News and Notes by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 28, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 21.

News and Notes.

By Editor

RELIGIOUS.

—The Church of England has an income and real estate which if realized would yield $1,000,000,000, says an advocate of disestablishment.

—The Shah of Persia has contributed $800 towards the erection of a new Presbyterian mission church in Hamadan, Persia.

—Bishop Coxe, of western New York, announces that the Diocesan Council has fixed $1,000 as the lowest salary which should be offered a minister.

—The constantly increasing Jewish population at Jerusalem is now said to be about 18,000, which is, perhaps, the largest number that has lived there since the city was destroyed by Titus in 70 A. D.

—One of our exchanges says 110 negroes were baptized in the Tennessee River at Knoxville in forty-seven minutes. We think that the sacredness of the rite must be sadly overlooked when an attempt at speed is made.

—A grocer at Keokuk, Iowa, who has a keen eye to business, in subscribing $1.00 to a church entertainment added after his signature, "the only place in Keokuk where you can get sixteen pounds of sugar for $1.00."

—There really seems to be a prospect of the union of the Greek and Roman Churches. The Roman Apostolic Delegate to Constantinople, and the Greek Bishop of Dakovar, both have lately written strongly in favor of it. And as, in behalf of the movement, the one calls for prayers to the Virgin Mary, and the other for prayers to St. Methodius, they will probably fetch it.

—There is to be a grand pilgrimage to the Grotto of Lourdes again this year. The pope has deigned "to open again the treasury of indulgences" in favor of it. But it is expected that each of the pilgrims will give "at least one penny for the construction of the Church of the Rosary, dedicated to our Lady of Lourdes," and a portion of these alms will be given "for the tomb of Pope Pius IX." What with Catholic pilgrimages, and Protestant fairs, festivals, mum socials, etc., the millennium will probably be brought about soon!

—Rev. E. O. Tade, of the Congregational Club of San Francisco, was to discuss this theme at the Club meeting last Monday: "The Source of Our Greatest Power Is the Source of Our Greatest Weakness." We should like to have heard it. We have a lurking curiosity to know how it could be made to appear that God is "the source of greatest weakness," or of any weakness at all; for he is undoubtedly the source of greatest power. Or does Mr. Tade propose to maintain that some other than God is the source of their greatest power? If so, then his proposition needs no argument.