Columbia Theological Seminary Bulletin, 29, number 1, February 1936

Bulletin of

COLUMBIA THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

DECATUR. GEORGIA

Vol. XXIX

February, 1936

No. 1

RETURN POSTAGE GUARANTEED
Entered as second-class matter. May 9, 1928, at the post office at Decatur, Ga., under the Act of August 24, 1912.

PUBLISHED QUARTERLY AT DECATUR. GEORGIA

COLUMBIA SEMINARY

and

THE SOUTHERN PRESBYTERIAN

CHURCH

SOME FACTS IN CONNECTION WITH
THE JUBILEE CELEBRATION

Columbia Theological Seminary

and

TheSouthern Presbyterian Church

WE are in the midst of the Diamond Jubilee Celebra-
tion of our Assembly. A great and challenging
program has been outlined for the year and our members
have been called upon, not only to remember all that has
been fine in the history of our branch of the Church, but
to rededicate themselves to the service of Christ and to
press forward to greater accomplishments in the future. In
thorough sympathy with that program and in accord with
its spirit, this bulletin is issued to call to the mind of its
readers certain facts in the history of an institution which
has played a notable part in the life of the Presbyterian
Church, U. S., and to challenge them to a realization of its
potentialities as an instrument for service in the years to
come.

DO YOU KNOW

THAT Columbia Theological Seminary is now in its
108th year of service to the Church?

THAT it was founded by the Synod of South Carolina
and Georgia on December 15, 1828?

THAT its birthplace was Lexington, Ga., but that it was
relocated in Columbia, S. C, in 1830 and continued to serve
there until it was brought back to its present location in
Georgia in 1927?

THAT, when it was founded, this institution was the
theological Seminary of one Synod having a total of only
128 churches, 73 ministers, and 8,560 members?

THAT, in 1936, it is owned and controlled by the five
Synods of South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and
Mississippi which together have 1139 churches, 706 minis-
ters, and 13 5,51 J members?

THAT graduates of Columbia Seminary played a part of
inestimable importance in making this expansion of our
Church possible?

THAT the first American Presbyterian Missionary to
Africa was a member of the first class to graduate from
Columbia Seminary Dr. J. Leighton "Wilson?

THAT what before and just after the War Between the
States was perhaps the largest negro church in our country
the Calhoun St. Church, Charleston, S. C. was founded
and ministered to by Dr. John L. Girardeau, an alumnus
and later a professor of Columbia Seminary?

THAT, of the 52 ministerial Commissioners who organ-
ized the first General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church,
U. S., in 1861, 13 were alumni of Columbia Seminary?

THAT the first Moderator and the first Stated Clerk of
our Assembly Dr. Benjamin M. Palmer and Dr. Joseph R.
Wilson, respectively were both alumni of Columbia Semi-
nary?

THAT the Magna Charta of our Church The Address
to the Churches of Jesus Christ Throughout the World
was largely the work of Dr. James Henley Thornwell, a
professor at Columbia Seminary, who also probably con-
tributed more to the shaping of our Church's distinctive
principles and polity than any other one individual?

THAT the organization of our Assembly's early Foreign
Mission Work was placed in the hands of Dr. J. Leighton
Wilson already mentioned as an alumnus of this institu-
tion?

THAT perhaps our Church's greatest apostle to the negro
people and the Chairman of its first Committee on Domestic
Missions was Dr. Charles Colcock Jones a professor in
Columbia Seminary?

THAT the Chairman of the Committee which gave us
our Book of Church Order was Dr. John B. Adger, another
professor of Columbia Seminary, and that this book was
prepared in the old Seminary Chapel at Columbia, S. C.

THAT the late President Woodrow Wilson, who was the
son of a professor in the Seminary, made his first profession
of faith in Christ at a service held in this same old chapel,
and that late in his life President Wilson is reported to have
said that though he had listened to many eloquent addresses
from the world's greatest living statesmen, he had never
heard such eloquence elsewhere as he had there in that
humble building during his boyhood days?

THAT the three outstanding contributions to Christian
Social Service which have been made by our Church were,
in large part, the work of Columbia Seminary Men? These
contributions with the names of the leaders associated with
them were:

The Cessation of the British Slave Traffic Dr. J. Leighton

Wilson.
The Expulsion of the Louisiana State Lottery Dr. Benjamin M.

Palmer.
The Chinese Opium Reform Movement Dr. Henry C. DuBose.

THAT Columbia Seminary has educated 1,107 men for
the work of the Gospel Ministry?

THAT 53 sons of this institution have gone into the
foreign mission work of our Church, and that this number

would have been materially increased had it been possible
for our Assembly to send out new missionaries in recent
years?

THAT in this year's Senior Class at Columbia Seminary
there are eighteen choice young men who will soon go out
into the active work of the ministry?

THAT Columbia Seminary is maintaining an increas-
ingly high standard of scholarship, believing that a thorough
preparation of the intellect is essential to the work of the
minister, but that it also insists upon the necessity of a
vital and personal religious experience and upon loyalty to
the great truths of the Gospel?

THAT, although conservative in theological outlook,
this institution is progressive in methods, and, that discon-
tent with present and past accomplishments, it is contin-
ually seeking to improve its service and to broaden its use-
fulness to the Church?

THAT this School of the Prophets is still handicapped by
a lack of sufficient endowment funds and that its opera-
tion without a deficit for the past two years has been made
possible only by the sacrificial service of its faculty and
administrative force?

THAT a contribution to theological education is a con-
tribution to every aspect of our Church's work?

THAT, by reason of its strategic location in one of the
greatest commercial and educational centers of the South,
Columbia Seminary has an opportunity to play an unique
and vitally important part in the winning of the Southeast
for Christ?

THAT there is a glorious opportunity for Christians to
make an investment here which will be returning dividends
for the work of the Kingdom long after they have gone to
their reward, and that Columbia Seminary urges you to
remember it, not only as you dispense your present benevo-
lent gifts, but also as you make your will?

THAT Sunday, February 16, 1936, has been set by the
controlling Synods as Columbia Seminary Day?

THAT all friends of the institution are asked to remem-
ber it, especially in their prayers and in their gifts at this
time?

COLUMBIA SEMINARY has done its
best for the Church. Have you done your
best for COLUMBIA SEMINARY?