Taft on Protestant Mission Work
By L. A. S.
SECRETARY-OF-WAR Taft, recently governor of the Philippines, is quoted as having made some interesting statements at a recent social function in Philadelphia concerning Protestant mission work in the islands from which he has just returned. He is quoted as saying that the present is no time for proselyting, such Protestant missionary work as he would approve being confined principally to gifts of money. Of the friars he is quoted as saying, “Justice demands that we acknowledge our indebtedness to the friars and other priests of the Roman Catholic Church, who have given to the United States Christian material from which we can make a self-governing people.” The ex-governor, as quoted, “did not think the time was ripe for proselyting,” but “believed that more good could be done for the Philippines by sending money for hospitals, schools, and churches.” Ninety per cent of the population, he said, lives in dense ignorance. He added also that the hygiene of the native “is dreadful.” This speech will no doubt have the approval of Catholics, who from the first have upheld the friars, and sought to discourage the idea of Protestant missionary work in the islands. The Catholic regime in the islands appears to have the passive support of the government, and the Catholic Church may be counted on to use every means to secure the active as well as the passive support of the civil power. Protestants are told that the present is not a good time for Protestant missionary work, and the papacy may be counted on to see to it that no more favorable time than the present shall ever arrive. But the gospel of the kingdom must go to every people on the earth, and the appointed time has come for the last gospel message to be given. That message no power on earth can now stop. L. A. S.