The Girl and Her Religion — Margaret Slattery
You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org . If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title : The Girl and Her Religion Author : Margaret Slattery Release date : August 13, 2005 [eBook #16520] Most recently updated: December 12, 2020 Language : English Other information and formats : www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16520 Credits : Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Eva Sweeney and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net *** START OF CARY Fifth Printing THE PILGRIM PRESS BOSTON WHILE PACKING HER TRUNK SHE DREAMED OF COLLEGE FOREWORD TO THOSE WHO READ THIS BOOK It is not a technical book, it does not attempt philosophy. It does not contain the solution of all girl problems. It is not a great book, it is simple and concrete. It is a record of some things about which the girls I have known have compelled me to think. I have but one request to make of those who read it—that they also think —not of the book, not of the author, but of the girls —for action is born of thought. THE AUTHOR. CONTENTS THE GIRL I THE RIGHTS OF A GIRL II THE HANDICAPPED GIRL III THE PRIVILEGED GIRL IV THE GIRL WHO IS EASILY LED V THE GIRL WHO IS MISUNDERSTOOD VI THE INDIFFERENT GIRL VII THE GIRL WHO WORSHIPS THE TWIN IDOLS VIII THE GIRL WHO DRIFTS IX THE GIRL WITH HIGH IDEALS X THE AVERAGE GIRL HER RELIGION XI THE GIRL AND THE UNIVERSE XII IN THE HANDS OF A TRIAD XIII THOU SHALT NOT XIV THOU SHALT XV A MATTER OF CULTIVATION XVI A PLEA AND A PROMISE XVII A PERSON NOT A FACT XVIII THE GLORY OF THE CLIMAX PART I The Girl I THE RIGHTS OF A GIRL She has certain inalienable rights, regardless of race, color or social state. When it has thought about her at all, society in general has supposed, until recently, that in a free country, a glorious land of opportunity, the girl has her rights—the right to work, the right to play, the right to secure an education and to enter the professions, the right to marry or to refuse, the right in short to do as she shall choose. And in a sense and to the casual observer this is true. Our country gives to her some rights which she can enjoy nowhere else in the world. But as one learns to know her, little by little the stupendous fact is impressed upon him that girlhood has been and is being denied its rights . It is the right of every girl to be born into a community where the sanitary conditions are such that she has at least a fair chance to enter upon life without being physically handicapped at the start. But hundreds of girls every year open their baby eyes in dark inner rooms where the dim gas light steals what oxygen there may chance to be in the heavy air, take their first steps in foul alleys, find their first toys in garbage cans and gutters. They have been denied their rights at the start. In a Christian land, they grow weak, anemic, yield to the white specter and in a few years pass out of the unfair world to which they came, or remain to fight out a miserable existence against terrific odds. They make up an army of girls who have been denied their rights. And her religion? What is it that religion may offer to her in compensation for that which she has been denied? It is the right of every girl to be born under conditions which will make possible sufficient food and clothing for her natural growth and development. But scores of little girls go shivering to school every morning after a breakfast of bread and tea, they return numb with cold after a dinner of more bread and tea and they go home to a supper of the same with a piece of stale cake or a cookie to help out. Nature calls aloud for nourishment and there is no answer. The girl enters her teens, finds a "job," goes to work, hungry the long year through, fighting to win out over the cold in winter, and to endure the scorching days of summer. And her religion? What is it that religion may offer to her in compensation for what she has been denied? It is the right of every girl to receive, through the educational work of the community, training which shall fit her for clean, honest and efficient living. Yet every year sees hundreds of girls turned out into the world wholly unequipped for life, their special talents undiscovered, their energies undirected, their purposes unformed, their ambitions unawakened. It is the right of every girl to be shielded from the moral danger and physical strain of labor for her daily bread, at least until she shall reach the age of sixteen. Yet every year sees a long procession of girls from eight to sixteen entering into the economic struggle who cannot claim their rights. It is the right of every girl to have a good time, to play under conditions that are morally safe, and to enjoy amusements that leave no stain. Hundreds of girls live in communities where this is absolutely impossible. What has religion to offer to a girl denied an education which will fit her for the life she must live, compelled to enter into a fierce struggle for daily bread while still a child, surrounded by every sort of cheap, exotic amusement behind which temptation lurks? Has it anything to offer in compensation, if it permits conditions to go on unchanged? It is the right of every girl to enjoy companionship and friends. Thousands of girls toil through the day in shops, factories, offices and kitchens and at night sit friendless and alone until the loneliness becomes unendurable and they seek companionship of the unfit and the refuge of the street. Has religion anything to do with lonely girlhood? It is the right of every girl to receive such instruction regarding her own physical life and development as shall serve to protect her from the pitfalls laid for the thoughtless and ignorant, and shall fit her to understand, and when the time comes accept the privileges and responsibilities of motherhood. Eve