"New York for Jesus"

Last week a 14-year-old handmaiden of the Lord stood beside a ripe ecclesiastic, her head upraised and look intent, locks flung back, red lips apart.

The ecclesiast spoke. "I hope," he said, "that this girl will grow into womanhood, ripe and rich, to spread her teachings and faith as beautifully as the flower promises."

The churchman was Rev. Dr. S. Parkes Cadman, President of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America, and the maiden who paused on his words was Uldine Utley.

And as the attentive Uldine surveyed the aristocratic timbers in the roof of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, Manhattan, perhaps she concealed a flitting thought of the first time she had heard almost identical words--from the lips of a certain Aimee Semple McPherson, in Fresno, Calif., three years before. Uldine had entered the tabernacle with her blind grandfather, against her will. The pair had started for the girl's dancing school (she was thinking of entering the movies) but when it was found to be closed that afternoon, grandpappy--hearing choral voices across the street--suggested attending Aimee's revival meeting. They attended, Uldine impatiently.

Eleven-year-old Uldine sat within the enchanting tent. She fidgeted, became still, swayed in her seat and slid from underneath grandpappy's hand . . . started forth toward the coaxing smiles and silvery sounding voice of the revivalist . . . out into the aisle . . . straight to the altar and down on her knees before Aimee, wanting to know how to be a Christian. . . .

Last week, her conversion, her guileless movements among the circusy proponents of God recurred to the handmaiden in New York. She remembered how papa and mamma had become religious, converted. The old home in Oklahoma, 80 miles from a railroad, was forgotten and plans were made to leave the new house in Fresno. Meetings were arranged, hundreds of meetings. Uldine liked to talk about God. The girl grew loquacious, talked all over the country. It is said she has converted 10,000 men.

Once in a little southern town she made rough workmen passing by the railroad yard hold their breath while she spoke to them from atop a pile of tar-smeared ties. An enraptured foreman forgot to blow his whistle. . . .

Last year, many a Fundamentalist reproached Dr. John Roach Straton, Fundamentalist thunderer, when he invited Uldine to his Manhattan temple to speak. The Bible, they said, forbids women's appearance in the pulpit. Fearless Preacher Straton permitted her to proceed, and she gave a sermon based so fundamentally upon the Ark of the Covenant that it soothed the hearts of the reproachful ones. But later in Madison Square Garden she was charged by atheists with violating the child labor laws by preaching for money. ...

Not less innocently Uldine's freeborn glance confessed wonder when she thought of that other day when Dr. Straton introduced her from his already surfeited pulpit as "a sunny-hearted child, apointed with God's oil. . . ." Mrs. Straton claimed she had been suffering with a severe pain in the side, but that it had been relieved promptly by Uldine's prayers.

Upper berths, speeches, meals ordered on the dining ear with the confidence of a vaudeville trouper, oratory, ecstasies of religious passion, testimonials, quick little dancing steps, trips to foreign lands, Cuba, Milwaukee, Youngstown, dolls, John Roach Straton, Fresno, Aimee McPherson, cinema shows, school, tutor, lollypops,-God, salva- tions. Dr. Cadman. ...

Amazing, fragmentary child's world: But Ecclesiastic Cadman had stopped and the pale handmaiden found herself facing the embattled visages of churchmen, curiosity-seekers, smart reporters, cynics, all agreed secretly to themselves to be as tolerant as possible.

Uldine began to talk.

There were words and phrases and sentences. There was nothing profound about them. They were the glorious old, old story.

". . . Like a mighty army we are assembled here today.

". . . We are in one hope and doctrine .

". . . God wants us to win souls.

". . . God wants all of you.

". . . We look forward with one thought and that is to save New York for Jesus Christ."

And then the maiden paused, as if to catch a distant strain. Like an alabaster monument of Joan of Arc she seemed to stand the guardian vestal of the light that dwells in the Hallelujah-and-Amen type of evangelism. And as she spoke her thin childish voice quavered:

"There must be scores of different beliefs in this audience, but we are not divided."

That meek devotional statement identified Uldine Utley. She sat down.

Later Preachers Cadman, Morgan (Fifth Avenue Presbyterian), Keeler (Crawford Memorial Methodist Church), Megaw (Fort Washington Presbyterian), as well as other committee members of the Evangelistic Committee of New York City, decided to sponsor a series of revivals to be held this summer by Miss Utley, in Manhattan.