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Show INTER-MOUNTAIN CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR. <br><br> on the Christian basis has changed all that and led the people to see the rightfulness of the Christian system which was embodied in the constitution of the new state, and although the constitution in this respect is disregarded in some communities, yet the change from the one social system to the other is an encouraging mark of Christian progress. <br> 3. Christianity has done great things for Utah in the way of education. Its efficient graded schools in this city on the American basis, carrying the course of study up into the academy grade, and preparing boys for the best colleges, performed a work here twenty years before the free public school system was established which prepared the way for that system and greatly hastened its coming. Moreover, the half dozen Christian academies in the state, the work of the Salt Lake College under the lead of the Congregational denomination, and the projected work of Sheldon Jackson College under the lead of the Presbyterian denomination, are a continual help in promoting a higher standard of education throughout the state. <br> 4. The representatives of Christianity have done a great work in helping to secure free, representative government in Utah. For nearly forty years after Utah was organized as an American territory under the government of the United States, there was a most harmful union of church and state here under a priesthood government, so that during most of that time no one was allowed to be a member of the legislature unless he acknowledged allegiance to that priesthood. But the representatives of Christianity have helped to secure that free and republican form of government which has prevailed here the past six years. And the only cloud resting over the future of Utah is the fear growing out of recent church movements, that there is going to be an attempt to restore the old union of church and state by which the state was merged in the church. But if an attempt should succeed it would be only temporary. The people are too much interested in free government to allow it to be taken from them. <br>[PHOTO: FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH.]<br> But, notwithstanding the moral progress of the past twenty-five years, a great work remains to be done, through Christian missions and Christian education, to lift this new state up to that moral level where it ought to be, and one of the sad proofs that such a Christian work is still necessary is the fact that some of the most immoral institutions in the state are under the control of those who claim to be the moral teachers and moral leaders of the people. Saltair Beach, with its Sabbath desecration, its saloon attachment, and its social immorality, and that immoral establishment in the Brigham Young Trust building in Commercial Street in this city, are tangible illustrations. <br> In addition, the reports from the smaller communities in various parts of the state show beyond all doubt that the anti-American custom of polygamy prevails quite generally. Now, while such deplorable things exist, and while the great majority of the people are taught to believe that the Mormon priesthood has divine authority, and that the counterfeit book of Mormon and the alleged revelations of Joseph Smith are on the same level with Bible Christianity, so long there will be urgent need of Christian missions in Utah. <br> Christianity has accomplished also one other important thing in Utah. It has helped to bring about that era of peace and good will among all classes of the people here, so greatly needed. The representatives of Christianity have demonstrated through the establishment of Christian churches and schools that they have been as the friends of the Mormon people and not as their enemies, and so the former strife and bad feeling have given place to peace and friendly intercourse. Salt Lake City, April 27th, 1897. <br><br> |
