p. 48 | Signs of the Times, Vol. 43, No. 3. (1/18/1916)

Pope Pleads for a United Christendom

AT the general convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church, held in Cincinnati, Ohio, in October, 1910, a commission was appointed "to arrange for a world conference on faith and order." They planned to have had this world conference in 1914, but the war that broke out that year prevented it. However, the commission has been very active, and many meetings of church dignitaries have been held in various places, and an active correspondence has been kept up by Robert H. Gardner, the secretary, with leading churchmen throughout the world.

In this correspondence, the pope of Rome has been approached, and through Cardinal Gasparri, has delivered to the commission one of the most significant letters of recent times.

Under the auspices of this world conference of faith and order, a meeting was in session at Garden City, New York, January 4; and Cardinal Gasparri's letter, conveying the sentiments of the pope, was read and most enthusiastically applauded. Among the striking things in the cardinal's letter, the following may be selected:

"Your project of an international convention of all who believe in Jesus Christ as God and Saviour, to accomplish the speedy fulfillment of the final prayer of the Lord that all may be one, I have, in obedience to your request, submitted to the most blessed father.

"I need not here describe the affection with which I saw the august pontiff kindled for you. . . .

"The august pontiff therefore was pleased with your project of examining in a sincere spirit and without prejudice the essential form of the church, 'or the inner essence of the church'; and he earnestly hopes that under the spell of its native beauty, you may settle all disputes, and work with prosperous issue to the end that the mystical body of Christ be no longer suffered to be rent and torn, but that by harmony and coöperation of men's minds, and likewise by the concord of their wills, unity of faith and communion may at last prevail throughout the world of men.

"Thanking you, then, that you have thought well to request the aid and support of the Roman pontiff in expediting your worthy project, his holiness expresses his earnest desire that the end may answer your expectation. . . .

"The august pontiff therefore kindly permits that copies of my letters, which though a faithful, are yet but a faint portrait of the pontifical love, shall be sent to all to whose welfare and peace you believe they will contribute.

"It is a pleasure to repeat the encouragement that the aid and earnest prayers of the Roman pontiff will never be lacking to any one who, having freed himself from prejudiced opinion, with a true and sincere will strives with all his strength that the unity of faith and fellowship instituted by Christ and built upon Peter may be restored, and that all who enrolled in the name of Christian may betake themselves to the bosom of the one most loving church, and may be joined and associated as members with Christ the head."

The report says, "The letter telling of the pontiff's interest in church unity created a tremendous stir." It is also stated that "the ministers applauded vociferously."

ROME TO REIGN SUPREME

Careful Bible students have taught, for years, that the prophecies most clearly indicate that just before the second coming of Christ, Rome, for a very short time, will reign supreme in this world. Furthermore, the same prophecies just as clearly indicate that Protestantism will cease to protest against Rome, and will unite with her in forming a world-wide religious despotism and tyranny. The man who cannot see that this thing is coming with a mighty progress, must be either exceedingly indifferent or else totally blind.

It was an organization of churchmen, claiming to represent the true church of God, that crucified the Christ, and that put to death all His apostles save one. It was the organized church, claiming to represent Christ, that also, all through the Middle Ages, misrepresented Him by torturing and killing the millions of martyrs. In all of those tragic times, the individual who was carefully following the Bible saw what it all meant, and knew where to take his stand. And likewise in this time in the world's history, when the greatest human tragedies of the ages will be enacted, men who understand their Bibles, and who are personally acquainted with their God, will have no difficulty in knowing what position to take.

The history of all the past shows unmistakably that a church as such is a very dangerous thing to follow. God has given us an infallible guide in His word as impressed upon the individual soul by His divine Spirit; and in this time, Catholic, and Protestant, and those of every other persuasion, need to know their Bibles for themselves, and thus avoid being swept down by the mighty avalanche of delusion that is forming in the world to fulfill the last great prophecy of events that immediately precede the second coming of Christ.

A Warning to Capital

B. C. FORBES, an editorial writer in the San Francisco Examiner, had a column recently on the subject of profit sharing. He advises the capitalist to consider seriously the dividing of profits with the common laborer, as well as with the stock-holding officer. Among other things, he says:

"We are entering a new era of democracy. The European war will alter the whole status of government, of capital and labor. Dynasties are doomed. We are to witness a changed order. The 'common people' are to rise up in their might, and take a stronger hand in running things. It behooves capital in this country to bestir itself to remove every reasonable cause for complaint on the part of the rank and file."

There is, indeed, a growing and more pronounced complaint, not only in this country, but in all the world, against the capital class. The capitalist of this time has difficulties just ahead of him which will eclipse anything the world has yet seen.

Speaking to the capitalist class who live in the last days, the apostle James earnestly exclaims, "Behold, the hire of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth." And in view of this defrauding of the laborer, the prophet-apostle points the rich man to the result that will follow. He is bidden: "Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days."

Nothing could be clearer or more striking than this Scripture text. According to its plain statement, the rich men "have heaped treasure together for the last days." They have done this fraudulently, by oppressing the laborer; and God has forewarned them that they will "weep and howl" for their "miseries" as the result of it.

It is well that men stand under the light of prophecy as they face the conditions that confront the world; otherwise they may sink in despair as they contemplate the spirit of revolution that is breaking out everywhere among the laborers, and rapidly growing more intense.

Federal District Court Passes on Oregon Sunday Law

By Editor

AS has been noted in recent issues of this paper, several test cases have been before the courts in Oregon for the purpose of declaring unconstitutional the Sunday law of 1864, which for years had been regarded as obsolete. But Judge Charles E. Wolverton has upheld the constitutionality of this law. This is another one of the accumulating court decisions that regard the observance of Sunday as a proper subject for legislation.

The readers of this paper well know we have taken the position, for more than forty years, that a universal Sunday law will yet require all people to observe that day under the severest penalty. The death sentence itself, according to the prophecy of the Bible, will finally be pronounced upon those who refuse to bow to this Sunday institution, which has no foundation whatever in the word of God. All who believe in the Bible as the one and sufficient source of guidance in religious matters, will do well to watch carefully the developments in the field of Sunday law activity.

Elder H. W. Cottrell, who is on the ground, will present us a review, in the near future, of this federal decision, and what it signifies.

Notice of Annual Meeting of the Pacific Press Publishing Association

NOTICE is hereby given, to all whom it may concern, that the annual meeting of the members of the Pacific Press Publishing Association, a corporation organized and existing under and by virtue of the laws of the state of California, will be held at the office of the association on Villa Street, in the town of Mountain View, county of Santa Clara, state of California, on Monday, the 24th day of January, A. D. 1916, at 10 o'clock A. M.

The election of directors, repealing or adopting by-laws, or such other business as may be necessary or proper to be transacted, will come before the members of the association.

By order of the directors. C. H. JONES, President. H. G. CHILDS, Secretary.

Prohibition and Other News

THE states of Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Arkansas, Iowa, Idaho, and South Carolina, by prohibitory law, banished the saloons from their borders on January 1 of this year. California, which made a big fight for prohibition in 1914, has been successful in initiating a prohibitory law that will be voted upon in the fall of 1916. The proposed law is in two sections, and either one or both of them may be voted upon by the individual voter. One section of the law proposes the abolition of the saloon on January 1, 1918; and the other, if carried, will prohibit the manufacture of alcoholic liquors for beverage purposes after January 1, 1920. The friends of temperance in California are very confident of the success of these reasonable and righteous measures.

UNDERGRADUATES and other men at Yale University will organize a field artillery company; and Major General Leonard Wood, United States army, will detail instructors to drill the student recruits, as a part in the general plan for national preparedness.

ACCORDING to the reports just published from Charles G. Yale, of the United States Geological Survey, California mines yielded, during 1914, $20,653,496 in gold. This is the greatest output in thirty-two years.

THE dispatches of January 4 announce that Emperor William of Germany is suffering from cancer of the throat, and is in a very critical condition.

MEMBERS of the Chinese Republic Association residing in America have raised a million dollars to help in financing the growing revolt against Yuan Shi Kai's monarchy.

International Federation

REPRESENTATIVE CAMPBELL, of Kansas, has introduced a bill in Congress proposing "the international federation of the world." His bill provides for a president, a vice president, two houses of congress, and a supreme court, as the governmental machinery of the new federation.

The appalling conditions in the world will lead men to try every sort of expedient and plan to save themselves from the ruin they see coming. But any one who is following closely the thrilling presentations of the Bible prophets concerning these times and conditions, knows perfectly well that even some of these expedients which are grasped to avert the ruin, will only assist in hastening it along.

A "SPIRIT" (CREEK) IN THE ORANGE FREE STATE, WHERE ONCE THE BUSHMEN WANDERED

Photo H. J. Edmed V. D. WESTHUIZEN AND THE HOTTENTOT CONVERT