For a country whose Christian citizens are largely convinced is God’s chosen nation, the Confederacy is a study in contrasts. Baptists, like many other Christians in the southern nation, move fluidly from Christian nationalist rhetoric to lamentations concerning the un-Christian nature of soldiers serving in the Confederate army. So heathen are army ranks that Baptists are already working hard to Christianize God’s army. Even committed Christian soldiers are in dire danger of losing their faith, according to many Baptist leaders.
This week’s Biblical Recorder, the newspaper of North Carolina Baptists, asks the question,
“Army Colportage — Shall we have it in North Carolina”?
Periods of commotion disaster and trouble, never justify any relaxation of effort on the part of Christians, but they often require a change in the direction of these efforts. — Providence often interrupts the labors of the faithful and turns them into a different channel, breaks up their cherished plans and opens before them, fields of usefulness which they had not thought of before. The christian minister finds it necessary to give up for a time, the public preaching of the Gospel, when the withering breath of the pestilence pervades the community in which he lives, and to render what service he can, in the house of mourning and death. When famine stalks abroad through the land, drying up the fountains of plenty and prosperity and spreading desolation in his track, the christian is for a while turned aside from his customary labors, to comfort the sorrowing and quench the wasting fires of starvation.
Such a crisis has arrived in the history of our country. Suddenly involved in all the horrors of war, we may not relax our efforts for the salvation of sinners, but a new and startling demand is made upon our liberality and energy. Nearly a half-million of our fellow citizens in arms in various parts of the country, withdrawn from the salutary restraints and influences which have hitherto been thrown around them and exposed to new and almost irresistible temptations, call loudly for our sympathies, our prayers and our active efforts to save their souls, or at least weaken the force of the temptations to which they are exposed, and strengthen the virtuous principles which have already been implanted in their hearts. Every principle of patriotism, philanthropy and religion call on us to engage in this work. These men are our brethren and kinsmen in the flesh, united to us by the strongest natural ties; they are our countrymen, and our hopes for the coming years must rest with the blessing of God, on them.
Our brethren of Virginia have seen and felt all this, and have been working energetically and successfully ever since the commencement of the present struggle; have sent a large number of colporters into the army and successfully inaugurated the publication of religious literature adapted to our soldiers. They have appealed, and not in vain, to the Baptists of other States. In contributing to this enterprise, the Baptists of North Carolina have not been behind the foremost of them all. They have manifested a noble determination not to leave to others the task of providing for the spiritual welfare of the twenty thousand choice spirits who have gone from our borders to fight and,–many of them,–to die, in the defense of our rights and the sanctity of our homes. A large amount of money and a considerable number of Testaments, tracts and religious books have passed through our hands for this purpose and a still larger amount has been sent directly to Elder A. E. Dickenson, the Superintendent of Colportage in Virginia. This is all as it should be. We wish it had been a thousand fold greater.
But while we have been thus liberal, in contributing for the benefit of the soldiers in Virginia we have been less careful, about those who are within the borders of our own State. From the beginning of the war, there have been.–and there will be until its close,–a considerable number of troops stationed in North Carolina, and for these we have as yet made no adequate provisions.–On the Coast, at High Point, in the neighborhood of this city and at other places in the State there are bodies of soldiers, and we want some men who will go among them to ascertain the nature and extent of the spiritual destitution prevailing among them and solicit and receive funds to supply services and reading material which may be needed.–We know that much has been done in this direction by pious and philanthropic individuals, but they had neither the time nor the money to do all that should have been done. Let us have a man who can give himself wholly to this work. He will be able, not only to accomplish much within the limits of our own State, but will also render efficient aid in securing and forwarding funds and religious reading matter to our soldiers in Virginia. The Convention at its recent session in this city, took no action in reference to the matter, but referred it to the Board of Managers. They meet to-day and the question will come before them for decision. We cannot tell what course they will adopt, but we think the step which we have recommended will receive the approbation of the Baptists of North Carolina. A brother who attended the late session of the Convention wrote to us after he went home, expressing his disappointment and regret that the Convention had done nothing to push forward this work, and we think that his feelings are shared by many others. We hope therefore that the Board will adopt such measures as will meet the wishes and expectations of the denomination in the State.
Thus concerned Baptists of North Carolina await to see what will happen regarding this matter of Christianizing their home state soldiers.
Source: Biblical Recorder, November 27, 1861 (link)
