62 Separation or Continuity, Which?
discern our rights guaranteed under the constitution of the
Church. The principal of Christianity underlies our continua¬
tion in the Church. Our Church at present stands as the last
hope in the order of Divine Providence to bind the races together
in any large degree in a united Methodism. We furnish the
only nucleus for a union of all Methodists. Let this relation be
broken up, and to all human view it is for the ages a divided
white and black Methodism. Separation means for us ostra¬
cism. There is no reason for another colored denomination*
We know that in our present relationship we stand for something
distinctive, for the principal of the brotherhood of all men in
Christ. We cannot be forced out. We have a right to stay,
since we were born in the Church. We are determined to face
the issues what ever they be. we cannot afford to give up the
struggle and permit ourselves to be set aside who have been al¬
ways true to the Church, to make way for a seceded Methodism
simply on the ground of color. We are a genuine part of the
Church with rights and immunities like all other members.
Can a bishop or any one else in the Church persuade 250,000
to forget their relation to the Methodist Episcopal Church ? No
one can force us to forfeit our rights. Nothing but the sheerest,
haziest imagination can anticipate the future withdrawal of our
people from the Methodist Episcopal Church. We do not say
it is impossible for us to agree to some plan of separation if we
are repressed on account of our color. Our continuation in the
Church is urged from expediency and inherent rights.
(a) Expediency because separation will open an impassable
gulf between the white and colored Methodists in the United
States. Separation would deprire us of advantages that come from
contact with a race that has a better chance than we. More than
three-fourth of the Christian world disapproves of any Church
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