[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 14]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 18639-18640]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 RECOGNIZING THE 150TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MT. PLEASANT COMMUNITY CHURCH

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. DARLENE HOOLEY

                               of oregon

                    in the house of representatives

                     Wednesday, September 15, 2004

  Ms. HOOLEY of Oregon. Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege today to 
recognize the Mt. Pleasant Community Church near Stayton, OR, a 
historic church that has served as a place of worship since its 
construction in 1854. As the oldest building west of the Rocky 
Mountains that has been continuously used as a church, Mt. Pleasant 
Community Church will celebrate its 150 years of history on Saturday.
  The permanence of this church is remarkable considering the massive 
changes that have occurred in the surrounding world since it was built. 
When Mt. Pleasant Community Church was founded, Oregon was a sparsely 
populated territory that had not yet become a state; Abraham Lincoln 
was a former Member of Congress who had retired from politics to return 
to law; and the union had not yet been torn apart by the Civil War. 
Over the church's 150-year history, our country has seen amazing 
technological change, from the Industrial Revolution and the invention 
of the car and the airplane to the rise of information technology and 
the birth of the Internet. And the position the United States occupies 
in the world has changed as well: During this century and a half that 
Mt. Pleasant has stood in the Willamette Valley, empires have risen and 
fallen, and the United States has risen to a position of unparalleled 
power in the world.
  Yet despite all these changes, Mt. Pleasant has remained, one small 
church serving the spiritual and social needs of the community. Even as 
members have come and gone, the church remains, both as a building and 
an institution, as a place of worship and fellowship,

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a vital part of the spiritual life of the community.

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