338 RELIGIOUS AGENCIES 



municants in mission churches 432,765, of whom 37,487 were added 

 in 1903; enrolling in 7136 schools 267,007 scholars; counting, in 

 addition to the communicants in the churches, not less than 

 1,000,000 adherents, and expending, in the year 1903, $6,964,976. 

 There can be no doubt that such a force as this, occupying strategic 

 points all over the globe, and steadily witnessing for the light, is 

 destined to affect powerfully the future history of the world. Al- 

 ready its influence has been felt in many ways outside the mission 

 stations. We need not claim everything for Christianity in the evolu- 

 tion of Japan; some elements mingle in that result of which it would 

 not be judicious to boast, and due credit must be given to the strong 

 initiative of Japanese intelligence; but it is safe to say that Chris- 

 tianity, as presented to that people, has had much to do with the 

 renewing of their minds; that it has furnished them with a good 

 share of the new sentiments and conceptions and ruling ideas by 

 which their national life has been revolutionized. Furthermore, the 

 transformation which seems to be taking place in Japanese Buddhism, 

 the movement toward the cleansing of that faith from its foulness 

 and the uplifting of its standards and ideals, is clearly the result 

 of its contact with Christianity. 



Such work as this will go on more rapidly in the future than in the 

 past; and the fruits of Christian missions will be far larger than those 

 reported in the columns of statistics. 



Such is an outline sketch, hasty, crude, and incomplete, of the 

 churches of America as religious agencies; of the churches as local 

 centres of religious and social influence ; of the churches as denomina- 

 tional groups cooperating for the purpose of home evangelization, 

 of philanthropy, of Christian education, and of foreign missionary 

 work. 



Other religious agencies must claim a few moments of our attention. 



The Young Men's Christian Association, with its branches for 

 railway work and for college work, is a most effective religious agency. 

 It is independent of the churches, though its active and governing 

 members must be communicants in evangelical churches, and its 

 work is nearly all done by the young men of the churches. The 

 Association has a place of its own and has proved itself a valuable 

 arm of the Christian service. Its foundation is in Christian faith 

 and experience, and the religious features of its work are central, 

 but it has undertaken to care in very practical ways for the young 

 men of the cities and larger towns; it furnishes them with comfort- 

 able and attractive places of resort; it assists those who are away 

 from home in finding homes and work; it gives them opportunities 

 of healthful recreation; it arranges for them educational classes; it 

 seeks to surround young men with salutary influences, and to enlist 

 them in generous endeavors in behalf of one another. 



