Religion and government, with the family to serve them both, are the
primary fundamental institutions of our society. Church and state
deal with the same people, each rendering them a vital and indispensable
service, the one in law and order and the other in moral and spiritual
values. A high wall separates their functions, but not their mutual
services. Ideally, they are the spiritual and temporal poles of all
human life. Each should show sympathy one to the other, and, within
the limits laid down by federal and state constitutions, each should
cooperate with the other. Each should also be jealous to protect its
own rights—the state the rights in the field of government and the
church the rights in the field of religion.

If organized religion interferes with the operation of government,
or if the government intrudes in the field of religion, there is sure to
be trouble. But if each, working in its own field, supplements the
other in the interest of the individual and society, if each renders to the
others its dues and tries to develop its services in a spirit of enlightened
unselfishness, only good can result. Government supplies, or should at
least provide for, peace and order, law enforcement, opportunities for
education and the necessary public welfare. The church should supply
the ideals and inspiration which will produce worthy citizens and keep
the state moving steadily toward its highest goal.

Government, in spite of occasional excesses and neglect, is becoming
more social minded, and on the whole, more efficient in our country. It
has stood relatively well the strains and readjustments that have re-
sulted from the new scientific outlook, war, population changes, indus-
trial and racial strife, and it has made its contribution to the meeting
of new social needs. But it needs the service of religion, with its emphasis
on spiritual values, to provide a proper balance. Religion, by cultivating
the sense of answerableness to God and of duty to one's generation, is
the factor which has shown the largest capacity to provide an adequate
motive for responsible citizenship. And a responsible citizenship is the
very foundation stone upon which organized society rests.

I would say to you then, as clergymen, that you will serve your gov-
ernment well if you continue to promote this wholesome alliance be-
tween church and state which has made the American creed, the Ameri-
can dream, almost as one with the Christian ideal. You and your
church will serve your government by doing as Isaiah, Amos and the
other great prophets of Israel did—proclaim God to men.

"Where there is no vision the people perish, " it is written in the Book
of Proverbs. And if the church cannot give vision—spiritual vision—to

474