The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1925, Page 172

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

⤓ Download .txt · copy text

172

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

Roman Catholics Believe in Giving Their Own
Higher Education. — The Roman Catholic Church
probably maintains more universities and colleges
than any other denomination in our country. It
realizes the danger of sending its young men and
women to be educated in other than its own schools,
and so it maintains this great array of higher
schools to conserve its youth for its own Church.
The conservation of our youth is a kind of mission-
work that is as necessary as is the expansion of the
Church by bringing the Gospel to those who are
yet without it. While doing the one, we should not
neglect the other.

Lutheranism in Iceland. — Lutheranism is prac-
tically the only religion on the island, the 85,000
people on the island being almost without exception
adherents of the Lutheran Church. The people
have not engaged in war for over a thousand years.
There is no one in Iceland who is unable to read.
Neither has the island a workhouse, prison, or
poorhouse.

Cincinnati, 0.— Missionary Kase reports that
the expectations for a new adult Catechism class
in the colored mission of Cincinnati are splendid.
The members, he says, are working hard and are
bearing fine testimony in word and deed. ‘Their
churchgoing is 100 per cent. A great disappoint-
ment is the failure to get a teacher for the contem-

plated Christian day-school which was to have been -

opened this fall; but it is the earnest prayer of
pastor and people that by next year they may have
a teacher to conduct a mission-school.

New York as a Mission-Field.— It is claimed
that New York City is one of the greatest mission-
fields in the world for Protestants and that many
of the Protestant churches of New York City have
to be subsidized by mission boards in order that
they may make ends meet. It is also claimed that
most of the Protestant churches are supported by
people who do not attend them. It is said that out
of twenty-six Methodist churches twenty-one are
‘being supported and maintained by missionary
funds and that the same is substantially the case
with the churches of the Presbyterian, Baptist,
and Episcopalian denominations.

Evidences of the Power of the Gospel. —
A Korean colporteur by the name of Kim was
preaching in the market-place of one of the dis-
tricts. A Christian in the crowd heard an un-
believer say: “Look at that man’s face! He used
to be one of the worst drunkards, gamblers, and
fighters in the market-place here. Now his face

is full of joy. I wonder what made the change.” —
In reply to the question, “What benefits have you
received from faith in Jesus?” a question asked
during her examination for baptism, an aged con-
vert, “Grandmother Yu,” replied: “Many. I will
tell you of one; though you may not think it im-
portant, I do. Before I was a Christian, I never
slept through the night without starting up and
lying awake, sweating with fear lest the evil spirits

‘were bringing some disaster on our family or

property. Now, when the sun sets, I commit my
family and all my possessions to God, lie down
and sleep clear through till morning.” ‘Truly, it
is what the psalmist of old said: “I will both lay
me down in peace and sleep; for Thou, Lord, only
makest me dwell in safety.” — Lutheran Standard.

Cannibal Tribe
Found in the Belgian Congo.

A secret society of cannibals, who eat human
flesh as a public duty, has been discovered by

'E. Torday and is described by him in a book en-

titled, On the Trail of the Bushongo.

The Bushongo, according to the author, are a
hitherto unknown African people, among whom,
despite their being untouched by foreign influence,
law and order reign supreme. They inhabit part
of the Belgian Congo, and they are not only ex-
tremely intelligent, but they carry on a number
of arts. .

But naturally their primitive customs form the
most interesting part of this narrative. For in-
stance, it is the Baluba sect, the members of whom
eat their fellows out of a sense of what is right and
fitting.

“In every village,” says Torday, “there is a cer-
tain number of people who, sometimes out of a feel-
ing of duty, for the public good, dispose of the
corpses of slaves and malefactors by eating them.”

This “disposal,” it is believed, prevents the souls
of the dead from returning to take revenge for
wrongs suffered during life.

The introducer of a candidate for membership
in this secret society will “first touch the candidate’s
tongue with a piece of pudding which has been
dipped in the stew of human flesh; then he will be
made to eat some of this stew in tiny bits, and
finally he will swallow a ‘piece of flesh.”

After this “he will have to attend several meet-
ings, and on each occasion he will have to partake