am. hjcj r^fns i' Half Told Tales Exclusive Information for Pastors FROM The Committee on Conservation and Advance Methodist Episcopal Church ' I / HE information in this pamphlet is issued exclusively to pastors. It is supplementary to the information con- tained in the Poster on Home Mission work and the pamphlet on Foreign Mis- sion work entitled “Unfinished Business" which have been prepared to be distrib- uted in the churches in the fall of 1921. The information given in those pieces of literature on what the two Mission Boards could have accomplished with the un-paid Centenary pledges is not re- peated in this pamphlet for pastors. To gain a full understanding of the present situation, the pamphlet for the congregation must be used in connection with the one for pastors. PASTORS’ BULLETIN NUMBER ONE Methodist Episcopal Church Committee on Conservation and Advance 740 Rush Street, Chicago, Illinois Concerning the Benevolent Collections The General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church of 1920 provided that : “The Treasurer of the Committee on Conservation and Advance shall receive all funds for the Council and the Constituent Boards and the American Bible Society, and he shall distribute the same, monthly, pro rata according to the asking approved by the Council of Boards of Benevo- lence, except designated gifts.” These Boards are : The Board of Foreign Missions. The Board of Home Missions and Church Extension. The Board of Education for Negroes. The Board of Education. The Board of Sunday Schools. The Board of the Epworth League. The American Bible Society. The Board of Temperance, Prohibition and Public Morals. The General Deaconess Board. The Board of Hospitals and Homes. Pastors are urged to encourage their local Church treasurers to forward on the tenth of each month, all moneys for the work of these Boards and all Centenary funds to Morris W. Ehnes, Treasurer, Committee on Conservation and Advance of the Meth- odist Episcopal Church, 740 Rush Street, Chicago, Illinois. Half Told Tales In all the worldwide program of the Methodist Episcopal Church, the acute problem is the holdup of hundreds of projects planned for and promised, due to the non-payment in full of Cen- tenary benevolent apportionments for the year 1920. Both in the communities at home and on the Foreign Field work is critically embarrassed. The local funds which were to be supplemented by promised Centenary funds have in a large number of cases been raised. The work halts because the expected Centenary aid has not been forthcoming. This pamphlet contains illustrations of the waiting opportuni- ties and the great seriousness of the delay. Methodist Foreign Missions T o-day While our attention here is chiefly centered on what the Board of Foreign Missions could immediately do with its share of the unpaid Centenary benevolent apportionments for the last year the great achievements of the Centenary program must not be forgotten. That program has been in operation almost two years. Already the reports for the first year of Foreign Missions under the Centenary program, show a very encouraging and significant advance. The complete statistics for 1920 for the various fields have just been made available. Following are a few of the outstanding facts and figures which give a condensed view of the great volume of the work of the Church in the Foreign fields : METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY IN FOREIGN FIELD INCREASED BY OVER 60,000 DURING 1920 Statistics just compiled for the year show increase of 36,153 members and of 23,889 baptized children. Value of Church property in mission field increased by $3,674,679 in year. A large amount of this reported increase is due to greater thoroughness on the field in gathering and report- ing statistics. Part of the increase is due to increased valua- tion of existing property and part is due to new improvements and projects made possible by Centenary funds. Contributions of church members on foreign field, $4,077,992, more than double that of 1919 — a notable Centenary result. Some of the statistics on Foreign Missions are printed elsewhere, and given here in amplified form. All else is printed in this booklet for the first time and is sent to pastors only. 3 Large Increase Recorded A total of 697,436 native Christians make up the Christian community under the care of the Methodist Episcopal Church in various mission lands, according to reports for 1920 just received and compiled by the Board of Foreign Missions. This makes an increase of 60,042 Christians during the year 1920, compared with the previous twelve-month period. The total baptisms, adults and children were 59,088. Strong Christian Communities India and Burma remain Methodism’s greatest field for evangelism; the Christian community there numbers 385,410; the number children and adults baptized in these countries in 1920 was 40,991. The church in Europe, principally located in the strong Methodist centers of Scandinavia, numbers 91.369. In the Philippine Islands, Methodism has a following of 56,526. New Recruits at Work The Board of Foreign Missions has 1,133 missionaries at work on the field: the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society has 575. This indicates a gain of 159 American workers for 1920 above all losses by death and retirement. China has 494 of the mis- sionaries of both the Board and the Society ; India and Burma, 452. In addition to the missionaries, the evangelistic staff includes 2,759 ordained native preachers and 6,288 unordained native preachers and exhorters. Other native workers — including Bible readers, colporteurs, teachers, physicians, nurses — number 7,378. This makes a total of 16,425 native leaders. Sunday Schools Grow There was an increase of 566 Sunday schools and 46,801 pupils during the year. The total number of Sunday schools under the care of the Methodist Episcopal missionaries is 9,833 ; of pupils, 452,047. India and Burma have 6,051 Sunday schools enrolling 182,001 children. In Europe, Methodism has 111,489 pupils in 1,247 Sunday schools. Many Schools of All Grades The Board of Foreign Missions and the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society maintain 2,827 secular schools of all grades. Their enrollment is 116,000. New Churches and Other Mission Property On all mission fields the Board of Foreign Missions has 2,752 churches, an increase of 123 over 1919. The estimated increase in value of church buildings ($1,105,417 United States gold) was due largely to additional property bought or erected with Cen- The term "Christian Community" as here used includes only full and preparatory members and baptized children under instruction. 4 tenary funds. Besides this the value of parsonages on the foreign field was increased by $662,662. Other mission property — in- cluding schools, hospitals, printing plants, etc. — increased in value by $1,906,600. The increased value of property owned by the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society was $895,847. Twenty-five Million Dollars in Property The estimated total value (in United States gold) of all churches owned by or for the Board of Foreign Missions is $10,- 254.779; of parsonages, $3,387,560; of schools, hospitals, and mis- cellaneous institutions, $7,034,037. All property owned by the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society has an estimated value of $4,403,656. In other words the investment in property and build- ings for the spreading of the Gospel message in the mission lands of the world by the Methodist Episcopal Church is more than twenty-five millions of dollars. Contributions Doubled The total contributions of the church members on the foreign field, including Europe, was $4,077,992. This is more than double the money contributed in 1919 ($1,849,025). In many fields also outside of Europe increases are reported. NEW POWER IN THE NATIVE CHURCH IN THE MISSION FIELD One outstanding result of the Centenary on the Foreign Mis- sion Field has been the new life and initiative developed in the native churches, due largely to the quickening which has come to them through their own Centenary campaign. In the achieve- ments which the native churches have brought about, it is possible to see more clearly than ever, the distant goal of self-supporting, self-propagating churches in the mission field. Here are a few facts from many fields illustrating this : In 1920 the Church in Mexico received over 2,000 new mem- bers, almost double the number in 1919. Eight hundred and ninety-two members are tithers. In one church, the Gante Church in Mexico City, a budget of $6,000 was raised in 1919 ; $10,000 in 1920; $15,000 pledged in 1921. In Chile, the conference gained 35% in self-support in 1920. Eastern South America gained 11% in membership, and has one out of every four members a tither. Better than that, the devel- opment of the spiritual life of the Church as manifest in mission- ary spirit and initiative has made, in the words of Bishop Oldham, “a new spiritual climate.” In China the objective as set by the native church averages a yearly increase of 32% in membership, 30% in literacy, 20% in self-support, 15% of members as tithers, 50% of members as intercessors. These goals are rapidly being reached. The West China Conference had a Centenary quota of $40,000. That quota was over-pledged 165%, and more than $90,000 has actually been paid already. 5 In India the conferences are enthusiastically striving forward to meet their objectives in intercessory prayer, increased mem- bership, greater literacy, life service, and tithing. An example of the progress taking place throughout India is found in Meerut District. It reports for 1920 an addition of 5,200 to a Christian community of 25,500; the distribution of 46,000 portions of Scripture and 11,000 tracts; 365 new tithers, 6,500 intercessors, and 3,000 pledged to give of their time to Christian service. Seventy thousand persons attended revival services in the district. All the leather workers of Larpura be- came Christians at one time. There are twenty-nine towns and villages on one circuit of the district that are asking for teachers and pastors that they may learn the Gospel of Christ. That same story, with local variations, could be told of many districts of India. In Japan already the financial goal of the Forward Movement has been passed, with over $300,000 subscribed. There are thou- sands pledged to “win one” for the Church each year. These instances are only samples of the new birth of Metho- dism on the foreign fields. In the midst of our thankfulness and gratification for this world revival growing out of the new life in our Methodist Episcopal Church, there comes to us a new note, a note alike of challenge and of warning ; we must not fail ! The mother Church of these Centenary endeavors must attain her goals if she is to keep the faith with those who are newly finding Christ. Bivouac or March? In the words of Corresponding Secretary Frank Mason North: “Whatever may be said of other mandates, here is one which comes from the throne of power. To the Church that mandate is given — it has no racial or international limit — ‘Go ye and disciple all nations.’ That word from the mountainside never was so clear as it is to-day. Never before in the agitated world did the deeps so call to the deeps. “Out into such a field of need the foreign missionary enterprise of our Church has gone with new hopes and new strength the first year of the Centenary. Christendom in its history since the first century has not known a greater movement. “With such beginnings we must keep faith till the end. For the program which has been laid down will give among the peoples of the world a place of action for the Gospel of our Lord for a thousand years. “In spite of all the embarrassments and disappointments of the present time when promising ventures are halted owing to in- adequate funds, every existing financial problem can be solved and the adequate Centenary program for foreign missions can be achieved if the church will give the board its share of one hun- dred per cent of the church’s Centenary pledge. The Gospel 6 never more needed interpretation in its intensity and its ampli- tude. Is it a time for counsels of ease ? Shall we bivouac or shall we march?” BUILDING THE CHURCH Under the head of “building the church” is included the whole range of direct efforts in extending the Gospel. The seriousness of the present situation in every field, is that plans made and promises given for the erection of needed church buildings and the furnishing of needed workers could not be carried out owing to the gap between Centenary pledges and payment. The follow- ing are a few samples of the opportunities and the emergency: One chain of projects of strategic importance which have been held up is the group of institutional churches in nine great cities. These churches will do what the Apostle Paul did for the great nerve centers of the Roman Empire set the Gospel to work in the center of life. In some cases building has begun. In all cases buildings have been promised and planned. A vivid sample of what the delay means is found in Yuki City, China, where Chinese Methodists have made 100,000 bricks with which to build an institutional church. They have purchased the site for the church. They have far surpassed their Centenary quota for a new building. But the bricks are still waiting. The promised Centenary help from the Church in the United States has not come. The eager sacrificial giving of these Christians of Yuki has been met with unpaid pledges. No one dare even pre- dict what the results of this holdup will be, but we all know it will be disastrous to the best interests of the Kingdom of God. Another sample is found in the Yenping District, where every Centenary goal set has been met, except one. This achievement includes 50% of the members and 20% of the probationers, mem- bers of the League of Intercessors ; 25% increase in literacy ; 20% in self-support. More than 5% are enrolled as tithing stewards. The unreached goal is that of adding 2,000 entire families to the membership, but that is rapidly being reached. Yet these are the people to whom we are denying our promised support. In North China, as a result of the wonderful famine relief which the Methodist Church dispersed, and the saving of thou- sands of lives, there is an unprecedented evangelistic opportunity. This work will have to be handled with care and wisdom. The gratitude of the Chinese to the Church is overwhelming and has created a very large movement toward Christianity. Neverthe- less if the proper care is taken and sufficient workers furnished, there is opportunity for bringing thousands of converts into the Church. INDIA EVANGELISM In India the great related movement of education and the Mass Movement are the lines of advance. The following note in a letter from James Lyon of Hissar, India, is an indication of what is taking place every week: “We recently visited hundreds of 7 places in the Northwest India Conference. At meetings held about 2,000 people publicly acknowledged Christ. The new con- verts demolished 183 places of idol worship. As the result of the meetings 150 places were opened for work.” Bishop Warne writes: “The Centenary has put us on our feet. The excessive cost of living which made the increase of salaries of missionaries and of Indian workers an absolute necessity, the loss of exchange, the increase in transit expenses — all greatly re- duced the work of most missions in India. But the Centenary has made it possible for our Methodist Episcopal Church to meet these new conditions and maintain her work and workers to go on expanding. Only those who are working beside other mis- sions that have been compelled to retrench, can appreciate this timely help that the Centenary has given us in India.” He adds : “I have been in India over thirty years and many times my heart has been thrilled with the great spiritual movements that have enabled me to see our Church grow from under ten to over 400,- 000 souls. At no former hour have I been thrilled with hope as at present. Best of all, the spiritual life of our meetings have been greatly quickened and deepened. They are having an entirely new view of Christ in India. In the face of this spirit the need for the promised teachers and schools to care for the 40,000 coming into the Church every year through the Mass Movement must not be denied.” Writing from Calcutta, Bishop Fred Fisher says, “The crying need in both Bengal and Burma is vital evangelistic reinforce- ment. The Bengal Conference has now arrived at the place where a great rising tide of evangelism is its only hope. But the great evangelistic program so necessary now cannot be carried forward by the present staff. Our men are languishing ; their health is breaking because every man is carrying the load of one- half dozen men. Our evangelistic advance will depend on in- creased reinforcements in missionaries and money. If you will help us turn this corner, we will show you one of the greatest spiritual advances ever achieved on the mission field.” EDUCATION In every field educational institutions with large opportunities are denied the promised means of meeting the demands made upon them. In China, for instance, fundamental to the whole program of evangelism is the educational work culminating in the four great union Christian universities in which the Methodist Episcopal Church cooperates. Peking, Nanking, Fukien, and West China Universities, four of the most influential institutions of learning in the world, have all begun strategic programs of development and advance. Our share cannot be held back. These institutions are to set Christian standards for government schools and the leadership of new China in a day of social dissolution and men- 8 acing chaos. It was possible to do very little on the university program in the first Centenary year. Christian education is the most powerful evangelistic approach. Delay is perilous to our program of evangelism. In Hinghwa, China, two teachers in the high school are trying to conduct classes in the same place at the same time. The place itself is unsuited for a school. The former students of another school have supplied the money for two new buildings, provided the money from America comes. And it has every inch of space, including hall, porches, chapel, teachers’ rooms, and study rooms, all packed, jammed and crammed with classes. They could not get another bov into the place. And those who want to come are beyond counting. In Malaysia, payment due on the Anglo-Chinese school at Singapore amounting to $90,000 must be made. This is by no means our only educational interest in Malaysia, but it is one of the most influential institutes in the Orient, with an opportunity boundless in extent when the expansion into a university now planned and going forward is carried through. In India the Centenary has done a very fruitful work for Luck- now Christian College. The government of India has pledged toward the new buildings now going up the unparalleled govern- ment grant of $103,000. They did this because the Centenary enabled the college to meet that grant with $50,000. This program for Lucknow is only a part of the educational tasks of our Church in India. The desperate need of the grow- ing Christian community can be met only by a whole well-organ- ized system of education, which begins with the primary day schools in the village and includes also high schools and Bible training schools. The acute problem is that of village education. There are more than 60,000 children in our Church in the Mass Movement areas. Only a small percentage of them are receiving education. It is easy to see the disaster which will come if the church in the next generation is to be an illiterate Church. The present needs are not so much for buildings as for teachers, for training schools and supervision and endowment, so that promis- ing natives can be educated. In Africa one part of the carefully planned Methodist program is the establishment of five industrial and agricultural training schools. One of these is being finished ; two others should have been begun last year. One of these is at Quessua, Angola, in East Africa, where 8,000 acres have been purchased and a trained director is on the ground, but where the necessary buildings and tools have not yet been supplied. The other institute which should be equipped is in Liberia. The high strategy of these schools is that they have so direct a bearing on the program of establishing a self-supporting native Christian community. Students are trained for vocations in life and their training makes possible a more flourishing and successful Christian community and so has a bearing on all the future work of the Church. In South America all our schools are full to bursting. Given 9 twice our present plant and equipment, our school numbers would double in a year or two. Wherever, by Centenary and local help, extension and accommodation are secured, there, at once, the numbers increase. The lure of English, of practical sense, of better discipline and moral atmosphere, the personal habits of the teachers, their temperance and strict morality, all these things have brought them over 10,000 children that Methodism now teaches and will bring the number up to 50,000 that will be with us when we are ready to take them. Four hundred thousand dollars is needed and should have been available for the pressing needs of our schools in Latin-America during the last year. In Europe the outstanding educational enterprise is the Col- legio at Rome. One sure index of the importance of the work which the Collegio is doing is the great attention which the Vatican has been paying to it during the past year. All that has been gained will be jeopardized if the plans made for it are not carried out or are delayed for long period of time. The Farm School in France at Charvieu and the orphanages in France and in Italy are doing effective work whose largest importance will be seen only in the future years. MEDICAL WORK Medical work on the Foreign Mission Field is not only a great Christian ministry to physical need, but it is also a most effective means of preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom of God and is a first line of defense for the health of civilization. The destructive epidemic — influenza, which ranged over the world, costing millions of lives, began in an obscure section of Asia Minor, where there was no mission station and no sanitation or medical care at all. Had there been medical missionaries there, such as have stopped epidemics in China and India, a large part of the destruction might have been avoided. A sample of the hospital projects awaiting funds which should have been available is the hospital at Nanchang, China, which is to be erected as a memorial to the late Bishop James W. Bashford. Nanchang is a city of 500,000 people and has a contributing country population of 15,000,000. It is an outstanding case of medical need in our work in China. Generous financial aid from among the Chinese gentry and officials is available if our help is forthcoming. The Thoburn Memorial Hospital in Nadiad, doing wonderful work with equipment that is little less than shameful, is in urgent need of enlarged equipment. Over 3,000,000 people are depend- ing on medical aid from this single institution. Dr. Corpron, the physician, is an eminent eye specialist and surgeon, but is able to do only a fraction of the work that is necessary. The Crawford Memorial Hospital at Vikarabad, South India, is another institution, for which the promised aid must be no longer withheld. 10 Centenary Remakes Home Missions “The Centenary has made the difference between success and failure in the home field,” says David D. Forsyth, in comment- ing on the fine way in which the members of the Methodist Epis- copal Church have responded to the Centenary appeal. “There is a greater sense of Christian Stewardship, more intercessory prayer and a deeper responsibility for personal evangelism. This is the greatest result and is what makes the outlook for the future bright. “The Centenary pledges paid in have enabled the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension to carry on a larger and more constructive program than was possible under the old ‘frontier’ idea of Home Missions. The heart of the strictly mis- sionary problem in America is in communities made up of tran- sient populations regardless of geographical location. The for- eign-speaking folks, wherever they dwell, the lumber men, the toilers in mining camps and in congested and industrial cities, our great student populations and the downtown city multitudes, those in the village and the open country — wherever the population is of a transient character, there are we ministering in the name of Christ for the Methodists whose offerings are making possible this new day. “Great have been the results. They are chronicled week by week in the Church Press and have been brought to the attention of the Church in lantern slide and pamphlet. What has been accomplished in the Home Mission field reads like a fairy tale of childhood days. And the tale is only just begun. Shall it be finished? But the Task as Yet is Not Complete “The unpaid Centenary benevolent apportionments last year were counted on by the Board of Home Missions and Church Ex- tension to carry out its program. When this amount failed to come in drastic changes in the program had to be made. The result is that there are Methodist Episcopal churches all over the United States that are left in the condition of uncertainty and despair. That the Church will respond, once it knows the facts, I have no doubt. May that day speedily come when the last individual who has not yet paid in the last amount now due awak- ens to the cause of these delayed Kingdom enterprises, and meets the obligation at once.” 11 With Unpaid Centenary Benevolent Apportionments for 1920 the Methodist Episcopal Church, Through the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension, Could — Build Better Churches 1. Invest $458,000 in 155 modern churches where old one- room buildings furnish inadequate accommodations alongside modern school buildings and homes. There is great need of rebuilding the Methodist Episcopal Church in large sections of America. There are a surprising number of communities in some of the poorer agricultural por- tions of the East, Central West, and South, where in building churches generations ago to meet frontier conditions, the Metho- dist Episcopal Church built the rudest kind of one-room build- ings. There is a similar situation in some parts of the West, where in an early day inexpensive churches were erected to meet immediate needs. In many of these centers which are now more progressive and up-to-date and where public buildings, such as schools and libraries, have been erected on modern lines, the antiquated and inadequate Methodist Episcopal churches are yet depended upon as centers of worship. Such buildings do not meet the needs of the ordinary program of the Church, and if Methodism is to include not only worship, but also religious education and community activities in its program, such equip- ment is impossible. The Church that is to meet the challenge of the neighborhood must bear some resemblance to the rest of the town. Centenary funds have made it possible to change religious con- ditions in many of these communities. But — There are 153 such communities that would have received help this year if Centenary pledges had been paid in full. Help Churchless Communities 2. Invest $443,000 in 293 church communities where Metho- dism has sole responsibility or opportunity. The Centenary survey reveals the fact that there is an increas- ing number of communities in America in which the Methodist Episcopal Church has the sole responsibility, due in some cases to the fact that churches which were once competitors have given up the field. In a large percentage of the communities in which the Methodist Episcopal Church is responsible for the religious life of the people it either has no church or has an inadequate one. There is some question about the wisdom of a denomination entering a field which is already at least partly served by another religious body, but when the field is entirely dependent upon the Methodist Episcopal Church, then our responsibility is clear. There are 296 such neighborhoods where assistance should have been given last year in helping to build churches if our income had made it possible. One county in the state of Washington, containing 1,146,847 12 acres, 90% of which are under cultivation, with a population of 35,000 people, has 107 school districts, 23 of which have schools with two or more rooms, containing 22,000 people, without re- ligious services of any sort, and yet all these communities are easy of access. These districts are marked on a map on the poster. The failure of any other denomination to maintain religious serv- ices in small towns in this county, under pressure of high cost living, demonstrates the responsibility of the Methodist Episcopal Church to provide the religious leadership. This part of the county has always baffled those who admin- istered the work by the old circuit plan, because the religious sentiment in these sections is not sufficiently developed to make the necessary preliminary organization possible. The Whitman County Methodist Preachers’ Association, which is an active and forward-looking group of men, has decided to attack this problem by the use of a well-equipped missionary. They have the man, in fact, there are two of him, an experienced man and his wife, both good preachers. They have a car and a stereopticon, and go from schoolhouse to schoolhouse, organizing the social and religious life of the communities. As the development of religious sentiment warrants, adjacent groups of communities will be tied together in working organizations, the nucleus of one of these now being in process of formation at Wilcox. The Presbyterians do not have a resident pastor in the county. They have six abandoned churches and four that may go again, but are now closed. The Baptists have four abandoned churches, and three going. The Christians have seven abandoned churches, and six going, but only four with resident pastors. They have twenty abandoned churches on the Moscow District. The Con- gregationalists have one resident pastor, and in three other places are federated with other churches, in two cases with the Metho- dist Episcopal Church. The people in the outlying sections are becoming increasingly wealthy and decreasingly religious. Re- ligious idealism is in no sense keeping pace with material devel- opment. Wealth increases and souls decay, and the situation is full of menace, not only to the rural sections, but to the centers where religious work is already established. Because it is to these centers the people come when they retire, and to which their children come to school, bringing with them their lack of church contact, and pagan ideals from the unchurched sections from which they come. Young people by the score are growing up absolute pagans, with no idea of religious restraint, many of them never having been inside a church. The situation has all the dangerous potentialities of abundant material resources, un- leavened with Christian idealism. The Methodist Episcopal Church has a responsibility for Whitman County, the fourth greatest in the United States, because the other denominations either do not see the situation or have frankly quit the job. 13 Already the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension has caused rejoicing in such cases, with funds provided by Cen- tenary givers. But — Help could be given here and in the other churchless communi- ties asking for churches and preachers if the shortage in Cen- tenary apportionments due the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension was paid. Minister to Negroes 5. Grant $165,600 to 158 inadequately churched city and in- dustrial communities to which Negroes have migrated in large numbers. When the original Centenary survey was made prior to the migration of hundreds of thousands of Negroes northward, the Methodist Episcopal Church had but one colored church in the region of the city of Pittsburgh. After the migration, there were enough Negro communities developed in industrial fields in and around Pittsburgh to constitute a Colored Conference District. So Bishop W. F. McDowell organized a district and appointed a District Superintendent. But there is still only one church build- ing for these twenty-five Negro communities. With Centenary help a second is being built, and soon there will be a third. The Department of Evangelism has furnished a tent for evangelistic meetings to which thousands have come. The new Pittsburgh District of the Washington Annual Con- ference, map of which is shown on poster, embraces twenty-seven counties, namely ; Greene, Washington, Beaver, Lawrence, Mer- cer, Crawford, Erie, Warren, Forest, Venango, Butler, Allegheny, Fayette, Westmoreland, Indiana, Jefferson, McKean, Elk, Potter, Cameron, Clinton, Center, Clearfield, Cambria, Blair, Bedford, and Summerset, in which there are 75,000 Negroes, fully 25.000 of whom came in during the last four years. Baptist Missions have sprung up and Holy Rollers thrive, all of which are served by preachers who are themselves laborers in industries of this section. Some Results : Congregations established, 6 ; total membership, 200; Sunday school enrollment, 419; congregations paying more than one half of pastor’s support, 5. One congregation six months old, worshiping in a basement, pays pastor $70 a month, pays District Superintendent and Bishop, and accepted a Cen- tenary quota, besides raising $3,000 for a new church building. Some Needs: (1) Assistance to build where congregations have been established and have pastors. (2) Twelve additional workers, to care for twenty-five opportunities and responsibili- ties. What the Centenary has made it possible to do for the Negro in the United States makes a story of romance and adventure. But — These twenty-five new Negro communities with but one church 14 building are typical of a situation throughout the country that failure to pay Centenary pledges is making it impossible for the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension to meet. Equip Foreign Language Projects 4 . Invest $ 226,000 in //j importunate situations among for- eign-speaking peoples where progress is impossible without ade- quate equipment. The Centenary has made it possible for Methodism to go at its share of the foreign language ministry in the United States with new vigor. And great results are being attained. But — With the exception of three or four of the foreign-speaking projects in the United States surveyed this year by the Bureau of Foreign-Speaking Work of the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension there has come first, surprise, then shame, then alarm, and then amazement at what was found. Surprise at the poor equipment, shame for the inadequate and run-down conditions of the buildings, alarm at the poor standing such ven- tures have in the community, and amazement that Methodist Episcopal foreign-speaking pastors have been able to accomplish what they have, so poor has been the equipment furnished them. Their efficiency could be improved fifty per cent if plant im- provements could be financed. A little paint and interior decora- tion at one place, a new roof or a new pair of steps at another, an adequate organ at a third, and a set of kindergarten tables or playground equipment at a fourth. The list is almost endless. A few illustrations indicate concretely this need. In a community in Minnesota a church built for community work, with social halls and gymnasium, was allowed to run down. The gymnasium is now used for a storage room and the entire building requires rebuilding and painting. The pastor could reach a large number of Finns and Austrians if he were properly backed up. Twelve hundred dollars would meet this need. In an Italian Mission in Vermont, where the Methodist Episco- pal Church is alone in the field there are forty young people be- tween the ages of sixteen and twenty -five. Two of these are preparing for Christian service as the result of the labors of a heroic group of deaconesses. There is need of equipment for kindergarten, gymnasium, and indeed for an entire building. The work now is being done in an old damp basement with rough cement walls where the rain always seeps through. An old, wheezy reed organ furnishes the music. The one room for wor- ship is used for almost everything, which drives the worshipful Italians away rather than attracts them. A little help was given last year, but for a piano and carpenter’s and painter’s job, and a new drainage system, $1,000 is needed at once. In an Iowa city there is a community of six thousand Bo- hemians, the Methodist Episcopal pastor is the acknowledged leader of the colony. His church of 125 members last year raised for all purposes $825. They met their Centenary quota in full 15 and have a fine lot where a community hall should be built. The local English-speaking churches and the mills near by would more than double the amount of the Centenary appropriation, if the project could be launched. In the center of a great steel industrial section in Pennsylvania the new Bohemian pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church has doubled the attendance of his fellow countrymen during the last six months. But the front steps to the church are dangerous. The back rooms of the church, which should be used for clubs and class work, are rented as a suite to eek out enough money to pay the bills. A trap door and narrow rickety steps lead to the basement. The building needs paint inside and out. English- speaking people will donate the material if the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension will put $1,000 into making this building a worthy place of worship. Meanwhile w r e say to these people of reverent worshipful meditative temperament: “The Lord is in his Holy Temple.” In a Massachusetts town a beginning was made to do adequate work among the Portuguese. The first part of a Centenary ap- propriation was used to buy property and build one unit of a building. But there has been no money to continue it. The un- finished, unattractive walls do not provide a decent place in which to worship. And the people, used to the worshipful sanctuaries of Europe, say to their pastors, “Better no worship at all than to dishonor God in such a house.” While waiting for the beautiful new building which was prom- ised for Plaza Community Church for Latin-Americans, Los Angeles, a variety of makeshifts are being used. Worship is conducted in an unfinished abandoned army hut. An old greasy garage next door is used for a day nursery'. In the clinic over 1,400 people were helped last year. There is an excellent staff with a physician who can pray as well as heal, and who could double his clinic work if he had equipment. The present condi- tions are a reproach to Methodism. Minister in Industrial Communities 5. Proceed zvith 191 projects in congested city and industrial centers, thereby providing Sunday schools and religious serv- ices for unchurched multitudes, to cost $1,485,000. In a California community with a population of 8,000. of whom 3,500 are Portuguese and Italians, there is no other Protestant church. The present Methodist Episcopal Church building of two rooms is inadequate for meeting a greatly increased popu- lation, due to demand of many new industries. The local church has taken subscriptions, but without missionary aid is unable to proceed with their building. There are thirty-one large manufac- turing concerns and a number of smaller concerns in the parish. In a town where the population of the parish is 20.000, the present Methodist Episcopal Church was erected in 1867. Two large ship-building plants were established here during the war, 16 as well as other industries. There is a large foreign population. No church is meeting community needs. The Protestant respon- sibility is mainly ours. And we have only six families with an income of $1,500 a year. A railroad and manufacturing suburban city of 300,000 people in the Middle West, with largest terminal of Big Four Railroad, and twenty-seven manufacturing concerns employing about 5,000 men, with a population nearly 15,000, has a small Baptist and a small Congregational church in the community, also a strong Roman Catholic church. There is no community program in any of these. Our Church is not strong numerically, yet is serving more of these people than any other. Parts of the Sunday school are now meeting in four near-by homes and in the parsonage. Thousands are unchurched simply because of inadequate facili- ties. There is “no room in the church.” In a Negro parish of 5,000 in Alabama aid is needed to replace a one-room building valued at $600. The population is increas- ing rapidly on account of new industries. A rapidly growing college community in Indiana, in a city of 300,000, with parish of 15,000, has no room and no program adequate for its task. The local church will assume four fifths of the cost of a new project and all maintenance expense. There is a membership of 900, with two churches in community. At the county seat of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, the West Side Parish has a population of 3,000 strong. It is sepa- rated from other parts of the town by the Susquehanna River and is connected by bridges. This section of Clearfield has nearly all the desirable building lots for homes ; therefore must be and will be the outlet for the future growth of the town. There is a strong community life also developing. To meet this responsibil- ity for community life, especially among the young people, the Methodists have at the present time only a little, old-fashioned church building containing an auditorium and two small rooms back of the pulpit, which were built on at a later date. Later they built a balcony, but at the present time they have a church membership of 500 and a Sunday-school enrollment of 900. There is no appropriation available as yet because of limited funds. Aid is needed for a parish house for work with the sailors and employees located at the Portsmouth Navy Yard. A plot of ground has been purchased near the entrance to the naval station, with the hope that the Centenary income would permit an ap- propriation for building in 1921. The chaplain in charge of the yard states that such a building is greatly needed, and would, in his judgment, be crowded constantly. The building would be used as Hostess House, Parish House, Library, etc., for the sailors. There are in Kittery no facilities for social work, nor any elevating influences to appeal to the men. The church re- sponsibility is entirely Methodist Episcopal, and we have only an old village church, not conveniently located. A total of 4,000 17 sailors is a low number for the yard, besides 4,400 civilian em- ployees. More than 8,000 men are constantly identified with the Portsmouth Navy Yard, which is a permanent yard, doing special type of repair and drydock work for the navy. Some- times as many as fifty ships are in the harbor. The famous naval prison is here, also a naval hospital. Our small church, part of a Circuit, is the only religious force in the community. It is most regrettable that we cannot have in Kittery a fully equipped Parish House, with an assistant pastor and a woman worker. All we have in the face of this opportunity and responsibility is a vacant lot and an old church a mile away from the navy yard. An Illinois city of 17,000 people and growing rapidly on ac- count of great industrial expansion has few churches in the city and none doing effective work aside from our own, which is doing a fairly good work but is handicapped by old-style brick building with one room and a small lecture room. It is a very important railway and steamboat transportation point. In a smelting and steel mill town of 70,000 folks in Colorado, the Methodist Episcopal Church was built in 1886 when the place was a frontier village. It is now largely of foreign population, especially Mexican. A full program of religious, Americaniza- tion, social, and educational work is planned, but there are no funds with which to proceed. Our church in East Braintree, Mass., a town of 10,000 people, a small, two-room frame building, was erected in 1891. The pop- ulation has greatly increased on account of the Fall River Ship Yard and other industries located at East Braintree, during and since the war, including a great oil refinery. One hundred new houses were built in a single development. Our membership is small, and unable, without aid, to meet present need in this greatly increased population. A local financial campaign has been put on, but the project cannot go forward without Home Mission aid. The list of communities of this sort that have been helped to secure adequate church plants and equipment by means of Cen- tenary funds is a long one. But the list as yet untouched is also long. Send Forth Evangelist Missionaries 6. Commission tliirty-tzvo missionary evangelists to minister to isolated families, churchless communities, lumber camps, migrant groups and weak churches, for $63,000. The logging camps offer a fruitful field of service. The Meth- odist Episcopal Church cannot afford to be unmindful of the challenge presented by the crying need of these men for religious privileges. Isolated as they often are, the tactful worker with a real program of Christian service is welcomed in the camps be- cause he comes in the Spirit of the Master, whose principles arc held in the highest respect by the loggers as a whole. They de- 18 mand a religion whose results will be apparent in the entirety of life. But only a few evangelists can be sent because of lack of funds. During the past year six rural fields in Michigan have been completely transformed and four others revived and stimulated by a constructive evangelistic program. Four hundred and twen- ty-six new members have been received, 159 have been baptized. 167 signed the life service pledge, 173 signed tithe pledge, and $2,085 was raised for local improvements. The membership in- crease averaged 219% for the year. The pastor’s salary has been increased in some instances three times former amounts paid as a result of work in thirty-five fields on the Saginaw Bay District following the program fostered by the Department of Evangelism. Nearly every possible field has been placed upon a self-supporting basis. This type of work is productive of the greatest results. Religious forums is a Centenary project in the Harlem section of New York City, in which field are sixty-two churches and seventeen synagogues having 100,000 members, and 100,000 labor radicals. As clear cut as with a knife is the cleavage between these church members and these radicals. How reconcile them? Religious forums are conducted as an intermediary group in radical headquarters and in churches, thereby bringing each to the other and thereby bringing spiritual dynamic to the radical and social vision to the church member. We go where men are. John 20:21: Reconciliation, not compromise! The gospel auto is preaching the gospel to non-church-going San Francisco. Hundreds are reached weekly through the in- dustrial plants. Street meetings are held in the most congested and foreign sections. Testaments and portions of the gospels are given to those coming forward and promising to read them. Thousands of cards and tracts have been distributed. Definite campaign among foreigners in their own tongue is planned. Some results of district evangelism on Alva District, Okla- homa Conference, 1920, are : Five meetings, averaging forty conversions each. Sunday-school enrollment increased 50%. Three new Epworth Leagues organized. Arnett: Formerly paid pastor $800; now pays pastor $1,200, and has repaired parson- age and will remodel church. Waynoka: Formerly paid pastor $1,000; now pays pastor $1,800. Burlington: Formerly paid pas- tor (for one-fourth time) $200; now pays pastor (for one-half time) $780, and will build $8,000 church. Byron: Formerly re- ceived $100 to $200, missionary money; now pays pastor $1,500. Vici : Now being reorganized for enlarged program. Summer tent meetings in rural fields are proving continuously fruitful. Over three hundred conversions have been reported on Ottumwa District, as a result of this method. Not half the calls can be answered for this kind of meeting in the rural fields. During nine months in Whitman County, Washington, the missionary evangelist and his wife traveled incessantly, visiting isolated schools and farmhouses in unchurched sections, holding 19 143 public services, sixty with stereopticon scenes from the life of Christ and Centenary pictures. Five thousand one hundred and seventeen persons attended, the smallest number being fif- teen, the largest, 350. An invitation to become Christians was always given and 142 responded to date. In the unchurched places were found ninety-seven members of the Methodist Epis- copal Church, seventy-six Disciples, twenty-nine Baptists, eight- een Presbyterians, and seventy-one belonging to smaller sects. The Albia Mission, among the coal mining camps of Iowa, was opened last September, and a missionary pastor who is a mem- ber of the Miners’ Union was put in charge. He has been busy making surveys of the camps opening Sunday schools, establish- ing preaching services and prayer meetings. Several evangelistic meetings have been held, resulting in over fifty conversions and the organization of two community churches. Similar plans are being worked out in other camps with promising results. Several abandoned churches will be moved in to provide houses of wor- ship. Adventism, Mormonism, and other fanatical cults are at work among these simple people. Sabbath desecration, worldli- ness, and religious indifference are general. But God has set an open door for this pastor-evangelist. He is gathering a people unto His name in every camp that time and resources have made it possible for us to enter. “A few days ago, while the writer was visiting the sick in the State Hospital of Missouri, a strange lady called him to her bed- side and asked if there was not someone who could go down into the country where she lived and help them to organize a Sunday school and go down and preach to them occasionally. On being questioned as to the location of the homestead section where she lived, it was found to be eighty-five miles away. Sixty by rail, and twenty-five across country. What can a pastor do in such a case, when he has the care of a church of nearly six hundred members in a town 12,000 population, ministering to a parish from eighty to one hundred miles square?” But — Think of what could be done to win America to Christ if funds were available ! Train More Leaders 7. Put $76,800 into 512 of the best-trained leaders the Church can provide for the most difficult, complex, and needy situations in America. Some of the greatest results of Centenary investments in the Home Field have come from placing of specially trained work- ers in churches that were about at the end of their usefulness under the old order. A Methodist Episcopal Church in New York City in a section that had changed from residential to downtown in character was in despair. With missionary aid it organized a community pro- gram one year ago, installing three full-time specially trained workers, a director of religious education, a director of com- 20 munity organization and recreation, and a parish visitor. As a result of a new program nearly four hundred people have been received into church membership. The Sunday school and con- gregation are three times as large as when the program was launched. Both pastor and church members claim that this phenomenal increase is a direct result of these specially trained workers. This church is now putting in additional equipment for the Sunday school and social program to cost $20,000. A little over a year ago a Methodist Episcopal Church in Den- ver, Colo., completed and dedicated a new parish house costing $83,000. Four specially trained workers were installed and a community program was undertaken. At the end of the first six months 450 people joined the church. The Sunday school had increased from 300 to an average of 800. The pastor, writing April 1, said that he had received 280 additional members in the church and the Sunday school and through March had an at- tendance as follows: First Sunday, 1,300; second Sunday, 1,283; third Sunday, 1,579; fourth Sunday, 1,300. The congregation now taxes the capacity of the church. This church prior to the launching of the new social and community program was con- sidered to be defeated. A Methodist Episcopal Church in Camden, N. J., stands in the downtown congested district and is serving a very poor class of people. For a number of years it was thought it would be impossible for this church to continue serving in the community. An intensified social and community program was started at a very small expense and one special worker was employed. The pastor states that the congregations have been quadrupled. He is conducting street meetings every night, specializing in children and young people, and the church is becoming the recognized center of the whole district for the young people and the boys and girls. The Sunday school is reaching large numbers. An old English-speaking Methodist Episcopal Church in New York City finally abandoned its building and consented that it should be turned over for community work in connection with Jefferson Park Italian Methodist Episcopal Church. An invest- ment of $28,000 was made in remodeling the church for this pur- pose. At once a great program was launched and a staff of work- ers employed. Three months later more than one thousand Ital- ian boys and girls were meeting each Sunday afternoon for Sun- day school in this building. There has also been a large increase in the membership of the Jefferson Park Church as well as its Sunday school, which has taken on new life. There are two Methodist Episcopal churches in South Phila- delphia located among congested groups of Italians and Syrian people, both of which are taking on new life because of the work of trained helpers. More than two hundred children were cared for in their Daily Vacation Bible Schools during the summer months. The playground conducted in connection with one of these churches is crowded daily with children and mothers. The playground is supervised and directed by competent helpers. 21 The Commission on Immigration which made its report to Congress in 1909 stated that there were 105 great colonization schemes in rural fields in nineteen states east of the Mississippi River. One of these colonies is in southern New Jersey, the people being Italians. This movement in New Jersey began in 1873, and there are now large sections of the southern rural part of the state occupied by Italians. The Board of Home Missions and Church Extension has scarcely touched this needy field. The District Superintendent of one of these sections, with the help of the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension, two years ago employed a woman who had been a school-teacher among these rural Italian people. She now gives all her time to Christian work among them. As a result of her persistent efforts she operates four Sunday schools for Italian children in addition to other church activities. She makes full use of all the agencies in the state and township which can be made to serve the com- munity. She has secured the cooperation of the Department of Education and conducts three night classes in which she teaches English to Italians. She distributes one hundred books every week furnished by the State Library. Through her influence a nurse has been secured for the township from the Visiting Nurses’ Association. She has secured from the Department of Agriculture a domestic science teacher who goes from home to home giving instructions to the mothers and daughters. Sewing and music are also taught by this Christian missionary. During the summer great “community sings” have been a feature of the program of the church and the Sunday schools. She has enlisted the aid of all of these agencies to strengthen her in her work for the Kingdom. Of the 105 great colonies reported by the Com- mission on Immigration the Methodist Episcopal Church has been able to enter only a few in a strong vital way. If we had the workers and money for their support, what is being done in one community in southern New Jersey could be duplicated in a hundred places. These are a few illustrations of what the Methodist Episco- pal Church is doing both in great cities and rural communities that have been breaking due to rapid changes in population, but which have been saved and been made efficient with the more in- tensive program which has been made possible by the employment of specially trained workers. Finish Half-Built Churches 8. With $104,000 complete tzuenty-six church building proj- ects nozv delayed but started zvith the expectation of Centenary funds. Not the least distressing among the delayed projects are those which were started with a hole in the ground, but hardly reached the surface before they paralyzed, some actually perishing, be- cause $104,000 on which the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension was depending for aid to twenty-six of such undertak- ings failed to get to the Centenary treasury. Some of these un 22 fortunate enterprises are in the small towns, but most of them are in growing communities and large cities. The disappointment and distress of these churches are indescribable, especially in the in- dustrial centers where the catastrophic sag in financial resources has absolutely shut out every hope of realizing their modest “House of the Lord.” One example will illustrate. In an industrial community congested with people and blighted with crass forms of perdition, a small but substantial member- ship heroically kept the gospel light burning, in a one-room church with a small kitchen attachment for the primary class of the Sunday school. For twelve long years they prayed and plodded for a new church. Regular contributions which had the unmistakable blood mark of sacrifice on them were made to the building fund whose growth was discouragingly slow. Suddenly there appeared a new light on their horizon, begetting glowing hopes of realized dreams. It was the Centenary with its appeal for and its promise of help. They were struck as if by lightning when the portly quota arrived. The pastor, official members, com- mittees and the Ladies’ Aid Society talked it over, and shook their heads in despair. They took it to the next prayer meeting, where it soon became the center of their thought and talk and supplication. They prayed on until they had “prayed themselves through.” Those were freighted hours of unprecedented possibilities and resulted in sacrificially meeting the quota on which already two years’ sub- scription has been paid. Glad tidings reached them when they were informed that their project had been included in the survey and would bring them enough aid to build their proposed church. The ramshackle, old building was at once torn down to make room for the new struc- ture. A few rooms were rented in a near-by dwelling to house the church and the Sunday school while the new house of worship was being erected. It was a glad day in the life of this struggling society when the first shovel full of ground was turned. Everybody took a hand at excavating so as to reduce the cost. The foundation walls have been brought up to the grade line and the joists were being placed in position for the first floor when word came that some Methodists throughout our Church had failed to bring into the storehouse of the Lord what they had subscribed and conse- quently no aid could be forthcoming for their enterprise. And there the matter rests. The Centenary has made it feasible for the Board of Home Missions and Church Extension to grant the extra aid which has made possible the pushing through to completion of many worthy church building projects, but the church just described and twenty-six others like it are waiting in distress because some churches have not done their part in raising their Centenary quotas. 23 S EE that every unit leader in your church and all of the other officials are regular subscribers to a weekly Methodist Episco- pal church paper. Then keep on until the list in- cludes every family in the congregation Observe Good Literature Dai ;