THE SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE AMERICAN CONGREGATIONAL UNION.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

THE Trustees of the American Congregational Union, in presenting a summary of the work of another year, congratulate its friends on the steadily growing efficiency and usefulness of this important and justly favorite Association. The results which they are permitted to lay before the co-operating churches are such as may well afford encouragement as regards the future, while they awaken thankfulness for what has already been accomplished. The last year has certainly been, all things considered, one of the best in the history of this institution, which is at once the outgrowth and the instrument of Congregational enlargement. Its influence has been widely felt. The contributions to its treasury have been larger than in any former year in which no special appeal has urged into transient excitement the natural and healthful action of the churches. It has moved steadily on, accomplishing more and more fully its original design of promoting in many ways the unity, strength, and co-operative Christian activity of the Congregational churches. There have been many indications of a growing appreciation of its influence, and of its vital relation to the right working of our entire system of effort for the dissemination of the principles of the Pilgrims, and the thorough evangelization of our country.

In our last Annual Report we referred in some detail to the original reasons for the organization of the Congregational Union, the necessity there was and is that New York should be its seat, and the methods in which it seeks to fulfil its end. With what faithful care and severe economy its affairs are managed was then particularly explained. It may safely be taken for granted, therefore, that these things are now sufficiently understood. We propose accordingly, at present, to state briefly the doings of the year, and a few of the happy results that have revealed themselves; and then to make some suggestions which seem to the Board important in reference to the present responsibilities and future prospects of the Congregational churches throughout the country.

GENERAL WORK OF THE UNION.

As the Congregational Union was organized for the purpose of furnishing to our widely scattered churches a central point of intelligence and intercommunication, its general work each year includes much that it is not possible to embody in any report, and especially much that is in no wise represented by the mere amount of money that is raised. As, in many

cases, it is not the greater and more conspicuous acts of an individual Christian, so much as the lesser and hardly noticed useful words and deeds of every day, that give its chief value to his life, so it is, to a very considerable extent, by unimposing and often not widely known good offices on behalf of ministers, churches, and the common Christian cause, that the Union fulfils its end. It seeks to lose no opportunity of strengthening the hands of pastors, especially in the missionary fields, and of helping forward the plans and efforts of those who are laboring to build up our institutions of Christian learning. As in former years, it has rendered valuable aid to churches in want of suitable pastors, and to ministers desiring to find churches in which their services are needed; this both in the East and in the West. Through its extensive correspondence it has done not a little, it is believed, to develop and sustain fraternal feeling between brethren in the widely separated sections of our country by giving to those stationed in each more or less intelligence as to what has been projected or accomplished in the others. A very considerable amount of this sort of done.

work needs constantly to be More than in any former year the rooms of the Union at the Bible House in New York have been visited by those representing our churches and interested in their growth. Our table is furnished with some of the best of the religious journals that circulate among the Congregational ministers and churches. A brother visiting the city can here enjoy a quiet hour in reading, or, if he chooses, in writing his letters home. In the room No. 49 the Clerical Union of Congregational ministers of New York and vicinity has continued to meet on the second Monday of each month, and the attendance has been uniformly good, and the exercises rich in interest. This meeting furnishes opportunity for the interchange of brotherly greetings and the discussion of such important practical questions as the exigencies of the hour press on the attention of those whose vocation it is to give direction to popular thought. During the last year a movement looking to a closer sympathy in Christian work originated in this fraternal circle, which has resulted in the establishment of a social conference of churches in this neighborhood at regular intervals. The meetings already held have been eminently successful; and this gathering of ministers and delegates from the churches for consultation and fellowship is likely to be fruitful of good in many ways, as it is designed to be a permanent arrangement. The sooner such conferences are organized among neighboring Congregational churches all over our country, the better. The closer the contact and sympathy between the several bodies of believers, the more orderly and effective will be their working for the common ends.

As it was one of the original objects of the Union, specified in its constitution, to provide "parochial and pastoral libraries," a little has been done the

past year in the way of contribution to the libraries of home missionaries and other pastors of feeble churches. One hundred and fifty copies of the Congregational Quarterly for 1869, and nearly one hundred of the same for 1870, furnished by the publishers at a reduced price, were paid for by the Union and given to such ministers. As it is the aim of the Union to further, as far as it may have the power, all the interests of our denomination, and as the liberal support and effective working of our chief religious quarterlies must have a most important bearing on these interests, a plan has been projected, and will soon, it is hoped, be consummated, by which a larger circulation of these valuable journals may be attained, to the great enriching of the ministry and churches, and in a way to add also to the resources of the Union. The details of this arrangement will be announced at an early day, if no unforeseen obstacle arises.

Some progress has been made during the year as regards the securing of lots on which churches may be built on the great railroad thoroughfares of the West. A very liberal spirit has been manifested by those who have the management of these lines of travel, so far as they have been conferred with on the subject. It is not deemed desirable to take up lots beforehand, to be held in trust till they are needed, for this reason, among others, that it is not possible to tell, at the very beginning of new towns, where it may be desirable to place the church when the time to build actually arrives. A lot chosen long beforehand might be found, when wanted, to be in a position altogether unsuitable. It is, however, a great thing to have the pledge of the directors of important roads that good lots for churches shall be freely given when they are actually needed. As the building of churches is sure to be of great advantage to these corporations in various ways, it may be pretty certainly anticipated that their pledge will be made good.

CHURCH-BUILDING.

Every year's experience renders more manifest and urgent the duty of aiding the new churches in the vast regions that are so rapidly becoming settled, as well as weak churches in some of the older States, in erecting houses of worship. The waste of labor and expense incurred when ministers are sent as pastors to church organizations that have no places of worship is painful to contemplate. Years of weakness, and often the total loss of the opportunity when success was possible, are in many cases the inevitable result of such a state of things. On the other hand, given a dozen or two faithful Christian men and women at any important point, together with a sanctuary, and it is nearly certain that the influence of the gospel of Christ will soon become effective, and will permanently pervade and fashion the community.

A noble work in this department has been accomplished the past year. Not only is the number of churches that have been assisted large, but an unusual number of these are churches located at specially important points. Some of these have received grants larger than the ordinary amount. This, however, has been because, in those cases, individual friends or churches have given us the extra sums with instructions to make them special grants. While it is not possible for the Union, in view of the great number of present and prospective applications, to adopt a higher scale in the amount of its appropriations, until the contributions for this purpose are much more liberal than at present, there are in some positions churches whose relative importance is so great, and their need of ample church accommodations so immediate and pressing, that the Board esteem it most fortunate when personal friends or interested churches give for their benefit special additional sums. These are always applied according to instructions, the Union giving at the same time its ordinary amount of aid.

The entire number of applications on the table of the Board during the year has been over one hundred.

The whole number of churches to which grants have been paid within the year is sixty-six.

The number of churches to which the Union stands pledged by vote, at the commencement of another year, is thirty-four.

The churches to which grants have been paid as above are distributed among the States as follows:

The Board are glad to have it in their power to state that up to the present time no church applying whose case was such as to make it fairly a candidate for aid, according to our fixed principles of action, has been turned away without assistance. It has, however, been found necessary in many cases to grant sums less than those asked for and really needed. The past year has been one in which the raising of money at the East, for religious and educational purposes, generally has been very difficult; and

at the same time it has been one in which the settlers in the Western States have been peculiarly straitened because of the very low price of wheat. Yet we have been able to go through the year without serious embarrassment. The generous offer of Mr. Henry C. Bowen, of New York, to give five thousand dollars, if at the end of the year fifty thousand should be made up, had doubtless not a little influence in stimulating the liberality of the churches; and it is a great encouragement to the Board to have reached, the last year, the sum of over fifty thousand dollars without any extraordinary appeals or agencies.

What is most of all needed to the effective action of the Union in aiding our rising churches, and the practical development of the Congregational system throughout the whole country, is a habit of regular, steady, and generous contribution to its funds by all the Congregational churches, such as an intelligent conviction of the vital importance of its work must prompt. We are glad to be able to state that the number of churches which give the Congregational Union a prominent place on their list of objects, for which collections are to be annually taken, is steadily increasing. Pastors and leading laymen are coming more and more fully to comprehend what a grand work is accomplished in planting, literally by the hundred, Congregational churches, with an educated ministry, and with a New England atmosphere about them, in all the new regions of our country. We have but to follow up this work with vigor, for a few generations, to see results over which heaven and earth will unitedly rejoice.

RESPONSES FROM CHURCHES AIDED.

A distinguished Western minister writes as follows:

"I came here yesterday to preach the sermon at the dedication of the Congregational church in this new town. The place is so recent that I did not know its locality on the Des Moines Valley Railroad. It is twenty-two miles from Des Moines, a village of nine hundred people, most of whom have been here but a few months. One citizen told me that he came here four months since, and during that time about seventy-five buildings have been erected. More business is done here than at any other point between Des Moines and Keokuk. The Congregational church is the best in the town, a very neat and convenient house, 32 feet by 54 in size, with a tower and spire; the whole planned by the minister, who has done considerable work with his own hands. The spire he framed, and it does credit to him. He has also advanced funds for the expenses of building, out of the proceeds of his own property, to the amount of something over $400. It was found to-day that about $ 450 was needed, in addition to all subscriptions, to meet all bills and leave the house free of debt. It was very bad weather, and all were not present who were relied upon to give; but those who were lifted the amount, subscribing most of it and assuming the balance. So after a sermon on Our Privileges, from the words 'We are His people, the sheep

-