H.'£, . o Philippine Mission ■'?ITTEE r ect!on c METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2016 https://archive.org/details/philippinemissio00stun_0 BISHOP WARREN AND AMERICAN MISSIONARIES IN THE PHILIPPINES (FALL OF 1903) The Philippine Mission OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH BY REV. HOMER C. STUNTZ, D.D. Presiding Elder of tile Philippine Islands District THE MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH OPEN DOOR EMERGENCY COMMISSION 150 Fifth Avenue, New York PRICE, TEN CENTS THE PHILIPPINE MISSION THE COUNTRY HE Philippine Islands lie in the northwesl em Pacific, almost due south of the center of China, and noith of Australia. They form a kind of boundary between Oceanica on its extreme northwest, and Malaysia at its farthest northeast, but are considered an integral part of the Malaysian group — Sumatra, Java, Borneo and the Celebes— for linguistic and geologic reasons. Their latitude limits are 4° 41' to 21° north latitude, and they stretch through nine and one half degrees of west longi- Latitude tude, from 126° 30' to 117°. This apparent width must be understood as being taken “over all,” for on none of the islands is it possible to get more than one hundred miles from the sea, and that only in the widest parts of Luzon and Mindanao. There are more than one thousand islands in the group. Only 343 are named. Many of these are mere jutting rocks, or spits of bare sand, named only that mariners may avoid them. In the governmental control of the islands, and in missionary operations, one dozen of the entire The Islands and number of islands practically absorb our atten- their Population tion. These are Luzon, Mindoro, Masbate, Panay, Negros, Cebu, Samar, Leyte, Bohol, Marinduque, Paragua, and Mindanao. Of these Luzon and Mindanao are the largest, differing in size by only a few square miles. Luzon is the most densely populated, carry- ing 3,798,507 out of a total population of 7,635,426, or 5 slightly less than fifty per cent. Add to this, equal fertility with the most favored islands in the group, and the pos- session of the capital — Manila — and it will be seen that Luzon is the most important of the many islands in the Philippines. Then it must be noted that whatever of Euro- pean uplift was furnished by Spain was most powerfully felt ONE OF THE ENTRANCES TO THE WALLED CITY, MANILA n and near Manila, so that as a result Luzon has an impor- tance in the destinies of the Archipelago which cannot well be overestimated. The area of the entire group is 112,000 square miles. This gives it a land surface about equal to all New England plus the state of New York or Illinois, Indiana, and two thirds of 0 Ohio. Compared with European states, the Philippines con- tain as much land surface as Denmark, or Switzerland or the Netherlands. Japan has but 28,000 more square miles, though it bears a population six times as numerous as the Area Philippines. With its high fertility of soil, its virtual mo- nopoly of the hemp industry, and its extensive deposits of iron, copper and gold, there is every reason to believe that the Philippines will carry a population of 20,000,000. This is sufficient to give it place among the nations as a power of no mean strength. THE CLIMATE The climate of the Philippines is the most equable and healthful of any portion of the tropics into which the white man has yet been led. It is a tropical climate. It is warm. TRAVELING IN' THE RAINY SEASON From April to September it is hot. That is to be expected. But as the islands are all narrow, and as the entire group is surrounded by vast bodies of water containing cool currents from Japan and farther north, the temperature is held A Tropical down to a level of comparative comfort the year Climate through. The total thermometric variation in twelve months is never more than forty degrees. Whole weeks pass with the extremes of temperature never more than ten or twelve degrees apart. The humidity of the atmosphere makes the heat somewhat trying during the summer months. 7 Contrary views of Philippine climate prevail almost uni- versally in the United States. The soldiers who first were in the Philippines have little to say in favor of the climate. This is not to be wondered at. They had no fair opportunity to judge it. They were rushed into the islands Americans in with little provision for housing or transportation, the Tropics They slept “ in the open,” or in hastily constructed barracks. Their food and water supply was irreg- ular. They marched days and nights in the sun, through swamps and almost impenetrable jungles. Of couise they A FILIPINO FIRE COMPANY became ill. But where the white man can keep out of the sun, and regulate his food and water supply, the climate is neither oppressive nor a menace to health. It is debilitat- ing. Persons from the temperate zone lose their red blood little by little, and need the bracing effect of at least one year 8 out 'of six in their own native air. Mr. Benjamin Kidd is quite right in saying in his book , “ The Control of the Tropics,” “ The white man in the tropics is like a diver under water. He needs to come to the surface frequently to breathe.” This l will be true of all tropical fields while “A POWWOW" BETWEEN THREE^MOBO SULTANS AND SOME AMERICAN OFFICERS (The morning after the American camp hail been attacked by unknown Moros in Mindanao) The Americans are at the left, out of view THE PEOPLE The population of the Philippines falls roughly into two main divisions, each of which divides and subdivides into many fractions. The principal part of the people — six sevenths of the total — are what are known to the general public as “Filipinos.” They are the Christianized descend- 9 ants of the Malay invaders who swept into the Philippines several centuries ago on commercial and missionary errands, some of them being emissaries of the Mohammedan faith. The other division or class of the population is made Tribal up of more than thirty wild tribes. These are Negritos Divisions — the aboriginal people of the archipelago, Igorrotes, Tinguianes, Bogobos, Moros, and others less numerous. These tribes have never accepted the teachings of the Spanish friais, and have either rude systems of idolatry or a degraded type of the Mohammedan belief. The Filipinos, or Christianized Malays, show indubitable evidence of having mixed blood. The Spaniard and the A ROAI) SCENE NEAR MANILA Chinese have left distinct marks in stature, feature, and mental characteristics. But so general has been this mixture of blood that all are called Filipinos — though the simon-pure Filipino is hard to find. Tn stature these people are short, rarely reaching more than five feet two inches, and The often falling below that. They have stiff black hair, Filipinos the flat face, and wide nostril peculiar to the Malay and the Melanesian. They are adepts in all forms of cunning and can deceive the most wary. A conquered peo- ple, deprived of arms, they have been driven to learn the art of defense by “deception.” They are polite, hospitable, and, as a rule, law-abiding. In one province having 406,000 popu- 10 lation the American judge had but seventy-five criminal cases at a recent term, and that represented all the criminals who had been arrested for all infractions of the criminal laws during three and one half months, and this in part of the islands in which insurrection and war had left its customary aftermath of rascality and vagrancy. The mental range of the Filipino has not been a wide one. He has a quick memory, but is not believed to have equally good reasoning powers. He is indolent. The climate accounts for part of this trait, and the SPANISH WATCH-TOW KR AT MINDANAO tyrannical and unjust government explains something more. Revenge is considered a duty, and disgrace attaches to the man who leaves an injury to him or his relatives or friends unpaid by injuries enough greater to leave a balance in his favor. Taken altogether the characteristics of the Filipinos are such as to give good hope that they will become valuable members of the world family. For this they need good government and education, supplemented and reinforced by the pure gospel of Christ. ll The wild tribes present altogether a different problem to the administrator and the missionary. They are wholly and frankly non-Christian. Some of them are head-hunters, and it is commonly believed that cannibalistic feasts are not un known among some of them. The Igorrote will trade The Wild a deer for a dog any time, and let you enjoy juicy ven- Tribes ison, while he regales himself with roast dog. The Ne- gritos build no houses and live far from the traces of civilization. They are purely a forest people. The languages of these tribes has never been reduced to writing. Indica- tions point to ultimate extinction of nearly all of them. They will not come under the yoke of civilization, and all who do not, disappear sooner or later. There is pathos in it, but the law seems universal. HISTORY The verifiable history of the Philippines begins when Magellan discovered the Islands in 1521, and Spain formally set about their conquest and occupation in 1564. Urdaneta, an Augustinian friar, and Legaspi, a lawyer and soldier, were at the head of the latter expedition. From that year Spain held a firm grasp with the exception of two years — -1762-176 1 — when English military force made her relax her hold for a time. The record is known to the world in a general way, and little need be said in detail. Two evils of Spanish ad- ministration have borne heavily in the Philippines as else- where. They are named in their order of relative hardship. First is the tyranny and corruption of bigoted, un- Tyranny of pitying, immoral priesthood. Romish priests claim the Clergy to have more power than is good for ordinary human beings to possess. Add to this fact that they were foreigners, and usually the most highly educated men in the several communities of natives among which their work was carried forward, and it becomes clear how entirely possible it was for them to tyrannize over the poor native people. With the union of church and state which prevailed wherever Spain planted colonies, it followed that the Friar was a paid agent of 12 the state. In the Philippines the government came to lean upon him as its best agent in the town or city in which he was curate or priest. As the years went on the friar was given eleven different civil functions by the government He was chairman of all kinds of municipal boards, and had a hand in everything from elections and schools to sanitation and secret service. He was the agent of a tyrannical government in carrying out its orders. His secret report could be called for at any time on any person or measure. This report had more weight in Manila than all other testimony put together. On the basis of these reports men were shot or hanged. To be in favor with the friar was to live free from anxiety. To be in the HOMES OK THE COMMON CEOCLK. shadow of his displeasure was to shiver with apprehension lest he strike the blow that would shatter home, business, or life itself. Some friars were strong enough to withstand the corroding influence of such excess of power, but they were in the minority. As a rule they went down, and the poor sheep who looked up to them as their shepherds were not only unfed, but were fleeced and killed. Immorality waxed more and more open and unashamed. Children of friars became recog- nized members of society. For every sin of this kind some flock was tom, some home felt the shame and dishonor of each lapse from priestly virtue. As a rule the public breathed freely when it was known that the friar had a mistress, for this argued greater safety for the rest of the community. 13 Cruelty was meted out without stint. Men were haled before the friar and whipped publicly for not attending divine serv- ice. Interment was refused to the bodies of such as had offended this little community tyrant, either directly or in the person of their friends, and the bodies left to decay in the sun. Greed added its own peculiar tint to the lurid glare of the picture. Money must be forthcoming for bapt isms, Greed of confirmations, burials, masses, weddings, and for every the Clergy priestly act pet formed. If devout souls built “chapels of ease,” or “ visitas,” as they are called in Spanish, it cost a tidy sum every time a piiest went from the central church to officiate in them. This sum must be forthcoming in cash before the step would be taken. The church and its friars came to stand for the most relentless kind of greed. Immense churches of stone and steel were built with the contributions of a people so miserably poor that Americans have no terms in which to express their poverty. It was wrung from them on every possible pretext, until rising after rising proved to the government how fierce was the hatred which had been begot- ten against the friars. The insurrection of 1896 was directed against the friars. Its first formulated demand was, “Let all the fiiars be killed and their bodies buried in the field ot Bagumbayan” — the field in which their friends had been shot by the hundreds. The whole movement aimed to secure relief from the tyranny, the immorality and the greed of those who should have been their best friends. This insurrection was com- promised in December, 1897, bv the payment of Insurrections $400,000 by Spain toAguinaldo and his fellow offi- cers, on condition that they would leave the islands and neither return nor use any further efforts to oppose the sovereignty of Spain in the Philippines This compromise was spurned by tens of thousands as a betrayal of their inter- ests, and guerilla warfare was rasing when Commodore Dewey sank the Spanish fleet on May 1, 1898. Aguinaldo was per- mitted to return from Singapore on condition that he would submit himself to the orders of the American officer in com- mand. This he refused to do when he was on land and among 14 SANTO DOMINGO CHUBCH, ARCHBISHOP'S MONUMKNT, AND UNIVERSITY OF SANTO TOMAS. AT SANTA ROSA the insurrecto forces; and in February of 1899 the arms of the insurrectos were turned against the Americans, chiefly be- cause of personal ambitions for place and power on the part of a few former leaders of the insurrection of 1896. Instead of accepting the sovereignty of the United States and giving that government time and opportunity to demonstrate its benefi- cent intentions, a bitter war was precipitated which could have but one end. On the Fourth of July, 1901, Governor First Civil Taft was publicly inaugurated as the first civil govem- Governor or, and since that date the organization of civil rule has gone on with a rapidity possible only to those of our own nation. With the exception of some local trouble with bigoted and warlike Mohammedans, and the lingering savagery of professional highway robbers, the archipelago is as well policed and as free from crime as the average state in the Union. All the processes of government go for- ward with apparent freedom from friction. Order has been evolved from chaos, and it has all been done in so short a space of time as to cause those who are familiar with the Orient to wonder. Within ten years not a trace of war will be left on the face of “Those far, fair isles, Which ocean kept for her own joy.” RELIGIOUS CONDITIONS Bigotry ruled the islands until the Treaty of Paris was signed. It was a crime to have a Bible. It was a crime to hold, communicate or in any way make known “any doctrine or teaching contrary to those established by the state.” The Bible Intolerance as pitiless as that which Philip the Second Excluded exercised was the universal order prior to the American occupation. Imprisonment, banishment, or death was meted out to any and all who questioned the perfect truth of any part of the mummery and superstitions of Rome. The British and Foreign Bible Society sent Senor Lallave and Senor Castells to Manila in 1889 to distribute the Scriptures. Their books were held up in the custom house, and they were 16 INSURGENT OFFICERS WHO WERE DEPORTED TO GUAM poisoned in their hotel within four days from their arrival. Senor Lallave lies buried in the English cemetery near Manila — a martyr to the cause of evangelical religion. Senor Castells recovered after terrible agonies, and was thrown into prison. After some months he was permitted to leave the islands on condition that he would never attempt to return. The friars held stubbornly to the middle-age theory of the absolute criminality of religious liberty. CROWD AT GOOD FRIDAY SERVICES AT THE TEMPORARY METHODIST CHAPEL, MANILA Protestant Missions, therefore, were unknown until Ameri- can occupation. But as soon as the occupation of the islands had been determined upon in Washington, Dr. New Mission Arthur J. Brown of the Presbyterian Foreign Mis- Fields sionary Society called a meeting of the secretaries of the different societies in the United States, and it was agreed among them as to the occupation of Cuba and Porto Rico and the Philippines. The Methodist Church, South, preferred to enter Cuba. The Methodist Episcopal Church took Porto Rico and the Philippines as its share of the new territory thus made accessible. In common with the latter church the Baptists and Presbyterians proposed to enter the Philippines, and some others indicated a purpose to do so at a later date if it could be arranged. Bishop James M. Thobunj, D.D., of the Methodist Episco- 18 pul Church, was sent to the Philippines by special cable orders from New York in March of 1899. He reported favorably upon opening work in a field which had been on his heart for many years. He preached in the Filipino Theater in Manila March 2, 1899, the first sermon delivered in the Phil i p- Bishop pines by a regularly accredited representative of any Thoburn Protestant missionary society. He says that the Spirit was present in peculiar power as he declared unto the people the free glorious gospel of salvation for all who would repent and believe. Several now in the Philippines heard that sermon, and they refer to it as one of the few times in their lives when they felt the power of God present in the place where his people were met for his worship. It was fitting that Bishop Thoburn should open the work of the Mission. He opened the work of the Mission in Singa- pore, the other great Malaysian city, under such special guidance of the Spirit as makes the account read like a twenty-ninth chapter of Acts. He had heard the cry of the oppressed people of the Philippines and prayed fervently for an opening among them through which the gospel might find free entrance for their salvation. Now that Providence has blown off the barred gates of bigotry and thrown down the wall of intolerance it was exactly right that Bishop Thoburn should be the human agent to be used in beginning the work of his church. More than an entire year passed, however, before a mis- sionary arrived. This was the Rev. Thomas H. Martin, who landed in Manila March 26, 1900. He was followed in May by Rev. J. L. McLaughlin and wife, and later in Methodist the same year by Rev. W. G. Fritz. Rev. Homer Missionaries C. Stuntz, who spent eight years in India (from 1887 to 1895) was sent out in April, 1901, as presiding elder and pastor of the church for Americans in Manila. He was accompanied by Rev. W. A. Goodell. These have been joined by others until there are now thirteen married men on the field, besides two single ladies, representing the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society. Work is in operation among the Americans in Manila, 19 where a self-supporting church serves its share of the com- munity of our own countrymen numbering more than six thousand, of whom more than four thousand are single men, or men away from their families. This church has An American its own pastor, Rev. Geo. A. Miller from California, Congregation and is a center of holy activity. It seeks and saves young men who would otherwise be drowned in the perdition which yawns at the feet of young men in the tropics. The Sunday School, League, and Ladies’ Guild of this vigorous branch of Methodism have life and spirit. AMERICAN METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH AND MISSION HOMES IN MANILA Scarcely a service is held at which actual results are not seen in the way of conversions, accessions, or the accom- plishment of some end toward which pastor and people have been striving. The congregation owns one of the finest corner lots in Manila, and have a temporary chapel which is filled with as fine an audience Sunday after Sunday as any pastor in Methodism faces. They plan to erect a commodious church soon. The far-reaching influence of this work among our own countrymen here in this nerve-center of Oriental world-forces can scarcely be calculated. The world literally becomes the “parish” of the minister who leads this handful of alert, aggressive members in their work. 20 Work is also going forward in Chinese, Tagalog, Pampan- gan, Ilokano, and the Pangasinan languages. Their work is carried forward on the Island of Luzon, in Manila Methodist and northward, that being the portion of that island Occupation assigned to the Methodist Episcopal Church by the Evangelical Union in 1901. Seven provinces are now occupied, and others are being entered as rapidly as workers are sent from the United States. WORK AMONG THE CHINESE The Chinese work is of great importance. From the seventh century the Chinese people have left their impress upon the Philippine Islands. Very much of the commercial work of the islands is in their hands, and will probably con- tinue to be controlled by them. They are instinctive traders. They are the Yankees of the Far East. They are crafty, Chinese industrious, thrifty, enterprising. Insult, oppression, Traders persecution, taxation of the most grossly unfair kind — all these they have borne under Spanish rule, and some of these he must yet bear, because of the settled hatred borne him by the Filipinos whose trade he captures by his superior ability as a merchant. Nevertheless his race multiplies and becomes daily more and more a factor to be reckoned with in the government and evangelization of the islands. There are 49,600 Chinese in the Philippines, of whom eighty per cent are from Amoy. Of the remainder, nineteen per cent are from Canton. The Manila total is 27,000. Iloilo has 3,000; Cebu has 3,000, and from 50 to 250 live in other large cities, while no city or town is without two or more. With few exceptions these Chinese are nominal Christians. For commercial advantage they have sought Christian bap- tism. With those who came from China since arriving at man’s estate this apparent change of religious position is not accompanied by any real alteration of belief. In such cases the Chinese are still Confucianists, in so far as religion has any place in their thought. But many so-called Chinese are of the fifth, sixth, and even tenth generation of those born in 21 the Philippines. In many cases they are of mixed blood also, having had Filipino mothers in some of the generations, but being reared as Chinese as to language, customs, and Chinese queue. With these sons of Filipino mothers the Chris- Catholics tian religion — in its Roman Catholic form — is all that they know. They believe in one holy God, with a purpose of redemption wrought out in Jesus Christ, who gave himself an offering for sin on the cross. They belief in Copyright, 1903, Fleming II. Revell Company CHINESE HUSBAND ANI) FILIPINO FAMILY conscious immortality, and in all the other fundamentals of our faith. This is mixed with much error, as to the Virgin and her intercessory relations, as to saints and their miracu- lous power, and as to the means by which the benefits of Christ’s death are made available for sinners. They are idol- aters frankly and without apology, worshiping the manifold images of the Catholic Church, without any refinements or sophisms as to the material having value only as it leads up 22 to the spiritual. To them the image between the candles is the deity they worship, and they look for no other. Discouraging as this state of mind is, it is a long stride on the way toward the truth as we hold the truth. It makes these Chinese a class by themselves in all the mission field. A Unique It is not known to the mission staff in the Philippines Condition where such a situation can be duplicated. Certainly not in China, nor in America, nor in all the Malaysian group of islands to our south and west. It is a situation from which results should be attainable. This community is not poor. There are poor among them, but the majority are prosperous. They are sturdily inde- pendent. All the conditions which make self-support and self-propagation possible exist among them. If American workers can be secured and thrust into this unique field of opportunity, there is good reason to hope that not only all the Philippines will feel the effects, but that China herself will be helped through the conversion and training of these her exiled sons. Work has gone forward among the Chinese of Manila for three years, but not until last Conference (1904) was an American missionary placed in charge. Rev. E. S. Lyons, who had spent three years in work among Chinese in Singa- pore, was appointed to this hopeful field, and already the results are most encouraging. There are now about fifty members and probationers. There are three regular preach- ing centers in Manila, and a night school which is Special Mis- more than self-supporting, and from which five sionary to young men have come into the church within the the Chinese past three months. Invitations come from all over the islands. If we had a traveling missionary among the Chinese he could be employed all the time going to communities of these people where he would be more than welcomed. Mr. Lyons will do as much of this work as is possible without neglecting the central work in Manila. With Mr. Lyons and wife in this work are two Chinese helpers, Mr. Ben G. Pay, a graduate of the Anglo-Chinese College, Foochow, China, who gives such time as he can spare after his 23 hours ot service in a government position are over; and Mr. Charles Fu, a lad who had considerable training under Mr. and Mrs. Lyons in Singapore. At least two more American missionaries should be provided for this work — one to aid in Manila, and the other to “travel the circuit’’ of the islands looking after these unshepherded souls. ItEV. E. S. LYONS AND TWO CHINESE FELLOW WORKERS IN MANILA WORK AMONG THE FILIPINOS The Filipino work, however, will always demand the most men, and the largest sums of money. The Filipinos form six sevenths of the whole population. They hold the desti- nies of the Philippines in their hands. If the kingdom of 24 SUMMER SCHOOL FOR FILIPINO PREACHERS. MANILA, SEPTEMHE1I. 1!HH God is to be set up in these fair islands it must be through its sway in the hearts and lives of the Filipinos, led by American initiative, reinforced by Chinese help in many wavs, but always with the men and women who are native to the soil, forming the rank and file of the army of spiritual conquest and moral occupation. Much as our hearts go out to the wild tribes in their filth and ignorance and squalor, we must not lose our sense of spiritual strategy. All told they Importance number less than 700,000 of a population of 7,635,426. of Working They bear all the marks of being decadent races, piti- Among the ful as this sad fact appears. If they should prove Filipinos to be virile and persist, our best and most rapid means of reaching them with the gospel is to quickly raise up an army of converted, consecrated, anointed native Filipino disciples from whom we can draw forces for their evangelization. Everywhere there are Filipinos already familiar with their rude and barren languages. It is from them that we hope to secure the recruits necessary for the capture of the wild tribes for our Lord. • Hence it is that our strength is laid out in labor for the real native of the country. Conditions have determined our methods. Here is a people thirsty for spiritual waters. Three centuries ago they were pirates, living a semibarbarous life, and without a knowledge of God. Rome has done them this inestimable good that she has led them to abandon their rude idolatry and accept a Christian conception of life and the world. But the tyranny of the friars, their immorality and Eager for greed, have made the leadership of the only religious the Gospel force with which the} - are familiar obnoxious to them. Her forms do not feed their souls. Their husks of tradition and miracle-mongering saint-worship leave the souls of her people hungry. The shallow wells of truth which she has scooped hold but a mockery of their need for spiritual waters which God has provided as rivers to swim in. They are thirsty for water from wells of salvation. At least three millions of the total population will have no religious lead- ership unless that is furnished by Protestantism. And the 28 SUMMER SCHOOL FOR FILIPINO PREACHERS. MANILA. SEPTEMHEH. 1904 8 God is to be set up in these fair islands it must be through its sway in the hearts and lives of the Filipinos, led bv American initiative, reinforced by Chinese help in many ways, but always with the men and women who are native to the soil, forming the rank and file of the army of spiritual conquest and moral occupation. Much as our hearts go out to the wild tribes in their filth and ignorance and squalor, we must not lose our sense of spiritual strategy. All told they Importance number less than 700,000 of a population of 7,635,426. of Working They bear all the marks of being decadent races, piti- Among the ful as this sad fact appears. If they should prove Filipinos to be virile and persist, our best and most rapid means of reaching them with the gospel is to quickly raise up an army of converted, consecrated, anointed native Filipino disciples from whom we can draw forces for their evangelization. Everywhere there are Filipinos already familiar with their rude and barren languages. It is from them that we hope to secure the recruits necessary for the capture of the wild tribes for our Lord. Hence it is that our strength is laid out in labor for the real native of the country. Conditions have determined our methods. Here is a people thirsty for spiritual waters. Three centuries ago they were pirates, living a semibarbarous life, and without a knowledge of God. Rome has done them this inestimable good that she has led them to abandon their rude idolatry and accept a Christian conception of life and the world. But the tyranny of the friars, their immorality and Eager for greed, have made the leadership of the only religious the Gospel force with which they are familiar obnoxious to them. Her forms do not feed their souls. Their husks of tradition and miracle-mongering saint-worship leave the souls of her people hungry. The shallow wells of truth which she has scooped hold but a mockery of their need for spiritual waters which God has provided as rivers to swim in. They are thirsty for water from wells of salvation. At least three millions of the total population will have no religious lead- ership unless that is furnished by Protestantism. And the 28 AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOL, ILOILO majority of the other half will get no impulse toward right- eousness from the leadership which they accept. Here is a people curious to know what Protestantism is, and tens of thousands of them eager to hear and accept Bibles in whatever will satisfy their burning thirst. They are Demand untaught. They are credulous. Impostors would find rich harvests among them. But their eagerness to hear and to learn is unparalleled in the history of missionary effort. Invitations pour in from all sides for Protestant serv- ices. Two Bible societies, the British and Foreign, and Amer- ican, can hardly print translations of the Word of God fast enough to meet the demand of a people who have been tor- tured, imprisoned, banished or shot in all the past if they so much as secreted a copy of this Source of Truth in their houses. In the face of such conditions there is but one thing to do as the main work, and that is to preach the gospel with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, and to do this as rapidly as possible. The three watchwords of the Mission thus far are Evangelization, Organization, Edification. The govern- ment educates. Free public schools, taught by more than nine hundred American and three thousand Filipino teachers have two hundred and fifty thousand Filipino children study- ing all the common English branches. Plainly it is not meet that the Mission should leave the demand lor the Word of God and serve classes in the school room. The rising generation is being taught. In the main it is being as well taught Our Chief as in the public schools of the United States. The time Work will come, and will not be far in the future, when the Mission must establish Christian seminaries and col- leges and training schools as is done in the United States, and for the same reasons; but not until the demand for such institutions on the part of our own members is so strong as to insure pupils and the greater part of the support of the staff necessary to carry forward the work. For the immediate present it is our plain duty to evangelize and organize and edify these hungry multitudes. And this we will do if God permits, and the Church sends us the workers and their sup- port. We recall the fact that during more than sixty years 30 Methodism in America gave her whole strength to the gigantic task of evangelization which confronted her, and remember that the deep and immovable foundations of all her great superstructure to-dav were laid in those years. The problem in the Philippines has many points in common with that early pioneer stage of American Methodism, and for the pres- ent at least, evangelism must be our great work. METHODIST MISSION PRESS, MANILA EDUCATION Thus far but two institutions have been opened, one a Mission Press, which is the most powerful single evangelistic agent employed, and the Girls’ Training School, maintained by the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society. The former publishes the first religious newspaper ever pro- The Mission vided for Filipinos in their own languages. This Press reaches thousands each month, and an English edition reaches hundreds of American residents in the Islands with religious and moral helpfulness, and has already begun to secure readers among the thousands of young Filipinos who have been learning English in the public schools. This latter , field will widen constantly, and, it is believed, 31 most fruitfully. Rev. F. A. McCarl was the first agent of the Press. The Girls’ Training School has been in operation a little more than one year. It was opened by Miss The Girls’ Winifred Spaulding, but ill-health has caused Training School her return to the home-land, and it is feared that she will not be able to return. Miss Lizzie Parkes is in charge, and right vigorously does she carry on the good work. Fifteen of the members of our own church are enrolled as students, about one half of them being supported STUDENTS OK THE OIHI.S’ Tit A IN I NO SCHOOL by their parents or friends. They are given a thorough course in English, and in the Scriptures, and taught the rudiments of music, both vocal and instrumental, so that they will be able to help in the singing in Sunday school and League work as well as in all the regular work of the church. A great work lies before this institution. It needs quarters for at least seventy-five pupils, and could be filled at once from the waiting list already made up. It is the policy of the Mission to put but one American 32 missionary in a province at first, and charge him with the responsibility of its evangelization. Seven provinces are thus occupied, the rule having been departed from in Distribution Manila and Bulacan provinces because of local rea- of Workers sons. Each man lives at the city which more nearly than any other commands the province in which he labors. If possible this is the provincial capital. From that as a center he is to reach all parts of his field. The language situation presents difficulties of the most vexatious nature. Each field has its own language. In some of the provinces, such as Pangasinan and Tarlac, there is such a mingling and confusion of tongues as to make it easy to believe that the attempt to build Babel Tower was made in central Luzon. The languages are all Romanized and are not what would be called hard to acquire. Spanish cannot be used as a medium for evangelism. Not more than five to eight per cent of the people know Spanish. In many parts of the provinces but half a dozen people in a Language thousand could follow a Spanish address. And to Difficulties further complicate the matter, English is being taught in public and private schools from one end of the island to the other. Not less than 300,000 people, old and young, are now studying English. English becomes the official language of the Philippines January 1, 1906. Already there are scores of communities in which English is more generally understood than Spanish. In the nature of the case it is the younger generation which is studying this new language. If the parents are to be reached and saved it must be through the medium of their own tongue. FOUR YEARS OF PROGRESS Some of the results of these four years of work may be set down in print. The larger results will not be caught in the mesh of a statistical tablet, and so escape enumeration, but they are seen and felt and acknowledged by even our enemies. There are at the beginning of 1905 about 10,000 members and probationers in the church, with three times as many 33 adherents, or sympathizers in more or less regular attendance upon our services. From these a steady stream of members comes into the church from week to week. These members are served by 126 licensed local preachers and Present Numer- exhorters, and by missionaries from America, ical Strength Only eight of these Filipino ministers are sup- ported from the United States, and they are evangelists rather than pastors, working from city to city under the direction of the missionary in charge. All the A TYPICAL MEMBER others support themselves in the calling in which grace found them — as clerks, printers, laborers, lawyers, business men, or fishermen. These members and local workers have built 48 churches, nearly all of bamboo frame and thatch sides and roof, in but three cases receiving more than $50 aid from the Church 34 Extension Society, and that because of local reasons. These chapels seat about 10,000 people, and are as good as the average homes of the worshipers. Some have cost as much as $1,500 and others as little as $100. Where the cost was as low as $100 we have given very little help from Church Exten- sion funds — $15 or $20 as seemed wise. Services are held by the score in the open air or in the houses of friendly Romanists or of our own members. These A TYPICAI. OPEN-AIR SERVICE are called prayer meetings, or meetings for Bible study. It is hard to secure an accurate report of these meetings, they are so spontaneous, and go on without any initiative on Spontaneous the part of the missionary in charge. They do great Meetings good in satisfying curiosity, disarming prejudice, awakening spiritual interest, and thus breaking the crust for the introduction of the seed, which is the Word. They also furnish an admirable school in which to call out and develop the talent of our native brethren. F rom these informal 35 meetings for prayer and the study of the Scriptures come candidates for license as exhorters. Night after night in seven provinces and in five vernaculars the hymns of the church are sung and devout prayer meetings carried on by humble men and women who were in deep spiritual dark- ness until one, or two, or possibly three years ago. Self-support is the undeviating aim of the Mission. From A SELF-SUPPORTING METHODIST PREACHER ANI) HIS FAMILY the first hour of the Mission until the present not one penny of the annual grant to the Missionary Committee has been paid for any expense connected with the Filipino work. Self- Not one native worker receives or has ever received one Support dollar or one cent from the regular Board grants. Spe- cial gifts have come to us from time to time, and from these we have supported a small number of translators, inter- preters, and evangelists. But the grant of the Board has been wholly spent in bringing and supporting American mission- aries. The self-support which has been aimed at has been, so far, rather a self-support of voluntary labor rather than of vol- 36 untary gifts. It has been thought wisest to supply our churches with preaching from unpaid Filipino local preachers and exhorters than to attempt at the beginning to raise up a class of paid laborers, whether that pay came from local or foreign sources. The example of English and American A FILIPINO CIRCUIT KIDEB Methodism has been before the Mission, and it has been be- lieved that in this way it would be possible to build up a work more nearly indigenous and more likely to propagate itself than by the use of the more conventional method. The members of the Mission have been a unit in standing for the principle that 37 it is better to have a few flowers growing on their own roots than very many cut flowers set in the sand, and destined to wither when the sun beats upon them. This policy makes heroic measures necessary. So much must be left to untrained local leadership that it sometimes appears as though the risk is too great. A place is visited a few times by the missionary or native evangelist. Christ is clearly presented. The people are told that if they become Protestants they must put away their vices, and live as be- cometh the children of God. They are offered the forgive- ness of sins on the conditions laid down in the Word, and after three or four visits seekers are called for. These are in- structed, and when they give evidence of having accepted Christ they are organized into a church. On later visits the man or men among them who seem to be natural leaders are given license to exhort, and instructed in the matter of holding services, visiting the sick, reproving the disorderly, and in helping the weak. In all the churches men can be found with fairly good, and often very good, education, and leaders are rarely hard to secure. Then the risk comes in. Then we must do as the apostles did. We must leave our Lystra and our Philippi and our Thessalonica to the leadership Native of untrained men, under the restraining, comforting, Workers sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit. In this con- dition, the missionary soon realizes something of the apostle’s deep meaning in the phrase — “the care of the churches which cometh upon me daily,” and is almost daily doing in his measure what the apostle did under special in- spiration — sending epistles to the churches which he has be- gotten in the Lord. But the Spirit has honored the method thus far, and it is the firm conviction of the brethren who are under the load that larger success than that which has greeted the toil thus far put forth awaits a still more heroic use of the same method. Some examples will make plain all that has been said as to methods used. In Malibay, a city of something like 5,000 people, four miles south of Manila, our brother Nicholas Zamora and Mr, 38 McLaughlin began work in the autumn of 1900. Brother Zamora bestowed no little labor on that work, and in Decem- ber, 1901, I received more than 200 probationers into Malibay full connection there, in an abandoned Catholic chapel in which they still meet. Within a few months local leader- ship was brought to the front, and help from Manila cut down to a minimum. I held the Quarterly Conference of that church on Tuesday evening, November 15, 1904. Fifteen of the sixteen official members were present, and the steward who was absent sent word from his sick bed of his deep interest in the work. Reports showed all bills paid, including three quarters of the whole support of a Filipino local preacher who is serving as pastor. Services are maintained on Sundays and two nights ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH AT MALIBAY USED BY THE METHODIST CONGREG ATION in every week in the congregation and more than a dozen prayer meetings from house to house are going on. There are about 300 members, and all the processes of church life go on with only three or four visits each year from the mission- ary in charge. One man in the membership plans to bear the heavy share of expense necessary for the erection of a new chap- el to seat 600 people. In Malibay the plant grows on its own root, and would continue to grow if all American supervision were withdrawn. It is practically a self-supporting church, and expects to support its pastor wholly from next Conference. 39 The Tondo Circuit in Manila is another example of what is meant by self-support by voluntary labor rather than by gifts of money. This circuit is in a densely populated suburb at the north end of the city. It is a poor population on the whole, Tondo and has had a decidedly bad reputation for many years as Circuit the home of ladrones or robbers and other disturbers of the peace. Now there are nine Methodist chapels, each having a membership embraced within this circuit. There are about FIRST FILIPINO MISSIONARIES Both supported by the freewill offering from the Tondo Circuit 1,800 members and 12 local preachers and exhort, ers. A plan is made out for each quarter by the missionary-in-charge, and these men hold all the services, except such as the mission- ary finds time to hold. The chapels take up their own collec- tions, have their own treasurers, keep a report of all receipts and all disbursements posted in the chapel from week to week, 40 and have their accounts audited in a perfectly business-like manner. Their official meetings would shame many of those in the homeland. The interest taken is steady and gratifying in the extreme. Such men as Pedro Castro, the senior local preacher, Moises Buson, Juan Alpa, and others would do credit to any church as official members. This circuit has organized a society for carrying forward the gospel in regions where Christ has not been named, and are supporting two of their own number as evangelists under the direction of the Mission. They are paying all their own bills and raising $500 missionary money, and this within four years from the OUR CHAPEL AT MEXICO This is a theater building used as a place of worship time they first found Jesus able to save. Here are quick returns from the investment of missionary money. All that has ever been spent on this lusty Anne is what missionary money has been required to support Mr. McLaughlin and wife, while they have labored in that part of the city. Mexico is a city in the Province of Pampanga. It exico has about 16,000 inhabitants, and was most prosperous before the insurrection and the war which followed the American occupation, the plague of rinderpest which killed eighty per cent of all work cattle, and the plagues of locusts which ate up the crops in 1901, 1902, 1903. Mr. Fritz began work there in 1901, having an'eager hearing. By the middle 41 of 1902 he had received more than 500 on probation. He was driven from the Philippines by malarial fever, from which he had suffered in South America. After six months’ interreg- num, during which other missionaries did wonders in helping minister to these spiritual babes, Mr. W. A. Brown was put in charge of the work in the province, and Mexico fell to his care. Two brothers had built a theater as a speculation. It was well-built, and seated more than 1,000 persons. They have given that to the church as a house of worship without conditions, except that it shall always be so used, and one of them preaches there every Sunday, while the other, who spent some time in London, and understands English very well, is our interpreter whenever any of us, who cannot speak Pam- pangan, visit the place. I attended an official meeting there last year, when it was announced that there would be no preaching, and there were 600 people present. Of course I preached, and several souls sought the Lord. All the serv- ices of that church are maintained by local leaders, and be- sides the stated services, meetings are held by the members every night in the week in the city and its barrios, and mem- bers are being received steadily, while those who came into the church at first are growing into self-reliant, aggressive workers for Christ. Some have forsaken us, having loved this present world, but the majority are following on. In the Province of Pangasinan Mr. Lyons began Province of work in April of 1903. Bigotry was more pronounced Pangasinan in that province than in any other portion of the Methodist field. He had no members, and little sympathy. But such has been the blessing of God upon his work and that of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Farmer, who have succeeded him in that field, that there are now sixteen organized churches under his care, with a total member- ship of nearly 2,000. Chapels are being built so rapidly as to make the statistics of to-day quite valueless to-morrow. Calls from eleven large cities for services have not been responded to yet because we lack workers. Many of these members are very ignorant; but they know what they want and make all necessary sacrifices to secure it. At one 42 service in Dagupan, where Brother Fanner lives, at least a dozen men and women were present who had walked twenty miles over rice dykes, passing four large stone Roman Catholic churches on the way, and worshiping eagerly in a damp, poorly lighted basement room, because there they heard of Jesus who saves men and women from sin, and saves them so that they know and rejoice in his favor. If workers can be had it will be possible to see 10.000 members in that one province within five years, all worshiping in neat chapels built with their own money, aided only a little with funds from the home church. Less than one year ago Rev. R. V. B. Dunlap and wife were sent to the Province of Nueva Ecija, to the city of San Isidro. There had been some good work done there by Rev. A. E. Chenoweth and an exhorter of that place. But on Province of a visit recently I found nearly 500 members, in six Nueva Ecija organizations, and chapels going up in three places. I preached twice the same evening in the city of Gapan, a neat, prosperous city of 11,000 people, and had from two to three hundred people at each service, and a more devout, eager, inspiring audience could not be placed before a minister of the gospel than they formed. Six accepted Christ, and were received on probation at the two services. In all that work Mr. Duidap has one Filipino evangelist. He is not yet able to speak the language, so nearly all the preaching is done by exhorters who have found Christ within the year. It is all new. It is all electric with possibilities. Mr. Goodell took charge of Western Bulacan Province in 1901, when there was one organized church and Western Bula- thirty members in his field. He now has ten can Province organized churches, and reported 788 members at the Conference in March of 1903. The growth in that province has been steady, and solid rather than rapid or sensational. At Malabon, five miles north of Manila, there are over 1,200 members where two years ago there were but 300. The membership has endured persecution heroically. They have five chapels, one of which cost $1,500. Of this sum $100 was .43 given by a devoted brother in the United States. Rev. M. A. Rader and wife have seen more converts added to the Lord in their less than two years of service at Malabon than the ordinary pastor in the settled portions of the United Malabon States sees brought in during a lifetime of hard work. Malabon was a hard place. Police records bore swift witness to its badness. Malabon has been transformed. The government could well afford to support the work there OUR CHAPEL AT CONCEPCION, MALABON for its direct police value alone. Christ still “sets judgment in the earth, and the isles (still) wait for his law” of right- eousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. Rev. B. O. Peterson in the Province of Uocos Sur, Ilocos Sur and Rev. W. H. Teeter in the Province of Tarlac are and Tarlac both new in the work, and will doubtless acquit them- selves like men in the midst of multitudes ready to hear and be saved. Remarkable conversions, and these glorious transforma- 44 tions of character which the gospel always produces would fill pages. Everywhere it is the old story of publicans and sinners pressing into the kingdom of God, while Pharisees scoff and mock. Gamblers have been so clearly saved The Old that they are the most bitter opponents of the evil. Rob- Story bers and other great sinners have felt the touch of Jesus and are clothed and in their right minds. The whole story is like the Acts of the Apostles in its record of salvation and sanctification of character. It is of the Spirit. SOUS OF A FILIPINO METHODIST “MANSE” Persecutions have been visited upon the converts from the first hour until the present. This is to be expected. The arguments of Rome are the bludgeon, the dungeon, Persecutions and the stake. At first, persecution took the easy form of wholesale arrests with the charge that the members were “insurrectos” plotting against the American government. Investigation proved in every case that the arrest was made at the instigation of Romish priests or lay bigots, and they were not only set at liberty, but the officials 45 who had caused their arrest warned that a repetition of that kind of thing would cost them their position. In one case thirty-two members were arrested at prayer meeting and spent the night in the “calaboose.” They sang and prayed and exhorted, and made their place of confinement holy ground, as did Paul and Silas before them. That arrest and liberation gave a powerful impetus to the little church. At Hagonoy the city treasurer, a bigoted Catholic, de- liberately set out to make it impossible for our members to worship in their chapel, which was opposite his house. He hired a band to come into his yard and play at the time of services. At last, waxing more and more bold as A Wholesome he saw that local authorities did not interfere Lesson with him, he gathered a rabble of more than fifty men and boys, armed with cans and pans and all kinds of noise producing instruments, and simply drowned singing, prayer, and speaking alike in a perfect bedlam. Mr. Goodell took the names of the offenders, the matter was re- ported to the attorney-general in Manila, and after many delays all the participants in the affair were found guilty of a breach of the peace and fined as heavily as the law would allow. A more astounded set of men could not easily be found. That the government should officially in- vestigate such an offense through the office of the attorney- general, and that the court should fine respectable Catholic citizens for trying to squelch a Protestant service was quite beyond them. But the lesson seems to be learned. Not a dog has wagged his tongue against the little church from that day forward. A priest in Orion, Province of Bataan, snatched a New Testament from a Protestant woman as he stood by the side of her husband, who was in the last stages of cholera. He tore the leaves all out, and had them burned bo- A Disconcerted fore her eyes, with the statement that it was Priest because of that evil Book that cholera had in- vaded the pueblo (or city), and that the sin of having it in the house was the cause of her husband’s im- pending death, and much more of the same sort. She had 46 him arrested, and he was out of jail on a bond of $1,000 for more than a year, waiting for his trial. At last, by getting friends to swear that they destroyed the Book in disinfection proceedings (which never took place at all!) he escaped imprisonment, but he will burn no more Bibles. He knows that he might not find others ready to swear him out of such A COURAGEOUS “LAY MEMBER” WHO DEFIED THE PRIEST a corner another time, but putting their own necks into the halter. The American authorities make every effort to hold the scales evenly, and the Mission has every reason to be grateful for their fairness. They make mistakes sometimes, but there is no ground for believing that the authorities — American authorities — have willfully sought to favor those who per- secute our people. 47 NEEDS OF THE MISSION The needs of the Mission may be classed under two main heads: I. Staff, and II Plant. The staff of American missionaries should be recruited up to twenty-five at the earliest possible hour. With this force we could occupy all the really strategic centers of our portion of the work, and take care of the Bible Training School, which LOCAL PREACHERS AND EXHORTERS OF THE TONDO CIRCUIT, MANTI.A has become a necessity. This addition to our force is only possible as the receipts of the Missionary Society are so in- creased as to make increased grants possible. This force of American missionaries will make necessary an increase in the number of Filipino evangelists temporarily employed, that is, imtil local churches “find themselves,” and become able to maintain pastors. There should be at least five more such evangelists employed next year, and as many more the year following. It costs &250 per year to support one of these men. 48 The Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society should double the number of their workers at once, and provide ten single ladies as the normal staff needed for the Training School, a boarding school for Christian girls in each language area, and at least two women to do district evangelistic work. Under the head of Plant, the needs of the Mission are legion. A few of those that are the most urgent may be set down. 1. Twenty thousand dollars more for the large Filipino church within the fire-limits of Manila. It is designed to seat BISHOP WARNE IN A PHILIPPINE “QUILEZ’’ 1,800 people, and can be filled at once. The steel is ordered. We shall build as funds are forthcoming. 2. At least $20,000 for missionary homes in Manila and the portions of the provinces in which it is impossible to secure decent living accommodation for our American staff. 3. Ten thousand dollars as a leverage for the church for Americans in this city. 4. A Bible Training School for our Filipino preachers. Until now we have depended upon (o) the regular courses of 49 study for exhorters and local preachers, and (6) upon a sum- mer institute of one month, for the training of our Filipino workers. These will be continued, but the time has come when special provision must be made for a more thorough training for the few who will be able to profit by it. This will cost from SI 0,000 to S15.000 for land, buildings, and furnishings. Rome has both staff and plant. She has millions of dollars, worth of the best located property, great churches, large colleges and seminaries, and endowments into the millions. American priests are being sent to the islands — men of fine education and varied experience, and every effort is being made to defeat the program of Protestantism. Methodism should awaken fully to the possibilities, and lay out her strength in taking these islands for righteousness. 60 DATE DUE Wr i ’ 66 CAYLORO MlNTtO IN U S A.