An International Lord’s Day Congress
By ELIZA H. MORTON
THAT there are undercurrents of power quietly and silently working in this free land is evident from the fact that the Fourteenth International Lord’s Day Congress, to be held in connection with the Panama-Pacific Exposition in Oakland, Cal., from July 27 to August 1, represents in its membership thirty-six organizations, covering associations of trade, manufacture, commerce, reform, of civic and social betterment, and working-men’s unions, as well as churches, Sunday schools, ministers’ associations, religious societies, educational associations, and all Lord’s Day and Sabbath associations. Delegates from all these organizations will be present at the exposition. The honorary chairman of the congress will be President Wilson, and the vice chairmen will be the governors of the several States. The permanent chairman will be Hon. Alton B. Parker, of New York. The platform of principles includes the following remarkable statement:— “We hold the Sabbath or weekly day of rest to have been founded by the Creator in the beginning; embodied in a commandment of the decalogue; confirmed by the Lord Jesus Christ, by him dedicated to the welfare of all mankind; and finally to have appeared in the Lord’s Day of the Christian church, all whose great, historic branches, however otherwise divided, are united in the observance of Sunday as a day of rest and worship.”
The great object of this congress is to promote the making and enforcement of strict Sunday laws. That it has a powerful working force is evident. The church and the state will clasp hands at this great gathering. The undercurrents of power will, for a brief time, be apparent. The platform of principles does not state how the seventh-day Sabbath, “confirmed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and by him dedicated to the welfare of all mankind,” finally appeared in the Lord’s Day of the Christian church. It quietly ignores the Jews, and the Seventh-day Baptists and the great body of Seventh-day Adventists, who do not unite with the rest of Christendom in the observance of Sunday as a day of rest and worship. It distinctly states that its aim is to educate the people to resist whatever tends to deprive them of the Sunday sabbath. While it disclaims any desire to enforce or interfere with the religious observance of the day, yet at the same time it maintains its object to secure for all citizens a right to worship which may not be infringed “by the distractions of pleasure or by the demands of business and labor.” The foundation of the platform is contradictory, and not in accordance with the fundamental law of the land, neither is it in harmony with the principles of the Bible. The outcome of this powerful religio-political combination is outlined in God’s Word. The Sabbath question is coming rapidly to the front. It may be the next great issue of the world. It will be the test which will face every soul. Now is the time to sow the seeds of truth. Now is the time to place literature in the hands of men of influence,—literature which will enlighten them concerning the true import of Sunday laws, and the great message now due the world. We must not forget that “the last moves will be rapid ones.”