nd that
the movement toward a larger concept of the religious forces as a
factor in rural progress will continue to spread at an accelerating
speed.

CHAPTER III

THE ECONOMIC CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH

As one travels through the rural districts of America and observes
differences in the standards of living he is convinced that human
welfare depends very largely on economic conditions. The broad,
well-tilled fields of Iowa, surrounding large, well-built houses, big
red barns and other outbuildings, form a marked contrast with the
patches of corn in irregular fields cleared from the brush and scrub
trees on hillsides in Tennessee or Kentucky, and the hovels and
rundown farm buildings which go under the name of homes for the hill
people. Healthy, well-dressed, happy children attending good schools
of the most modern type in the corn belt undoubtedly have the
advantage of the boys and girls in the hills who often do not learn to
read and write before they are ten years old, if at all, and when they
do go to school must be taught by poorly trained teachers for short
terms, ending before the holidays, and in one-room schools often
attended by nearly a hundred children. Religious service and
leadership in the one section under the direction of college and
theological seminary men can hardly be put in the same class with the
highly emotional expression of religious impulses of the mountain
section led by once-a-month absentee pastors with no education, or,
worse still, by wandering so-called evangelists of doubtful morality.
One could go through the whole list of contrasts between the
economically well-favored sections of the country and the less favored
agricultural sections and in no way would the advantage be on the side
of the latter.

Efficient social and religious institutions cannot be built on poor
economic foundations. So long as a section of the country cannot
afford to pay more than five hundred dollars per year for teachers or
preachers, it cannot hope to have the leadership possible to another
section where ministers to rural people can easily secure eighteen
hundred to three thousand dollars per year. Good buildings cannot be
erected, nor can any of the material comforts which go to make up the
foundation of civilized life be enjoyed.

For the sake of the church, as well as the people, the church must
attend to the economic foundations of rural life. It is unfortunate
for many parts of the United St