"VI e.\ eto Nutt' H. RELIGIOUS DESTITUTION IN A “CHRISTIAN COUNTRY** From the Annual Report of the Rev. J. D. Nutting, Secretary of the Utah Gospel Mission of Cleveland, January, 1907 A few facts may help to realize the religious n*ed of the region where we labor, though nothing less than a long and thoughtful experience there can enable any one to appreciate it fully. First, note the number of destitute settlements. In our work we have thus far visited about 450 places, ranging in population from a few dozen up to 65,000. Practically every one of these has its regular Mormon services, with all the anti-Christian features which the term implies. But only about no have any Christian work, leaving about 340 which have none! And to this latter number must be added about fifty more places which we have not yet reached, making in all NEARLY FOUR HUNDRED PLACES ENTIRELY DESTI- TUTE OF CHRISTIAN WORK, in Utah, eastern Idaho and western Wyoming alone! We often call this a Christian country; but there are some things which we should always remember in doing so ! Between July and November, 1906, we visited about 92 of these 450 places, finding only about a dozen with any Chris- tian work, and eighty without ! — all in eastern Idaho and the edge of Wyoming. Of these eighty, about six- teen had 500 or more people, one had 1,500 and one 2,000! Second, let us try to gauge the case by distances. The writer once traveled about 225 miles, in the most direct line possible between two places, passing through 22 settlements, in not one of which was there so much as a Christian Sabbath-school; and the same journey now would better this record only by one small Sunday- school and preaching service. Another of our wagons once visited the settlements in nine hundred miles of route, eighty-five in number, taking about ten months ; in hardly more than a dozen of which was there any Christian work. This trip was all in Utah. Again, measure by time. Scores of these villages have been settled forty, fifty or more years. The writer has in mind a typical one, settled about forty- eight years ago, now having between three and four hun- dred people, all Mormons. It has had just FIVE Christian services, in the forty-eight years, and we have given them these — they having been over forty years •without a single Christian service! Again, measure by population. Not less than ioo,- ooo people in Utah alone, taking the figures of the last census, which are now often too small, live in these destitute places; and about 25,000 more are in eastern Idaho, taking the populations as we found them re- cently. And as the Mormon people will not usually attend Christian church services when they do have them, all told there are probably nearly 300,000 Mor- mons, besides many others, who are practically never seen inside of church doors and who must conse- quently be reached by some other method if at all. All are bound for the same eternity to which we travel, and need just the same blessed gospel light and life as much as we, and are receiving practically nothing of the kind from any other outside source but our work. Have we not an immeasurably important duty in such a case? If the reader has a child, let him now try and pic- ture the difference between it with all the Christian advantages it has had, and the same child as it would be had it been brought in one of the places where so many thousands of other children are living — with nothing but dank, dark, Mormon, semi-pagan teaching, never a Christian sermon, Sabbath-school, home paper, book or friend — all they have is saturated through and through with these terribly false ideas of God and man and woman and duty and morals and the home! Imag- ine the child grown up thus, if we can; — how awful it is to think of our dear ones in such a plight! Almost any Christian would rather that his child had never been born ! But scores of thousands of other people’s children have been born into just that condition, and are living there to-day, so saturated with the evil re- sults of the system that both they and their parents are entirely unconscious of its evil and believe it to be the only true religion ! The only thing which seems feasible to do for them at present, in most cases, is to go to them about as the Utah Gospel Mission is going, as often as is wise and as wisely and lovingly as we can, sowing the good seed which by the power of God shall bye and bye spring into an abundant harvest. Incidents of Our Work 1 asked a Mormon lady: “Have you a Bible in the house?" She answered, “Yes, somewhere in the house, but it hasn’t been opened in a year that I know of." One Mormon woman said to me, in talking about the Bible: “If I wuz ter read the Bible ev’ry day I’d go clean crazy. It’d send anybody crazy. A lot of it is too foolish to be true anyway. It’s not in it with the Book of Mormon.” There are many infidels in this town ; probably al- most half the population. One hopeful case I can re- port; one woman not believing in either God nor the Bible, promised to ask God to show her the truth. As she was sincere in her desire to know the truth, I believe God will convince her. The words of a Mormon woman after the missionary had explained that good works should be works of grati- tude for God’s wonderful love, rather than attempting to be works of merit to pay for salvation : “Wall, I guess it’s a fact that if a person really do give up to Christ it ain’t no trick to do the works. And it do seem nat’ral that God would be more pleased with our works out of love for Him than work done for some- thing we were ’spectin’ to git." An old Danish woman, 82 years old. “Why, your God is not my God. I believe in many gods; but there is the only one god I worship and pray to!” “Who is he?” I asked. “Adam. I pray to Adam when 1 pray night and morning. He created this world and came here from another planet. The Ancient of Days is Adam. Michael is Noah. Noah is resurrected. Jesus is the son of Adam. There is a father and a mother god !” — these were some of her statements ; and all are genuine Mormon doctrine. A Danish woman joined the Mormons when she was a girl, leaving home and emigrating to Utah. She apostatized years ago, and is now an avowed infidel. She told how she became a Mormon, and the trouble she caused in her home. While talking with me she would curse and cry; when I read the Bible she would curse it and say “It is not reasonable; I can’t believe;” she would make fun of Christ, and say there was noth- ing in it at all. This is the most pitiful case I evei dealt with. A Mormon bishop’s daughter: “No, I am not a mem- ber of the church. This life ends all. There is no salvation for a woman, and a woman is nothing in the church. I am a bishop’s daughter and 1 know.” This woman swore several times while I talked with her. She asked me questions about the hereafter, and seemed i- pressed hefe h aft?ld b0 seUed Mormon idea of * hat if we have a perpe- S 3 U' we’ will have to toko our pas- sions over womans account of how the re- ceived her “testimony” taj monism is true). She h. and so of course SSSSfeiflwS hunting eggs in the ta'M h [ d about , t . Her l“l P T«ked° n h r to go o 'inference with him. and husband asked ner to g whose profile suggested [that she ^TsweaV stand out experiences in Mormonism, and how sorry she »a that she had joined ll _ whom we know the' cfTansitig of our sins; it pel alone that can save us. By this he mea . the ordinance of bapt, am In*” “ M omin doc . alone can wash away sin , ^ n after living ^ea»h«!l^^-^r ssrsyrsA ° f MOT °" i! " > hrous, ’ o ” , ' Send 10c for packet of best literature on Mormonism. aena r or i, c f the Mission ;:^"d^r,urJ^ihu S -kh worker tor. year. 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