Excerpt from A Social Theory of Religious Education What consequences for religious education follow from the now widely accepted social interpretation of the Christian mes sage? The present work is an attempt to answer this question. The answer is not simple. For the social message does not require us merely to insert this or that new duty into our present scheme of living, but also to judge every detail of conduct from a higher point of view. We are required to organize the whole of life upon a different level. It would be strange indeed if the new meaning that this gives to every-day affairs did not change our outlook upon child life. If we are to be logical and practical in our social Christianity, we must revise our policies with respect to children at least as much as our policies with respect to adults. The chapters that follow undertake to show the directions that this revision will need to take. As we proceed, it will appear that the whole perspective of religious education undergoes a change. The central purpose, to begin with, grows more specific because the nature of good ness is seen to be as concrete as the neighbor who lives next door. Christian experience comes out of the clouds, because in our dealings with our brother whom we have seen we are deal ing with the Father whom we have not seen - yes, we here come into relation with what is deepest in his character and purposes. To Christian ears these statements do not sound strange, per haps, yet when they are applied to the religious life of the young they do sing a new melody. A profounder significance attaches to the will of a child, and especially to his relations with persons, whether children or adults. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.