Religious Notes by Editor

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 28, 1883

Religious Notes.

By Editor

—A telegram confirms the report of the murder of the two German missionaries in Zululand.

—It is said that the queen of Madagascar spends half an hour or an hour every morning in reading the Bible and prayer.

—There were twenty-five hundred Sunday-school workers present at the recent Georgia Sunday-school Convention.

—Dr. J. P. Newman, of New York, says that "half the Christian world is worshiping a Jew [Christ], and the other half a Jewess [the Virgin Mary]."

—Of the 1,300 graduates of Middlebury College, 500 became preachers, 18 presidents of colleges or theological schools, 70 college professors, and 40 missionaries.

—A home for needy widows of the Protestant Episcopal Church is to be erected at Nineteenth and E Streets, Washington, by Mrs. Elizabeth Stone, who has given the ground and $25,000 for the purpose.

—A little girl on being asked what was the greatest festival of the church, promptly replied, "Strawberry festival." Thus the little ones are learning to act their part in conducting the affairs of the popular church.

—An agreement has been reached between the British and Foreign Bible Society and the English Baptists, by which a marginal reading is placed in the versions issued by the society, where the words "baptize" and "baptism" occur: "Some translate immerse."

—Dr. Howard Crosby attended the Baptist anniversary meeting at Saratoga, as messenger from the Presbyterian General Assembly. In his address he said: "Two great evils confront us—Romanism, the master-piece of Satan, and infidelity, masquerading under the cloak of learning. Romanism thrives only in the soil of ignorance."

—At the Petaluma District Ministerial Association, of the M. E. Church, last month, the Presiding Elder read an essay upon "Time Limitation in the Itineracy," in which he took strong grounds in favor of removing the limitation, and leaving the length of the pastoral term entirely to the prayerful discretion of the bishops and their counselors.

—The spirit of Catholicism is shown by a priest at Ansonia, Conn., as follows: "A Catholic doctor having established himself in the town, the priest introduced him from the pulpit, told the people they would no longer have to call in 'heretical murderers,' and charged them, further, that unless they did call in the Catholic doctor they could not have the services of the church for the sick or dead."

—The London Christian Commonwealth has this item: "The Birmingham trade in idols is rather brisk. A thousand glass gods have just been imported into Burmah from that town. They only cost 1s. 6d. each, and sell for eight rupees." Doubtless the same ship that bears the idols to the heathen, will also carry a few missionaries to tell them that there is but one God. This is no more inconsistent, however, than to send missionaries and whisky to the heathen on the same vessel.

—Rev. Charles F. Thwing discusses in the Independent the question, "Is Congregationalism going to the Wall?" He states that in point of numbers the Congregationalists are "being distanced by the growth, not only of the population, but also of churches other than their own." He gives various reasons for this, and says: "Yet, perhaps, the most important of these causes lies in the undue emphasis which the Congregational Church places on the intellectual, and the too slight emphasis which it places upon the spiritual means of its propagation."

—The Examiner has this to say of pulpit irreverence: "We enjoy genuine wit as well as the next man, but have no hesitation in saying that sacred things are not a fitting subject for witty speeches in a public assembly. Let us leave the irreverent joking to the pot-house politician and the infidel lecturer. The minister who indulges in this species of jesting may raise a laugh among the thoughtless and gain a reputation for smartness with a few, but the judicious will grieve at the lowering of its dignity, at his loss of influence with the sensible, and at the demoralizing effect of his example on all who hear him."

—A woman in Ohio has applied for a divorce on account of the manner in which her husband conducts family worship. He calls the family to prayers three times a day, and fills his prayers with denunciations of his wife, and quotations from the Scriptures about her sins. It is hard to say what the police court will decide, but the Lord about our neighbors, or lecturing them upon their supposed sins, is weak and hypocritical, and unwise.—Golden Censer. Hypocritical and provoking a man undoubtedly is, but if such conduct is sufficient for divorce, the next step will be a divorce because a husband sits at table in his shirt sleeves, and uses his knife; or because the wife cannot make the bread Saxon." And the S. S. Times adds: "That advice is as timely, in its spirit, to Sunday-school teachers as to preachers. It is all very well for teachers to broaden and perfect their knowledge by outside study; but the only value of that study to their scholars is in the simpler and more direct pressing home of the practical applications of the lesson of the day to those scholars' minds and hearts."

—Samuel J. Wilson, of Alleghany Theological gave the following sound instruction to the ing class: "Young gentlemen, study Hebrew, pore over Greek verbs, read Latin, and if time and desire, translate ancient hieroglyphics; but I charge you, when you go into the to preach the gospel, to use the plain Anglo-Saxon."