Volume IV Part 146 (1/2)
THE FREE BAPTIST WOMAN'S MISSIONARY SOCIETY was organized June 12, 1873, to conduct home and foreign missions. This is believed to be the only Woman's Missionary Society (with possibly the exception of the Christian and the Friends') which from the beginning has been entirely independent and not an auxiliary organization. It has furnished eleven women missionaries for India, one of whom is a professor in the Theological School and two are physicians, and supports a large number of schools, many native and Bible women and extensive zenana work.
Besides this it aids all other women missionaries of its denominational conference board by annual appropriations for their local work among women and children at the various stations occupied by Free Baptists. The Rhode Island Kindergarten Hall, the Widows' Home and the Sinclair Orphanage, all located at Benares, province of Orissa, India, are the property of this society.
Its home missionary work is connected with Storer College, Harper's Ferry, W. Va., to which it has furnished thirteen teachers, besides contributing largely to the erection and equipment of two of the main buildings. Its receipts have been about $200,000. It has a permanent fund of about $42,000.
The society has twenty-five State organizations, others in Canada and India, with between 8,000 and 9,000 members.
THE WOMAN'S PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS OF THE SOUTHWEST was organized at St. Louis in April, 1877; originally to create and foster a practical and intelligent interest in the spiritual condition of women and children in our own land and in heathen lands. Since the close of its fourteenth year its work has been for foreign missions only, being one of the seven woman's auxiliaries to the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian church in the United States of America. It has given to the cause of missions $249,618, and has had missionaries, as teachers or physicians, in India, China, j.a.pan, Korea, Siam, Persia and South America. The record of their work has been of a nature sufficiently encouraging to warrant continued and larger support. The Board has 605 branches or auxiliary societies and 13,776 members.
THE WOMAN'S BOARD OF HOME MISSIONS OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH was organized in December, 1878, to establish and maintain Christian schools among those near home. It has eleven stations in Alaska, eighteen among the Indians, twenty-seven among the Mexicans, thirty-one among the Mormons, forty among the mountaineers, six among the foreigners in this country, five among the Porto Ricans, making a total of 138, with 425 missionaries and teachers and 9,337 pupils.
The Board has secured to the Presbyterian church $750,000 worth of property and has expended about $3,500,000 since organization. Two magazines are published, the _Home Mission Monthly_, and _Over Sea and Land_ for the young, the latter jointly with the Foreign Societies. It has about 5,000 auxiliary societies with about 100,000 members.
THE CHRISTIAN WOMAN'S BOARD OF MISSIONS was organized Oct. 22, 1874, to maintain preachers and teachers for religious instruction; to encourage and cultivate a missionary spirit and effort in the churches; to disseminate missionary intelligence and secure systematic contributions for such purposes; to establish and maintain schools for the education of both s.e.xes.
Fields: The United States, Jamaica, India, Mexico and Porto Rico.
Work: University Bible lectures.h.i.+ps, Michigan, Virginia, Kansas, Calcutta, India; eighteen schools, four orphanage schools, two kindergartens, four orphanages with 500 children, one Chinese mission, one hospital, three dispensaries, one leper mission, thirty mission stations outside the United States; 135 missionaries, besides native teachers, evangelists, Bible women and other helpers; $900,000 raised during twenty-six years; income last year, $106,728. Its publications are _Missionary Tidings_, circulation 13,500; _Junior Builders_, same circulation; leaflets, calendars, manuals, song books, etc. Property values: United States, $120,000; India, $60,300; Jamaica, $38,550; Porto Rico, $10,000; total, $229,650; amount of endowment funds, $85,000.
This is purely a woman's organization; funds are raised and disbursed, fields entered and work outlined and managed without connection with any ”parent board,” although relations with other organizations of the church are most cordial. There are thirty-six State organizations, 1,750 auxiliaries, forty-five young ladies' circles, 374 mission bands, 1,711 junior societies of Christian Endeavor, 177 intermediate societies and 40,000 members of auxiliaries.
THE WOMAN'S STATE HOME MISSIONARY ORGANIZATION OF THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH represents a slow but steady growth during the past thirty years. Branches exist now in forty-two States and Territories. The last report available, that of 1897, showed $100,768 collected that year and disbursed for the usual home missionary purposes.
THE WOMAN'S CENTENARY a.s.sOCIATION OF THE UNIVERSALIST CHURCH was organized in 1869 to a.s.sist weak parishes, foster Sunday-schools, help educate women students for the ministry, endow professors.h.i.+ps in schools and colleges, relieve the wants of sick or disabled preachers, ministers' widows and orphans, distribute denominational literature, and do both home and foreign missionary work. Since its organization it has raised and disbursed over $300,000 and has a permanent fund of $20,500, the interest of which is annually expended for the purposes for which the a.s.sociation was organized. Millions of pages of denominational literature have been distributed. The a.s.sociation has ten State societies and 100 mission (local) circles.
THE NATIONAL ALLIANCE OF UNITARIAN AND OTHER LIBERAL CHRISTIAN WOMEN was organized in 1890. Its objects are primarily to quicken the religious life of Unitarian churches and to bring the women into closer acquaintance, co-operation and fellows.h.i.+p; to promote local organizations of women for missionary and denominational work and to bring the same into a.s.sociation; to collect and disseminate information regarding all matters of interest to the church, viz.: needs of local societies, facilities for meeting them, work to be done, collection and distribution of money, etc.
The Alliance takes part in the missionary work of the denomination, a.s.sisting small churches and starting new ones; supports one or more students each year at the Meadville Theological School and maintains several circuit ministers. It has lending and traveling libraries and libraries for ministers, and has established and maintained three permanent ones in places where there was no free library. Through its well-known Post Office Mission it distributes annually about 300,000 sermons and tracts, and through its Cheerful Letter Exchange an untold amount of miscellaneous literature. Money is not disbursed from a central treasury, but is given by the branches which are independent in such matters, an Executive Board making recommendations. The expenditures of the past ten years have been $419,757. The Alliance has 255 branches and nearly 11,000 members.
THE WOMAN'S MISSIONARY a.s.sOCIATION OF THE UNITED BRETHREN IN CHRIST was organized Oct. 21, 1875, to engage and unite the efforts of women in sending missionaries into all the world; to support these and other laborers in mission fields, and to secure by gift, bequest and otherwise the funds necessary for these purposes. Valuable missionary work is being done in West Africa, China and the Philippines. The a.s.sociation in the last twenty-five years has raised $311,920. It has forty branches and 13,232 members.
THE WOMAN'S FOREIGN UNION OF FRIENDS was organized May, 1890, to increase the efficiency for spreading the Gospel of Christ among the heathen, and to create an additional bond between the women of the American Yearly Meetings. It has been the instrumentality of greatly quickening the missionary zeal and activity in the denomination. It established missions in j.a.pan, China, India and in unoccupied parts of Mexico, and rendered valuable a.s.sistance in planting missions in Alaska, Jamaica and Palestine. It founded and has successfully managed the _Friends' Missionary Advocate_. During the past ten years $300,000 have been raised and expended. It has ten branches and 4,000 members.
THE WOMAN'S HOME AND FOREIGN MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF THE GENERAL SYNOD OF THE EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN CHURCH IN THE U. S. A. was organized in 1879. Its object is to cultivate a missionary spirit, to create a deeper interest in the spread of the Gospel, to disseminate missionary intelligence, and to engage and unite the efforts of Christian women in the Lutheran church in supporting missions and missionaries on home and foreign fields, in co-operation with the Boards of Home and Foreign Missions and Church Extension. In the Foreign field it is now supporting eight women missionaries in India, two of whom are physicians and one a trained nurse. The princ.i.p.al station is Guntur, Madras Presidency. In Africa it is supporting two women missionaries at Muhlenberg, Liberia. In the Home field it has helped support eighteen missions and build churches for twelve of them. The amount contributed by the societies for the year ending March 31, 1902, was $27,286.
The Society has twenty-two Synodical Societies, 760 auxiliaries and 20,452 members, active and honorary and cradle roll, besides 489 life members.
THE WOMAN'S MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF THE GENERAL SYNOD OF THE REFORMED CHURCH was organized in 1887, to aid in the advancement of the work of Christian Missions in Home and Foreign Lands. Individual societies had existed for ten years previous. The last report available is that of 1893, when 144 societies were reported and $10,000 collected during the year. One-third was expended for foreign and two-thirds for home missions. The society has published an official organ, the _Woman's Journal_, since 1894. Women also belong and contribute to the general missionary societies of the church.
THE INTERNATIONAL BOARD OF WOMEN'S AND YOUNG WOMEN'S CHRISTIAN a.s.sOCIATIONS had its beginning in 1871, when thirty of these a.s.sociations affiliated for biennial conferences. Later they organized as the International Board which became incorporated. Its object is to unite in one central organization these bodies of the United States, Canada and other countries, and to promote the forming of similar ones, to advance the mental, moral, temporal and above all the spiritual welfare of young women.
The Ladies' Christian Union of New York, organized in 1858, was the first work in this country for the welfare of young business women. A home was the imperative need of the friendless young women employed in cities then as it is now, since the small wages received make possible for them only the poorest quarters amid demoralizing conditions. These Christian Women opened a house and took into it as many as they could reach, giving clean rooms, wholesome food, cheap rent, pure moral atmosphere and religious influences. From this developed the Young Women's Christian a.s.sociation.