172 



CONGREGATIONALISTS. 



fession during the year, 25,180; of baptisms, 11,- 

 202 of adults and 11,494 of infants. Amount of 

 benevolent contributions (4.854 churches report- 

 ing) : For foreign missions, $379,452; for educa- 

 tion, $103,670; for church building. $86,000; for 

 home missions, $477,600: for the American Mis- 

 sionary Associations,$122,457; for Sunday schools, 

 $56,690; for ministers' aid, $25,075; for other 

 benevolences, $501,870. Amount of legacies re- 

 ceived during the year. $431.650; amount of con- 

 tributions for home expenditures (1,458 churches 

 reporting), $6,725,011. 



The seven theological seminaries Andover, 

 Hangor. Chicago, Hartford, Oberlin, Pacific, and 

 Yale returned 64 professors, 25 instructors and 

 lecturers, 10 members of advanced or graduate 

 classes, 27 resident licentiates or fellows, and 371 

 undergraduate students. 



Congregational Church Building Society. 

 The forty-seventh annual report of the Congre- 

 gational Church Building Society shows that the 

 year 1800 had with one exception been the best 

 year in its life. The number of contributing 

 churches was greater by 164 than in any previous 

 year. The receipts from all sources had been 

 $247,307. The expenditures had included $153,047 

 paid to 95 churches on houses of worship, and 

 $118.450 to 41 churches on parsonages. Seven 

 hundred and two church-building accounts and 

 407 parsonage accounts had been closed. A con- 

 siderable number of the aided churches had al- 

 ready returned all the money they had received 

 from the society, and in some cases had con- 

 tributed a large additional amount. The sum of 

 $121,649 had been voted to 125 churches, and 

 $29,745 to 65 parsonages. Six of the churches 

 had received loans only, 15 loans and grants, and 

 the rest grants only. Fourteen of the aided 

 churches were east and 76 west of the eastern 

 line of Ohio. The church-building loan fund 

 stood at $655,855, an amount including $449,763 

 gifts to it and $206,091 loans refunded. The par- 

 sonage loan fund stood at $111,468, in addition 

 to $187,814 paid back on loans. During 1899 

 $30,397 were paid back on church-building loans 

 and $19,161 on parsonage loans. 



American Home Missionary Society. The 

 seventy-third annual meeting of the Congrega- 

 tional Home Missionary Society was held at Hart- 

 ford, Conn., May 23 to 25. Gen. Oliver O. How- 

 ard, of Vermont, presided. The receipts of the 

 society for the year from all sources had been 

 $294,670, while the auxiliaries had, in addition, 

 raised and expended on their own fields $221,575. 

 The expenditures of the National Society for mis- 

 sionary labor and expenses had been $313,462, 

 and those of the auxiliaries $221,575. The soci- 

 ety had begun the year with a net debt of $106,- 

 500; this had been increased by $26,969, so that 

 the net debt at the close of the fiscal year, March 

 31, 1899, was $133,469. Eighteen hundred and 

 twenty-four missionaries had been employed in 

 44 States and Territories, including 24, who, hav- 

 ing labored in more than one State, were counted 

 twice viz., 466 in the New England States, 119 

 in the Middle States, 97 in the Southern States 

 102 in the Southwestern States, 185 on the Pa- 

 cific coast, and 879 in the Western States and 

 Territories. Of the whole number of mission- 

 aries in commission, 956 had been pastors or 

 stated supplies of single congregations, 549 had 

 ministered to two or three congregations each, 

 and 319 had extended their labors into still wider 

 fields. The number of congregations and mis- 

 sionary districts supplied or where the Gospel 

 had been preached at stated intervals was 2,875 

 Forty-six of the missionaries had preached to 



German congregations, 102 to Scandinavian, 22 

 to Bohemian, 5 to Polish, 13 to French, 5 to 

 Mexican, 3 to Italian, 2 to Spanish, 4 to Finnish, 

 2 to Danish, 5 to Armenian, 1 to Greek, and 2 

 to Welsh congregations. The number of pupils 

 in Sunday schools and Bible classes w r as not far 

 from 146,604. One hundred and ninety-nine new 

 Sunday schools had been organized, and the whole 

 number of Sunday schools under the special care 

 of missionaries was 2,064. Thirty-four churches 

 had been organized during the year in connection 

 with labors of the missionaries, 44 churches had 

 become self -supporting, and 5,030 members had 

 been added on confession of faith. Sixty houses 

 of worship had been completed, 220 repaired or 

 improved, and 77 parsonages provided. The 

 woman's department, .which was now in its sev- 

 enteenth year, had contributed $42,341 to the 

 treasury of the society and $98,758 to the treas- 

 uries of the five " homeland " organizations. A 

 resolution was passed at the meeting declaring 

 that it appeared to be the duty of the society 

 to preach the Gospel in Alaska and Cuba. 



American Missionary Association. The 

 fifty-third annual meeting of the American Mis- 

 sionary Association was held in Binghamton, 

 N. Y.,* beginning Oct. 17. The Rev. A. H. Stim- 

 son, D. D., of New York, a vice-president, pre- 

 sided in the absence of the Rev. F. A. Noble, D. D., 

 of Chicago. The receipts for the year had been 

 $297,682 for current work, $71,960 income from 

 the Daniel Hand fund, and $2,026 for the endow- 

 ment fund of Straight University. The payments 

 had been $296,811, leaving the society free from 

 debt and with a small balance in the treasury. 

 The main sources of support were the contribu- 

 tions from churches, Sunday schools, missionary 

 societies, and individuals, and receipts from lega- 

 cies. The great fluctuations in receipts from lega- 

 cies, sometimes amounting to $95,000 in a single 

 year, had been the chief cause of the debts which 

 had so often burdened the association in the years 

 past. It having proved impossible to make any 

 satisfactory estimate of these receipts for the 

 appropriations for the year, the Executive Com- 

 mittee had sought a plan which would aid in 

 equalizing current receipts from legacies from year 

 to year. The plan consisted in crediting to an 

 account of " reserved legacies " all money in ex- 

 cess of $3,000 received from an estate in one year 

 for the general purposes of the association, such 

 reserved legacies to be paid out only upon special 

 appropriations by the Executive Committee. 

 From the first day of January to Sept. 30, 1899, 

 $28,230 had been credited to the reserve-legacy 

 account under this plan. Of this sum, $19,500 

 had been specially appropriated to meet urgent 

 demands, leaving $8,730 in the account, of which 

 $5,000 had been appropriated for repairs greatly 

 needed on buildings in the South. The amount 

 of the Daniel Hand Educational fund was returned 

 as $95,000. The Women's Missionary Societies 

 had contributed $26,578 to the work of the as- 

 sociation. The experience of the year in the 

 Southern educational work had been " " charac- 

 teristic and happily uneventful." The 26 purely 

 elementary schools were chiefly situated in places 

 uncared for by public schools, and were associ- 

 ated for the most part with rural churches in 

 the States of North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, 

 Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee. The 45 

 normal and graded schools were located in dif- 

 ferent centers in 10 Southern States 1 in Vir- 

 finia, 8 in North Carolina, 2 in South Carolina, 

 in Georgia, 2 in Florida, 8 in Alabama, 6 in 

 Tennessee, 3 in Kentucky, 4 in Mississippi, and 

 1 in Arkansas. The 10 mountain schools were 



