Protestant missions

“ A small book, showing the extension and glorious fruits of Christian Protestant missions during the last half century would do much to silence the infidel and the enemies of Protestant missions to the heathen, enlighten the indifferent, and draw forth the united praise and prayers, and increased money support, and personal, zealous coöperation of Christians in all lands, so to conquer the world for Jesus Christ by His own appointed means. ”

“ On that principle they organized their churches, literally preaching the Gospel to the poor, and, at the end of a century, had a membership outnumbering any Protestant church in Christendom. It would be easy to show that modern missions, at home and abroad, have been most successful as they have relied most fully on the simple preaching of the word, and that the building up of churches has been the saving power of communities intellectually, morally and even materially. ”

“ There is no attempt to claim for Protestant missions greater success than they have had, and a very fair tribute of praise is given to the celebrated Catholic missionaries who have labored in that arduous field. ”

“ And how did He arouse the careless and instruct His own people, by alarming providences, at a season when they greatly needed such a stimulus."—"Historical Sketches of the Protestant Church in France," p. 522.
Another writer, Dr. D.L. Leonard, historian of the century of missions, says:
"The closing years of the eighteenth century constitute in the history of Protestant missions an epoch indeed, since they witnessed nothing less than a revolution, a renaissance, an effectual and manifold ending of the old, a substantial inauguration of the new. ”

“ Further, the Protestant missions in the East are mainly supplied by ministers in the communion of the Establishment in England, but often not episcopally appointed or ordained, and in all cases a perfect the equality is admitted between such as are so appointed and those who are not. ”

“ There are few impartial and well-informed Protestants who will not confess that their missions throughout the world have invariably proved to be utter failures. No matter to what sect or denomination they belong, or from what country or association their funds are derived, Protestant missionaries, as preachers of that gospel about which they speak so much, never have converted, and we believe never will, convert the heathen save by units and driblets, hardly worthy of mention. ”

“ As yet, the people do not possess the intellectual and moral elements necessary for the maintenance of the liberal institutions of Protestantism independent of foreign aid." "Those," he adds, "who have become Protestant in principle, far exceed in number the registered Protestants. The indirect influence of Protestantism has been greater and healthier than is apparent." ”

“ It is impracticable to present the totals of the seventy-two columns, suggestive of the many subordinate activities of missions; a few items will indicate the more important contacts established between the Protestant churches of Christendom and the fifty fields which their missions have touched in many helpful ways. In these mission countries 351 Protestant societies had as their foreign staff 24,039 missionaries, including 13,719 women workers and wives. ”

“ It is an indubitable fact that at first the religious movement was supported by the Protestant missionaries, and the views of its founders forwarded by every means in their power, with the object of using it to prepare the soil for the promulgation of Christianity. ”

“ The effective presentation of the case of Catholic Missions, both to the clergy and to the laity, is the field-secretary's first and important duty. Nothing indeed can be hoped for, nothing can be accomplished until the Catholic people fully grasp and intensely feel what their help and co-operation—however little it may be—mean to the Church, to the salvation of souls, to the honour of our Blessed Lord, to the glory of God. ”

“ But the paramount object which is present to the Protestant missionaries is not to subvert the national Church or to attach it to their own denomination, but rather to raise the standard of the national religion and to improve the social condition of the people among whom they have come to live. ”

“ But this, Reverend Gentlemen, I must say, that if the Catholic Church, had no better foundation than declamation against the Protestant Church, I would not be either a minister, or a member of it for a single day. But mind, the Catholic Church has both a good foundation, and can also show the flimsy texture of the Protestant Church, when Protestant ministers are so imprudent as to attack her. ”

“ It is not my purpose to frame a general indictment against persons and movements, but rather to suggest certain ways and means of possible recovery, and in general I shall try to confine myself to that form of organized religion to which I personally adhere, that is to say, the Anglican or Episcopal Church, partly because of my better knowledge of its conditions, and partly because whatever is said may in most cases be equally well applied to the Protestant denominations. ”

“ Oftentimes the service is gone through with, and nothing in it but an out-and-out performance; no life, no spirit, no power. Protestants often speak disparagingly of the ritualistic services gone through with by the Roman Catholic church, but if you come right down to it you will find about as much spirit and power in the one as the other. The result is that scores and hundreds of men, and women, and children are being gathered into the Protestant church who have not an ounce of Christian experience. ”

“ The Protestant Mission relieves the poor, but does not offer to travellers or pilgrims of its own faith the same advantage as the heads of the Latin community, who bestow their benefits upon members of other religious sects with as much care as upon their own. ”

“ The great need for missions lay in cities and large towns, where dense masses of Catholics were gathered, and where churches, clergy, and religious organizations of all kinds, were inadequate to the spiritual wants of the people. ”

“ But reassured by the steadfast loyalty of the Protestant missionaries, who have adhered strictly to their position as religious teachers, and whose prudent, sober conduct in difficult circumstances the Directors consider deserving of high praise, the nobles, believing that christianity had proved itself a great public blessing, began to accept it heartily for themselves. ”

“ There is hardly a spot upon earth (if we except those enslaved by Popery) where the Protestant missionary may not preach the gospel without the fear of persecution. The door of the world has been thrown open, and the world's Lord and Master commands and invites His servants to enter, and, in His name, to take possession of the nations. ”

“ Here then are two tendencies that surely show the way and demand encouragement and furtherance; recovery of the sense of Christian unity in Christ and through an united Catholic Church, and the re-acceptance of sacramentalism as the expression of that faith and as the method of that Church. I feel very strongly that wherever these tendencies show themselves they must be acclaimed and cherished. The Protestant denominations must be aided in every way in their process of recovery of the good things once thrown away ”

“ The sending of missionaries is dependent upon the zeal and liberality of the churches in our land. But how can one who is not sure that Jesus ever uttered the words of the Great Commission urge the churches to fulfil that command of Christ? How can one who has never felt his own need of an atonement adjure his brethren, by Christ's death for their sins, not to let the heathen perish? How can one who has had no experience of Christ as a present and divine Saviour, have power to stand against the rationalism and apathy of the church? ”

“ CHRISTIAN MISSIONS.—The spread of the Christian religion by missionary efforts is one of the means of unifying mankind. In ancient times and in the Middle Ages, the two great achievements of the Church were the conversion of the Roman Empire, and then of the barbarian nations by whom it was subverted. But, in the Middle Ages, there was also missionary labor, here and there among the Saracens and in the lands of the East. Since the thirteenth century, missions in the Roman Catholic Church have been chiefly prosecuted by the monastic orders. ”

“ It is characteristic of Protestantism, as of humanism in general, that it lays its chief emphasis upon the intelligence. If we go to church to [pg 186] practice the presence of God, must we not first know who and what this God is whose presence with us we are there asked to realize? So most Protestant services are more informative than inspirational. Their attendants are assembled to hear about God rather to taste and see that the Lord is good. ”

“ Statesmen, as well as theologians, often felt the need of strengthening the whole Protestant body by an organised harmony among its several members, something akin to that which gives the Roman Catholic Church so imposing an aspect of general unity. ”

“ Every principal sect has its missionary society, whose utopian speculation is the conversion of the world under the warrant of the apostolic commission! As if a command given to the apostles to preach the gospel of the kingdom were a command given to modern missionaries to go and preach Churchism and Dissenterism, Calvinism, Arminianism, and Popery to all the world! ”

“ The Protestants talk a great deal about Catholic priests, but I believe they are much more honest in the sight of man, and will do more for their pay, than. any Protestant minister you can find. You will find them up at five o'clock in the morning, saying mass, and attending to what they consider are their religious duties—visiting the sick, and going among fevers and plagues, where Protestant ministers, dare not go. ”

“ They come from countries in which neither Church nor State has attempted to lift them out of ignorance and its attendant superstition; and whenever the churches in whose bosoms these people have starved in the Old World do not make amends here in the New, the Protestant church is called upon to lift them into a better knowledge of the nature of religion and into a better conception of human relations, both for her own sake and for the sake of the communities which she wishes to serve. ”

“ The supreme question of missions is how to multiply the number of Christians who, with truthful lives and with clear unshaken faith in the character and ability of God, will, individually or collectively, or coöperatively as a church, wield the force of intercessory prayer for the conversion and transformation of men, for the inauguration and energizing of spiritual movements, and for the breaking down of all that exalts itself against Christ and his purposes. ”

“ In this way missions are the testing-places of Christian doctrine.
[219] In a similar way New Testament polity is showing its power in our foreign work. At home we are getting to be lax in our reception of members, and are taking in numbers of persons without proper evidence of their conversion. Baptist churches which used to examine carefully their candidates for admission now receive them without public and oral confession of their faith. Yet these new members may vote, and may determine the attitude of the church in important exigencies. ”

“ Other denominations, too, are looking largely to the schools of the Association for ministers. And England, in her missions for Africa, naturally turns to the Freedmen of America for missionaries.
Your Committee would call the attention of the churches to the growing prominence of the religious question at the South, and would most earnestly advise the patrons of this Association to make fit provision and endowment for the permanent work of educating men for the ministry. ”

“ A mental, moral, and social revolution is in progress, and mainly as a consequence of the republication of the Gospel by missionaries in the past half century; and there is no probability of any event occurring that shall be sufficient to arrest it. ”

“ On this occasion I cannot forbear recalling somewhat of my earlier youth, in order to make it obvious that the great affairs of the ecclesiastical religion must be carried on with order and coherence, if they are to prove as fruitful as is expected. The Protestant service has too little fulness and consistency to be able to hold the congregation together ”

“ They create, as with the Protestant clergy, a stronger feeling of mutual sympathy, a greater community of ideas and sentiments; while they also tend to diminish pastoral authority, and to check the reverential respect involuntarily shown to those who, from noble and lofty motives, make the sacrifice of the purest joys granted to mankind. ”

“ No service in a Protestant church is permitted, and the Protestant must promise that all children born of the union shall be baptised and brought up in the Catholic faith. There is no written contract, and the promise may, of course, be broken, but if the Catholic is a party to it he is guilty of mortal sin. ”

“ They see the interest in missions increased, but point out to how small a circle it is confined, and how utterly out of proportion it is to what it ought to be. To the great majority of Church members, to the greater part of the Church, it is as yet anything but a life question. ”

“ On the other hand, even if missionaries from all Christendom be taken into the account, there is not more than one minister to a million of pagan souls, with almost no intelligent Christians to assist as teachers, elders, catechists, and tract distributers; no physicians, artists, and judicious legislators, to improve society and afford the means of civilized habits ”