Women's mission

“ Through it pass the sympathy and the help of the earnest workers in the older churches to the earnest workers in our mission churches and schools. The people for whom we labor cannot be saved either for this world or the next, unless the women who make the homes are lifted out of coarseness and vice, and taught true womanhood and womanly duties and arts. The Woman's Bureau is a most potent factor in the work of bringing the Gospel to the rescue of womanhood in our mission fields. ”

“ Yet women have a mission! ay, even a political mission of immense importance! which they will best fulfil by moving in the sphere assigned them by Providence: not comet-like, wandering in irregular orbits, dazzling indeed by their brilliancy, but terrifying by their eccentric movements and doubtful utility. That the sphere in which they are required to move is no mean one, and that its apparent contraction arises only from a defect of intellectual vision, it is the object of the succeeding chapters to prove. ”

“ She thus made it easy for other women agents to live and work amongst them; probably there is no similar mission field where these can dwell in such freedom and safety. And through her womanhood she gave them some idea of the power and beauty of the religion which could make that womanhood possible. ”

“ Call them to a mission more worthy of their origin, more deserving of their destiny. Arm them with that self-protecting culture that will enable them to pursue a useful calling. Fit them—our girls, as we do our boys—to enter, if need be, upon the great business of life. ”

“ The word "mission," as applied to woman, refers to the purpose for which she was created and brought to man. In considering her mission, we are safe in avowing that woman found her mission, 1. At home. Her mission is in the home. Her training must fit her for the home, whether she serves as a wife or as a domestic. Her life is a success when she makes home a pleasure and a joy to those to whom the home properly belongs. It is for this reason that there is deep concern on the part of many thoughtful minds because the drift of the times is against educating women for the home. ”

“ Its object is to engage and unite the efforts of Christian women in sending missionaries to the women in foreign mission fields of the church and in supporting them and the native Christian teachers, and all forms of work carried on by the society. ”

“ In inviting the women of the North, and particularly those of the Congregational churches to help establish and sustain its missions, the American Missionary Association has felt that woman’s work in the churches at home is as important as woman’s work in the mission field, in order to secure the greatest efficiency, the best results of the labor expended. ”

“ Man in the abstract will do anything to help a woman. Of course. How does it work when his pocket is touched? Where is his chivalry then? Will the doctors help her to qualify? will the lawyers help her to be called to the bar? will the clergy tolerate her in the Church? Oh, it is close your ranks then and refer poor woman to her mission! Her mission! To be thankful for coppers and not to interfere with the men while they grabble for gold, like swine round a trough, that is man's reading of the mission of women. ”

“ The former may add to the luxuries of life; the latter is essential to the happiness of home—to the joys and endearments of a family, to the affection of relations, to the fidelity of domestics. “Woman’s mission” has become almost a phrase of the day. That there are other duties for women besides household, and for some women especially, we by no means deny. But here are the broad, general, and permanent duties of the sex. ”

“ Such women who fulfil their mission, are those who reign over reigning men, and serve as a guiding-star to humanity,—those who prepare new generations of men and form public opinion: and therefore in the hands of these women lies the highest power of men's salvation from the existing and threatening evils of our time.
Yes, women, mothers, in your hands, more than in those of any others, lies the salvation of the world!
NOTE TO CHAPTER XL The vocation of every man and woman is to serve other people. With this general proposition, I think all who are not immoral people will agree. ”

“ But there are also others, equally gracious women, although not equally gifted and cultured, whose labours, sacrifices, and influence are and have been such as even their more gifted and cultured sisters have never come near—gentle, sweet-tempered, tender-hearted, unobtrusive women who, seldom seen on platforms and never in the pulpit, and little heard of even in missionary circles, are not much reckoned among the workers and forces making for righteousness—and yet the influence, example and work of such are among the most powerful factors [149] in the mission field. ”

“ Although the Church was indifferent to the great mission that lay before it in the eighteenth century,—a mission that had to be met by the raising up from the laity of men and women who should stand for the spiritual rights of the lower orders of society especially,—there was a notable band of Christian philanthropic women who brightened the close of the century. ”

“ Before I came to the mission field I thought that the reason there were more women than men on the field was that more of the women were wholly consecrated to the cause of Christ; but after I had been out for some time I changed my mind. Now I believe that God calls more women than men because more women are needed. ”

“ Therefore Us, by virtue of our spiritual authority that, although unworthily exercised, we address you in the current Lent, mothers, to exhort you to think about your dignity and social mission. We wanted to talk about women and their social mission, because never before were women's social activities so discussed about as is today. It seems as they should become men. They are taken from home and thrown everywhere, even municipalities and political parliaments; and the household without the woman becomes empty. The household is the kingdom of the woman. ”

“ The Council of Women for Home Missions, formed in November, 1908, was organized that there might be a medium through which National Woman's Home Mission Boards and Societies might consult as to wider plans, and, co-operatively, do more efficient work for the Homeland. ”

“ Long denied the right of public testimony as well as the opportunity to proclaim the truth of the Saviour’s mission, women have in the history of our Movement fully proved that they may be as effective, as acceptable, and as successful as their brethren, both as teachers and rulers in the Kingdom of Christ on earth. ”

“ It has been since the war, and as the result of the great quickening of women which it occasioned, that women have organized missionary, philanthropic, temperance, educational, and political organizations, on a scale of great magnitude. ”

“ Nearly all the work of the Salvation Army is done by women, and its leader in this country is a woman. Who are the women of influence in America to-day? They are those who can speak well—teachers, lecturers, social workers, and others engaged in professional and business pursuits. Who are the coming women of this country? Those who can speak their innermost convictions with certainty and power, help to solve great national problems, and give a message to the world that shall ring through the centuries! ”

“ Already fifteen applications are before us for lady missionaries to work in the homes, and we wait only for the women of the North to furnish us the necessary funds. As fast as we receive pledges of support the missionaries will be sent out.
May the heart of every Christian woman be quickened to new impulse for the development of womanhood in those in our own land, so degraded and helpless! ”

“ That few of the sex have risen to eminence in any path but that of literature, is too well known to admit of denial, and might be proved by the scantiness of female biography. How few of the memoirs and biographical sketches which load the shelves of our libraries, record the lives of women!
The missionary enterprise opens to woman a sphere of activity, usefulness and distinction, not, under the present constitution of society, to be found elsewhere. ”

“ But I have heard the Master's voice, speaking through Lucy Stone and her co-workers, and speaking in my own soul also, declaring that I, in common with every other woman in this grand Republic, have a duty to the State that must not be ignored. In the home, and in the church, most women acknowledge they have duties—but as to the State they hesitate. ”

“ If the world were mine, and I could educate but one sex, it should be the girls. I could make a greater and better [Pg 87] world of the next generation by educating the girls of this. It is not half so important that our legislators be wise, as that our mothers be so. It is not half so important that our men be brave, as that our women be so. Strengthen the women-heart, and you strengthen the world. Give me a nation of noble women, and I will give you a noble nation. Cultivate the woman-mind if you would cultivate the race. ”

“ She is the first, however, to ascribe the real success of the work to the _esprit de corps_, the loyalty, and the patriotism of the women themselves, who have shown their capacity to carry on women’s most time-honoured household duty under unexpected and increasingly important conditions. ”

“ A glance at any account of the mobilization of woman-power in Great Britain, Miss Fraser's admirable "Women and War Work," for instance, will reveal the printed page dotted thick with the names of volunteer associations. A woman with sympathy sees a need, she gets an idea and calls others about her. Quickly, there being no red tape, the need begins to be met. ”

“ In them you will find the sure prophecy of the future of the Christian Woman's Board of Missions. Whether that prophesy be radiant with promise, depends upon how we are educating the girls of to-day, to be the women of tomorrow. Some time, our brains will grow dull, our hands helpless. Shall not the daughters receive the torch of truth from the hands of the mothers? ”

“ What is this mission which is reserved for woman? All that is humble, that is mean, that is soul-killing, that is so contemptible and so ill-paid that none other will touch it. All that is woman's mission. ”

“ We know, too, that the great woman's movement of our country, which has worked to this end for fifty years and numbered our greatest women among its adherents, has had much to do with the ability of our women to take the great part they have in this crisis. If women had not toiled and opened education and opportunities to women, and preached the necessity of full service, we could not have done it. ”

“ Realising the responsibilities of citizenship which the opportunities of the war have brought to the women of the country, the advantages are manifest of a voluntary training for girls, on the lines which have been so successful with boys, and the Girl Guide movement is a step to this end. ”

“ But they all know that there’s much, much more work to be done to ensure that women’s leadership is recognized and we have more diverse leaders; we reach the top echelons of command for all who are qualified, including all women — all women; and that all women feel safe and respected in our military — period. ”

“ The leaders of these governments have announced that the vote has been or will be given to their women in recognition of the devotion, sacrifice, skill and endurance of women in their varied service to their country under the strain of war. Our Republic stands upon the threshold of what may prove the severest test of loyalty and endurance our country has ever had. It needs its women; and they are ready — as fearless, as willing, as able, as loyal as any women of the world. ”

“ Today, empowered by this great legacy, American women serve in every aspect of American life, from social services to space exploration. The opportunities for American women are growing, and their efforts as mothers and volunteers, corporate executives and senators, police officers and administrators, construction workers and cab drivers, and teachers and scientists enrich all of us and make our country great. Women continue to strengthen our Nation's social fabric as leaders in the home, the community, the workplace, and the government. ”

“ They contribute immeasurably through faith-based and community organizations.
Our Nation's women could not be where they are—nor could our country be where it is—without the strength and courage, wisdom and persistence of those who preceded them. ”

“ When it became possible to work together for other than religious ends,—when large social service was made possible to women, as in our sanitary commission during the last war,—women everywhere rose to meet the need. The rise 166and spread of that greatest of women’s organizations, the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, has shown anew how ready is the heart of woman to answer the demands of other than personal relations. ”

“ So when the Council of National Defense laid upon the Woman's Committee the responsibility of calling them together to mobilize women's war work, we knew exactly how to do it.... It is not a question of whether we will act or not, the Government has said we must act; it is an order as much as it is an order that men shall go and fight in the trenches. It is an order of the Government that the women's war work of the country shall be coordinated, that women shall keep their organizations intact, that they shall get together under directed heads. ”

“ And it is the pride and honour of our country, that woman holds a commanding influence in the domestic and social circle, which is accorded to the sex in no other nation, and such as will make her wishes and efforts, if united for a benevolent and patriotic object, almost omnipotent. ”

“ We’ll work with the National Security Council to advance gender equality globally, recognizing the needs and roles of women and girls in conflict prevention, peacebuilding, humanitarian crises, and development assistance. ”