The School in the Modern Church

The School in the Modern Church is a work by Henry Frederick Cope on the role of religious education programs within the broader life of American Protestant congregations during the Progressive era. The book continues the practical religious education reform argument that Cope developed across his various publications during his service as General Secretary of the Religious Education Association.

The central question Cope addresses is the proper relationship between the Sunday school or religious education program and the rest of the congregation’s life. The older nineteenth-century pattern had often treated the Sunday school as essentially separate from the regular congregational work, with separate teachers, separate curriculum, separate organizational structure, and only loose connection to the regular worship and pastoral activities. Cope argues that this separation produced serious educational and pastoral problems and that the religious education program should be more fully integrated into the regular life of the congregation.

The integration argument has several practical dimensions. The teachers in the religious education program should be people who are also involved in the broader life of the congregation, not just volunteers brought in to handle the Sunday school separately. The curriculum should connect with the themes and concerns that the broader congregational work addresses. The students in the religious education program should be moving into the regular adult activities of the congregation as they grow up, not being treated as a separate population. The pastoral staff should be involved with the religious education program rather than leaving it entirely to the Sunday school superintendent and the volunteer teachers.

Cope draws on his observation of American Protestant congregations across various denominations during his years at the Religious Education Association. The book provides practical examples of congregations that had successfully integrated their religious education work into their broader congregational life, along with descriptions of the practical methods they had used to achieve the integration.

The Progressive era religious education reform that Cope was central to had real and lasting influence on American Protestant church practice. Many of the specific recommendations Cope and his colleagues made were adopted across the following decades, with substantial improvement in the quality of teacher preparation, in curriculum design, and in the integration of religious education with the broader congregational ministry.

The book runs about two hundred pages. It pairs with Cope’s other writings and with the broader Religious Education Association literature of the period.