Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/439

 CHRISTIAN SOCIOLOGY 425

method of life as that taught by their Master. These little groups of individuals Jesus likened to leaven which was thrown into the meal and there remained until it had leavened the meal. Though they are not of the world, yet they are to stay in it. 1 Conquest, not flight, is to be their watchword. The progress of Christian society in the world will depend upon the power which each nucleus of Christian individuals gathered into a society will have upon the surrounding social life. It can expand only by transforming and assimilating to itself this environment. As the process is not one of mere instruction but of the impartation of new life, Jesus must have had in mind certain means by which this impartation could be accomplished. And these means we should expect would be such as would render especially easy the bringing of individuals under the influence of those forces which would make him fraternal by making him Christlike. Does Jesus specify or imply any such ?

First. In the larger sphere of life Jesus seems indirectly to recognize the power of public opinion in modifying environ- ment. There is, it must be granted, a certain Christianization of society going on unconsciously. The life of genuine mem- bers of the kingdom has an influence upon those who are out- side its professed members that is as real as it is unmeasurable. For do they not contribute something to the formative ideals and opinions of their society? Through the "influence of indi- viduals who have come under the influence of Jesus others are constantly forced to adopt higher standards in at least conven- tional morality. Yet the force of public opinion, so far as Jesus recognizes it, appears at first glance, largely evil. His apostles were not to be of the leaven of the Pharisee;* they were not to pattern themselves after the habits of the hypocrite ; 3 they were not, to use the Pauline expression, to "conform to the present world." 4 But it is not difficult to see that such a vitiated public opinion must be replaced by a new and better as soon as hypocrites are replaced by honest men. If one is not

'John 17: 15. 'Matt. 6:2, 5, 16.

Matt. 16: II ; Mark 8:15; Luke 12 :i. Rom. 12:2.