MIXED EFFORTS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVII, Issue 21, 13 September 1889, Page 15

MIXED EFFORTS.

China has her missionary problem too, it seems. According to the Chinese Recorder, there are forty Protestant missionary bodies in the country, all working in entire independence of each other. There is no division of labour, it is stated, no settled plan of work, aud no organisation worth mentioning. It is not surprising, perhaps, that in these circumstances the ratio of converts to missionaries has gone down from 31*3 communicants in 1887 to 30*8 last year. The total of Communicants is now 34,555 and of missionaries 1,123. Here is the State of affairs at the present moment as pictured by the Chinese Recorder :— " To begin with, we have the Church of England with her thirty. nine articles, her prayer-book, and her formularies all translated, and she is striving and hoping to impose them in all their entirety upon China. Again, we have the Presbyterians with the Westminster Confession, their longer and shorter catechisms, their system of church government, also translated, equally zealous and sanguine in their endeavour to lead the Chinese to adopt their system. Further, we have the Methodists, with their elaborate organisations ; the Congregationalists, with their form of government ; the Baptists, with tbeire ; the Lutheran Church, seeking to produce in China a fae simile of itself, nothing less or more ; the American Episcopal Church, with a like aim. And so with other denominations. What a spectacle to thoughtful Chinamen i and there are many such. No wonder they say to us—' Agree among yourselves, and then we will listen to you/ But this is not the worst of our divisions. We have three branches of the Spiscopal Church, eight different sects of Presbyterians, six sects of Methodists, two Congregationalists, two Baptists, beside several other minor bodies, all acting independently of each other ; and in addition to these we have the Inland Mission, many of whose members belong to our own denomination, but the bulk of whom disclaim creeds and systems ; and unless the leaders of that mission receive special guidance from God, it will become neither more or lesß than another Beet." Some of the statistics of conversions, as may be imagined, are not a little curious. The Bible Christians, for instance, have two missionaries for each communicant, the communicants in this case numbering three ; the Foreign Christian Mission Society has seven missionaries and two communicants and the Society of Friende, with one missionary, his wife, and two single women, although they have been, comparatively speaking, a long time in the field, have not yet succeeded in making a single convert. China must be careful, or the Methodist Times may once more turn its eye eastward.— Times of India