[Sidenote: Abandoned Fields]
The truth is that as the foreigners have moved into down-town New York
the old-time Protestant churches have moved out, in great measure
abandoning the field, on the assumption that there was no constituency
to maintain an American church. It did not seem to dawn upon the rich
churches which moved up town that the new population needed
evangelization and could be evangelized. The result is that the
immigrant accustomed to imposing churches and splendid architecture and
impressive ritual, sees little to impress him with the existence of
Protestant Christianity. Go through that teeming East Side in New York,
and here and there you will find a mission supported in desultory
fashion by some church or city mission society or mission board, and in
quarters conducive to anything but worship or respect. There is nothing
to make the new arrival feel the presence and power of the religious
faith that created this free Republic and still predominates in its best
life. So it is wherever you go. The home mission work is in its
beginnings, and these are manifestly feeble and inadequate.
[Sidenote: An Example]
The Roman Catholics teach us some practical lessons.
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