p. 327 | Religious Miscellany by Dudley Marvin Canright

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, Cal. · Aug 19, 1875

Religious Miscellany.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

—The constitution of New Hampshire, adopted at the late session of the Legislature, abolishes all religious tests.

—Miss Sarah Bassett, of Crawfordsville, Indiana, and Miss Anne Poage, of La Grange, Missouri, sail as missionaries to Persia on the 7th of August.

—The total amount received in the last three years, in all the conferences, for the support of the Methodist bishops, is $93,262.—72 which is $77,000 less than their salaries.

—Spain’s new constitution recognizes the principle of "individual and civil liberty," and in so many words allays the anxiety felt for Protestant missions there since the return of the monarchy and a Catholic king. But it was by the powerful influence of the Protestant nations around her that Spain was compelled to make this concession.

—The Church of England has reached a dividing of the ways before which she pauses. The contending parties, who are held in an unnatural coalition by the cohesion of State patronage, stand irresolute, each willing to go on its way, but each afraid of the other, and of the consequences of collision; while Mr. Gladstone and some others beg them not to contend, least the whole Establishment should tumble down.

—Camp-meetings are becoming popular with all denominations. Noticing the fact that the Baptists have arranged to hold an out-door meeting or camp-meeting at Martha’s Vineyard, in August, a Boston paper predicts that "before many years we may see the Congregationalists, the Universalists, the Presbyterians, the Unitarians, who are second to none in their appreciation of the advantages of social gatherings, the Episcopalians, and even the Catholics, having their meetings also in God’s first temples."

—The following is the number of meetings held by Messrs. Moody and Sankey in London during the past four months, with the aggregate of attendance:—

"In Camberwell, sixty meetings, attended by 480,000 persons; in Victoria, forty-five meetings, attended by 40,000 persons; in the Opera House, sixty meetings, attended by 330,000 persons; in Bow, sixty meetings, attended by 600,000 persons; and in Agricultural Hall, sixty meetings, attended by 720,000 persons."

—The Pacific Methodist is down on the ministerial "vacation" which is now so popular. It says:—

"We are inclined to regard it as unauthorized innovation, and detrimental to the best interests of the churches. Let us think for a moment, and ask, Did Jesus, Peter, John, or Paul, ever leave their flocks? Did they, or any one of the apostles, or those commissioned of Christ, ever have time to seek their own pleasure, taking a fourth, a sixth, or a twelfth, of the year for recreation?"

—The Examiner and Chronicle says:—

"When a man like Thomas Hood dares to say that as soon as he hears a man is pious, he begins to suspect him; when he can say this, and not outrage the sense of the world by it, then we may begin to ask what kind of Christians our age has to show. For the insolence of the Sadducees will always be found in near proportion to the indolence of the Christian. Many a church of Christ at the present time sits like Eli; without courage to rebuke sin in its own members; yet trembling for the ark of God."

—Universalism does not run smoothly on the Pacific Coast. It assumes a wild and uncontrolled freedom that has occasioned the denomination no little trouble. Two or three small societies have sprung up, and more than once the great lights of the East have had to visit the West to harmonize things. The fragments of societies have at last been amalgamated, and the friends of the sect hope that matters have settled down on a solid basis, and that a large and solid society will now grow up. The Unitarian congregation of San Francisco, founded by Starr King is one of the most prosperous in the city.

CATHOLIC PERSECUTION.—Rev. William Le Conte, a Presbyterian missionary to Brazil, in a letter which we find in the Christian Observer and Commonwealth, gives an account of the opposition to Protestantism manifested by the Catholics of that country. He was obliged to procure an escort of soldiers to secure him from being assaulted by the mob which at times was quite threatening. The Catholics assert that "Protestantism is the beast, the Anti-Christ." Notwithstanding their protestations to the contrary, whenever the Catholics have the power, they always have persecuted, and do still persecute, all who do not agree with them. D. M. C.