No Converts

During the last year, more than 32% of U. S. Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist churches failed to secure a single convert "by profession of faith." These figures, amply documented, were presented to the Men's Church League last week in Manhattan. If they hold true for other denominations, 60,000 out of the total 200,000 U. S. Protestant churches failed to gain a single convert during 1927. Of the remainder, many gained only one or two. Much perturbed, the League asked itself: "What is the matter with the Churches?"

The answers were various and somewhat unsatisfactory. J. Campbell White, General Secretary of the League, pointed out that church members had reached a point in working for foreign missions beyond which they should not go until they had done more efficient missionary work in their own communities. Said an Episcopal official: "What's the matter? Spiritual inertia and laziness." Missionary C. H. Fenn, home on furlough, spoke in metaphor, saying that the church was infected with "fatty degeneration of the heart, pernicious anemia, cerebrospinal meningitis, cancer, and neuritis." Not the least cogent and discouraging explanation was supplied by the New York Herald-Tribune which mischievously remarked that only in times of physical distress were spiritual remedies at the height of their popularity, and that "Christian principles forbid them [the churches] to wish for the kind of change that would benefit them."