theology unannounced

I love when I am blindsided by revelations or insightful observations from unexpected places at unexpected times. I have been reading Lewis Carroll's Sylvie and Bruno as my presleep reading. It is mostly about dreams and the "eerie" feeling that allows one to imagine the fantastic in ones waking state (or more accurately, semi-waking state). It's perfect kindling for dreams. But for a section of a chapter it seems that Mr. Carroll left the fairies to gather on a later page and gave the floor to religious social commentary.

But by this time we had reached the little church, into which a goodly stream of worshippers, consisting mainly of fishermen and their families, was flowing.
The service would have been pronounced by any modern aesthetic religionist ---or religious aesthete, which is it? ---to be crude and cold: to me, coming fresh from the ever-advancing developments of a London church under a soi-disant "Catholic" Rector, it was unspeakably refreshing.
There was no theatrical procession of demure little choristers, trying their best not to simper under the admiring gaze of the congregation: the people's share in the service was taken by the people themselves, unaided, except that a few good voices, judiciously posted here and there among the, kept the singing from going too far astray.
There was no murdering of the noble music, contained in the Bible and the Liturgy, by its recital in a dead monotone, with no more expression than a mechanical talking-doll.
No, the prayers were prayed, the lessons were read, and---best of all---the sermon was talked; and I found myself repeating, as we left the church, the words of Jacob, when he "awaked out of his sleep". " 'Surely the Lord is in this place! This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.' "
"Yes," said Arthur, apparently in answer to my thoughts, "those 'high' services are fast becoming pure Formalism. More and more the people are beginning to regard them as 'performances', in which they only 'assist' in the French sense. And it is specially bad for the little boys. They'd be much less self-conscious as pantomime-fairies. With all that dressing-up, and stagy-entrances and exits, and being always en evidence, no wonder if they're eaten up with vanity, the blatant little coxcombs!"
When we passed the Hall on our return, we found the Earl and lady Muriel sitting out in the garden. Eric had gone for a stroll.
We joined them, and the conversation soon turned on the sermon we had just heard, the subject of which was "selfishness".
"What a change has come over our pulpits", Arthur remarked, "since the time when Paley gave that utterly selfish definition of virtue, 'the doing good to mankind, in obedience to the will of God, and for the sake of everlasting happiness'!"
Lady Muriel looked at him enquiringly, but she seemed to have learned by intuition, what years of experience had taught me, that the way to elicit Arthur's deepest thoughts was neither to assent nor dissent, but simply to listen.
"At that time," he went on, "a great tidal wave of selfishness was sweeping over human thought. Right and Wrong had somehow been transformed into Gain and Loss, and Religion had become a sort of commercial transaction. We may be thankful that our preachers are beginning to take a nobler view of life."
"But is it not taught again and again in the Bible?" I ventured to ask.
"Not in the Bible, as a whole," said Arthur. "In the Old Testament, no doubt, rewards and punishments are constantly appealed to as motives for action. That teaching is best for children, and the Israelites seem to have been, mentally, utter children. We guide our children thus, at first: but we appeal, as soon as possible, to their innate sense of Right and Wrong: and, when that stage is safely past, we appeal to the highest motive of all, the desire for likeness to, and union with, the Supreme Good. I think you will find that to be the teaching of the Bible, as a whole, beginning with 'that thy days may be long in the land', and ending with 'be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect'."
We were silent for awhile, and then Arthur went off on another tack. "Look at the literature of Hymns, now. How cankered it is, through and through, with selfishness! There are few human compositions more utterly degraded than some modern Hymns!"
I quoted the stanza.

"Whatever, Lord, we lend to Thee,
Repaid a thousandfold shall be,
Then gladly will we give to Thee,
Giver of all!"

"Yes," he said grimly: "that is the typical stanza. And the very last charity-sermon I heard was infected with it. After giving many good reasons for charity, the preacher wound up with 'and, for all you give, you will be repaid a thousandfold!" Oh, the utter meanness of such a motive, to be put before men who do know what self-sacrifice is, who can appreciate generosity and heroism! Talk of Original Sin!" he went on with increasing bitterness. "Can you have a stronger proof of the Original Goodness there must be in this nation, than the fact that Religion has been preached to us, as a commercial speculation, for a century, and that we still believe in a God?"

There was more, followed by meetings with fairies and an introduction to physical manifestations of mental will called Phlizz, but I had to stop somewhere. I felt that so much of what was written could apply to today. How easily the heart loses its bearing. I would only strongly correct the last statement. Perhaps it should say, what stronger proof of the truth at the core buried beneath it all, than the fact that Religion has been preached to us, as a commercial speculation, and that we still believe in God? I could detail all that I saw in the section, but I feel it speaks strongly enough for itself, and this post is long enough.