By SIR CHARLES MARSTON, F.S.A.
AS we pass through life we notice there are mental black-outs as well as material ones, and they are not all beneficial. A few years ago a section of our people started a black-out against German war preparations, and its results have been disastrous. Other calamities may be traced to black-outs which have actually been forgotten. There is an aspect of modern life which causes some few of us a good deal of anxiety. We claim to be a Christian Nation, we claim that this War is being waged for Christian ideals, yet something like four-fifths of our people attend no place of worship on Sabbaths. Why? No satisfactory answer seems to be forthcoming. Surely the solution of this enigma is of some importance. I suggest that the cause may be traced to a black-out which was started half a century or so ago by then current knowledge, and has never been lifted. My first contact with it came when, as a young man, I discussed religion with the sister of a distinguished scientist. She stated that her brother had just written that scientists then knew about all there was to be known, and there was no room left for miracles. So, to fit the phraseology of this essay, miracles were blacked out by the current knowledge of fifty years ago, and have not been restored.
Now this non-miracle philosophy has gradually saturated this country from the learned to the unlearned. It is, of course, true that many still conventionally believe in miracles, who would not otherwise go to Church. But it is quite another matter to find a real belief in them. A small boy, educated under present-day conditions, has defined Faith as “that quality which enables us to believe what we know to be untrue.” And this definition rather coincides with the modern popular conceptions. Consider for a moment how a non-miraculous secular teaching alters our education. For there is nothing constant about the benefit of education as so many seem to assume—it depends upon its fundamentals. Hitler has manipulated German education to startling effect by tampering with these, and so have others. Organised religion is now advocating more religious education, but is it to include belief in miracles? The difference becomes clear-cut when we come to prayer. The average man in the street subconsciously feels—”What is the use of praying to a God who is entirely subject to natural laws; it is mere superstition?” And with this mental background it is easy to understand—”Why waste time on going to Church? It won’t help us against the Germans!” What with all the printed matter and with all the radio messages which ignore the Deity, it takes moral courage in any form of society for a man to affirm a real belief in miracles. To the great mass of our people religion is to-day “just precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little.”