Kane goes into the church, and there are men there who want to help him. Want badly to help him. Are very passionate about wanting to help him. Speak loudly about how everyone ought to be ashamed of themselves for not wanting to help him. And then Kane walks out alone.
Sorry, but I don't see these guys who want to help him being persuaded by the weak arguments given, especially given their own intense arguments to help Kane.
The final comments by the town mayor (the famous actor, Thomas Mitchell) in the church seemed to doom the sheriff's (marshall's ?) attempts to get help.
Stupid!?! I never never called you stupid! To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people!
They probably wanted to help him on impulse, an impulse that quickly cooled as they heard the arguments against him.
http://thinkingoutloud-descartes.blogspot.com/
Church scene is simply to show that Kane is abandoned by religion in his attempt to save the town.
shareSeveral people volunteered to help, as long as there were 10 or 12 other dudes signing up too, and it would be 12 against 4 when the bad guys showed up. Outnumbered like that, the bad guys would probably just ride out of town. But if it's just you and the marshall against 4 killers, no one wants to sign up to die.
shareI’m with alydar21. Yes, the film is pretty hostile to organised religion, both to churchgoers and to Quakers. Though the founder of Christianity insisted on pacifism, Foreman’s script suggests that this view of life allows the weak to do nothing and the bad to prevail. Evil, he asserts, must be confronted.
shareThose guys who voiced support at the church. They were willing to fight if, and only if, all the others went along too. They weren’t going to go unless they had heavy numbers.
But the mayor’s speech prevented a good portion of the people from going; a lot of people felt Kane should have just left. That’s why the few guys who voiced support for Kane ended up staying put