Progress in the European Division by L. R. Conradi

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Nov 10, 1910

Progress in the European Division

By L. R. Conradi

L. R. CONRADI

From all appearances, 1910 will mark another great step in the advancement of the European Division. As I am about ready to start to spend the rest of the year in the South American field, I will briefly review the season's work.

All our various gatherings during the year have been marked with unity. God's Spirit has touched hearts, souls have been converted, and plans laid for the extension of the work. Liberal donations have also been given to missions, and we are able to spend some ten thousand dollars more in our mission fields this year than last year.

We were happy to dedicate the Stanborough Park College, in England, also to see the main building of the sanitarium at Gland, Switzerland, completed.

In view of the large gathering of the General Conference Committee in Friedensau next summer, the lacking wing of the new school building has been given out to the contractor. As the Hamburg Publishing House must necessarily have more ground, we secured some of the adjoining property for eight thousand dollars; this will give us ample room for future growth. The purchase of some property in Riga for the publishing house, and the erection of a chapel for the growing church there, are also under consideration. The Latin Union has removed its headquarters to Paris, and the depository has been reopened there, while the depository from Geneva has been removed to Gland. Brother E. Borle has taken hold of the publishing work since October 1, and is visiting Spain and Portugal in its interests. We expect to put up a small printing plant in Gland to print our French papers and tracts.

Important changes are taking place in our African mission fields. In the Pare Mission of German East Africa, our work is constantly growing. We have one thousand young people attending our schools, and our committee has now decided to open up a fourth main station there. There is a hopeful outlook for a steady growth in the number of converts from heathenism. We now have the Gospel of Matthew, also a primer and a hymn-book, in print in the Chasu; and the British and Foreign Bible Society is pressing us to complete the translation of the New Testament, which it will assist us in getting out.

The greatest changes, however, are taking place in the Victoria Nyanza field. We have there two stations on the British East African side, and three on the German side. Elder B. Ohme, with eight new workers, is also on the way to that field. We expect these stations will be doubled on both sides within a year; and if possible, we shall occupy the whole east side of the Nyanza. Translations are being made in the Kavirondo tongue, also in Waganda and Suaheli, and we expect to have quite a literature in all these different languages within a year.

Our buildings are about completed in Asmara, of the Abyssinian Mission. Brethren A. Grundset and P. N. Lindegren look after the school now, and we hope it will prove a success. Dr. F. W. Vasenius and Brother J. Persson made a trip lately into Abyssinia as far as Aksum and Adua, but found no favorable opening for medical missionary work, as the Italian government is supplying free medical help in that region. The doctor will now try a new district. We are taking Brethren Toppenberg and Persson to the Victoria Nyanza, to gain a larger experience; and as soon as the country opens, they will push to the north from there toward the southern Abyssinian border. Thus we are doing what we can to come as near as possible to Abyssinia from the north and the south. We are also contemplating getting out literature in some of the Abyssinian tongues.

The work is also advancing in the Levant Union. In our late meetings, which I shall report in another article, important steps were taken to more fully organize that large union mission field. From the present Turkish field, we cut off ancient Armenia, close to the Russian border, with a population of about two and one-half millions, as a separate mission field. Elder Z. G. Baharian, who has lately made a tour of that country, will take charge of it, and be joined by several workers. The Grecian mission field, comprising Macedonia, Albania, Greece, and Crete, with about six millions of people, has also been organized. Elder R. S. Greaves will look after it, and has taken up his headquarters at Janina, in Albania, while Brother F. Scior is placed at Thessalonica. Perhaps the most important step was the organization of a small institute to be held this winter at Constantinople.

We have just received word that Brother F. F. Oster has safely arrived in Baku, preparatory to entering Persia. He will be joined by Brother H. Dirksen early in 1911. We trust that God will graciously care for these, our pioneer missionaries to the Persian nation, and that he will open up the way for them to reap a rich harvest in this interesting and difficult field.

Important changes will take place by the beginning of the new year in the Russian Union Conference. As the present Russian Union has not only the largest

population of any union conference in the world, but by far the greatest extent of territory, a division has been arranged; and from Jan. 1, 1911, the Siberian Union Mission field will be organized. Great Siberia will be divided into an eastern and a western field; the present East Russian Mission field, with some provinces of the Middle Russian field, will be divided into the Volga and Ural mission fields. These four, with the Central Asiatic fields, will form the Siberian Union Mission field, with about one thousand members. Elder G. Perk is already on the way to Samara, the great junction of the Siberian and Central Asiatic railways, to establish headquarters there. Elder E. Gnadjin, who has lately organized a church of twenty-five in Manchuria, expects to settle in eastern Siberia, while Elder H. K. Loebsack has already settled in Omsk, western Siberia, and Elder J. F. Hinter in the Volga district at Zaritzin.

Wherever we have taken up a collection for the $10,000 supplementary fund to the $300,000 Fund to be raised in America, to serve for educational purposes for the Levant, Latin, and Russian fields, our people have received it with enthusiasm, and we expect that by our meeting next July, every cent of it will be in hand.

While the first quarter of this year did not show so great a net growth as in former years, yet we are pleased to notice that the following quarter has regained the balance again, and we have every reason to believe that our membership will be above the twenty-two-thousand mark at the close of 1910. Our income, both in tithe and offerings, shows a steady, growing increase; and this opens before us the possibility of extending the work in our mission fields beyond, without having to call for extra help from America. As our work comes more and more to the notice of leading men in Europe, and the truth is being circulated among all religions, we feel more keenly the need of better literature, and we are hard at work to increase the same in the thirty tongues in which we are now printing throughout this division for the 540,000,000 people in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Our canvassing work and our book sales are increasing. We have every reason to be encouraged concerning this branch of the work.

Important changes are apparent throughout Europe. Turkey is now open to the gospel; the change in Portugal and Spain will throw open that large field; God has also been preparing the way in Austria-Hungary, where we have now nearly one thousand Sabbath-keepers; and though Russia is still restricting liberty, yet the avenues for the growth of the work are widening out.

Though we have neither the means nor the men to put forth special efforts in the great cities, yet something is being done, and there is a steady growth of our membership in all the larger cities of Europe. As our union and conference presidents are set free from institutions, and devote their time to successful city work, it keeps the ministry under them astir, and the result is that with our five hundred workers throughout Europe we shall add probably four thousand souls to our membership this year. Elder J. C. Raft, the president of the Scandinavian Union, raised up a good church in southern Sweden; Elder H. F. Schuberth is hard at work in the great city of Berlin; Elder J. H. Schilling has been helping with lectures in his union; Elder J. T. Boettcher has been out to Siberia, and organized several churches; Elder L. P. Tieche, of the Latin Union, has again entered Paris; while Elder W. J. Fitzgerald is holding a course of lectures in his union this winter. At the same time, we are exerting every influence possible to give our young people a Christian education in our schools, and to educate them for practical work in the field, realizing that to a large extent the hope of our steadily growing work to-day lies in our youth.

Hamburg.