Porto Rico by B. E. Connerly

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 24, 1907

Porto Rico

By B. E. Connerly

WE are now in our fifth year in this little tropical island field; and as we look about to take an inventory of our work, we do wonder what the Lord can see has been accomplished. To us it seems little.

In general, we can see great changes in the people of Porto Rico. This is a Catholic field, and Spain educated only twenty per cent of the people, while to-day by day the large majority of the children in the island are under instruction. The Bible and good literature have been and are being distributed among the people, and we now have a number of good religious papers that are well received by them, whereas before they had but fiction and political reading. This change is having a great influence for good, and the people are beginning to compare and choose between the good and the bad.

The visible results of the work this year are not encouraging, and we have neither baptized nor received into the church any members, notwithstanding that a goodly number have asked for baptism and church-membership; but our past experience has taught us that it is better to wait until they prove that the work is of God.

After returning from the Kingston conference, I suffered from physical inability to work, and as Brother and Sister J. C. Brower were unable to do field work while studying the language, Mrs. Connerly did the most of the work on the paper, while the burden of the field work fell on our faithful Brother Nathan Moulton.

The Lord has blessed the brethren in Arecibo, and on my last visit there I found them all of good courage, and some of them were out visiting among their neighbors and selling our paper, El Centinela de la Verdad.

In San Juan two sisters who were baptized a year ago are conducting a little Sabbath-school and selling both El Centinela and the Caribbean Watchman.

The middle of July Brother and Sister Brower went to Ponce to make their home, and the Sabbath-school in their family makes the fourth one in the island, each a little light to which the Spirit of God can call the attention of the honest in heart. Sister Brower is also watching for an interest in medical missionary work.

Brother Moulton spent four months in Santo Domingo, where he did a splendid work. He had planned to sell as many of our books there as possible in opening up that work, but we were disappointed in getting the books. As a result of the work in Santo Domingo, we are sending nearly a thousand copies of El Centinela and twenty-six of the Caribbean Watchman monthly, and nearly every mail brings the Macedonian cry for help. Somebody must locate there soon. Our Earthquake special in March did a good work in getting the people to thinking on the signs of the times; and in August we issued a special on the advent message, which has been gladly received by the people, and I trust may cause some to decide in favor of the message.

B. E. CONNERLY.