Virginia citizen. (Irvington, Va.) 1891-1921, 1906-03-16
PRAYER OF A "HEATHEN"
An Incident of the. Chicnno Parlia-
ment OF RELIGIONS

An Incident of the. ChIcnwo Parlia-
ment OF Religions.
The recent death OF Protap Chunder
Mozoomdar brings to MUD an incident
occurring ut the parliament of religions
in. Chicago twelve years ago. which
more than anything else I have seen
or heard OF him manifested his won
derful spiritual power. In the formal
exercises of the parliament care was
taken to exclude all criticism OF the so
called heather religions and all efforts
to proselyre their adherents, though
now and then such speakers as Joseph
Cook and George Pertecost could not
resist the temptation to violate all cour-
tesies and "go for them'' face to face
on the common platform.
But besides the formal meetings of
the parliament. presided over by its
officers. a multitude OF subsidiary gath
erings were held by the different Chris.
tan denominations among them morn
ing prayer, meetings. over which the
general officers had NO control. At one
OF these prayer meetings, quite nuner-
ously attended by representatives OF
the non-Christian faiths. the spisit Of
proseiytfsm was let loose. The new
corners were prayed for as souls lost in
pagan darkness and exhorted by speak
err after speaker to forsake their hea-
then superstitions. come to Jesus and
be saved from eternal death by beinr
washed In the blood OF 9 cxueified Re-
deemer. IT was all doubtless well 10
: tended, tbutsans exhibition. OF the mies
sionary zeal OF Christianity In Its worse
form, and some Of us wearing the
Christian name could not but DO pain
ed and ashamed at its occurrence. = 4
Near the close OF the meeting, after
specially denuneiatory harangue, Mo!
zoomdar arose simply to offer prayer.
and with the first half dozen words the
entire atmosphere was changed. There
was no allusion to anything which had
been said. no petitions In behalf of
narrow minded Christian brethren
and some Of us have had experience of
the wounds that can be inflicted by
prayers In our behalf-no use of Jesus
words on his cross, Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they
do" but simply great spiritual ma
ture lifting the whole assembly above
all narrow, dividing, controversial Diff
ferences into the very presence OF the
, Eternal One himself. No art could have
devised more effectuai answer to
what had been said against heather
religion, no wit or logic has put it's
defenders more to shame or more pal
pably in the wrong, but the best OF It
was the feeling 1t produced that there
was no art about 1t. nothing but the
natural outpouring OF the man, and
that its hearers were made to forget to
be ashamed, and we, sympathizers with
him, made % forget any exultation
over them-forget everything but that
/ weSwsre being lifted into the Coy OF a
worship md into the beauty OF n world
such as the most Christian OF MS had
never experienced before and never TIL
then known to exist.
The prayer was very short, and when
It was ended there was no hymn sung,
no benediction pronounced, no other
voice that could break into the unutter-
| able peace 1t left on all souls. and
without even the usual buzz of CONVEX
sation, but with shining eyes, the meet
Ing dissolved into the outside world.
An orthodox lady who was present said
that hitherto she had always attended
menthiy missionary meetings and put
ner quarter Of a dollar into the contri-
button box to send religion to the hea-
then, but hereafter she should devote
her money, to getting some heathen to
come here and show us Christians
what religion really is.-John G. Kim
ball in Christian Register.