The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1926, Page 180

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180

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

held high government positions, men of high
financial standing, and men of scientific fame.
Former Russian princesses are working here in
restaurants, former generals are dishwashers and
cobblers. A former well-known Russian lawyer is
working in a biscuit factory.

The immigrants from Fsthonia, Latvia, and
Lithuania are few in comparison with those from
the larger countries of Slavic Europe. However,
in the aggregate their number runs into the tens
of thousands. Probably about seventy-five per cent.
of the Letts and Esthonians are Lutherans. They
have also largely settled in industrial centers.

The Duty of the Church.

The Church should strive to do her duty to
these strangers. At the ports of entry she should
meet the immigrant in his first shock of dislocation
and bewilderment by a representative who will do
his utmost to help the newcomer and send him on
his way. Then utilizing and making the best of
the tendency on the part of these immigrants to
settle where others of their nationality have already
made their home, the Church should gather all
these into congregations, with pastors of their own
race, if possible, give them brotherly advice, super-
vise them, and grant them financial subsidies if
necessary. Naturally, our Lutheran Church should
take a very prominent part in the spiritual care of
those immigrants who were reared under Lutheran
influence, and the opportunity offered us in these
immigrants should not be lightly ignored by us.
Many of these immigrants of more recent arrival
furnish us most hopeful material for evangelization.
In our large industrial centers, we feel, these for-
eigners, in many cases, could be organized into
branch churches, sometimes even occupying the
same building with the supporting congregation
and under its careful supervison.

The Slovak Lutheran Synod, affiliated with the
Lutheran Synodical Conference, numbers 59 con-
gregations, with.a baptized membership of over
12,000, served by 32 pastors. The Lutheran Mis-
souri Synod at the present time has twelve mission-
aries working among the Poles, Lithuanians, Letts,
and Slovaks of our country at thirty-three different
places. F. J. L.

THE Church of Christ has no choice. She has
received her marching orders. She is to think
imperially in the fullest sense of the word; she is
to go into all the world, and preach the Gospel to
_ 6very creature.

Our Great Need in Greensboro.

Ye shall say: “The Lord hath need of them.” And

straightway he will send them. — Matt. 21, 3.
Our Work in Greensboro.

Believing that colored pastors and _ teachers
should be educated and trained for our colored
Lutheran Church, the Christians of our Evangel-
ical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North
America erected a college and seminary in the
beautiful and prosperous city of Greensboro, N. C.
About 100 students are enrolled. These are
taught by six white professors.

Deplorable Housing Conditions in Greensboro.

The housing conditions at Greensboro are far
from being ideal.

The boys must sleep in poorly ventilated
attic-rooms.

For the girl students a private house was
rented. The house burned down in 1919. One
of two things had to be done —the students had
to be sent home, or the mission-school on the
campus had to be closed, 160 children dismissed,
and the students sheltered in the schoolhouse. The
latter was done. That was seven years ago.

What an Eye-Witness Says.

Rev. O. A. Sauer, of Richmond, Va., had oc-
casion. to visit our Greensboro college; and this is
what he told his people in his parish-paper : —

“A short distance away is the girls’ dormitory.
The building looks as if it were large enough to
accommodate about twenty girls, but they pack in
over fifty. All these girls study in one large room,
in the center of which is a stove, the only one in
the building. The sleeping-rooms are partitioned
off with beaver board. For the sake of economy
this board runs up only about eight feet instead
of to the ceiling. In each sleeping-room are five
single beds, in which about ten girls sleep. Not
so inviting on a hot day! A new building is to
be put up soon in Greensboro.”

\

“Intolerable!” ‘“Disgraceful!”

Last August the representatives of the 1,298,086
members of the Synodical Conference met in Lock-
port, N. Y. When the deplorable condition at
Greensboro was set forth by eye-witnesses, every
representative was shocked. They said: “Why, that
condition is a disgrace to our Lutheran Church!
It is intolerable! ‘To crowd two girls into a bed
intended for only one person is a menace to their
health”