Notice to the First Episcopal District
Christian Recorder: February 14, 1889
Dear Brethren: -- Letters which are sent me occasionally indicate that my presence in the First District would be of some benefit to our work. But I am home at my writing desk hard at work seventeen hours out of every twenty-four. But Bishop Tanner, who is in Philadelphia for the present, has kindly consented to take the oversight of the district during my absence. Please confer with him, etc. When he visits any of your churches please do not beg everybody out of the church before raising his traveling expenses, or be so dignified that you cannot ask for anything and then hand him virtually nothing and whisper in his ear that your officers are to blame. He has found out those tricks already.
A large number of eminent pastors, General Officers and Bishops have requested me to pay no attention to Bishop Wayman’s declination, in observing the twenty-fifth anniversary of his and Bishop Campbell’s election to the episcopacy; as Bishop Wayman did not elect or ordain himself, nor did he decline either at the time; As Bishop Arnett well says, “It is not his Bishopric but the bishopric of the Church.” I concur with DD’s Handy, Smith, Thompson, Brown and others that Bishop Wayman is the servant of the Church; as Bishop Payne puts it, “A slave of the Church.” The committee will therefore proceed with the contemplated anniversary. As we expect to make it the occasion of a great organization for the future good of our ministry. It is time to stop letting so many of our great workers linger upon sick beds like paupers and be buried like dogs when dead. This is common in all the colored churches of the land. May 23rd will be the twenty-fifth anniversary.
H. M. Turner.
