The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1930, Page 186

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186

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

Jaws concerning the teaching of religion. Now that
China’s president has embraced Christianity it is
possible that the hateful antichristian laws may be
repealed. Let us hope so.

U. L. C. India Mission. — The Guntur-Rajah-
mundry field of the United Lutheran Church in
India publishes the following statistics: Baptized
members, 146,122; communicant members, 58,995 ;
baptisms, 9,308; baptized children in the mission,
57,098, of whom 16,887 were in mission-schools.
Receipts from the field, about $150,000; receipts
from America, about $200,000.

India and Mohammedanism. — India is to-day
the greatest Mohammedan country on the globe.
Its Mohammedan population speaks seventeen dif-
ferent languages, reads 222 periodicals, and sup-
ports not a few missionaries to spread the pernicious
doctrines of Islam. There are very few Christian
workers among the Mohammedan peoples of the
earth; the work among them is very difficult and
blessed with little outward success. Nevertheless
our prayer should be that God may send faithful
laborers also into this harvest.

Let There Be No Retrenchment.—The Leipzig
Missionary Society, at a meeting recently held at
its headquarters in Leipzig, Germany, passed strong
resolutions favoring an expansion policy rather
than one of retrenchment. In view of the fact
that cries demanding retrenchment of our mission-
work in these days of economic depression are fre-
quently uttered among us also, it will be well for
us to read the resolutions passed by the represen-
tatives of this old missionary agency: “Represen-
tatives from almost all of the Lutheran churches
in Germany and from churches outside of Germany
connected with the Leipzig Missionary Society, sent
is delegates to the General Conference of the society,
are deeply convinced of the necessity of refusing to
retrench the expanding work of the mission-fields
in India and Africa, despite the economic depres-
sion, and of continuing the present work with all
ayailable strength, particularly since the activities
of the German Lutherans in the Christianization of
the world must, according to leading foreign church-
men, be reckoned with. ‘The General Conference
therefore, conscious of its great responsibility to the
people, pleads with the churches to continue with
joy and sacrificial willingness to support the impor-
tant work of the Leipzig Missionary Society.”
Surely, if these men, coping with far greater finan-

cial difficulties than those which confront us, have

= the courage to decide upon a policy of expansion,

would it not be a token of spiritual cowardice or
most reprehensible indifference to the cause of
Christ were we to think of retrenchment?

Progress of German Missions. — The native
congregations of the Hanover Free Church Mission
in South Africa have increased by 400 members
and now number 8,921. The receipts were about
$15,000 in 1929. The Leipzig Mission, which has
a total membership of 45,000 among the natives
of India and Africa, had receipts amounting to
almost $175,000 last year. The Hermannsburg
Mission reports an income of about $100,000 for
1929. The Gossner Mission in India, which has
been autonomous since 1919 and has been striving
hard to become self-supporting since that time, is
gaining in membership, but is suffering greatly as
a result of the present financial depression.

The Maoris of New Zealand. — An indication
of the rapid progress of Christianity among the
natives of New Zealand is the fact that the Church
of England has founded an independent Maori
diocese and consecrated a native pastor to be its
first bishop.

Portuguese East Africa. — The government is
making it inereasingly difficult for Christian
workers to carry on their labors. The written use
of native tongues is forbidden, and the teaching of
religion by natives is greatly restricted. The trans-
lations of the Bible into a number of native lan-
guages have lost their value completely. Since the
great mass of natives do not understand Portuguese,
the result is that most of them cannot be reached
by the Gospel. The law that all schools must be of
stone will result in the closing of many mission-
schools.

Onward March of the Bible. — Almost 30,000
copies of the Bible were sold in North Africa last
year. Twenty-five years ago the sale in one year
was only 17,000. In Quezzan, the holy city of
Morocco, a Bible colporteur sold 800 copies of the
gospels on the street. Last year almost 650,000
Bibles and parts of the Bible were sold in Korea;
this was an increase of 2,300 per cent. over the
annual sales twenty-five years ago. In spite of the
war two Bible societies have been organized in South
China during the last few years, and both are doing
very successful work.

Seventh-Day Adventists. — This body is work-
ing in 135 countries and 347 languages. It sup-
ports in mission-lands 8,181 evangelists, physi-
cians, nurses, and teachers. It also maintains
eighty-one sanitarium-hospitals, dispensaries, and