The American Missionary — Volume 37, No. 3, March, 1883Various
Religion
The American Missionary — Volume 37, No. 3, March, 1883
Various
Congregational churches -- Missions -- Periodicals; Home missions -- Periodicals
June 22d and 23d, 1874, this church was organized with eleven
members, only one of whom was an Indian. But while there was only
one Indian, it was hoped that God would bless the work so that
others would be induced to come in, and we have not been wholly
disappointed. Since that time twenty-eight Indians and half-breeds
have joined it and our new church at Jamestown, near Dunginess,
besides thirteen whites who have joined on profession, and thirteen
more by letter, making seventy-five in all, including the first
members. Forty-five Indian marriages have taken place here in a
Christian way, and twenty-seven funerals. All of those married,
who are alive, are still living together, owing mainly to the
Agent. Christian services at funerals are something about which
the Indians at first cared very little, and often have the dead
been hurried off to burial without even letting me know that any
one was dead; and their burying-ground with its small houses and
clothes, cloth and other things, was a curiosity to visitors. But
after a time, having made some slow improvements, they opened a new
burying-ground, and when the first grave was made the chief said
to me: “To-day we become white people. We do not like the idea of
having cloth and other things around our graves, and we expect that
there will be none of it here.” That was nearly four years ago, and
there are now no such things visible. At a later day I was absent
when one person died, and no white man was present at the funeral;
but when I returned, the Indians asked me to make arrangements so
that if I should necessarily be absent some Christian white man
should go and help them bury their dead in a Christian manner.
A prayer-meeting was begun here as soon as the present Agent came
(before there was a church or minister), which has been constantly
maintained, and its influence has gone into all the Christian work
here. But it has been too old for some of the children, and too far
away and in a wrong language for many of the Indians; hence it has
been supplemented by children’s, ladies’ and Indian prayer-meetings.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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