Wesleyan Foreign Missions.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 4979, 11 April 1889, Page 2

Wesleyan Foreign Missions.

The annual meeting at Timaru in aid of the Foreign Missions of the Australasian Wesleyan Church was held at the Wesleyan place of service, Bank street, last evening. There was a very good attendance of members and friends of tho Church, and the Rev. W. B. Marten presided. On this occasion at the annual meeting be had tho pleasure of introducing the Rev. Isaac Rooney, missionary ia charge of Duke of York station in the Hew Britain (Western Pacific) group, who’was accompanied by D. Tomokaiti, a Polynesian, and a native teacher on the island named. In opening the meeting the latter gave an address in his native tongue, which was freely translated and commented upon by Mr Rooney, descriptive of tho island, the people, their gods, their belief in witchcraft, their superstitious, and other “ things of the past,” coming in turn to the advent of the missionaries and to the reception of tho gospel when they now had “ rest and peace.” In concluding his address Mr Tomokaiti sang three verses of three of Wesley’s hymns in his own language, the strangeness of which rather amused the audience. Mr Rooney then followed, prefacing his remarks by pointing out on a map the mission stations in New Guinea, New Britain, and New Ireland. His headquarters were at New Britain and it was with this island he chiefly dealt. In commencing a mission they first of all dealt with the smaller islands for they found the people on them much more tractable than those on the large islands. Near to his station there were German settlements, and the people on these helped the Wesleyan missionaries in every way; in fact afforded them every facility in carrying out their good work. The natives were shrewd and intelligent, were keen at driving a bargain and were ready-witted, and were of a very generous nature. But, wedded as they were to their idols, extremely superstitious and great believers in witchcraft, the missionaries had to contend with many difficulties. Another thing was the great diversity of tho languages spoken. On an island distant only half a mile from Duke of York, the people spoke a totally different language to that on Duke of York Island, and he had found in one small group that 20 different kinds of languages were spoken. Preaching the gospel under such a difficulty as that was work of a very trying kind. After experience they had found it best to do their work principally among the young, and they found them very apt learners. At his station there were thousands of natives in attendance at church and Sunday ecbool, and some 40 young men (natives) were engaged in preaching tho gospel to their fellow men. Though they had much to be thankful for in converting tens of thousands of natives to Christianity in the groups named, yet they (tho missionaries) were not at all satisfied, for they knew that there were still hundreds of thousands of natives in a heathen state. He gave illustrations of tho good the preaching of the gospels had on the natives, and of the great benefit tho children derived from the schools, where they were taught reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, etc, and-made excellent progress in their studies. Mr Rooney spoke in eloquent terms of his assistants, the native teachers, who in their discourses gave the elements of the gospel in plain simple truths, and in a clear way that delighted him very much. At various points Mr Rooney gave some amusing illustrations of tho various habits of the natives, and on concluding was thanked for his interesting address.