The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-03-07
INDUSTRIAL MISSIONS.
One of the Topics That VIII he Dis
cussed at the Coming Conference

Occasional Correspondence of the Journal.
NEW YORK, March 6.-Industrial mis-
sions is term that has popular sound.
Send workers out in the name of the Lord.
and let them support themselves in agricul-
ture, in trade and in various other ways;
the business man likes that idea. And the
more of a business and the less of
| churchman he is, the better he likes 1t.
| Such missions have been experimental
with. The theory has been put into prac-
| tice.
| Manifestly, industrial or self-supporting
missions are impossible in countries like
| Persia, Korea, Japan, India. There every
| form of industry has its followers. often
| more numerous than at home. AS well
| might churches in the United States be ex-
| pected to support themselves by trade.
| They might do it but ii would be at the ex-
pense of time and energy drawn from re-
| ligious effort. There comes back, In that
| case, the familiar question of division of
| labor, of each man doing that which he can
| do best.
The problem is quite different one how
| ever, when the matter of African missions
| comes up. There elements other than the
| religious conversion Of the people enter In.
| Ignorance wide and deep reigns concern
| ing problems of everyday life. The people
| need to be taught how to sow and to reap,
| how to construct their houses, how to cook
their food, and practically all of the essen
tials of modern time living. To teach them
these things is to do much toward prepar-
ing them to be gospel students and to un-
| derstand Bible truths. While instructing
| them in the arts of sowing and reaping,
| for example, products of their labor may
| be sold and the proceeds employed in the
further development 'of Industrial and
Christian progress.
The earliest adaptation of this idea was
made by the Baptists of England. Some
| London coffee merchants, who were also
| Baptists, thought they could raise coffee
| at profit and educate and convert African
| blacks at the same time. They put conse-
| Grafton into their scheme, and founded in
| southeastern Africa, inland from Zanzibar,
| the initial industrial mission. In spite OF
some minor failures the general plan has
succeeded, and there is growing up there a
| state, not political as yet, which may,
some time in the future, have to be reck-
oned with by the grabbing powers of Eu-
rope
| Within a year or two some American
1 Baptists have helped to start another in
| duStrial mission in the same locality. To
| start such mission and put 1T on Its finan-
| cial feet costs $4,000. Within four years
4 good MANAGEMENT makes It's income eQudl
to its outgo, including a start for new
| mission. The latter, il is claimed, can itself
be made self-supporting In another four
years, and so the thing can go. when once
| ii is started, duplicating itself until, so
| far as theory goes, all Africa is civilized
| and the main part of 1t Christianized on an
initial outlay of $4,000. The main support
| of these missions is derived from the sale
of coffee in the London market, a company
| having been organized specially to dispose
/ Of industrial mission products.
On the west coast of Africa below the
| mouth of the Congo there have been plant
| ed several missions aiming at self-support
| and Industrial education. They are fos-
| tered at the beginning by American phi
lanthropy. but have been In operation too
| short time to prove anything beyond a
| hopeful outlook and about years success
| full test of some very good theories
| Some Boston and Brooklyn Baptists have
| mission plan yet conceived, and have Sc
| lected for the active head Of ii Rev. c. s.
| Morris. He is a colored man, the aim be-
| ing TO employ Christian negroes OF Amer
| lea to Christianze Africa. Mr.. Morris re-
| sembles Booker Washington in breadth of
view and high ambition, and he has found
| some of the ablest friends of missions in
bring forward ip the theory that Se African
| slavery I'm America is to be used by God as
the instrument to finally bring Africa to
| Christianity. The practical part of the
| plan is to start industrial missions on the
| western and on the eastern limit of the
| Sudan. When one mission has become self
| supporting il is to establish a second, and
| so by gradual approach to cover I'm time
| the whole vast region. There are declared
| by Mr.. Morris to be no fewer than $4,000. 900
| of people dwelling in the Sudan who have
| never yet heard of the outside world, much
| less of Christianity. To reach, civilize and
| Christianize this vast mass of humanity is
| the conception of the latest and largest of
| industrial mission schemes. Mr.. Morris
| has been for a year on the field inspecting
Il &c cd
| at any time to prepare for the Inaugural
| ton of his first mission.
At the end of April next is TO be held in
| New York ecumenical conference on
/ foreign missions, when this and large
| number OF other missionary topics are to
| be taken up. Mission effort is keeping pace
| with commercial and political progress-in
| some particulars outstripping IT.