most important task of wording 
 them. Not sensational words should be used, but live 
 words, words that have some “pep” to them, some “go,” 
 some power; words that the uninterested girl has never 
 
 12 
 
thought of in connection with that vague thing called “re- 
 ligion”; words that will catch in her mind when she hears 
 the announcement read in the dining room, or at chapel, or 
 sees the subject on the bulletin board; interesting words — 
 for words in themselves can be interesting or deadly dull; 
 words that point a finger straight at the girl herself or at 
 one of her interests. Get the brightest, most interesting 
 girl in school to work on those subjects and see what hap- 
 pens. 
 
 Samples of both colorless and catchy ways of wording sub- 
 jects: 
 
 University Obligations — My Debts (or Oughts). 
 
 Value of Solitude — The Silent Places. 
 
 Self-Expression — Translating Myself. 
 
 Use of Scriptures — A Text Book on Every Day Living or 
 Have You Studied Your Text Book? 
 
 The posters are just as vital as the wording of the sub- 
 jects, because they often catch the eye at a distance too 
 great to read, and fail either to “register” or to hook into 
 the interest of the passerby. They need not be always 
 “hand made” in the sense of being painted by a student 
 from the art school, but they do need to be live, catchy. A 
 girl who is clever with her fingers and her imagination can 
 make fascinating advertising material, although she may 
 not be able to draw a straight line. And the poster must 
 catch in the minds of the passers-by to create their first 
 voluntary impulse to go to the meeting advertised. We 
 must have posters with life in them, and motion, and hu- 
 man interests — not merely conventional designs, not flowers 
 or fruit or leaves — posters that prick the imagination, that 
 are irresistible in themselves. When and where the posters 
 appear, too, make a world of difference. Sometimes they 
 are up so long before hand that they lose all interest by the 
 time of the meeting. Sometimes they are too late to per- 
 meate the consciousness of the student body. And some- 
 times they are shabby in form, so lacking in neatness that 
 
 13 
 
no self respecting person wants to be connected with such 
 a careless organization ! The regular appearance of the 
 poster each week can be made an event looked forward to 
 by the college students who revel in fresh and interesting 
 things. It has been done in some campuses. Is it true of 
 yours? 
 
 For special emphasis on a particular meeting or series, 
 a printed or hand written post card, or an attractive and 
 unusual letter folder or “dodger” in one’s mail box some- 
 times strikes into one’s attention better than a general an- 
 nouncement. 
 
 If the program is made out by the semester, or by the year, 
 is it a good plan to have it printed on a “topic card”? Which 
 weighs more on your campus, the business-likeness of such 
 a card or the element of surprise when each meeting is 
 kept secret until the psychological moment to advertise it 
 by itself, to catch people’s attention and get them there? If 
 you do have the topic card is it good psychology to have 
 merely the name of the speaker and the date? Is that par- 
 ticularly interesting or enticing? 
 
 And of all mistreated opportunities, perhaps the most de- 
 plorable is the space given Association write-ups in some 
 college papers! — stupid reports of things past, that no one 
 cares to read; write-ups of speeches that people never would 
 recognize as their own; and colorless or pointless things 
 written in the spirit of “have to because we have the space, 
 and we must fill it up!” When one stops to think of the 
 endless possibilities in one small section of space in a col- 
 lege paper if intelligently used to accomplish something for 
 the Kingdom of right things, the failure to use that space 
 powerfully is tragic. A single sentence that would catch 
 in some reader’s consciousness and make a difference later, 
 is worth more than a whole paragraph of gray, uninter- 
 esting remarks. And the reason many students don’t care 
 
 14 
 
to go to religious meetings may well be the stupid way in 
 which they are habitually written up. 
 
 Beyond the mechanical means of printed and spoken an- 
 nouncements to draw folks to what has been planned for 
 them, lies the still more vital means of personal interest in 
 whether a girl goes or not. Merely inviting a girl to a 
 meeting is not the point. It may be the very thing that keeps 
 her away, if it is not done in the right way! The girl who 
 is wanted most at any particular meeting, the kind of girl 
 for whom the meeting has been planned, may be the very 
 one who will not come if people appear too piously inter- 
 ested in getting her there. If some one says impressively, 
 “Now you will be sure to come to the meeting, won’t you?” 
 she will in all probability feel like doing anything else, — 
 that is, if she has any reason to feel that the “religious peo- 
 ple” of the school are “after her”. But if some one who has 
 been with her normally in common interests in other things 
 asks her to come to a particular meeting in the same in- 
 terested way in which she would ask her about going to see 
 a tennis tournament, it is much more likely to result in her 
 being “sure to be there”. 
 
 Building an Actual Meeting 
 
 What is the best time to hold a meeting so that it will 
 reach the greatest number of girls? Is the time you are 
 accustomed to just accepted from precedent, or would it be 
 possible to find a better one. In case the Sunday services 
 already provided are sufficient, it is usually wiser to put the 
 time for the Association meeting somewhere in the week on 
 a day that has a comparatively light schedule. Why crowd 
 Sunday? 
 
 A growing number of colleges that have many town stu- 
 dents are giving one chapel period a week for the students 
 to have their Association meetings. If the chapel time is 
 
 15 
 
long enough, and if the students are not required to attend 
 the Association meeting, that works very well in the solu- 
 tion of the joint meeting of town and boarding students. 
 
 The actual condition of the meeting place needs study, to 
 be sure that it is best for the purpose. Is its location on 
 the campus convenient to the majority of students? Is the 
 room so little as to be crowded to the extent of discomfort, 
 or is it so big that the few who come rattle around in it? 
 Which way are the seats facing, — toward the door, so that 
 each late comer disturbs the whole group? Is there a strong 
 light back of the speaker, that strains all eyes looking that 
 way, or has the lighting even been considered? Is some one 
 delegated to have as her sole responsibility in life the keep- 
 ing of the room well ventilated, both before and during the 
 actual meeting, or can people nod along, discouraging the 
 leader, not because they are not interested, but because they 
 are literally put to sleep by warm, bad air? The official 
 “ventilator” on the Meetings’ Committee ought, of course, 
 to be a “fresh air fiend,” so she will know when the air is 
 bad, and know it is her business to act immediately and with 
 authority. 
 
 Does the meeting from the very beginning give onlookers 
 the impression of having been carefully prepared for, or is 
 it ragged, with all sorts of obvious loose ends? Are the 
 song books and the chairs and the windows and the pianist 
 and the leaders always in their places at the proper instant, 
 so that precious minutes need not be wasted in scurrying 
 around to get them ready in the presence of waiting people? 
 Is the violin tuned with the piano before people come, so 
 that that painful process need not be gone through with 
 at the wrong moment? And if there are both a leader and 
 a speaker for the meeting, are their consultations always 
 held before the meeting is opened in order that they need 
 not distract attention by whispering together during the 
 progress of the program? Absolute preparedness should be 
 
 16 
 
one of the slogans of the whole meetings’ staff, both of those 
 who prepare the program and those who carry it out, even 
 to the smallest detail. 
 
 A meeting usually begins with music. Why? Is it to be 
 used to cover up the noise as late comers arrive? To pass 
 away some pleasant time in waiting? Or has it a purpose? 
 And if it has a purpose, is that purpose filled by the kind 
 of songs that many Associations persist in singing — so- 
 called “hymns” that sound like dance tunes, and that have 
 for their words sheer selfishness in doggerel form? Thoughts 
 of my getting to heaven, and of rest always in connection 
 with religion, are tremendously bad psychology for young 
 people. As young Christians, starting out to win the world 
 to the principles of Jesus Christ, there ought not to be 
 much room in our hymn-thinking for simply “a home over 
 there”, for “me and my wife, my son John and his wife, 
 us four and no more!” Nor of eternal rest! What we need 
 is to be at work, and to leave the thoughts of eternal rest 
 to those who have already worn their bodies out in working 
 for the Kingdom! Shall the songs we sing in our meet- 
 ings mean something in their words and music, something 
 that will work toward the fulfilling of our purpose, and 
 toward rounding out the subject of that particular meet- 
 ing? Does the song book that you use have that kind of 
 songs in it? Or have you never found them? Many and 
 many a wonderful hymn lies buried in our hymn books if 
 they are the right kind of books.* But many of us don’t take 
 the trouble to hunt them out and sing them till they become 
 a part of our very being. It “saves time” to sing the old 
 familiar ones that are so entirely a matter of habit that the 
 words roll off our tongues without ever a thought paid to 
 what we sing. Is that what music is for, in a service that 
 has to do with God? 
 
 •‘‘Fellowship Hymns,” 45 cents, and the 5-cent leaflet of “Associa- 
 tion Music,” both of which may be ordered from the Publica- 
 tion Department of the National Board, are recommended in 
 this connection. 
 
 17 
 
And why have “special music”? Merely for the sake of 
 advertising, to wheedle more people into coming? Or is it 
 to add something definite to the building up of a perfect 
 meeting connected with the coming of the Kingdom into 
 life? It has been known to occur that in the midst of a 
 meeting apparently for worship and thinking along lines 
 that count most, a piece of “special” music with absolutely 
 no point to it, sometimes a “love song,” attractive enough 
 in itself but entirely unrelated to the subject, has been 
 thrust in with as much appropriateness as planting a grow- 
 ing flower in a loaf of bread! Why have special music un- 
 less it “belongs”? 
 
 And how much thinking have you done about the “scrip- 
 ture reading”? Must it always be a whole chapter, or even 
 a whole verse, if a part of it given alone would stick better 
 in the hearers’ minds? If the Bible is read at all, it ought 
 to accomplish something in a meeting. And what is read, 
 and where it comes in the service, depend upon what is to 
 be accomplished by that particular meeting, and should be 
 very carefully worked out with that in mind. Often the 
 girl who is to read the “scriptures” hastily picks up her 
 favorite psalm, or a bit from the fourteenth chapter of 
 John, or the Sermon on the Mount, or a well known passage 
 from Isaiah, with no thought at all of the subject of the 
 meeting. And many a reading misses its mark because the 
 reader has not gone over it beforehand to be sure she knows 
 how to bring out what she reads from the realm of gray, 
 monotonous, toneless words, to living, breathing life. Often- 
 times, too, if the passage is a well-known one, it will stimu- 
 late fresh thinking in the hearers’ minds if it is read not 
 from the older versions, but from a newer translation* that 
 
 •For example, the Weymouth translation of "The New Testament 
 in Modern Speech,” which may be ordered through the 
 National Publication Department; 65 cents to $1.75. 
 
 18 
 
puts old truths in new ways. But whatever the Bible 
 reading, every word of it ought to count. 
 
 Prayer. What does that word mean in your meetings? 
 What does it accomplish? Do all types of girls find satis- 
 faction in the prayer parts of the Association meetings? 
 For the girl who thinks only in terms of the prayer book, 
 are the prayers most familiar to her ever used? The girl 
 who prays best in the silence, is she provided for? The girl 
 who likes to pray aloud as simply as a little child, has she 
 the opportunity? Not that all can be provided for at every 
 meeting, but if the committee can find out what many girls 
 think and feel about the use of prayer, their needs can be 
 better met. Are people habitually called upon to pray with- 
 out warning in meetings, — made suddenly to pray aloud 
 whether they are ready or not? And how much thought 
 has been given to training girls in social prayer, a gather- 
 ing up of group needs and thanksgivings and interests in a 
 single voice for the sake of all. 
 
 When do the announcements come? Just when the meet- 
 ing has been impressively finished, or right on top of a 
 wonderful hymn? How much thought has been put into 
 locating the announcements in such a place in the program 
 as to jar least upon the beauty of the whole, and to the plan- 
 ning of the announcements themselves so that they may fit 
 smoothly into the whole instead of being the kind that would 
 jar? 
 
 What about the variety in the order of service? Must there 
 of necessity be a song and a scripture reading, a prayer, an- 
 other song, then the speech, a closing song and the benedic- 
 tion? Is it always so nearly the same that girls can refuse 
 to go, saying they “know exactly what will happen anyway” ? 
 True, every meeting ought to be so carefully planned that 
 it balances well, with music and prayer and thinking to- 
 gether under the leadership of one or more; but the arrange- 
 
 19 
 
ment can be so different, varying with the subject or the 
 leaders, that no one can ever proclaim that she “knows ex- 
 actly what’s coming.” There ought always to be some ele- 
 ment of the unexpected in the service somewhere, some- 
 thing that belongs to that particular meeting alone. 
 
 What happens when the speaker has finished and the 
 leader closes the meeting? Is it good taste to comment on 
 “the message” then and there? Doesn’t it often break into 
 the very thinking that the speaker meant for the listeners 
 to be doing for themselves? And even if a closing hymn 
 has been on the program, is it always necessary? Isn’t it 
 sometimes more effective at the end of a tremendous pre- 
 sentation for the audience to sit in silence for a few minutes 
 and think, and then be allowed to go out quietly? Little 
 thought, apparently, has been spent on such closing mo- 
 ments. How shall we send people out with the power of 
 the meeting conserved instead of scattered? Is the bene- 
 diction that you use a mere form or is it as carefully planned 
 as the rest of the meeting? Have you used the Mizpah bene- 
 diction, for instance, without ever taking the trouble to look 
 up its origin to see whether it “fits”? Has your choir or 
 quartet been trained to sing perfectly a quiet, or challeng- 
 ing, or triumphant benediction, sometimes a fitting stanza 
 of a hymn? Possibly some girl has written a prayer that 
 means much because it has come out of your own midst; 
 possibly there may be a prayer from the New Testament; 
 possibly silence in which all pray together; but whatever the 
 closing moments are like they must be as carefully planned 
 as any part of the service. 
 
 Members of the audience often seem to feel uncomfortable 
 unless they say to the speaker, “I certainly did enjoy that 
 talk!” as if it were a party, or the leader a professional enter- 
 tainer! If the “talk” accomplished its purpose, it was not 
 primarily for the sake of entertaining people. And if it 
 went deep, there ought to be some way of expressing one’s 
 
 20 
 
appreciation in words that say the exact truth. Many a 
 leader who has given deeply of her best has been struck 
 dumb immediately after by that smiling, trite, well-mean- 
 ing remark. 
 
 “Nothing but meetings,” one hears occasionally in a sar- 
 castic tone. Sometimes it is justified, that sarcasm. But 
 need it ever be? Is there anything bigger, in all the range 
 of possibilities for a year’s work than making the meetings 
 as big as the vast challenge they present? Study to find 
 out what they could do, actually do; work out a whole year’s 
 program on one big plan to accomplish something definite, 
 leaving no ragged edges; and then build up each separate 
 meeting until it is a perfect whole, fit to offer to the students 
 who take their time to come. Make every meeting so un- 
 failingly worth while that finally all types of girls in the 
 school will be coming in because they find there challenge 
 and satisfaction. And know in the doing of it that wher- 
 ever Jesus Christ is presented as He is, thither will the 
 people come in numbers. 
 
 Jesus traveled through all Galilee, teaching . . . and 
 
 proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom . . . and his 
 
 fame spread through all Syria .... -and great crowds fol- 
 lowed him. 
 
 Upon descending from the hill country he was followed by 
 great crowds. 
 
 Jesus went away to an uninhabited and secluded district; 
 but the people heard it and followed him in crowds. 
 
 Jesus went along by the Lake of Galilee; and ascending 
 the hill he sat down there. Soon great crowds came to him. 
 
 Again he went to the shore of the lake, and the whole mul- 
 titude kept coming to him and he taught them. 
 
 And he went into a house. But again the crowd assem- 
 
 21 
 
bled so that there was no opportunity for them even to 
 snatch a meal. 
 
 A crowd was sitting around him . ... in a circle. 
 
 He began to teach by the side of the lake and a vast mul- 
 titude of people came together to listen to him. 
 
 22 
 
PUBLICATIONS FOR LEADERS OF EIGHT WEEK 
 
 CLUBS 
 
 1. How to Promote Eight Week Clubs in the Colleges, by 
 Mabel Stone. 5 cents. 
 
 2. College Women and Country Leadership, the study book, 
 by Jessie Field, national secretary for country work. 25 
 cents. 
 
 3. For Leaders of Eight Week Clubs (among American 
 girls) by Jessie Field. 10 cents. 
 
 4. An International Friendship Club (among foreign girls) 
 by Edith Terry Bremer, national secretary for immi- 
 gration and foreign community work. 15 cents. 
 
 Eight Week Club Packet containing 1, 2 and 3 or 4 (cross 
 out one not wanted). 40 cents. 
 
 Texts: 
 
 Out of Doors in the Bible, by Ethel Cutler. A pilgrimage 
 with outdoor people of both Testaments. Written espe- 
 cially for summer use. 15 cents. 
 
 Jesus Among His Friends, by Ethel Cutler. Six stories from 
 the life of Christ. 15 cents. 
 
 Christian Citizenship for Girls, by Helen Thoburn. Ten 
 chapters on a girl’s relation to home, work, worship, 
 recreation, friends, etc. 25 cents. 
 
 Note: The five cent leaflet, “Two Kinds of College Girls,” 
 
 containing “little stories” by Oolooah Burner and Abbie 
 
 Graham, is of special interest to Eight Week Club leaders. 
 
 Order from 
 
 Publication Department, National Board Young Women’s 
 Christian Associations, 
 
 600 Lexington Avenue, New York City. 
 

 
 
STUDENT LEAFLETS 
 For Universities and Large Colleges 
 Advisory Committee. Bertha Conde. 10 cents. 
 
 Association Membership and Church Work. Bertha Conde. 
 10 cents. 
 
 Association Meetings. Oolooah Burner. 10 cents. 
 Association News Committee. Edith Dabb. 5 cents. 
 Bible Study Committee and the Voluntary Study Plan. 
 Ethel Cutler. 10 cents. 
 
 Cabinet, The. Bertha Conde. 5 cents. 
 
 World Fellowship (for the Missionary Committee). Mar- 
 garet Burton. 10 cents. 
 
 Conferences and Conventions Committee. Louise Brooks. 
 . 5 cents. 
 
 Finance Committee. Blanche Geary. 5 cents. 
 
 How to Promote Eight Week Clubs. Mabel Stone. 5 cents. 
 How to Realize Our National Association Membership. 
 Eliza R. Butler. 10 cents. 
 
 For Colleges, Seminaries and Academies 
 The first six leaflets listed above, and “World Fellowship,” 
 “Conferences and Conventions Committee,” “How to Pro- 
 mote Eight Week Clubs,” and “How to Realize Our National 
 Association Membership,” as listed above. In addition: 
 Committee Work in Small Associations. Eleanor Rich- 
 ardson. 5 cents. 
 
 Finance Committee in a School or College Association. 
 Edith Helmer. 10 cents. 
 
 Social Service Committee. Eliza R. Butler. 5 cents. 
 Year’s Outline for Religious Meetings. Oolooah Burner. 
 10 cents. 
 
 Note: As the cost of each of these lists totals $1.05, a 
 
 packet of each will be sent for $1.00. 
 
 Watch The Association Monthly for announcement of 
 additional leaflets during 1916-17. 
 
 Order from 
 
 Publication Department 
 
 National Board of the Young Women’s Christian Associations 
 
 600 LEXINGTON AVENUE, NEW YORK