73 2 UNITED STATES CHURCHES 



outcome. The principle of comity, the prevention of waste by doing away with rivalry' 

 overlapping, over-churching small communities, and the joint study of difficult problems' 

 are some of the achievements aimed at. 



The missionary spirit thus dominates all Protestantism as well as the relations of one 

 denomination to another. It has made possible the Federal Council of the Churches of 

 Christ, the second quadrennial session of which was held in Chicago, early in December 1912. 

 The Council is a consulting and advisory body composed of official delegates appointed by 

 the chief judicatories of the various evangelical churches, including Baptist, Congregational, 

 Disciples of Christ, Friends, Lutheran, Mennonite, Methodist, Presbyterian, Protestant 

 Episcopal and Reformed bodies. The purpose of the Council is to express the common 

 consciousness of the united churches upon matters of mutual and public interest, and to 

 render such service in their behalf as may be possible; to co-ordinate and correlate the work 

 of the churches so as to secure a more perfect distribution of effort and prevent duplication; 

 to bring about the formation of state, city, town or other local federations of Churches, and 

 to co-ordinate their work. 



The affairs of the Council are directed, in the interval of its quadrennial sessions, by a 

 large Executive Committee. Important commissions and committees deal with such subjects 

 as evangelism, social service, peace and arbitration, temperance, Sabbath observance, 

 family life and divorce, and theological and primary education. The Social Service Commis- 

 sion covers a wide field of activity, and has a broad policy for the moral and spiritual uplifting 

 of the working people, of the vicious, criminal, unfortunate and depressed classes, for the im- 

 provement of industrial conditions for men and women and for the abatement of poverty, 

 better housing, etc. In other words, by careful investigations and surveys and the thorough 

 study of unsatisfactory conditions the commission seeks to find effective measures for the 

 alleviation of unnecessary human suffering and human misery, and to apply the Gospel of 

 Christ, in the Spirit of Christ, for salvation in the largest sense. Social service has also been 

 done by the Men and Religion Forward Movement, the aim of which is to interest men in 

 the Church and the Church in men. It has endeavoured by a series of conventions to arouse 

 the churches, particularly in the cities, to the necessity of organised effort to secure social 

 justice and civic reforms, to make Bible study interesting and profitable, to surround boys 

 with good influences, etc. The Federal Council meeting at Chicago was very successful 

 and showed no signs of denominational cleavage. The new president is Prof. Shailer 

 Matthews, a Baptist, succeeding Bishop Eugene R. Hendrix, a Methodist. The general 

 feeling was that this Council, which represents 16,000,000 communicants or more, is no longer 

 an experiment, and that its province is to secure a wider and more complete practical unity. 



Another movement aiming to bring about as far as possible the corporate union of 

 Evangelical and Orthodox Christian Churches has been started under the auspices of the 

 General Convention (1910) of the Protestant Episcopal Church. A large commission, of 

 which Bishop Charles P. Anderson, of Chicago, is president, was appointed to invite all 

 Christian Churches which "confess our Lord Jesus Christ as God and Saviour" to unite in 

 arranging for and conducting a Conference for the consideration of questions of faith and 

 order, with the reunion of Christendom as the ultimate object. Most of the Protestant 

 bodies have responded cordially to the invitation, and have appointed commissions to confer 

 with the Episcopalian Commission; the Church of England and the Episcopal Churches of 

 Scotland, Ireland and Canada have agreed to co-operate. It is expected that individuals of 

 the Roman Catholic and Oriental Orthodox Churches will assist in the arrangements for the 

 conference and some of these bodies may participate officially in the conference itself. A 

 circular issued late in 1912 in the name of the commission says that important preliminary 

 questions, such as the basis of representation, the time and place of meeting, the method of 

 procedure, may require years of discussion. 



Reunion of bodies of similar faith, order and history has not made much progress in recent 

 years. The Northern and Cumberland Presbyterian bodies voted in 1906 to consolidate, 

 but only a minority of the ministers, churches and communicants of the latter entered the 

 United Church. Much property litigation and consequent bitterness of feeling have resulted. 

 Some important projects of union are pending, (i) Between the Methodist Episcopal, 

 Methodist Episcopal, South and Methodist Protestant Churches. A plan in outline has 

 been prepared, proposing that the three churches unite in one body with three or four territo- 

 rial divisions, each to have a quadrennial conference for jurisdiction over its local affairs, 

 and all to have a general conference with jurisdiction over the general affairs of the United 

 Church. The plan contemplates the possibility of the union of the negro constituents of the 

 Methodist Episcopal and Methodist Protestant bodies with the Colored Methodist Episcopal 

 Church and other colored Methodists under a quadrennial Conference. The new Church 

 would have from 5,000,000 to 5,500,000 communicants. The plan has received little general 

 discussion so far. (2) Between the Church of the United Brethren in Christ and the Metho- 

 dist Protestant Church, bodies similar in doctrine, discipline, polity and usage. (3) Between 

 the Free Methodist and American Wesleyan Churches, small bodies not far apart. (4) Be- 

 tween the Evangelical Association and the United Evangelical Church, Methodistic bodies 

 which separated about twenty years ago. (5) The Presbvterian (Northern) and the Re- 

 formed Church in the United States (German). (6) The Presbyterian (Southern) and the 



