Report No. 3
II. CHURCH LEADERSHIP IN THE NATION
“Your Committee has had its attention directed to the work of the Church in the problems of reconstruction by some pregnant passages in the address of the General Superintendent, and by a Memorial from the Alberta Conference.
“Even before the war it was widely foreseen that great social changes were imminent in the western world. This gigantic convulsion has precipitated the nations into the melting pot. Such an era summons the prophetic gifts of the Church, first, to the task of interpretation—to discern amid the turmoil and confusion the hand of God, and secondly, to the task of inspiration—to breathe into the hearts of men the faith, the courage, the patience, the brotherliness, by which alone the happy harbor can be won. And no Church is under a deeper obligation to assist in this two-fold task than our own. Methodism was born in a revolt against sin and social extravagancies and corruption. It was content with no aim lower than ‘to spread scriptural holiness through the land.’ Insisting on personal regeneration and all the implications therein, it transformed the face of England and saved that land from the excesses of a French revolution. To it the ideal of the Christian life was simply love made perfect. Without seeking at this time to commit the Church to a definite programme of economic policy, we would present for the consideration of our people the following statement which reflects our point of view:
“1. The present economic system stands revealed as one of the roots of the war. The insane pride of Germany, her passion for world-domination found an occasion in the demand for colonies as markets and sources of raw materials—the imperative need of competing groups of industries carried on for profits.
“2. The war has made more clearly manifest the moral perils inherent in the system of production for profits. Condemnation of special individuals seems often unjust and always futile. The system, rather than the individual, calls for change.
“3. The war is the coronation of democracy. No profounder interpretation of the issue has been made than the great phrase of President Wilson’s, that the Allies are fighting to ‘make the world safe for democracy.’ It is clearly impossible for the champions of democracy to set limits to its recognition. The last century democratized politics; the twentieth century has found that political democracy means little without economic democracy. The democratic control of industry is just and inevitable.
“4. Under the shock and strain of this tremendous struggle, accepted commercial and industrial methods based on individualism and competition have gone down like mud walls in a flood. National organization, national control, extraordinary approximations to national equality, have been found essential to efficiency.
“Despite the derangements and the sorrow of the war, the Motherland has raised large masses of her people from the edge of starvation to a higher plane of physical well-being and, in consequence, was never so healthy, never so brotherly, nor ever actuated by so high a purpose, or possessed by such exaltation of spirit as to-day—and the secret is that all are fighting or working, and all are sacrificing.
“It is not conceivable that, when Germany ceases to be a menace, these dearly bought discoveries will be forgotten. Relapse would mean recurrence, the renewal of the agony.
“The conclusion seems irresistible. The war is a sterner teacher than Jesus and uses far other methods, but it teaches the same lesson. The social development which it has so unexpectedly accelerated has the same goal as Christianity. That common goal is a nation of comrade workers, such as now at the trenches fights so gloriously—a nation of comrade fighters.
“With the earthquake shocks of the war thundering so tremendous a re-affirmation to the principles of Jesus, it would be the most inexcusable dereliction of duty on the part of the Church not to re-state her programme in modern terms and re-define her divinely-appointed goal.
“The triumph of democracy, the demand of the educated workers for human conditions of life, the deep condemnation this war has passed on the competitive struggle, the revelation of the superior efficiency of national organization and co-operation, combine with the unfulfilled, the often forgotten, but the undying ethics of Jesus, to demand nothing less than a transference of the whole economic life from a basis of competition and profits to one of co-operation and service.
“We recognize the magnificent effort of many great employers to make their industrial organization a means of uplift and betterment to all who participate, but the human spirit instinctively resents even the most benevolent forms of government while self-government is denied. The noblest humanitarian aims of employers, too, are often thwarted by the very conditions under which their business must be carried on.
“That another system is practicable is shown by the recent statement of the British Prime Minister, that every industry save one in Britain has been made to serve the national interest by the elimination of the incentive of private profit. That the present organization, based on production and service for profits, can be superseded by a system of production and service for human needs, is no longer a dream.
“We, therefore, look to our national government—and the factor is a vital one—to enlist in the service of the nation those great leaders and corporations which have shown magnificent capacity in the organizing of life and resources for the profit of shareholders. Surely the same capacity can find nobler and more deeply satisfying activity in the service of the whole people rather than in the service of any particular group.
“The British Government Commission has outlined a policy which, while accepting as a present fact the separation of capital and labor, definitely denies the right of sole control to the former and, insisting on the full organization of workers and employers, vests the government of every industry in a joint board of employers and workers, which board shall determine the working conditions of that industry.
“This policy has been officially adopted by the British Government, and nothing less can be regarded as tolerable even now in Canada.
“But we do not believe this separation of labor and capital can be permanent. Its transcendence, whether through co-operation or public ownership, seems to be the only constructive and radical reform.
“This is the policy set forth by the great Labor organizations and must not be rejected because it presupposes, as Jesus did, that the normal human spirit will respond more readily to the call to service than to the lure of private gain.
“The acceptance of this report, it cannot be too clearly recognized, commits this Church, as far as this representative body can commit it, to nothing less than a complete social reconstruction. When it shall be fully accomplished, and through what measures and processes, depend on the thinking and the good-will of men and, above all, on the guiding hand of God. But we think it is clear that nothing less than the goal we have outlined will satisfy the aroused moral consciousness of Canada or retain for the Churches any leadership in the testing period that is upon them. And in such an heroic task as this, our citizen armies will find it possible to preserve, under the conditions of peace, the high idealism with which they have fought for democracy in France.
“Recognizing the greatness and complexity of the task before the Christian people of Canada, and the imperative necessity of united action by the Churches, we recommend that the suggestion of the memorial from the Alberta Conference be adopted, and that this General Conference invite the other Churches of Canada to a National Convention for the consideration of the problems of reconstruction.
“Further, in order that our Church may give the most intelligent support to the movement, we recommend that our Ministers and people should acquaint themselves with such important documents as the Report of the United States Commission on Industrial Relations, the Inter-Allied Labor Party’s Memorandum on War Aims, the British Labor Party’s Programme of the new social order, and the British Governmental Commission Reports on Industrial Relations.
“Your Committee outlines this programme in the profound conviction that it can be carried out only by men quickened and inspired by the spirit of Christ, and that for that Divine Spirit, working in the hearts of men, nothing that is good is too high or too hard.”