p. 16 | Signs of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 32. (8/9/1905)

A Barrier Yet to Meet.

By Editor

The Catholic Mirror of July 22 congratulates Cardinal Gibbons on the occasion of his seventy-first birthday, and among other things says:

It must be no small part of the pride which fills the cardinal on this day to feel that the church, which had before it in the '60's so many chasms to bridge, so many rivers to ford, so many cliffs to scale, has bridged them, forded them, and scaled them all victoriously through the support lent by his and other valiant arms. . . . It must be with joyous heart, indeed, that the cardinal turns at this milestone, and views, from the summit he has laboriously won, the past with all its difficulties overcome, its dangers faced, its barriers of prejudice broken down, and its countless thousands won for the church, and who still toil in the valley.

But there is one barrier which that church is yet to meet, and that is the eternal truth of God in the judgment,—truth which she has perverted by tradition, truth which she has trampled down, truth the disciples of which she has put to death, truth embodied in the law designed of God as a hedge to His people, but which that church has broken down, truth personified in the life of the Incarnate Word, whom Rome has crucified afresh, and locked in her sepulcher of dead forms from her starving devotees. But when Rome meets these at the bar of God, all her mitered power and gilded pomp will perish in the presence of Him from whom Rome has shut away the millions by cordons of priests and dead saints. Those of her flock who are saved then will be saved despite the ministrations of her perversions of truth. For Cardinal Gibbons, or any other Roman Catholic, we have naught but the honor due all men, our kindest wishes and earnest prayer but for the "body of doctrine" by which Catholics are held in direst bondage, and which, when accepted, will ruin the world and nations, we have no use, and we wish that every Roman Catholic would so conclude before he meets God's truth in the judgment.

Do You Not Wish to Help?

By Editor

In his report of the first camp-meeting in Greater New York, printed in the Review and Herald of July 20, Pastor W. A. Spicer well presents the immensity and need of the great mission field of that mighty city. After speaking of the work which has been done, Brother Spicer says:

The Lord can make ways where there are no ways, and He is showing our friends in this city of apartment-houses the way to get to the people. It is a matter of the utmost importance, for face-to-face and house-to-house effort is the work in which all the believers can join. It would be a blessing, indeed, if somebody had a few hundred dollars, or even a thousand, for this conference to use in a special campaign with the SIGNS to be followed by systematic effort with other literature and Bible work. Somehow this truth is to go right through these long-barred gates, and the workers are full of faith that the time has come, and that they have found the way of victory.

Now if there are those who wish to help in this needy field in this way, we shall be glad to furnish the SIGNS or to forward the money to proper parties.

Which Will Rule?

By Editor

Which Will Rule?—A writer in the San Diegan Sun asks the question, Who will rule the world, the Catholics, the Jews, or Protestants? As among these three we do not see how there can be any question. Both Jews and Protestants have left in large part the fundamentals of their religions, and neither are numerous or cohesive. But the Roman Catholics are numerous, consistent, cohesive, politic. Rome has one foe—Socialism—which will yet become for a time an ally. She has also made God her adversary, by setting herself against His law. One will, beyond all this, rule, even Christ Jesus. He will do it now if men will receive Him in their heart and life. He will rule then anyway.

The Personal God of the Bible

Buddhism prays to nobody for nothing. New Thought gives us the same kind of no personal God. The Bible reveals to us a personal God—Jehovah, the source of all life and power and love, manifested through His Son Jesus Christ. It is a revelation of a God who is a Father, of a Saviour who is a Brother.