The family altar

A returned missionary, shocked at conditions in America, noted the fall of the family altar as one of the chief changes in American life: “My father gathered his family together each morning, and commended.us to God’s keeping before we separated for the duties of the day. On my return from India I found that he had given up the practice of family prayer entirely, and that my younger brothers and sisters were individualists who cared nothing for the moral and religious influence of the home. What is true of my father’s household is true of many homes throughout the length and breadth of the land. The home is no longer a unit; family life, with its spiritual and moral training is very largely a thing of the past. This in my judgment is the explanation of the lack of moral earnestness and disregard for the rights of others so strikingly apparent to me after an absence of a comparatively few years.”