VI.

A WORKING CATECHISM FOR THE REFORMED

CHURCH.

BY REV. WILSON F. MORE, A.M.

One of the most highly prized books in my library is a copy of the tercentenary edition of the Heidelberg Catechism. Not only on account of the manner in which it came into my possession and the sacred associations which cling to it on that account but more particularly because of the very fine introduction by the sainted Dr. Nevin and the four-fold text of the catechism itself, I value the book so highly that I would not part with it at any price if I knew that it could not be replaced. And yet it is mostly as a memento and a curiosity that I value this particular book. While it true that I usually refer to it when I attempt to make a serious study of the history of some dogma yet I never think of it as a working catechism for the Reformed Church. All of which goes to show that a catechism may be good, yea, very good and yet be not at all adapted for use in preparing catechumens to assume the duties and reponsibilities of full membership in the church. It may be an excellent book for reference but not a working catechism.

We mean

What then do we mean by a working catechism? a catechism to work with as a text-book, as a tool, in the catechetical work of the church, as practiced to-day. A book to be placed into the hands of catechumens such as we usually have in our catechetical classes, with the hope and expectation that they, in a measure, master it; a catechism of which the words will be committed to memory and their meaning impressed upon the minds and hearts of those under instruction; a catechism that will fit present day theology without being wrenched or twisted; a catechism that will meet modern

catechetical conditions without adding to it or substracting from it; not a catechism which contains everything that a church member is ever expected to learn in this world but a catechism which contains all that, and only that, which is essential to make an intelligent confession of faith and choice of service such as is implied in a voluntary assumption of full church membership.

Does any one say that we already have such a work in the Palatinate edition of the Heidelberg Catechism? I answer, what then mean these many other editions? Why have we a Gerhart's Child's Heidelberg Catechism, and Good's and Harbaugh's and Mosser's and Snyder's and Bahner's and many others too numerous to mention ? Why has Pastor R. prepared a little catechism of twelve pages for use especially with adult catechumens? Why is Pastor H. looking for some briefer catechism somewhat like the abridged catechism used in the Moravian Church? I venture to say that there are few if any pastors of the Reformed Church to-day who use the Heidelberg Catechism just as it is, without abbreviating or supplementing it, not to speak of even worse treatment than that. We have heard of the story of the Irishman's knife which notwithstanding a new blade and a new handle, was the same old knife still. We wonder whether the old Heidelberg Catechism has fared much better after all the individualistic efforts with pastepot and scissors and differences of interpretation in the vain attempt to construct a working catechism for the Reformed Church.

We call it a vain attempt and verily we believe it to be such. For altogether apart from all theological considerations and the particular purpose for which the catechism was originally prepared, the conditions under which it was then to be used were so different from the conditions prevailing to-day that the same catechism could not possibly be a satisfactory working catechism under both sets of conditions.

Frederick the Pious is rightly called the father of the Heidelberg Catechism. His introduction to the book begins

with a salutation "to all and every, our superintendents, pastors, preachers, sacristans and school masters.' To all these the catechism was commended; and this indicates how at that time the entire structure of society was related to religious instruction and how large a part of the life of the people was to be brought under catechetical training. Nor was this all. The pulpit was bound by the catechism as a perpetual directory and rule. The Bible was to be preached "in the sense of the catechism" and care was to be taken to quote and bring in the language of the catechism to enforce and support the preaching. In addition to this, the catechism must be formally read before the people from the pulpit, a section or lesson each Sunday, as a part of the morning service, so as to go over the whole work in ten weeks. "To crown all, an afternoon service was established for the sole object of expounding and enforcing the instructions of the catechism. For this purpose it was divided into fifty-two Sundays or parts, on each one of which the minister was to preach in turn so as to cover the whole book in the course of a year.'

"But care was taken, at the some time, that the work of the pulpit, in this form, should be properly supported by a corresponding work in the school. The whole business of education, from the mother's knee up to the theological chair in the university, must be so ordered as to have its religious basis throughout in the catechism. The school teachers were in fact a part of the ecclesiastical establishment of the land; and it was their province in particular to see that the young were diligently trained in the knowledge of the catechism from the beginning, so as to be qualified in due time for a full religious profession."

This was the condition of things in the Palatinate in 1563; to meet such conditions the catechism was prepared and under such conditions the book was a good working catechism. There was none better then, and where these conditions can be reproduced, there is probably none better now.

But the excellent working catechism for the Palatinate in

1563 is not at all likely to be a good working catechism in the United States in 1904. Then and there it was the textbook "from the mother's knee to the theological chair in the university" and all the time under church supervision and government encouragement and control: here and now it is the text-book for perhaps fifty hours in a lifetime; excluded from the school like the small-pox; used in the church, with the government indifferent, parents often careless and the whole process largely subject to the sweet will of immature boys and girls who in many cases must be persistently humored or they will not come to instruction at all.

You may say that all this is not as it should be. We know it. But it is as it is and most of it is beyond our power to alter. Even in the pulpit and in the Sunday-school, it would be impossible to reproduce the conditions which the Palatinate Heidelberg catechism was made to meet. Therefore, however excellent it was in its time, both in itself and as compared with other Reformation catechisms, it is not a good working catechism under present-day conditions.

For one thing, as a book to be used in preparing candidates for confirmation, its length is against it. This is practically admitted by everybody. There is probably not a single pastor in the church who even attempts to cover the entire book in a course of catechetical instruction. Dr. Gerhart used to take the theological students through the book once in three years giving them one lecture a week. When these students enter the ministry, the boldest of them would scarcely attempt to do in six months that for which their own instructor took three years. And so they select what they consider the most important questions, each one using his own judgment as to what questions are the most important. Rev. Stanley L. Krebs, whose catechetical work has been referred too as a grand success, recommends that the class "commit only the most important or cardinal questions"; eleven selected from the whole number, which in his opinion, form a complete and comprehensive system by themselves. That is to say,

his working catechism consists of eleven questions which make a complete system. Assuming that Rev. Krebs knows what a complete system is, why should not his eleven questions be published in a separate pamphlet and be the properly authorized working catechism for the Reformed Church? Why confront a candidate for confirmation with a book of 129 questions when eleven of these 129 make a complete system and when these eleven are fully as many as even the best catechist can hope to teach thoroughly in the time usually given for catechetical instruction? Surely this were better than to have each minister select parts here and there according to his own notion of propriety. For we have learned this to be true and the experience of others confirms our own, that as soon as the minister begins to skip questions the class begins to lose interest. For ourselves, we have tried to solve the problem of a working catechism by using Gerhart's Child's Heidelberg Catechism in all our catechetical work. In this catechism the controversial and the abstract theological questions are omitted and the remaining questions are broken up and thus simplified, making a book about two-thirds as large as the original Palatinate catechism. This book especially as now published in the Twentieth Century edition makes a fairly satisfactory working catechism for the Reformed Church. This Twentieth Century Heidelberg Catechism puts the unabridged catechism within easy reach for ready reference, and the junior catechism for class use and study, and this arrangement will do provided the pastor has the children under catechetical instruction from early childhood up to at least confirmation age and provided he be allowed very considerable liberty and latitude of interpretation to bring the theology of the catechism up to present day standards as fixed by the spiritual scholarship of the age.

But however desirable it may be to have a practical working catechism for use in the Reformed Church, it may well be questioned whether we can afford to mutilate and abuse the good old Heidelberg Catechism in the attempt to make it fit