Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 July 1875 — RELIGIOUS AND EDUCATIONAL. [ARTICLE]

RELIGIOUS AND EDUCATIONAL.

—The faculty of Yale College have forbidden the Sophomore secret societies on the ground that they- are productive Of insubordination and other evils. f —The American Sunday-School Union lalxirs for the children and youth in the needy and neglected places. During the month of May it organized and aided 150 Sunday-Schools in the Northwest, which had a membership of 581 teachers and 4,591 scholars. —An ecclesiastical question of some importance has been settled in Russia by the elevation of a secular priest—who had been married—to the episcopate. By an Imperial decree the Arch-priest Marcel Popiel, of tlie United Greek Church, waa made Orthodox Bishop of Lublin upon his entry into the Russian Church. —The condition of the expelled nuns in Italy is described as most pitiable. Many of them, in their old age, are totally without means or resource, and their number adds to the calamity. Charity fails to relieve their distress, and those whose lives were devoted to the succor of tin' poor, tin' sick and the ignorant are now without home or shelter. —An Ohio Superintendent sends this circular to Sunday-school absentees: “We have missed you from your place for several weeks. We are sorry to have you stay away. Won’t you come as regularly as you can hereafter, beginning next Sunday ? Don’t let anything but sickness or absence from town keep you from Sunday-school, will you? Affectionately, your Superintendent.” —Bishop Cummins has a letter from a clergyman in the island of Tobago, British West Indies, giving the following information: “I am authorized by the Leeward parishes of this island, namely, St. David’s and St. Patrick’s congregations, of about 3,000 attendants and 500 communicants, to express our united desire to join the Reformed Episcopal Church, placing ourselves under your Episcopal charge.” A cordial reply has been sent. —From the “ Association Notes” of the Young Men’s Christian Association it appears that thirty-eight of the associations throughout the country have found employment for 8,721 persons; 83 hold daily prayer-meetings; 387 hold regular weekly prayer-meetings; 114 conduct 185 openair prayer-meetings, and 128 conduct weekly Bible classes. In addition, the associations have conducted 730 prayermeetings in jails, hospitals and schoolhouses.