News and Notes by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 12, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 23.

News and Notes.

By Editor

RELIGIOUS.

—There are more than 500 missionaries, male and female, in China. In Japan there are 157.

—The Methodist General Conference, after a long and earnest debate, adopted the report against the licensing of women to preach.

—Our neighbor, the California Christian Advocate, in conformity with a recommendation of the General Conference, is to have a temperance department.

—Rev. William Taylor, familiarly known as "Father Taylor," was elected by the Methodist Episcopal Conference, on the 21st ult., as Missionary Bishop for Africa.

—The Archbishop of York says of the Church of England that "no one can now hesitate to say that disestablishment is at least a possibility, and may very soon be actual."

—In a recent lecture before the Union Theological Seminary, New York, Dr. Philip Schaff said that "on strictly exegetical and historical grounds baptism must be immersion. Without prejudice no other interpretation would ever have been given to Bible baptism."

—Through the liberality of some gentlemen connected with the congregational churches at Chicago, a mission service for Bohemians has been begun in that city. It will be known as the Lumberman's Mission. It is estimated that there are 40,000 Bohemians in Chicago.

—The English Baptist Hand-book for 1884 reports 2,593 churches, 2,738 chapels, 1,939 pastors in charge, 304,902 members, 437,187 Sunday scholars. The number of churches has decreased in the past ten years, though the number of chapels has increased from 3,172 to 3,738. During the same period the increase in Sunday scholars has been about 100,000.

—The Christian at Work says: "Since the war the colored Baptists have grown from nothing to over 600 churches in Texas alone. They are trying, too, all too unsuccessfully, to give their membership a higher idea of Christian character, and to make church membership mean something." It seems to us that 600 is a pretty high figure for the number of churches.

—The report of the Australasian Wesleyan Missionary Society, in New Britain, contains the following: "Sixty-four natives have been admitted into membership with the church during the year. The Sunday schools show an increase of 230 scholars, and the day-schools of 205, while the attendance on the public means of grace exceeds that of the previous year by 204. While the work is thus progressing, while teachers are called for on the right hand and on the left, we mourn that the laborers are few. A grand but pitiful sight we are called upon to witness—whole districts waiting for teachers, whole communities begging for teachers, and we have none to send."

—A correspondent of the Christian at Work, asks, "Is it possible that the Baptists could ever have taken the ground they occupy, in relation to baptism and the Supper, had the 'Teaching' come to light a century ago?" We answer for them (for we are Baptists, and more), most certainly. Why not? Is the "Teaching" an inspired book? Its most valorous defender has not yet claimed that for it. Well, there have been thousands of uninspired books written, many of them more than a century ago, which claimed that baptism was not necessarily immersion, and still Baptists clung to the Bible. The printing of an extra book or two, even though it were called the "Teaching of the Apostles," would have made no difference.

—A prominent religious journal, in answer to the question as to the esteem in which Swedenborg and his doctrines are held at the present day, says: "In our judgment, his teachings have gradually, and by a very imperceptible and pervasive movement, affected the whole Church of Christ, so that, to a very large extent, the old-time doctrines of the church have been modified and brought into forms which, though not Swedenborgian, partake very much of the spirit and character of Emanuel Swedenborg's teachings." We do not know of any more severe indictment that could be brought against "the church" than this, although it is not intended as such. If it be so, and we have no reason to doubt it, it is sufficient evidence that "the whole church of Christ" stands sadly in need of a reformation.