Smyrna times., 1908-05-06
SMYRNA DELEGATES LEAVE
FOR GENERAL CONFERENCE
PRESIDING ELDER KOONs AND w.
o. HOFFECKER ARE MEMBERS
Will be Away a Month Looking After
The Important Business That Will
Come up Before Methodist Body

WIN De away a Month Looking After
he Important Business That Will
Come up Before Methodist Body
Presiding Elder W. G. Koons
ministerial delegate, and Hon.
Walter o. HOffecker, lay delegate,
representing Easton District of Will
mington M. E. Conference, left yester-
day for Baltimore to attend the
General Conference of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. Mr.. Rooms was
accompanied by Rev. DIR. Robert Watt.
pastor of Asbury NJ. E Church. a
reserve delegate, who will be there
all of this week and will probably
make frequent visits to Baltimore
during the four weeks session. Mrs.
Rooms will join her husband part of
the time. Mr.. Hoffecker will be
accompanied by his wife who will
remain with him most of the session.
Bishops, ministers and laymen of the
Methodist Episcopal Church have
been hurrying to Baltimore for
several days. They come from all
over the world. The convention was
called to order this morning at the
Lyric Theatre. Every continent,
most of the large islands and practically
every country is represented. There
will be in round figures 800 delegates.
They will represent 5000, 900 mem
oers in this country and hundreds of
thousands in the missions fields. The
bishops number "a, eight of whom are
missionary bishops. The delegates
from Wilmington Conferenceare Pres
iding Elders A. S. Mowbray, w. G.
Koons, S. N. Morgan and Adam
Stengle on the part of the ministers,
and l. T. Parker, w. 0. Hoffecker.
John P. Holland and Robley D.
Jones on the part of the laymen.
The bishops will take turns in presid-
ing.
Important Problems May Come Up
The Conference promises to be one
Of the most interesting in the history
of the Church. Problems that have
been before the church for manv
years have now reached crisis and
will be settled one way or another.
The oldest of these subjects is that of
electing the presiding elders. The
matter first came up for discussion at
the Conference of 1903. 1t has been
a burning question every since. The
theatre and amusement questions will
again come up. They always cause
much discussion. This is assured by
the action of the New York Con-
ference in asking for a change in the
sections of the discipline regarding
theatre going, card playing and horse
racing. The subjects always creates
much discussion and are probably
more interesting to the general public
than any other thing. Another
great matter that is stirring Method
ist circles is the restoration of the
time limit for pastors. At one time
they were changed every year.
Then the time limit was increased to
two years, three years, and five
years. Finally, eight years ago the
time limit was removed entirely. The
consolidation of the book concerns,
the work of the deaconess, the reduc-
ing of the General Conference repre-
sentation, the uniting of the M. E.
Church South, and various other
questions of Importance will come up |
before the Conference.
Eight or Ten Bishops to be Elected
A number of bishops will be
elected. The general opinion is that
there will be eight new ones. Some
predict that the growth of the church |
during the past four years will |
justify the addition of twelve men
to the general superintendency. In
connection with the subject of Bishops |
a radical step is proposed for a dio-
cesar system for bishops. At
present different bishops preside over
the annual conferences every year.
1t is proposed to assign a certain
territory to each bishop for a term of
years, probably four. He will con-
duct the annual conference in the
district year after year, and be re-
sponsible for the church work in that
section during his term. This means
a decided change in the policy in
regard to, the episcopacy and will be (
bitterly fouOht