Birmingham age-herald., 1895-04-08

from Bethany to Jerusalem have been
 largely exaggerated. People from all the
 Roman dependencies were moving toward
 the great city, some from curiosity, some
 with the desire of gain, some from religious
 impulse. There must have been few of this
 great throng who recognized Jesus' true
 personality or entered intelligently into the
 acclamations by the wayside. Those who
 had been healed, the blind and the deaf,
 those who had been attached to the person
 of Jesus during three years, may have been
 among those shouting hosanna, but If so could not have numbered more than 700.
 This tendency 10 exaggerate histori-
 cal incidents is fatal to truth
 of Christian principles. Gibbon was right
 in his famous fifteenth chapter in estimat-
 ing the victory ofCbristianity when he said
 that we should not forget the decay of
 organism. How striking is this tendency
 to over statement, illustrated in the mis-
 erable Emperor Constantine, who, al-
 though he slew his wife, nephew and son,
 has been apothesized by the annalist and
 by pious elation has been made to see a
 vision in the skies. The council of Nice,
 to which traditional Oh ristians refer as
 pure source of Christian doclrine was the
 scene of a disgraceful fight between the
 presiding officer and one of the members
 of the court. This compels us to pass by
 the accidents of the Palm Sunday process
 sion and to concentrate our gaze upon
 those incidents which manifest it's essential
 glory.
 No man can give the philosophy of tear.
 No pen can trace the infinite tributaries
 which converge in that invisible manifesto
 tion of grief. We might say that the Savior
 wept because He realized the doom of the
 ancestral city; or that He suffered because
 of It's sufferin gs clearly forseen; or because
 of the failure of that glorious people to
 give to His cause the impetus of their pres-
 tige. The most pathetic word in the Bible,
 perhaps, is the word lost. He felt that
 Jerusalem was lost. He felt that every one
 who had neglected the day of their visita-
 tion would be lost. Therefore He wept.
 The road that led from Bethany 10 Jeru- salem may be obliterated. Hosanna to the
 Lord may cease to vibrate upon an ear of
 reverential memory. The swinging of the glorious palm trees may lose their place in zsalous reml niscence, but the tears that
 Jesus shed on that memorable occasion can never be forgotten.
 At night the subject was ''Visions." Most men follow something. Since Jesus ascended religious men follow visions. Whether these visions are perceived by separate faculty, or by the conspirng and harmonious exercise of all our faculties
 time fails to discover. Seeing visions is a fact. Moses was regenerated by vision in the desert, when God appeared to him in burning bush. The Apostle Paul ceased to persecute the Christians after seeing the vision on his way to Damascus. And he | tells us iu reviewing the fact that he was | not disobedient to the heavenly vision. | While in certain surface susceptibilties 8 | certain peculiarly of endowment and con- genial environment may conduce to the | seeing of visions, we believe that the secret l of this power lies in earnestness of pur. | pose. No man may leave this church to. | night, provided he be in earnest, without seeing vision as grand as that Moses saw | in the desert, as glorious as that which ap- 1 peared to Paul on the Damascene road. Morning S6rViceg will be cid at St. MaS | ry's through the week at 7:30. Litany at | every evening, except Thursday evening, | when the darkened service of holy com
 munion will be held at o'clock. On Good | Friday three hour service will be held from | 12 to clock. People may come and go, | but only during the singing of hymn. The full Easter services will be held with | sermon at II o'clock. The Sunday school | celebration will be held at 4 o'clock. The Knights Templar commandery, of which | Mir. Fi,Zsimons is chaplain, will attend | the service at II o'clock on Easter morn- | ing.
 Rector Owen P. Fitzsimons took charge | of the parish of St. Mary's four years ago. | He is the son of.CoI. o. P. Fitzsimons of Augusta, Ga. He was three years at the
 University of Virginia, and spent one year | in Scotland and two years in Germany pros | ecuting his studies. When he assumed the charge of St. Mary's the church had been | burned, and the congregation were wor- | shipping in a temporary structure. He | bent his energies toward building new church, and with the help of his jealous | flock the handsome stone church on Nine- | teenth street and Twelfth avenue was soon | erected. It cost s3l ,000, including furniture and organ, and IS all paid except about S5c00 which will be paid this year. MT. riizsimons is a broad churchman. Under his rsctorship over 100 new members have
 been added. The parish of St. Mary's was organized seven years ago With i've fami-