Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - Mar/78

Contributor - Peter J. Yff

Title - Editorial

Topic - Editorial

For many people Christianity will come to a climax this month. There will be an upsurge of religious interest and even emotion as the steps of our Lord are retraced in memory. The event of Palm Sunday will remind us again of the claim of a King upon his followers. Jesus standing before Pilate's judgement tribunal will cause many to observe that truth often stands on trial before unjust accusers. The Friday of sacrifice will be observed by many a union service, or a special trip to the church. Easter will bring its surge of joy in Christ's victory over death and the promise brought to human kind through the Saviour's triumph.

Perhaps one difficulty for us all is that our religious practice is too much confined to the time of climax and crisis. We thrill to the thought of Good Friday and Easter, and certainly we should. But what of the time after that? Such days are important, too. In fact, when our faith does not speak to the ordinary day with quiet conviction, it will not speak effectively on the high holy day, either.

Last year I wrote about a personal experience in which many people trapped in a winter storm ministered to each other. Suddenly, and without apology or embarrassment folks were close to each other. Next day, however, with rescue assured and travel ready to begin again, life returned to the ordinary cares of getting one's transportation running, and the complaints were both frequent and bitter. Something similar is all too often true in society generally. It seems to require a crisis of great dimension to get us concerned enough to band together and do something besides wring our hands in frustration and in unison agree how bad the world has become.

For many people life has lost its absolutes, that is, a standard of right and wrong, a viewing of life in terms of white and black. "The world just is that way, and you can't change it" we are told. Even so, some good can be done in this world and its worst evils at least denounced, and often prevented or eliminated.

One such is the tide of pornography that has risen. It inundates even (and sometimes especially) the corner milk store or the variety candy outlet. Materials unfit for any eyes are so placed, either carelessly or deliberately, as to invite the curious eye of the child. A bill now in the federal legislative process, C207, would provide stiff penalties for pornography involving children. Two year sentences would become ten. Good. What is also needed is better, and consistent enforcement of the law. And what is especially needed is a definition of pornography which would stand up to court testing. Write your Member of Parliament about your concern for the quality of life in your neighbourhood and your country.

Let us thrill together to the emotion to Good Friday, give rise, recognizing anew with penitence and regret that our own sin was also reason for the Christ to give himself. Let us rejoice together in his Easter victory over death and the grave. Let us also express that Easter faith in concern for our communities, and for the climate or atmosphere in which our children grow up. When people in your town attempt to band together in an attempt to improve the quality of life, don't say, "It won't work anyway." Instead, go join their effort, and perhaps then it will. Too many a battle against wrong has been lost, not because the enemy was too strong but because the people of God didn't care enough, didn't band together effectively enough, and remained silent when they should have spoken.

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