PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27190, 6 November 1953, Page 3

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Sir, —According to the report of the Presbyterian Assembly the number of Presbyterians under pastoral care has risen to 360,479 and communicant members to 66.803. I take it that the last number constitutes the church’s members, for I cannot see that the others can be called members, if they are not Christians. So, if this is a true picture of the church, one could truly say, spiritually speaking, the church is as dead as the dry bones we read off in the book of the prophet Ezekiel. I wonder if any of the church’s ministers could tell us how many converts they have yearly, and how many elders have they in their various cnurches who do not attend race meetings. I notice the Rev. Mr Scarrow’s remark that the church has lost its first love, but I question if some of the ministers ever had such a thing as a first love. —Yours, etc., WONDERING. November 2, 1953. [When this letter referred to the immediate past Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (the Rev. J. Baird) he said that |he figures were not encouraging, but not quite as bad as they had indicated to the correspondent. “In the Presbyterian Church the stated membership refers to membership in full communion and is apart from the much vaster number of children, adolescents and adherent members,” he said.]