CONGREGATIONALISTS. 



and Turkey, two had returned to their fields, and 

 two women had been appointed teachers in Kobe 

 College, Japan, for five years. The younger 

 women of the churches and the Christian En- 

 deavor Societies had together raised $11,127 for 

 the board; and the children's work and Junior 

 Christian Endeavor Societies $4,476, ; the contribu- 

 tions of the children's work showing a gam of 

 $203 over the previous year. Addresses were 

 made at the meeting on subjects pertaining to 

 the work of the board, and by returned mis- 

 sionaries. 



Plan of the Committee of Fifteen. I he 

 Committee of Fifteen on Missionary Work, in- 

 eluding representatives of the Congregational 

 missionary enterprises and of the Christian En- 

 deavor Society, instituted by the National Con- 

 gregational Council of 1S98 to devise plans for 

 promptly paying the debt of every society and 

 for such increased gifts as shall make it possible 

 to enlarge the Congregational work at home and 

 abroad, assembled and organized on April 19, 

 with Samuel B. Capen as chairman. Its conclu- 

 sions were published about a month later, and 

 were embodied in the recommendations that 

 " committees on missionary work " be chosen, 

 first, by each State convention, a committee com- 

 posed 'of one from each conference; second, by 

 each local conference, a committee of such num- 

 ber that each member shall be responsible for 

 not more than five churches: third, by each 

 church, a committee to make some plan, best 

 suited to itself, for systematic giving. " The one 

 purpose," the paper explained, " is to secure as 

 far as possible, in each church, an interest in 

 the whole missionary work to which as a denomi- 

 nation we are pledged, and without which co- 

 operation we can not hope to succeed." The ulti- 

 mate object of the plan is to secure a gift every 

 year from every church for each of the six mis- 

 sionary societies. 



Congregational Union of Ontario and Que- 

 bec. The Congregational Union of Ontario and 

 Quebec met in Brantford, Ontario, June 7, the 

 Rev. J. W. Pedley presiding. Mr. Edmund Yeigh 

 was elected chairman for the ensuing year. Reso- 

 lutions were passed in favor of closer relations 

 with the Congregational churches of the United 

 States and of Great Britain, and approving the 

 students' home missionary movement. Reports 

 were received from the home and the foreign mis- 

 sionary societies, after which the union approved 

 the principle of the amalgamation of the differ- 

 ent societies, and a committee was appointed to 

 formulate some definite scheme of action on the 

 subject. Besides missions, various subjects were 

 discussed, relating to the young people, Sunday 

 schools, the civil order, education, and temper- 

 ance reform. 



Congregationalists in the British Isles. 

 In the English Congregational Yearbook for 1899 

 more comprehensive and detailed statistics are 

 given than in any previous number, and conse- 

 quently a more satisfactory view of the condi- 

 tion of the denomination is presented. Of the 

 o.OOO churches, branch churches, and mission 

 stations in the kingdom, about 500 failed to re- 

 port. Omitting these, 4,509 churches, etc., in 

 England and Wales returned 1,034,327 sittings, 

 377,339 church members, 014.742 pupils in Sunday 

 schools, 54,135 teachers, and 4,981 lay preachers. 

 There were also 240 churches in Scotland, Ire- 

 land, and the smaller islands, the return of mem- 

 bers in which does not appear, making the whole 

 number of churches in the British Isles 4,815. 

 Lists are given of 3,122 ministers in the British 

 Isles, 210 evangelists and pastors returned by 



county associations, 1C colleges and institutions 

 for ministerial training in England, Wales, Scot- 

 land, and the colonies, with 430 students, and 10 

 institutions belonging to the London Missionary 

 Society, with about 300 native students. 



The Yearbook for 1900, published just as this 

 article goes to press, in which returns are in- 

 cluded from 99 more churches than that for 1899, 

 gives 4,592 churches, with 1,030,209 sittings, 388,- 

 009 church members, 01,524 teachers and 055.472 

 pupils in Sunday schools, and 5,309 lay preach- 

 ers in England and Wales; and in all the British 

 Isles 4,851 churches, 1,735,005 sittings, 415,004 

 church members, 04,334 teachers and 084,000 pu- 

 pils in Sunday schools, 3,132 ministers, and 5,484 

 lay preachers. 



At the forty-fifth annual meeting of the Eng- 

 lish Congregational Chapel Building Society, an 

 income for 1898 was returned of 4,930, includ- 

 ing 2,750 on account of repayment of loans. 

 The loans for the year had been 2,520 to chap- 

 els and 285 for manses, while the society was 

 under engagement to advance 9,700 to cases 

 recently considered. Since its formation, forty- 

 five years previously, 800 churches and 90 manses 

 had been assisted, by grants or loans, to an 

 aggregate amount of 170,472. The grant fund 

 out of which the free gifts had been made was 

 now exhausted. These gifts were made on an 

 understanding that the churches assisted should 

 take an annual collection for the fund, but more 

 than two thirds of them (298 out of 430) sent 

 nothing. A resolution of the annual meeting of 

 the society affirmed the duty of maintaining 

 Protestant evangelical truth in the rural districts, 

 and urged the necessity of church extension in 

 large populations. 



A Congregational Home. Medland Hall, the 

 home for the homeless of the London Congre- 

 gational Union, returned for 1898 109,779 admis- 

 sions, representing more than 11,000 different 

 men, who made use of the shelter on an average 

 of ten nights in the year. The Sunday services 

 had had an attendance of 20,921. Every county 

 in England was represented among the lodgers, 

 and 008 admissions were from foreign countries. 

 Fifty men had been sent to Canada, at a cost, 

 including outfit, of 400. This philanthropic 

 work is carried on at an average cost of less than 

 three halfpence per man per night, including bed, 

 food, washing, cooking appliances, and all ex- 

 penses of administration. 



Congregational Union of England and 

 Wales. The sixty-seventh annual assembly of 

 the Congregational Union of England and Wales 

 was opened in London, May 8, the Rev. H. Arnold 

 Thomas, of Bristol, presiding. Mr. J. Carvell 

 Williams, M. P., was elected chairman for 1900. 

 The annual balance sheet showed that the total 

 receipts had been 17,143, and that a balance 

 remained in the treasury of 524. 



A scheme for a " twentieth century fund " was 

 submitted by the Executive Committee, and was 

 adopted, the assembly, however, empowering the* 

 council administering the scheme to ma*ke such 

 modifications in it as might seem desirable, pay- 

 ing special attention to the needs of the weaker 

 churches. The scheme as adopted, subject to this 

 condition, contemplates the raising of 500,000 

 guineas, to be allocated: (a) For foreign and co- 

 lonial missions a sum not exceeding 100,000; 

 (6) for church extension, 150,000; (c) for the 

 extinction of debts upon chapel and school build- 

 ings, 50,000; (d) first, toward the maintenance 

 of the weaker churches and the augmentation of 

 inadequate ministerial stipends, 25,000; second, 

 toward the maintaining of an efficient ministry 





