100 YEARS AGO IN THE SARATOGIAN
Sunday, June 16, 1918. Commencement week at St. Faith’s School concludes with a call for women “filled with a vision of the new world order” at Bethesda Church this morning.
Rev. Irving G. Rouillard preaches the baccalaureate sermon for the girl’s school. “It is time now for our girls to begin to think of these terrible forces of evil which bring agony to the heart of the world, and to decide what forces of righteousness must be used to bring to pass the salvation of humanity,” he says.
“It is your duty to ask yourselves what must be changed, and to resolve to have your share in bringing in a new order.” Rouillard has some ideas of his own, of course.
“There is the curse of drink, intemperance, which leads on to so many evils. No social evil so invades the home of America as the curse of alcohol. It robs manhood and attacks defenseless womanhood and childhood. It is God’s worst enemy and the devil’s best friend.”
Rouillard urges the young women of St. Faith’s to “help forward the great cause of temperance.” Opponents of alcohol nationwide are getting closer to ratification of a constitutional amendment prohibiting the sale of alcoholic beverages throughout the United States.
Meanwhile, “Ignorance and illiteracy are appalling today, even in our own country.” Surveys have shown that “a large percentage of the men in our army cannot read or write [while] many cannot understand the language of the officers, do not know English.”
Women can change that by becoming teachers. Rouillard believes that “every child ought to have the opportunity of a free education at the expense of the state,” but laments the fact that “in so many nations at war today, millions have been spent for the instruments of war, whereas only pennies have been given for the agencies of peace.”
Taking part in a world war should force Americans to question their traditional prejudices, Rouillard argues. “Our admiration for the British, for the French, for the Italians and for the Belgians, for their valor in this war, is now at a high pitch! Will it survive after the war?
“Can we extend sympathy and friendship toward other races that are down-trodden and oppressed, the Russians, the Negroes, the Latins of South America, the Chinese and Japanese? They are striving as we are for the realization of freedom and democracy, the right of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Students in Saratoga Springs need only looks at the Spirit of Life statue to “catch the spirit of the vision of some who have lived and labored here,” Rouillard says.
-- Kevin Gilbert