Appendix — Presidents and Executive Officers of the Board of Foreign Missions
PRESIDENTS OF THE BO.\RD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS
RECENT DEVELOPMENT (1909-12) 383 tion of the said General Council, provided, however, that the said Board shall have the power to fill any vacancies that may occur in its membership between the conventions or meetings of the said General Council."
At the subsequent meeting of the Board the following action was taken: "In accepting the Charter of Incorporation this Board interprets the clause, 'in accordance with the Confes- sions of the Evangehcal Lutheran Church as accepted by the General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America,' to mean, that all the work of this corporation shall be on the basis of the Principles of Faith and Church Polity of the General Council, according to the directions of the General Council in session at Minneapolis, September 9-14, 1909." Under this Charter and Constitution the Board re-organized by the election of its former officers and the adoption of the former by-laws.
The Rev. H. Grahn, D. D., resigned as business manager of the " Missionsbote " at the close of the year 1910, having served in that capacity since 1901, and the Rev. R. C. G. Bielinski, editor of that paper, took charge also of the business management. The Rev. Prof. H. E. Jacobs, D. D., resigned as a member of the Board in February, 191 1, and the Hon. Frank M. Riter was elected to fill the unexpired term. In August, 1910, the Rev. P. J. O. Cornell succeeded the Rev. S. C. Franzen as a member of the Board. The General Coun- cil in 191 1 elected the following new members of the Board: The Rev. F. Jacobson, Ph. D., and Messrs. A. Raymond Bard, Robert Gaskell and B. F. Cressman.
The present officers of the Board are: President, the Rev. Prof. Edward T. Horn, D. D., LL.D.; Treasurer, Mr. James M. Snyder; English Recording Secretary, the General Secre- tary, the Rev. George Drach, by appointment; German Recording Secretary, the Rev. R. C. G. Bielinski; Swedish Recording Secretary, the Rev. P. J. O. Cornell. Dr. S. C. Seiple, of Centre Square, Pa., a former member of the Board, is the Board's Medical Adviser. The other members of the Board are the Revs. L. G. Abrahamson, D. D., S. G.
384 THE TELUGU MISSION OF THE GENERAL COUNCIL Youngert, D. D./ C. A. Miller, D. D./ W. E. Frey, John A. Weyl, R. C. G. Bielinski, and Messrs. Prof. C. W. Foss, W. F. Monroe, Frank M. Riter, A. Raymond Bard, Robert Gas- kell and B. F. Cressman, making sixteen members, represent- ing five different synods of the General Council.
A Swedish District Secretary of the Board of Foreign Mis- sions was elected in 191 1. The first incumbent of this office, the Rev. Carl Solomonson, began his work December 15, 191 1, but one year later obtained leave of absence for a year or more to act as a solicitor of funds for Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, Minn., his alma mater. The duties of this office are defined as follows: i. To represent the Board in the congregations of the Augustana Synod. 2. To spread information, awaken interest and sohcit funds for the support of the foreign missions of the General Council. 3. To interest and recommend young men and women for service in our mission fields. 4. To keep the people informed of our work at home and abroad through the papers of the Augustana Synod and such literature as may be approved by the Board. 5. To perform such other duties as the Board from time to time may determine. 6. The relation of the Swedish District Secretary to the Board shall be (a) to labor under the direction of the Board and report to it at each regular meeting through the General Secretary concerning his work and expenses ; (b) to attend the regular meetings of the Board as often as possible and to be present whenever called by the President of the Board; (c) to remit monthly all money received for our foreign missions to the treasurer of the Mission Board of the Augustana Synod, and report the same to the Board of Foreign Missions. Among the sure indications of a more intense and widespread interest in foreign missions is the support of individual missionaries by societies and congregations. Those now being supported are:
The Rev. C. F. Kuder by the Men's Bible Class of Holy 1 The Rev. Dr. Youngert and the Rev. Dr. Miller were elected by the General Council in 19 13, taking the places of the Rev. M. C. Ranseen, D. D., and the Rev. C. Theodore Benze, D. D., the latter having been elected American professor in the Theological Seminary at Kropp, Germany.
RECENT DEVELOPMENT (1909-12) 385 Trinity Church, Buffalo, N. Y., the Rev. F. A. Kaehler, D. D., pastor; the Rev. Karl L. Wolters by the Luther Leagues of Buffalo; the Rev. Edward T. Horn, Jr., by the Men's Foreign Missionary Society of Holy Trinity Church, Reading, Pa.; the Rev. O. O. Eckardt by the First Swedish Lutheran Church of St. Paul, Minn, (in part) ; Miss Sigrid Esberhn by the Ice- landic EvangeHcal Lutheran Synod; Miss Susan E. Monroe by herself; Miss Betty A. Nilsson, M. D., by the Women's Missionary Society of the Augustana Synod; Miss Lydia Woerner, M. D., by the Women's Missionary Society of the Eastern Conference of the New York and New England Synod; Miss Agatha Tatge by the Church of the Advent, New York, the Rev. William M. Horn, pastor; Miss Agnes I. Schade by the Women's Missionary Society of the Pittsburgh Synod; Miss Amy B. Rohrer, M. D., by the Missionary Society of the Church of the Reformation, Rochester, N. Y., the Rev. Frank F. Fry, pastor; Rev. Oscar V. Werner by St. John's Church, AUentown, Pa., the Rev. A. Steimle, pastor.
There has been a decided increase in the income of the Board of Foreign Missions during the past few years. In 1905 the income was $29,552.87; five years later (1910) it was
,451.57; in 1911 it rose to $60,263.13, and in 1913, to 1,546.41. These figures do not include the sum raised by the Women's Home and Foreign Missionary Societies for the new hospital, which flowed into the Board's treasury in 1910 and 191 1, and amounted to over $30,000. The expenditures have steadily kept pace with the income, due in part to the increase of the number of missionaries, and in part to increased appropriations for the expanding mission work. Thus, while in 1905, $8000 were sent to India for the regular expenses of mission work, $18,000 were sent for that purpose during 1911, and $20,625.00 in 1913. These figures do not include the salaries and allowances of the mssionaries. Two of the main factors in the development of the foreign mission spirit and effort in our churches have been the organ- ization of women's missionary societies and the Laymen's Missionary Movement.
386 THE TELUGU MISSION OF THE GENERAL COUNCIL The following table of statistics shows the growth of our Telugu Mission since it became the General Council's Mission:
1870. 1880. 1890. 1QC50. 1905. 1910. 1912. Christians 160 335 1056 6159 13,823 16,953 i9'75i Communicants 70 216 978 3000 6,135 Q1926 10,845 Foreign missionaries 2 4 4 5 16 12 21 Native workers 9 16 90 142 314 347 411 Pupils in school 138 440 1473 3500 5,275 6,099 6,559 In 191 2 the Rev. and Mrs. Arps returned to India and Dr. Lydia Woerner left Rajahmundry on sick-leave and furlough; and the Revs. Thure Holmer and Ivar F. Witting and Miss Mary Borthwick were sent out as missionaries. Rev. Ivar F. Witting, after a residence of four months in India, re- signed and, although urged to reconsider his resignation, insisted on it and returned to the United States. The Rev. Thure Holmer was born in Sweden, June 5, 1882, and came to the United States with his parents when he was eight years of age. The family settled at Falconer, N. Y. Mr. Holmer entered Augustana College in 1902, and was graduated from the Theological Seminary and was ordained in 191 2. On July 17th, that year, he married Miss Pauline Celia Bjork. Sailing from New York on July 31st, Mr. and Mrs. Holmer reached Rajahmundry on October 23, 191 2, the day on which the Rev. O. V. Werner and Miss Margaret C. Haupt were married in St. Paul's Church, Rajahmundry.
Miss Mary S. Borthwick was born in Chestnut Hill, Phila- delphia, where she was baptized and confirmed in Christ Church. She took the one year's course at the Mary J. Drexel Home and Motherhouse of Deaconesses, and was commissioned in her home congregation on October 15, 191 2, by the President of the Board. She accompanied the Rev. and Mrs. Arps to Rajahmundry, arriving November 21, 1912. Mr. Hiram H. Sipes, Jr., a graduate of Thiel College, class of 1 913, accepted the call of the Board to go to our Telugu Mission in India and assist in its educational work. He married Miss Elsie Ashe of Greenville, Pa., on Aug.
RECENT DEVELOPMENT (1909-12) 387 21, 1 913, was commissioned on Sunday evening, October 12th, in Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Greenville, Pa., and reached Rajahmundry in November, 1913. During that month Dr. H. E. Isaacson returned to India, leaving his wife and children in Lindsborg, Kansas, and Dr. Betty A. Nilsson came back to America on furlough.
The year 191 2 opened at Rajahmundry with the con- vention of the All-India Lutheran Conference, December 31, 1911-January 4, 191 2, which was attended by 93 dele- gates. "They represented the Leipsic, Swedish and Danish Missions of the Tamil country, the Hermannsburg, Schleswig- Holstein, Rajahmundry and Guntur Missions of the Telugu country, and the Gossner Mission of Chota Nagpur in the North. Greetings were received from the Santal Mission, the Missionary Society of Stockholm and the Moravian Mis- sion. If not in the strictest geographical sense, at least as far as Lutherans go, the comprehensiveness of the term "All India" was justified. The delegates came from the South of India, where the breezes have not yet spent all their spicy fragrance, of which, softly blowing, they robbed Ceylon's isle; they came from the sun-scorched plains of Central India, where great rivers roll seaward in tepid sluggishness; they came from the far North, where the vast, snowy reaches of the Himalayas abruptly bound the view. There were young men still in the newness of the first years of their service, still studying the respective vernaculars of their fields of work; men in the prime of life, who had tested their strength upon the tasks God gave them to perform amidst surround- ing heathendom, and who were wise in counsel and strong in deed ; older men whose whitening hair confirmed the story told by their battle-scarred faces, of decades of service against the forces of Satan, and who yet burned at heart with the zeal of young warriors. Moreover, there was not a department of woman's work in missions that had not its representative among the goodly complement of women present at the Conference. Finally, by the type of their manhood and by their faith, the twelve Indian delegates, almost all of them ordained ministers of the Lutheran Church, gave proof of the
388 THE TELUGU MISSION OF THE GENERAL COUNCIL quickening power of the Gospel of Christ, and were distinct encomiums upon the work for the furtherance of which the Conference and its individual members were human agencies."
"Federation" was the main topic of discussion, and the desire for closer co-operation and union, especially in educa- tional and literary work, found expression in a set of resolu- tions and in the appointment of a permanent committee, each Mission being represented by one member, to which was entrusted, among other things, the duty of the furtherance of the federation of Lutheran Missions in India, which, accord- ing to the census of 191 1, have a constituency of nearly 250,000.
One of the resolutions of the All-India Lutheran Con- ference, held at Rajahmundry, reads as follows: "The All- India Lutheran Conference, in session at Rajahmundry, strongly urges and approves of the establishment of a United Lutheran Theological Seminary at Madras. It recommends that every mission represented in the Conference, uniting in the establishment and maintenance of such a united insti- tution, pay its share of the original cost involved in the starting of such an institution, including the land and buildings, set aside and support a missionary professor, if desirable, and pay its part of the salaries of Indian teachers and other general expenses. It recommends that, as soon as possible, the first class be formed. It recommends that all professors and teachers in this Seminary be bound to an acceptance of the Bible as the infallible rule of doctrine and life, and that they be required to subscribe to the Augus- tana Invariata. It recommends that the Synodical Books be an essential part of the curriculum of studies."
The General Council at its convention' in Toledo, 0., September 11-16, 1913, discussed this project and adopted the following recommendations of the Board of Foreign Missions:
"Resolved, that we approve the resolution adopted by representatives of the Lutheran missions in India, namely, that the All-India Lutheran Conference become a permanent body ; but the details of its organization should depend upon
Rev. William Ashme.\d Schaeffer, D. D. Secretary 1888-1906 Rev. B. M. Schmucker, D. D. Secretary, 1876-1888
Rev. F. W. Weiskotten Commissioner to India in 1900
Rev T. Telleen. 1). D.
snt and Sui>erintendent, 1891-1902 Rev. George Drach General Secretary, since 1905. Mr. Tames M. Snyder Secretary 1902-1908; Treasurer, since 1908.
EXECUTIVE OFFICERS OF THE BOARD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS
Ill-: ALL INDIA LUTHERAN C(JNFERliNCE OF MISSIONARIES Held in St. Paul's Church, Rajahmuiuh y, in January, 1912.
. RECENT DEVELOPMENT (1909-12) 389 the further action of the Boards concerned. In reference to co-operation in this Conference, as well as to the Joint Theological Seminary proposed for all Lutheran missions in India, the General Council advises, as precedent to all action on the subject, an amendment to the Confessional Statement, to wit, the acceptance of the Old and New Testaments as the infallible Rule of Faith and Practice, the adoption of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession and the Small Catechism of Luther as the statement of our faith, and the rec- ognition of the other Confessions contained in the Book of Concord as a correct answer to the questions concerning the faith which arose in the Lutheran Church after the adoption of the Augsburg Confession.
"The Board of Foreign Missions is hereby authorized, upon the approval of our suggestions by all the other Boards or a number of them, to proceed to the consideration of the further propositions of the All-India Lutheran Conference."
If the Hoitie Churches in America and Europe will do their full share of foreign mission work by sending a sufficient num- ber of missionaries and furnishing an adequate financial sup- port, the day cannot be far distant when the Lutheran Church in India, united, strong and vigorous, will stand in the front rank of the great army of the Lord Jesus Christ, fighting with the spiritual armor and weapons which He furnishes, for the Christian conquest of India; and one of the largest and strongest divisions of the Lutheran part of this army should come from the field of the Telugu Mission of the General Council in the Godavery and Kistna districts of the Madras Presidency.