WOMEN AND THE AGNOSTIC REGIME.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR']
SIR,—Part of your article under the above heading will cause intense pain to a very large number of Christian women. Is it from ignorance, or indifference, or as a mere rhetorical device, that you write as if the movement for the advancement of women was led and dominated by unbelievers ? All the specific efforts which have been made for and by women— the long struggle to obtain the means of higher education, the amendment of the law regarding the property of married women, the admission of women to professions and other means of employment, their appointment to posts of official usefulness, their claim to vote in municipal elections and in Parliamentary, and many other matters of importance both to themselves and to the community—have been carried on by bodies of women the great majority of whom are members of Christian Churches, and are actuated by religious motives in their public as well as private life. No doubt there are vague and violent talkers about " emancipation " who are also, opponents of Christianity. But even if they were also practical workers for women, which very few of them are, they are so devoid of influence over their sex, that no impartial observer would think of treating them as representative, even in the smallest degree. After more than five-and-twenty years of work at women's questions, I cannot recall more than two or three agnostics amongst those who joined in it. On the other hand, I recall hundreds of members of the Church of England, Presbyterians, Methodists, Congrega- tionalists, &c. Perhaps the most unwearied and tenacious workers have been members of the Society of Friends and strict Calvinistic Presbyterians. Many of these Churches, whilst holding their religious convictions so strongly, set but little value on the clerical authority which the writer of the article seems almost to identify with Christianity. Perhaps that is the reason why he has so strangely ignored them. But that does not account for his overlooking Episcopalians and Roman Catholics who desire freedom for women.
To any one who knows the women's movement, nothing is more certain than that the heart and core of it are the devout women who believe that they are doing the duty to which God has called them, in endeavouring to set women free from all artificial fetters which interfere with their obeying their consciences as Christians.—I am, Sir, &c., [We publish our correspondent's letter from personal respect, but if she lived in London, she would speedily alter her opinion. We should say a clear majority of the more "advanced" women inclined to disbelieve all received opinions on religion. —ED. Spectator.]
Previous page
