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Dear Teetotalers, Moderates, and Lushes:
On this first anniversary of my letters to you about the zany sector of religion-land, I feel like celebrating. My crude wielding of the ecclesiastical mace has occasionally brought a brace of flying missals my way, but somehow I’ve survived. To commemorate this great day, I suggest we all hoist a few. By so doing we also can strike a blow against the alcohol problem in America, in accordance with recommendations in the new book, Alcohol Problems: A Report to the Nation. The report suggests, among other things, the use of alcoholic beverages at church youth gatherings to help modify improper attitudes toward liquor and thus curb alcoholism. So join me and my friend John Barleycorn as we educate the youth. Come on, have a snort. After all, you don’t want to become an alcoholic, do you?
Please don’t think I no longer respect your abstinence. But you must realize that if you look upon “the sauce” as forbidden fruit, you will subconsciously develop a thirst for it. And when you finally give way to your restrained desire for liquid courage, you’ll be three sheets to the wind in nothing flat. I mean you’ll be plastered, potted, pickled, blotto, smashed, stewed, and stoned.
Thaaat’s right! Down the hatch. Say, you’re really getting in the spirit of this occasion. You’ll surely not be a party pooper at our new series of B.Y.O.B. meetings at the church. No, not Bring Your Own Bible. Bring Your Own Booze. In case you forget, we’ll have some Christian Brothers brandy handy. If necessary, man, we’ll trundle out the vintage where the grapes and mash are stored. Then after we bend the elbow a few times at “the dear old temple bar we love so well,” we’ll join in a sad rendition of the “Whiffenpoof Song”: Baa, baa, baa. We may have to install a brass rail on the mourner’s bench.
By hooch, hasn’t this celebration been a blast? What a way to put demon rum on the run! Since that NCC official said our solution to the drinking problem will tend to be wet, our church meetings should always follow an open-tap policy. As those theologically tipsy clergymen sloganize: “Draft beer, not people!” Every time we churchmen meet, we should hoist our glasses high to strike a bloody blow against problems brought on by the nectar of the gods. Now, everybody, bottoms up!
Cheers,
EUTYCHUS III
450 YEARS AFTER
Thank you so much for the wonderful article (Oct. 27), “95 Theses … for the 450th Anniversary of the Reformation,” by John Warwick Montgomery.
The denomination to which I have always belonged is one that seems to be taking the lead in “way out” thinking, and the stressing of social concerns, before the spiritual development of its flock. This may cause us someday to shed tears for our lost offspring.
One wonders at the ministers and teachers who dare to preach less than the real Gospel of Jesus Christ when one studies the New Testament truths for oneself. Yes, we are apt to be led straight to hell by these false teachers. But the average member of our churches hasn’t studied the Scriptures very thoroughly, and looks to his minister for truth.…
When the churches take a stand for peace at any price, knowing that the enemy is a godless one, led by Satan and not by the Holy Spirit, it would do us all good to read your good articles, and think and pray and communicate our weakness and our lack of spiritual vision to our Heavenly Father, and ask for more insight into his will for us.
MRS. RODGER BRODIN
Minneapolis, Minn.
Jesus was condemned by the orthodox of that day. Luther was condemned by the orthodox of that day. John Wesley was condemned by the orthodox of his day because he took the Gospel out of the Church (institutionalized) and into the mining towns and the open fields. The orthodox of today in the institutionalized church are the ones who are condemning anyone who attempts to take the Gospel into the world in anything but the eighteenth-century revivalist terminology; and John Warwick Montgomery (and his cohorts) condemn those who try to interpret the Gospel in the language of the twentieth century.…
What is so sacred about the way the Gospel was preached in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries?
STUART I. PRICE
Brillion Methodist Church
Brillion, Wis.
Like the original Ninety-five Theses, the declarations were rooted in the biblical faith, were based upon man’s timeless need to rely upon the all-sufficiency of Christ, and reaffirmed the fact that religion must be intensely individual to have vital implications either spiritually or socially.
We hear much chatter about relevance; here was something truly relevant!
HAROLD L. TROTT
St. Paul’s Reformed Episcopal Chapel
Albuquerque, N. Mex.
It was nothing less than shocking to read the following in your editorial “Remember the Reformation!” (Sept. 29):
“Roman Catholicism, inspired by saintly leaders from Ignatius Loyola to Pope John XXIII, has sought internal reforms …”
“Observance of Reformation Day will be ecumenically meaningful …”
Ignatius Loyola’s rules include the following unreasonable dictates:
“Rule 1: Setting aside all judgment, we ought to have a spirit which is prepared and ready to obey completely … the hierarchical church.”
“Rule 13: We should always be disposed to believe that the white which I see is black if the hierarchical church so declares it.”
Pope John XXIII was known to have used blasphemy as blatantly as any agnostic. In the light of these facts, how can any honest historically cognizant evangelical publication call men such as these “saintly leaders”?
JOHN JAMES
Ottawa Bible Church
Ottawa, Kan.
Thank you for a thought-provoking editorial (“Protestantism’s Lost Momentum,” Oct. 27). Let us say “sola scriptura” and “sola fide.” Recently I was reading in the Today’s Modern Version, “For the wife is the head of the husband, even as Blake is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.”
JAMES D. MCGOVERN
The Church of Christ
Pomeroy, Ohio
WORDS FOR WYCLIFFE
I found the article “Wycliffe Translators: A Controversial Success” (Oct. 27) very interesting. As a former member of another evangelical mission I have had a number of contacts with the Wycliffe Translators, and am well aware of the facts which you present. I think that it is timely that the Christian public be informed of such matters. So much is heard in the homelands of the romance, the adventure, the success of missions. So little is heard of the hard, cold facts of sustaining a missionary enterprise, conventional or not, in a hostile environment.…
A further concern, which you do not mention, is the fact that Wycliffe does very little in some fields towards the organization and establishment of the local church—surely the prime objective of all evangelism should be the building up of the local church. Because of the secular, scientific image projected by Wycliffe into their relationships with foreign countries, their missionaries are almost precluded in many situations from becoming actively involved in the work of the national church.
On the positive side, I agree that Wycliffe has chalked up some very real accomplishments in the field of Bible translation. Furthermore a total budget of $5,000,000 divided by a membership of 2,000 works out at $2,500 per person per annum to pay for everything—a very real indication of the measure of personal sacrifice involved.
F. J. SMITH
Brantford, Ont.
The rather picayunish charges listed as sometimes hurled at Wycliffe by evangelical missionaries may miss the real issue.… More significant is the role that Wycliffe and others have played in siphoning a disproportionate amount of missionary resources from strategic, high-population areas to sparsely populated tropical rain forests. In some instances, and Ecuador might be an example, Wycliffe seems to have set up an expensive parallel to existing missionary outreach to indigenous tribes. A more appropriate alternative in such countries would have been for Wycliffe to have sent linguistic specialists to cooperate with translators already working in the tribes.
This is written from a background of twelve years of personal overseas experience in which warm friendship and mutual cooperation was developed between our missionary staff and translators from the Summer Institute of Linguistics.
PAUL ERDEL
Foreign Secretary
The Missionary Church Association
Fort Wayne, Ind.
The article [says], “Total Wycliffe membership stands at nearly 2,000, making it the world’s largest Protestant missionary organization.”
I would not detract from Wyclffe’s great accomplishments, but for the sake of accuracy I call attention to the fact that the “overseas” missionary force of the Southern Baptist Convention stood at 2,279 as of September 1.
M. O. OWENS, JR.
Parkwood Baptist Church
Gastonia, N. C.
• We erred in crediting Wycliffe with the title “world’s largest.” Apologies to the rightful claimants, the redoubtable Southern Baptists.—ED.
A MEANS TO THE END?
Your editorial on “the Danger of Christian-Marxist Dialogue” (Oct. 27) demonstrated to me your lack of faith in the providence of God, a misunderstanding of the ultimate need of man for God, and an ignorance of religious life in Russia.…
Could it not be that God in his providential care is working through the “revisionists, demythologized, dedogmatized” Marxists to bring once again freedom and the Gospel of our Lord to the Russian people and other suppressed peoples of the Communist world?…
We criticize their bond of “humanistic orientation” and “the need for revolutionary political action.” Evangelicals may not be able to go the whole route with either the Communists or the secularist theologians, but the living and written Word certainly does not disengage us from humane concerns and social, political action. My biblical faith and understandings portray a revolutionary Gospel.
There may be dangers in such dialogue, but since when do we operate out of a fear to communicate rather than out of passionate concern to use any means at our disposal to glorify Christ that men might know the benefits of his Kingdom? May the spirit of love rather than the spirit of fear push us. May faith in a providential God rather than a stale belief in a God boxed in by creeds motivate us to be where creative possibilities exist to redeem man and society.
MYRON R. CHARTIER
Baptist Campus Center
Hays, Kan.
COUNCIL COUNSEL
After reading “The Council and the Bible” (Oct. 27), this thought occurred to me: Why was not Dr. Hughes invited to write the “Response” to the Constitution on Divine Revelation in The Documents of Vatican II? His sympathetic understanding combined with incisive critique stand in sharp contrast to the vapid ramblings of the response contributed by Dr. F. C. Grant. Could it be that the Roman church is invincibly ignorant of the existence of evangelical scholarship?
WILLIAM S. SAILER
Evangelical Congregational School of Theology
Myerstown, Pa.
THE WAY IT IS
The carefully worded news item (“Church Anti-Poverty Problems,” Oct. 27) concerning Senator James Eastland’s declaration on the Senate floor concerning the Child Development Group of Mississippi still manages to discredit the United Presbyterian Board of National Missions as the administration office of the project.…
You should have been cognizant of the attitude of a man who represents Mississippi, a state where every effort to aid the Negro is hindered, even if it means the murder of civil-rights workers and the burial of their bodies in an earthen dam, and the mass display of the emblem of rebellion by the spectators at the nationally televised football game at the state university.
H. GLENN STEPHENS
Adena-Harrisville United Presbyterian Churches
Adena, Ohio
SOCIAL WORK
Traditional fundamental Christianity has been accused of emphasizing individualistic salvation in the spiritual sphere to the neglect of social improvement. How inaccurate this accusation is, is highlighted in Christiana Tsai, Queen of the Dark Chamber:
Who can estimate the results of missionary service in China? It made Christ known; it built churches, schools, orphanages and hospitals far and wide; it opened the door for women to enter the schools and have the same opportunities as men; it helped rouse the people to the evils of foot binding for women, and opium smoking; it healed the sick and brought comfort to the blind, the deaf, the dumb and the lepers; it brought knowledge of sanitation, fed famine victims, and cared for the war sufferers; it helped prepare Chinese of the following generation to take over the missionaries’ work, to carry on their own evangelistic campaigns, and build their own churches; it showed the infinite value of a human soul in God’s eyes, and wherever the light of the Gospel shown, it enlightened that society so that it soon outstripped other places in its progress toward modern culture.
I earnestly hope that the pages of CHRISTIANITY TODAY will continue to point up the total values of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. LESTER E. PIPKIN Appalachian Bible Institute President Bradley, W. Va.
GOOD DEAL!
Since you are mending your ways by dropping the freeloaders, I have decided to mend mine by a clean confession and a renewal of my subscription by accepting the deal you have made.
BILL G. CAMPBELL
Southland Baptist Church
Houston, Tex.
Thank you for the many free copies of your journal. I am enclosing a very modest check, in token of my appreciation, as a gift. I myself am liberal in my outlook but have profited by your publication, and it has enriched my sermons.
CLARENCE NETH
Columbia Station, Ohio
My thanks to … the entire staff for so fine a magazine. The world needs magazines like yours, and I hope that it will never suffer as so many other good Christian magazines have suffered. I am enclosing my check to cover a year’s subscription.
E. JAMES CAIN
First Baptist Church
Elko, Nevada
For my money, CHRISTIANITY TODAY just has to be one of the best of today’s journals, irrespective of classification. This is evident from the fact that my Christianity Today gift-subscription list is the longest of all such lists.
JOHN F. SCHMIDT
Peoria, Ill.
CHRISTIANITY TODAY will reinforce every aspect of my ministry.…
CECIL F. MCKEE
Department of Corrections Chaplain
Huntsville, Tex.
I take this opportunity to congratulate you on producing an evangelical magazine that I don’t feel uneasy about lending.
DENNIS G. PAPE
Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil
BANG!
The October 13 cover was armed with a delayed-action fuse. After careful surveillance of the menacing fieldpiece topping a formidable offensive arsenal, I did a double take at spotting the tracer and spent projectile of the secularist salvo.
OVERTON W. BROWN
Chiapas, Mexico
SPACIOUS TOGETHERNESS?
Immediately following an editorial which seems to plead for the united thrust of evangelicals upon a divided world for the salvation of mankind (“Ours Is the Generation,” Oct. 13) comes the editorial concerning the need and nature of conversion (“The Urgency of Personal Conversion”). In stating that “Christianity proclaims original sin” the writer once again has driven the dividing wedge between myself and him. If we are ever going to get together we had better allow a little more room in the areas of opinion of our theology or we shall remain poles apart.
RICHARD L. JONES
Westfield Church of Christ
Porterville, Calif.
THE TIE THAT BINDS
Your news story, “‘Divided They Merge’” (Oct. 13), and its poll were most interesting. If your poll of the faith of the Missouri Synod ministry is correct, it would appear that a small minority of the Synod’s spiritual leaders are masters of mendacity. Some of the questions are poorly worded. However, faith in Christ’s physical resurrection and virgin birth, a personal devil, and a divine judgment with positive and negative consequences have always been accepted by the Synod. All pastors and teachers are required to accept the Scriptures, the three ecumenical creeds, and the Lutheran Symbols which teach these doctrines. It seems to me that any minister who no longer holds these basic beliefs is obligated by honesty to deny them openly and to withdraw from the Synod, which still accepts them (e.g. The New York Convention, summer, 1967). I would not regard such a minister as my co-worker in Christ, and it seems that the last verse of the Athanasian Creed supports this belief.
DONALD POHLERS
Sea Cliff, N.Y.
EPISCOPALIANS EXPLAIN
Thank you for the rather full coverage given to the General Convention of the Episcopal Church (News, Oct. 13). But why must such reporting always tend to be so quantitative?…
The provision for trial use of the “New Liturgy” got pushed to a mere mention at the conclusion of your article. With the ecclesiastical body’s celebration of the Mass being the most thoroughly Christian action possible—the beginning and end and central action of our lives on earth—is it not much more consistent to give such action of the convention more than a mere notice? Certainly it is more significant than much of the superficial matter so thoroughly covered in your article. The last revision of our Prayer Book was effected in 1928, and a very minor one at that. Our Eucharistic Liturgy has been practically the same since its adoption in 1789–178 years! And practically all the revisions since the 1552 English Liturgy have been attempts to “patch up” the work of Cranmer since he abandoned what was essentially his English translation of the Latin Mass of 1549. Now we have something which appears to be fresh, dynamic, living, and meaningful for the people of God today.
Along this same line, the fact that the resolutions “authorizing and creating the machinery for a revision of the Book of Common Prayer” were adopted by the Convention was not mentioned. And finally we are permitted to use translations of Holy Scripture other than the AV, including the Jerusalem Bible, NEB, and RSV, for any lections, including those at Mass as well as at the Offices.
Finally, must we continue to beat a dead dog? Neither I nor any of my brother clergy in the Episcopal Church are “Protestant ministers” as you indicate on page 48. As it is generally understood within the context of the current (at least) American dichotomy, bishops, priests, and deacons within the tradition of the apostolic succession cannot be termed “Protestant ministers”!
GUS L. FRANKLIN
Saint Paul’s Cathedral
Springfield, Ill.
I feel as a clergyman of the Episcopal Church that I cannot just sit back and let your article go without comment.
The title alone—“Episcopal Church Endorses COCU”—is rather misleading. The General Convention approved the report of the Consultation on Church Union (with no audible opposition either) and commended their work, but made it quite clear that the Episcopal delegation had no mandate or authority to go beyond the talking stage when it came to discussions of organic unity. Further debate and discussion by some future General Convention will have to take place, and that convention will have to authorize the delegation to go ahead before anything more than talk can be done. Please—we have enough problems as it is convincing our own people that COCU is worthwhile with out having to cope with a misleading press.
Secondly—we do not “sack” bishops! The discussions were not about “sacking” bishops but about what procedures should be implemented to deal with a bishop who seems to be talking in a direction opposite the orthodox. The old canon stated that a bishop could be “presented” upon the written advice of three bishops. The new canon makes presentment very difficult, as was noted by the writer, requiring the written consent of ten bishops to start the proceedings and the written consent of two-thirds of all the bishops in the American church to proceed to the trial. So you see, we just don’t up and “sack” bishops!
BRUCE G. BREHM
The Church of St. Edward the Martyr
New York, N. Y.
CHOOSING SIDES
Dr. Hunnex’s article, “Have the Secularists Ambushed God?” (Oct. 13), is food for thought by all laymen and clergy who are concerned about the influence of the peddlers of secular theology.
How such teachers or scholars can so blatantly ignore the historical significance of the Church’s dependence on Holy Scripture as an absolute guide to man’s understanding of God, his Son, and man’s struggles with forces outside of himself—objective in every sense—is a tragic commentary on the pride of man. Searching for new truth is always commendable; but inventing “truth” at the expense of established truths is tragic! It seems that “subjectivity” has come to mean “invented truth.”
One basic truism that the secular theologians seem to miss (or ignore) is that man is historically linked to his past. The long chain of history was forged by the supreme Maker, and not a flaw or crack can be found in any generational link because all of the links are mysteriously tied together, bound up in the procreative system established by the Creator. He has made us, and he will not abandon his own; neither will he be “secularized.” No matter how much the mind of man may be determined to compartmentalize God, man must always be man (limited), and God must always be God (unlimited)!
I’ll “stick to the original teachings” (1 John 2:24, Phillips), as Dr. Hunnex suggests. The foundations are clearer, surer, and stronger. Besides, history is on our side!
WALTER W. SCOTT
Executive Vice-President
American Sunday-School Union
Philadelphia, Pa.
James Montgomery Boice
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Second of Two Parts
Luke has always been highly regarded for historical accuracy and for his breadth of knowledge. Nevertheless, his reliability has often been questioned. And the pall of doubt falling on one part of the work inevitably casts a shadow on the whole. Can the Gospel According to Luke and the Acts of the Apostles be trusted? In some ways this question is more important than the question whether the Gospel of John is reliable, the problem discussed in the previous section of this article. John’s Gospel could be regarded as a somewhat restructured, even stylized, account of Jesus’ ministry. But Luke explicitly claims to be writing an “orderly account” of Jesus’ life and of the rapid expansion of the early Christian Church (Luke 1:1–4 and Acts 1:1, 2).
What can be said about Luke’s accuracy? In some places there will never be a way to check his data, for often his statements are unique. Over the years, however, Luke’s reputation has progressively been enhanced through archaeology and historical research.
The Accuracy of Luke
It is difficult today to imagine the obstacles that faced a historian in ancient times. There were no newspapers—in fact, no printed documents of any kind. The official records of the Roman Empire were not distributed. Postal service was available only for military or governmental correspondence, and it was irregular. There were few books.
In addition, the task of writing the history of the early Christian Church had its special problems. Herodotus wrote about the clash of empires and Thucydides about the well-known struggles between Athens and Sparta at the height of their influence. But Christianity was, at the beginning, a small and insignificant movement among the lowest classes of society. It was under local leadership. Yet it spread so rapidly that within forty years after the death and resurrection of Christ there were Christian congregations in most of the major cities of the empire—from the eastern capitals of Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Antioch to Rome itself—and in many lesser places. To capture this movement and present it intelligently, concentrating upon its major figures and its major lines of advance, was a monumental task.
Yet this is precisely what Luke did. He speaks of thirty-two countries, fifty-four cities, and nine of the Mediterranean islands, and he presents them in such a way as to chronicle the spread of the Gospel from Jerusalem to Rome. He speaks of four emperors and indicates their significance for Christianity. He speaks of many prominent men: Roman governors (Quirinius, Pilate, Sergius Paulus, Gallio, Felix, and Festus), Herod the Great and his descendants (Herod Antipas, Herod Agrippa I, Herod Agrippa II, Bernice, and Drusilla), and leading Jewish figures such as Annas, Caiaphas, Ananias, and Gamaliel.
Clearly, Luke is concerned to present the expansion of Christianity in its broadest scope within the Roman world and to commend the Christian faith to the widest possible spectrum of intelligent Gentile readers. But this is a dangerous procedure. For having painted upon so broad a canvas and for so wide an audience and having thereby given his critical readers many points to test his work, the author may anticipate rejection of his message if the facts are wrong. Luke, however, repeatedly passes the highest test of accuracy.
1. In the first place, Luke shows amazing accuracy in handling official titles and the corresponding spheres of influence. In a small book entitled The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable?, Professor F. F. Bruce of the University of Manchester is at some pains to document this fact. He writes:
“One of the most remarkable tokens of his accuracy is his sure familiarity with the proper titles of all the notable persons who are mentioned in his pages. This was by no means such an easy feat in his days as it is in ours, when it is so simple to consult convenient books of reference. The accuracy of Luke’s use of the various titles in the Roman Empire has been compared to the easy and confident way in which an Oxford man in ordinary conversation will refer to the Heads of colleges by their proper titles—the Provost of Oriel, the Master of Balliol, the Rector of Exeter, the President of Magdalen, and so on. A non-Oxonian like the present writer never feels quite at home with the multiplicity of these Oxford titles” [p. 82].
Luke does feel at home with the Roman titles, however, and he never gets them wrong.
Moreover, Bruce adds, “Luke had a further difficulty in that the titles sometimes did not remain the same for any great length of time.” A province might pass from administration by a direct representative of the emperor to senatorial government, and would then be governed by a proconsul rather than an imperial legate (legatus pro praetore). Cyprus, for instance, an imperial province until 22 B.C., became a senatorial province in that year and was therefore governed no longer by an imperial legate but by a proconsul. Thus, when Paul and Barnabas arrived in Cyprus about A.D. 47, it was the proconsul Sergius Paulus who greeted them (Acts 13:7).
Similarly, Achaia was a senatorial province from 27 B.C. to A.D. 15, and again subsequent to A.D. 44. Hence, Luke refers to Gallio, the Roman ruler in Greece, as “the proconsul of Achaia” (Acts 18:12), the title of the Roman representative during the time of Paul’s visit to Corinth but not during the twenty-nine years prior to A.D. 44 (Bruce, op. cit., pp. 82, 83). Such accuracy is remarkable and argues forcefully for Luke’s care in writing and for his presence at many of the events he describes.
2. In Acts 19:38, the town clerk of Ephesus attempts to calm the rioting citizens by referring them to the Roman authorities. “There are proconsuls,” he says, using the plural. This remark might be considered inaccurate since there was only one Roman proconsul in a given area at a time. But an examination of the data shows that only a short time before the rioting in Ephesus, Junius Silanus, the proconsul, had been murdered by messengers from Agrippina, the mother of Nero, who was yet in adolescence (Bruce, op. cit., p. 83). Thus, since the new proconsul had not arrived in Ephesus, the town clerk’s vagueness may be intentional. It may also be, as Bruce suggests, that the words refer to the two emissaries who had committed the murder, Helius and Celer, who were Silanus’s apparent successors. Disturbances among the populace seem especially appropriate in a time of turmoil among the ruling classes.
3. In a number of places in the Book of Acts (16:10–17; 20:5 to 21:18; and 27:1 to 28:16) Luke speaks in the first person, indicating that he himself was with the characters he mentions and thus an eyewitness of the events. In one of these passages, that which relates the dangerous journey in which Paul was taken to Rome for trial, the technical vocabulary used for the parts of the ship and its management by the sailors is so precise, as shown by other ancient texts, that it is believable not only that Luke was present on the ship, as he indicates, but also that he had taken some time to learn the sailors’ vocabulary.
Readers should exercise great humility in the presence of works whose factual details have so often been vindicated.
4. In the broad sweep of his two-part work, Luke has occasion to report the words of many different people: Jews, like Stephen and Peter; Romans, such as Felix and Festus; and international and bilingual figures, such as the Apostle Paul. These men undoubtedly expressed themselves in different ways and geared their addresses to different audiences. But in each case Luke captures the tone of the speech correctly. Paul’s address to the Greeks of Athens is a remarkable example of a learned apologetic to cultured pagans. The sermons by Peter recorded in the first half of the Book of Acts preserve Aramaic turns of expression, even though they are written for a Gentile audience and recorded in Greek.
It is of interest for this general subject that the accounts of the virgin birth of Christ and the accompanying events of those early days bear a stronger Aramaic flavor than any correspondingly long passage in the New Testament, as J. G. Machen observed years ago. To conservative scholars, this is clear evidence of the antiquity of that section of the Gospel, a section embodying either a very early written tradition or else the personal reminiscences of Mary, whose point of view is reflected throughout.
5. Just as the tone of the speeches is varied, so also were the cities Luke mentions in the course of the narrative. There was Antioch, with its tumultuous mixture of races, its busy atmosphere, and its irreverent populace (as the Emperor Julian found to his mortification many years later). There was Jerusalem, tense and hostile, on the brink of a war that finally erupted in violence and led to the destruction of the city in A.D. 70. There was Ephesus, with its business interests centered in the cult of the goddess Diana. And there were many other cities, each with its own particular flavor. Luke paints each picture perfectly, showing either that he himself was present or that he gathered his information about these places from reliable witnesses.
Any presentation of evidence for the reliability of the Lukan material should mention, however, that in at least two places the author of Luke-Acts appears to be in error, at least on the basis of the information available to historians today. In Luke 2:2, at the beginning of the well-known Christmas story, the evangelist says that the taxing under Caesar Augustus was made while Quirinius was governor of Syria. Apparently this is impossible, for Quirinius became governor of Syria in A.D. 6, ten years after the death of Herod the Great, in whose lifetime Jesus Christ was born. Several solutions to this problem have been offered, the most successful being the arguments for a prior governorship of Syria by Quirinius. But no solution has met with general acceptance.
Similarly, Luke seems to commit an anachronism as well as to reverse the order of two well-known revolutionaries in Acts 5:36, 37. He reports in a speech by Gamaliel that the rebellion under Judas, which took place in A. D. 6, the year in which Quirinius became governor of Syria, was preceded by a rebellion under Theudas. But Josephus dates Theudas’s rebellion A. D. 45, after that of Judas and at least ten years after Gamaliel’s speech in Acts. One may suggest, however, either that Josephus may be the one who is wrong, or that Luke is referring to another Theudas, otherwise unknown to us, who lived in the time he indicates.
In such cases a careful historian will suspend his judgment until further information appears, and he will exercise great humility before a work whose factual details have so often been vindicated.
Pauline Authorship
The writings of the Apostle Paul do not pose the same problems of historical reliability as the Gospels and the Book of Acts, and few scholars of any note question their historical statements. Instead, critical questions have centered around the authorship of the books themselves, particularly the pastoral letters—First and Second Timothy and Titus. According to the most articulate critics, the pastorals differ in style and vocabulary from those letters definitely known to be Pauline and reflect a type of church organization unknown before the second century. To explain the letters’ own statements that Paul is their author, such writers appeal to the alleged acceptance of pseudonymous writing in ancient times. To write in the name of another person was an accepted practice, we are told, and no one considered a pseudonymous work deliberate forgery.
Whatever the value of some of these points of argument (and the value of the evidence varies), it is apparent at the very least that the matter is one of probability. For if the explicit claims of the books to be Pauline are rejected, there are no definitive data to resolve the issue. When, therefore, the alleged disparity in style is set forth as evidence of an author other than Paul, a number of conscientious scholars, without denying the differences, also bring forward factors that weigh against this possibility. And they do so more and more.
The Parable Of The White Rat
One day a scientist who was experimenting with white rats created an intricate maze, and in it he placed one of his choice white rats named “Theo” (short for “Theologian”).
For days and weeks Theo was puzzled about the mysteries of the scientist’s creation. He said to the other white rats in the laboratory, “How great is our scientist!”
Then one day, after weeks of experimenting, Theo was able to solve the baffling network of the maze.
With an air of arrogance, he turned to the other white rats in the laboratory and said, “Our scientist is dead.”—RAY E. STAHL, director of information, Milligan College, in Milligan College, Tennessee.
In the first place, it has become very evident that the form of church organization reflected in the pastoral letters was not confined to the Church of the second century. In actual fact, the offices mentioned (presbyter and deacon) may be of considerable antiquity, for they are reflected in a striking way in the Dead Sea Scrolls, all of which are dated before A. D. 70 and many of which are considerably older. On this point W. F. Albright observes:
The repudiation of the Pastoral Epistles of Paul, now commonly assigned by critical scholars to the second quarter of the second century A. D., becomes rather absurd when we discover that the institution of overseers or superintendents (episkopoi, our bishops) in Timothy and Titus, as well as in the earliest extra-biblical Christian literature, is virtually identical with the Essene institution of mebaqqerim (sometimes awkwardly rendered as ‘censors’) [From the Stone Age to Christianity, p. 23].
There is also increasing cause to question the cavalier manner in which some writers ascribe the acceptance of pseudonymity to the New Testament age. For a number of years some scholars, among them Donald Guthrie, have maintained that evidence for the acceptance of this practice in ancient times is entirely lacking. Now an elaborate work in German—Pseudonimität im Altertum, by Joseph Sint—has made the same point with great erudition and with characteristic German thoroughness. Since two epistles attributed to Paul by the second-century Muratorian fragment (the Epistles to the Laodiceans and to the Alexandrians) were rejected from the canon by the later Church, it might also be argued that the Church of the third century certainly did not accept the principle of pseudonymity and that the Christian scholars of that age, whose language was Greek and who lived much closer to Paul in time than we ourselves, accepted the pastoral books as genuine.
It is not a mark of obscurantism, therefore, if the conservative scholar adheres to the traditional authorship of the pastorals, and includes in his conviction of the reliability of the New Testament documents the belief that they are reliable on questions of their authorship.
Contemporary New Testament studies do not prove the total reliability of the New Testament documents. No amount of research could do that, for frequently the necessary facts are lacking. Nevertheless, the studies of recent years, some of which have been noted, have gone a long way to verify the extraordinary reliability of these books. Verification of the biblical writings is often slow, and many are impatient with the slowness. But little by little the data seems to come. It comes from archaeology, from history, and from a better understanding of the sacred and secular texts. It will also, we believe, continue to come, until, in God’s good time, the sum-total of the overwhelming evidence for an integrated and reliable Bible is complete.
Milton D. Hunnex is professor and head of the department of philosophy at Willamette University, Salem, Oregon. He received the B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Redlands and the Ph.D. in the Inter-collegiate Program in Graduate Studies, Claremont, California. He is author of “Philosophies and Philosophers.”
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Merville O. Vincent
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Four ethical systems are very evident on the contemporary North American scene. Three emphasize a single basis for decisions: for one it is freedom, for another law, and for the third love. But each of these principles alone is inadequate. The fourth system successfully integrates these principles, and it alone is valid.
Existentialism
Jean-Paul Sartre is probably the best-known exponent of this view. Sartre believes there is no God, and he therefore is pessimistic about the human predicament. Man is alone in the universe, says the existentialist; he is free to act, but he is under the necessity to act in order to be free. He exists, but existence is void of meaning, absurd. Man is a biological curiosity, temporarily arising in nature, struggling to survive and to find meaning to life before he dies. He lives for himself and establishes values as situations arise. All guidelines are irrelevant. Authentic decisions arise spontaneously from man’s inner sense of what the moment demands.
For Sartre, freedom is the nearest thing to a guideline. There is no one correct decision for freedom to make in any circumstance. Decisions are not right or wrong; they are only authentically free or not free. In this view, man is condemned to a freedom so absolute that it knows no limits other than that of ceasing to be free at all. Unfortunately, many men who have never heard of existentialism or Sartre share this position and will say they “just do what is right”—decided solely by their feelings.
Hyperlegalism
This distortion of true Christian ethics is all too prevalent among Christians. Its spirit is to make hard and fast rules for everything and then maintain that they are biblical. This view makes absolutes of many things that are relative, things that individuals must decide on principle in their own situation. Is a Christian one who puts his faith in Christ and then “neither smokes, drinks, dances, or chews, nor associates with those who do”?
The lists of do’s and dont’s are often bound more closely to cultural traditions than to true biblical principles. However, those not bound by this legalism are often unnecessarily hostile and critical toward those who are.
Laws certainly have value, but they can be misused. There is often a confusion of the letter and the spirit of the law. Non-scriptural absolutes on such matters as dress and entertainment are sometimes stressed more than loving concern for others. Often the details of the code are transplanted directly from biblical times into the twentieth century, with the result that the underlying principles are missed. We can have the letter but miss the spirit. Thus concern for feminine modesty is lost sight of in the debates about hair length. Modesty is a constant, but the meaning of hair styles can vary. Such things must be understood in their earlier cultural context and then be translated accurately into the context of the twentieth century.
Many hyperlegalistic Christians are sincere, but they substitute appearance for responsible conduct. They may then do the right thing for the wrong reasons, thereby bringing little satisfaction to themselves and predisposing to rebellion those who see through the inconsistencies. It is worth remembering that hyperlegalism was soundly condemned by Christ: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity” (Matt. 23:27, 28).
Situation Ethics
In part, situation ethics is a reaction to the hyperlegalism that has at some times and in some places existed within the Church. But it is more. It is also a part of man’s recurrent temptation to overestimate himself, his reason, and his essential goodness. In short it is idolatry, the ethical equivalent of worshiping the created and neglecting the omniscience and sovereignity of the Creator. To the degree that situation ethics denounces excessive legalism, provincialism, pride, and oversimplification, it has merit. It has a healthy skepticism of traditions; but unfortunately it classes God-revealed laws and principles as “mere traditions” and concludes by making all absolutes relative.
It then follows inevitably that there are no rules that can be applied apart from the complex nature of the particular situation. Admonitions of Scripture are regarded as inflexible and therefore inadequate. The only guideline permitted is love. The question one must ask is: “What does love demand of me in this situation?” From this perspective no situation is always wrong. Because love can never express itself in absolute laws, one can never prejudge any situation.
But why this assumption? What is the basis for accepting the teachings of Christ on love as valid and universal, yet denying his confirmation of the Ten Commandments? Presumably just plain reason. But assuming that man is neither completely rational nor completely irrational, how can we be sure that the advocates of the new morality are correct? If Jesus is God, however, this fact alone provides a completely rational base for Christian ethics.
A major problem in situation ethics is that man cannot really define “a situation.” From his limited view, with all his subjectivity, a man simply cannot foresee the future repercussions of what he decides at this moment. Might not an omniscient God be able to see the total situation objectively and be able to define absolutes?
It is sometimes implied that Christ set the precedent of doing away with rules and substituting love. But this view fails to distinguish between rules made by God and rules made by men. We should be ready and willing to rebel against man-made rules and to substitute love. But God’s rules are an expression of his love. Christ did not do away with any of the Ten Commandments. He did, however, point out the way a legalistic spirit had thwarted the meaning of those laws. He broke down a number of man-made traditions about the Sabbath, for instance, but he did not say we were not to keep the Sabbath holy. Rather, he showed what it meant in the first century to keep the Sabbath holy. Certainly he expressed love to the woman taken in adultery; he treated her as a person with meaning and value and prevented her being stoned. But he did not say that adultery was right. On the contrary, he said, “Sin no more.”
The Scriptural Approach
This approach to ethics seems to provide the freedom, law, and love that the other approaches seek. It accepts love as the guiding principle of conduct, yet recognizes too that man is not completely rational in all his choices and that, without some guidelines, he can talk himself into many unloving things in the name of love.
Submission
Although corralled in Grace,
My will still sometimes balks
And stomps and stamps the earth
And rears and flails and neighs
Defiance, for
The bit is hard.
Once, Lord, you rode
An untried colt—
Unbroken, yet for you,
Submissive—and it heard
Hosannas to your name!
O Lord, subdue—
I long to hear hosannas too!
JANE W. LAUBER
An imperative of the scriptural view is the truth that love and law are not opposites; they are complements. Just as the love of God motivated the giving of these laws for man’s own welfare, so does the person who truly loves God try to keep his commandments. Love is clearly superior to cold law in human relations. But love subjectively experienced and humanly interpreted is quite inferior to divine love which is experienced in the Godhead and is objectively revealed to man—in Christ and in the biblical propositions. Hence, human love cannot be the final norm for ethical conduct. The decision is not really between love and law, both on the human level, but between the revealed divine love and human love apart from revelation. Scripture maintains that man experiences love from God and then in turn expresses this love in his situation within certain revealed guidelines. The Christian seeks to live an ethical life because he is a Christian; love makes him wish to live as his Lord and Master would have him live.
Love can be seen as the basis for each of the Ten Commandments. I love God, so I do not worship other gods or graven images or take his name in vain. I love my neighbor, so I do not steal from him, seduce his wife, or lie to him. In these situations, law merely expresses what love demands.
Having accepted this scriptural approach, we still often meet problems in which it is difficult to be sure just what the demands of love are; these must be resolved situationally. Although the commandments define the larger boundaries of personal conduct, those who accept God’s explicit commands still are left with enough decisions to make to insure the development of ethical responsibility. How are we to be Good Samaritans in our own century with its poverty, exploding population, and threat of nuclear war? What does it mean in an affluent society to have no other gods? We are to keep the Sabbath holy, but what does this imply about our conduct in the twentieth century? How does one honor father and mother in what increasingly seems to be a welfare state? Premarital intercourse is wrong, but how do we show Christ’s love and concern situationally to the pregnant single girl? Murder is wrong, but are abortions always murder? In these areas we must act situationally and through prayer, Scripture, and the Holy Spirit seek to find what God’s love demands of us. We can be certain it demands action.
Why should God not express his love in rules? As a parent I express my love for my children in rules I know are for their benefit. God also can express his love in rules as well as in relationships. Rules are certainly no substitute for love. But love expressed to us by God, and by us to others, may well include some rules. Rules alone cannot express the full meaning of love in any relationship. Yet rules may well define what love permits and what it disallows.
Milton D. Hunnex is professor and head of the department of philosophy at Willamette University, Salem, Oregon. He received the B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Redlands and the Ph.D. in the Inter-collegiate Program in Graduate Studies, Claremont, California. He is author of “Philosophies and Philosophers.”
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D. Elton Trueblood
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What new church forms are emerging?
One of Christ’s sharpest satires was directed against those of his contemporaries who did not know what time it was. They could forecast the weather, he said, but they seemed to be wholly unable to “interpret the present time” (Luke 12:56). The more we ponder this, the more we realize that our efforts cannot be effective if we do not know where we stand in the temporal sequence. To provide answers to questions that are not being asked is a waste of time.
Examples of being out of date are all around us. Only a few days ago I heard a sermon that was devoted, for the most part, to an attack on the excessive Puritanism of the preacher’s aunt—thirty years ago. If this man had been at all alert, he would have known that his point was obsolete. Excessive Puritanism, though it may have been a danger once, is not our danger now. A far greater danger is the faddish paganism that in its glorification of self-indulgence is the exact antithesis of Puritanism. If the preacher wants to be helpful, he must get around and try to see what the danger is now.
Another illustration of obsolescence is the motion picture Hawaii. In contrast to the book on which it is supposedly based, the picture goes to absurd lengths to caricature and ridicule one of the early New England missionaries in Hawaii. Anyone who knows anything about the situation soon realizes how unfair this portrayal is. Unfortunately, however, many viewers know little about past missionaries and hardly any more about contemporary ones. The result is that they are unaware of the distortion and are strengthened in the anti-missionary bias that is now prevalent. The producers of the picture are no doubt making money, but they are doing harm by fighting the wrong battle at this time.
If we are to be truly conscious of what time it is, one of the chief facts we must know is that, so far as the Christian religion is concerned, we are in the post-denominational age. The person who spends his effort attacking denominationalism is fighting a battle of another period. Denominations, as we know them, are not evil; they simply are not very important! There is no harm in their continued existence, and they may do some good that would not be done otherwise. But they are no longer in the central Christian stream; they occupy the side channels. It is as inept to condemn the side channel as it is to spend one’s life limited to it. Strong denominational loyalty and bitter attacks on denominationalism are equally out of date.
It is important to remember that denominations as we know them are only about 400 years old at most. The period of denominational usefulness and manifest strength is only a fraction of Christian history—a fraction that has already come to an end. The external forms of denominational activity will undoubtedly continue to exist for quite a while as vestigial elements in our culture, but people will be less and less interested. When people move from one neighborhood to another, they now change their denominational affiliation with ease and with no agony of decision. Even the line between Roman Catholics and Protestants is being crossed and re-crossed with ease, as the differences become less apparent. One reason is that Roman Catholicism has at last become one of the denominations.
I hope no reader will suppose that this essay is one more effort to beat the drum for church union. I realize that we shall have some more mergers, but the times have changed so rapidly that these are no longer matters of major interest and concern. After all, the Church is the people, and the people are the same, regardless of the label on the bulletin board. Union can overcome duplication in villages, but villages are not where most of the people live today. Despite a good deal of talk about mergers, the main thrust of our time has been toward renewal rather than unification.
A Christian who tries to know the time of day will usually retain his denominational affiliation while at the same time he puts his major effort into the new movements that are really on the Christian frontier in this last third of the twentieth century. I myself am a Quaker both by heritage and by conviction. My family has been Quaker, without a lapse, for more than three hundred years. Earlier this year I visited the town in Lincolnshire that was the residence of Arnold Trueblood in 1658 when he died in prison as a persecuted Quaker. Denominational loyalty was not a side eddy then; it was a matter of both intensity and power, and I thank God for it. We know a great deal about the declining importance of denominations when we realize that, while men were martyrs for denominational ideas three hundred years ago, today the idea of such martyrdom is fantastic.
What I want to make clear is that my heritage is one for which I shall always be grateful and to which I shall always adhere. But I cannot be loyal to it if I am loyal to it alone! Although I take my Quaker membership seriously, my purpose is to mingle constantly with Christians of all denominations or of none, in the effort to put my energies where the real battles of our time are found. The membership is necessarily of the part, but the concern is for the whole.
Most of the Christians whom I most respect today recognize clearly that it is the total cause of Christ to which they are loyal. They do not know how big the Church of Christ is, but they at least know that it is bigger than their particular church. They are not, for the most part, arguing for one great monolithic ecclesiastical structure, but they are humble enough to try to learn from one another. They realize that no group has a monopoly of truth. They are perfectly willing to allow their denominational affiliation to stand, but they know it is out of date to get excited about it. A man who is visibly enthusiastic about his denomination is now obsolete, so far as the main thrust of Christianity is concerned.
As we move further into a time in which the denomination is neither an idol nor a target of attack, our major effort should be to envisage the new forms the Christian movement ought to take. Some of these we dimly see. For example, the Christian task force may come to be a standard unit in our operation. The basic Christian fellowship may be that in which the members see themselves as missionaries rather than those who merely support missionaries. The promotion of the general lay ministry is more important than the promotion of any particular denominational viewpoint and, fortunately, is consistent with any. The new evangelical theological stance, which is marked by a union of mind and heart, transcends all sectarian lines and is far more important than those lines. The last third of the twentieth century is an exciting time in which to live, provided we know what time it is.
Milton D. Hunnex is professor and head of the department of philosophy at Willamette University, Salem, Oregon. He received the B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Redlands and the Ph.D. in the Inter-collegiate Program in Graduate Studies, Claremont, California. He is author of “Philosophies and Philosophers.”
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Other religious journals may well envy CHRISTIANITY TODAY for the competence of its editorial staff (at one stage three members were Who’s Who personalities). Every other month one or another staff member is invited to join some other enterprise. We consider this a compliment to our gifted colleagues, who regard CHRISTIANITY TODAY as far and away the most strategic thrust in the religious journalism field today.
It is always a pleasure to reward good performance. Beginning in this issue, the masthead lists as assistant editors Dr. James M. Boice and Dr. Robert L. Cleath. Both are members of the United Presbyterian Church, and both combine theological competence with literary skill and critical insight. Boice holds the A.B. from Harvard, B.D. from Princeton, and D. Theol. (insigni cum laude) from Basel; Cleath holds the B.A. from Northwestern College, M.A. from University of Oregon, B.D. from San Francisco Theological Seminary, and Ph.D. from University of Washington. Boice’s doctorate was in New Testament, with a dissertation on “The Idea of Witness in the Gospel of John.” Cleath’s doctorate was in the field of speech: rhetoric and public address, and his dissertation analyzed the persuasive speaking of “Earl Browder, American Spokesman for Communism, 1930–1945.”
Listed on the masthead for the first time is Miss Janet Rohler, B.A. from Shelton College in literature, whose duties as editorial assistant include the processing of letters for “Eutychus and His Kin.” She is the second distaff representative. Miss Carol Friedley, an English major from Houghton College, has served as our able copy editor for over five years. Congratulations.
J. D. Douglas
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Five years of covering major ecumenical occasions for this journal have seen the steady growth of what used to be a mere sneaking suspicion. It is now my firm conviction that in its Geneva fastness the World Council of Churches keeps a specialist word-spinner. His job (and he’s no slouch at it) is to put a gloss on all outgoing materials intended for general consumption. He makes certain that ecumenical utterances are hazy, ambiguous, and vaguely euphoric. Widely acclaimed for his dexterity in playing striking new variations on tired old themes, the word-spinner can take this a stage further and say things differently without being suspected of saying different things.
This brings me to the Heraklion meeting of the Central Committee, where evangelism was billed as the chief topic—and discussed surprisingly little, apart from a keynote address by the Rev. Philip Potter. He recognized three major questions: Is evangelism at the heart of the WCC’s life and work? What does the WCC mean by evangelism? How can the WCC better show its concern for evangelism? Good questions, deserving better answers than they got.
To the first, after surveying past WCC thinking on the subject, Potter replied in effect that it all depends on what you mean by evangelism. He went on to quote ecumenical statements of yesteryear, beginning with the pre-WCC World Missionary Conference declaration at Tambaram in 1938: “By evangelism we understand that the Church Universal, in all its branches and through the service of all its members, must so present Christ Jesus to the world in the power of the Holy Spirit that men shall come to put their trust in God through Him, accept Him as their Saviour and serve Him as their Lord in the fellowship of His Church.”
It was splendid to hear this at Heraklion 1967, but underlying the quotation was the assumption that this statement, unchanged and undiluted, would be acceptable to a representative WCC gathering today. This is at least dubious. For one thing, the Orthodox joined up in 1962, and their disproportionate influence is felt not least in a marked dislike of evangelism and, even more, of evangelicals. At the present time a sharp probe into Orthodox ecumenical involvement would create a shattering crisis in the WCC—a body that, ignoring this summer’s warning signs in Greece, is even now planning to increase Orthodox representation on its permanent staff.
In his address Mr. Potter had a section entitled “The Authority for and Urgency of Evangelism,” but every single word that followed was quotation, like this from the Amsterdam assembly: “If the Gospel really is a matter of life and death, it seems intolerable that any human being now in the world should live out his life without ever having the chance to hear and receive it.… Now, not tomorrow, is the time to act.” Good evangelical language, but simply not the speech of ecumenical gatherings today.
Subsequently Potter relapsed into that exasperatingly imprecise form of speaking that I call the Geneva gloss. When the Commission on World Mission and Evangelism met at Mexico City in 1963, he points out, “there was a moment of serious crisis … when it was claimed that there is evidence of changed lives in communities other than those of the recognized church. This is a challenge to the long held conviction that outside the Church there is no salvation.” The phrase I have italicized is familiar to traditional Roman Catholicism, but even the New English Bible puts clearly the doctrine of Acts 4:12: “There is no salvation in anyone else at all, for there is no other name under heaven granted to men, by which we may receive salvation.”
This paragraph ends with Potter’s conclusion: “The issue is perhaps best posed by the need for our churches to be radically renewed and flexible to meet man within his natural communities.” This prime example of the Geneva gloss sounds good, says nothing, offends no one, and could be part of an interfaith speech for any occasion.
Perhaps most revealing of all (how did this get past the backroom boy?) is Potter’s admission that in the almost twenty years of the WCC’s life “it cannot be said that cooperation in evangelism has been a high priority as an expression of the unity we have so far attained and as a means towards fuller unity.” Forgive my further italics; maybe I’ve misunderstood, but all this seems two or three stages removed from the real point: doing something because Christ commands it. We’ve got on to peripheral issues whose rallying cry seems to be, Do something together to show we’re united and to get us further united. But why? The evangelical who is doing his Master’s work might understandably decline an invitation to turn aside for ecumenical chit-chat with those whose view of the Gospel is basically different.
What was missing from Potter’s keynote address, and from the Heraklion meeting generally? I can put it in six words used by my good friend Leon Morris in describing an Australian evangelical conference: “The Cross received a continuing emphasis.” (No apologies for the italics). This is where the true ecumenical movement differs from the structure we know. This is where the Bible-based Christian differs from those ecumenists for whom heresy is one of the quainter notions inherited from a less sophisticated age.
In 1919 two Christian student groups at Cambridge University were considering a merger. Finally it all came down to one vital question: “Do you consider the atoning blood of Jesus Christ as the central point of your message?” The answer given by the second group was, “No, not as central, although it is given a place in our teaching.” Commented Norman Grubb, one of those present, “That answer settled the matter, for we explained to them at once that the atoning blood was so much the heart of our message that we could never join with a movement which gave it any lesser place.”
Is it really ingenuous to suggest that in ecumenical discussion the same answer might settle the matter for evangelicals today?
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News of a plane crash that killed two missionaries (see box below) was released last month. Ironically, at about the same time Church of the Nazarene journalist Elden Rawlings, on a trip to Central America, was writing this personal account of missionary aviation anecdotes:
“It is really the safest airline in the world.”
With this, the missionaries smirked and began to unfold stories that even the most imaginative of their listeners couldn’t top. Missionaries on furlough seldom mention flying in public. Maybe it’s because they think that people won’t be interested, or that the factuality of their stories will be questioned. But this was in private, and they were not on furlough.
After hearing their tales, I might have suggested they should travel by car—had I not been over some of the roads. The advantage had to lie with flying. Riding antiquated airplanes is occasionally a mite perilous. But the time during which you wonder whether you will reach your destination is gratifyingly shorter.
“These pilots are good,” piped one missionary. “They have to be.” He told of one who had become a special friend. Then his voice trailed off: “But he crashed recently. They never did know what happened.”
One of the older missionaries remembered his first flight twenty years ago: it ended prematurely in a cornfield. The bewildered passengers crawled out and hailed a bus (they are omnipresent in Latin America) to the next town. Legend says the plane, which was soon repaired and on its way again, is still in service.
A vast array of World War II-vintage planes still are hopping the mountains, enduring the violent weather of the tropics, and landing on abbreviated airstrips with a remarkable record of success.
The missionary spun another yarn about three passengers boarding an ancient DC-3 loaded with fourteen gasoline drums. The contents sloshed gently as fumes wafted through the fuselage. As soon as the plane was airborne, the copilot appeared, shaking his finger from side to side in the traditional Latin way of saying “no.”
“No smoking, please,” he said politely. The instruction was as necessary as telling the passengers not to jump out—which seemed, at the moment, a safer option.
A missionary nurse recalled waiting to board a plane when a jeep brushed the tail of the aircraft. The entire tail section quivered, then plopped unceremoniously on the runway. The ground crew rushed out, picked it up, and carted it away. After a short delay, another equally mature plane was rolled out to take her truncated sister’s place.
Milestone Mishap
The crash of a single-engine Cessna 180 in Venezuela last month was the first fatal accident in the twenty-three-year, fifteen-million-mile history of Missionary Aviation Fellowship.
The astounding record, established in the face of the extreme adversities of jungle flying, was broken with the death of Don Roberson, MAF pilot, and Curtis Findley, who served with the New Tribes Mission. Their plane went down October 6 near Puerto Ayacucho, apparently after a fire of undetermined origin broke out in the back of the cabin. The wreckage was found five days later, and the bodies were taken by helicopter to Puerto Ayacucho.
Roberson, a Navy jet pilot during the Korean war, is survived by his wife and three children. Findley is survived by his wife and a married son.
MAF, with headquarters in Fullerton, California, operates forty-one planes in fourteen countries. The accident follows by four months a fatal mishap in New Guinea experienced by MAF’s sister organization of Australia (after a sixteen-year fatality-free record).
Another missionary told of a flight with a half-dozen passengers and two tons of fish. The left motor of the twin-engine plane stopped four times during the brief flight. Each time, the co-pilot revived the stricken engine by handpumping fuel into the carburetor with a small pump. During the precarious seconds when the engine was dead the plane would tip, allowing the fish to slide gently across the fuselage. Then the engine would catch, and the craft would lumber on a few minutes more.
My brief experience with such airplanes failed to provide any hair-raising stories. During one flight, however, we crossed four mountain ranges with peaks from 10,000 to 12,000 feet and missed one jagged row of mountain tops by 200 feet, with the aid of a gentle updraft.
As we neared our destination, what the captain assured me was an airstrip appeared to be only a mountain trail. It matched descriptions I had heard from the missionaries. One had recalled a time when a pilot who was attempting to take off, brought his plane to a spinning halt while a pair of elderly Indians made their way across the strip, taking their wares to market.
I watched in amazement as the plane nestled onto the ground far more smoothly than had the jet in which I last had been a passenger. Barefoot Indians clambored aboard to cart away any luggage.
On the return trip, we simply taxied to the top of a hill and let gravity pull us to air speed, with assistance from the propellers. A final bump jolted us skyward and we skimmed the tops of trees, narrowly missing fleeing Indians who were using the runway as a road.
There was nothing to it. It really is the safest airline in the world.
PERSONALIA
Canon Gerald McAllister of San Antonio will perform the Episcopal wedding service next month for Lynda Bird Johnson and Charles Robb at the White House. McAllister has been a fill-in priest at a church in Fredericksburg, Texas, that the Johnsons sometimes attend while at the LBJ Ranch.
The Rev. Delmar Dennis, 27, a Southern Baptist who was an FBI informant during three years as a Ku Klux Klan member, testified at last month’s Meridian, Mississippi, conspiracy trial about Klan plans to murder a civil-rights worker. Seven defendants were convicted.
A storm of protest, mainly from students, followed the Rev. Malcolm Boyd’s swearing and loose talk to the University of New Mexico Newman Club.
Father Herbert McCabe, fired as editor of a Dominican journal for saying the Roman Catholic Church is “corrupt,” is joining the order’s study house at Oxford University.
Mary Cardell, 54, lost a libel suit against a London paper that said she participated in a 1961 witchcraft ritual. She must pay $14,000 in court costs.
James Kavanaugh, author of the bestselling A Modern Priest Looks at His Outdated Church, has renounced the Catholic priesthood and plans to marry.
Catholic Archbishop William Cousins refused a mayoral appointment to Milwaukee’s community-relations commission.
Valparaiso University (Missouri Synod Lutheran) marked the Reformation anniversary by giving an honorary doctorate to Notre Dame President Theodore Hesburgh.
Priest John Mitchell was the first Roman Catholic to be elected an officer of Seattle’s council of churches.
The Evangelical Church in Germany named the Rev. Eugen Stegmann, 40, a roving chaplain to circus and show people.
PROTESTANT PANORAMA
Seventy-five evangelical pastors in West Berlin joined laymen to form the Evangelische Sammlung Berlin, an association committed to proclaiming biblical doctrines in the midst of the present theological situation in Germany.
The Salvation Army’s Joystrings musical group agreed to perform in the London Playboy Club. In return, club bunnies will take to the streets to sell bonds for the Salvationists, Reuters reports.
Methodists hope to raise $100,000 toward construction of a Protestant religious and social center in Katowice, Poland.
Individual congregations of the Italian Baptist Union will decide whether to join the new Evangelical Church Federation in Italy, which includes Waldensians, Methodists, and Lutherans.
Pledges to the United Presbyterian Church’s Fifty Million Fund for capital needs now total $64,427,659. During the last fiscal year, Methodist financial-crusade experts raised a record $50,443,000 for various construction projects.
The Southern Baptist Sunday School Board joined an equal-employment-opportunity council for Nashville businesses. The board will not lower job qualifications, however, and most professional slots must be filled by Southern Baptists.
The 63,000-member General Association of General Baptists voted to join the intra-Baptist Crusade of the Americas in 1969, and chose the Rev. Glen Lashley of Oakland City, Indiana, as moderator.
Marshall C. Dendy, 66, current moderator of the Presbyterian Church, U.S., will retire next year as top Christian education executive so his successor can follow through on “relationships to be established with other boards and denominations.”
MISCELLANY
United States Ambassador Chester Bowles criticized attacks on missionary welfare work in India. And Assam State reversed an earlier decision to deport Catholic Bishop Orestes Marengo.
Education Minister S. N. Eliufoo of Tanzania, a Lutheran, assures churches that the government has no plans to give in to demands for a ban on teaching religion in public schools and government take-over of Christian schools. Lutherans were active in a recent Tanzania crusade by the Revival Movement of East Africa. Festo Kivengere, a Uganda Anglican, spoke.
The Sudan will now admit missionaries from Africa approved by the All-Africa Conference of Churches.
Deaths
GORDON W. ALLPORT, 69, Episcopalian and Harvard University professor who was one of the pioneer psychologists promoting a positive view toward religion, as in The Individual and His Religion (1950); at Harvard, of lung cancer.
CLAUD D. NELSON, 78, Arkansas-born Methodist clergyman, YMCA leader, religious liberty director of the National Council of Churches, and consultant to the National Conference of Christians and Jews; of a heart attack in New York City.
FRIEDRICH GOGARTEN, 80, Göttingen professor whose demythologizing outdid Bultmann and whose historicized view of the creation doctrine bolstered those Germans who saw Nazism as a heavenly gift.
ARTHUR T. MORGAN, 66, general superintendent of the United Pentecostal Church; of a heart attack while presiding at the UPC national meeting in Tulsa.
Delegates from sixteen nations are expected to attend the West African Congress on Evangelism at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, next July. It is a follow-up to last year’s world congresses in Berlin and in Wheaton, Illinois.
The Greek military regime rescinded a requirement that evangelical publications be stamped “Protestant.” Now, after censorship, an “Evangelical” imprint will be used.
A chat between Christians and Marxists endorsed by top British church officials produced no conclusions or decisions.
Forty tons of electronic equipment flown to Quito, Ecuador, last month will enable Christian radio station HCJB to triple its power. The Seychelles Islands in the Indian Ocean will let Far East Broadcasting Company build transmitters there beamed at India and Pakistan.
All major religious bodies in Kingston, Jamaica, are uniting to raise $280,000 to build six basic schools, a training center, and a community center in the western slum area of the city.
Christian Business Men’s Committee International added members from Ireland and Australia to its board, previously all from the United States and Canada. Ted DeMoss of Chattanooga, Tennessee, is chairman. Last month’s convention in Winnipeg, Manitoba, drew about 1,500 persons. Alma College, Jesuit seminary for the West Coast, hopes to raise money to move to Berkeley, California, for closer ties with the Graduate Theological Union, which involves Jews, Unitarians, and four Protestant denominations.
Moody Bible Institute is scheduled for a free full-page ad in Time on its missionary-aviation program under the magazine’s offer to boost “unique” college offerings.
The ubiquitous James A. Pike represented Christianity at last month’s centennial of the Baha’i faith in Chicago. Followers of Baha’u’llah, who believe in the unity of religion and mankind, now meet in some 30,000 localities.
Planned Parenthood formed a council to raise $ 18 million and offer birth control to low-income couples.
The Roman Catholic weeklies in Chicago and St. Louis came out against the bombing of North Viet Nam. But the Anglican Synod of Sydney, Australia, gave U. S. policy strong support.
Because of the White House’s usual late proclamation of the National Day of Prayer, Orthodox Archbishop Iakovos could give his priests only six days’ advance notice.
Russell Chandler
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As victory vibrations for the World Series-champion Cardinals died down in St. Louis, the International Convention of Christian Churches (Disciples) staged some celebrations of its own. Restructure and unity exponents rolled to a decisive (20 to 1) victory over conservative Disciples who vainly defended local autonomy against sweeping ecumenism.
For the first time the convention had elected delegates from congregations, regions, and agencies. Of the 9,575 persons registered at giant Kiel Auditorium last month, 4,085 were voting members.
Executive Secretary A. Dale Fiers called restructure approval “historic” and “the first step toward the Christian Churches’ becoming a denomination.” Delegates also sounded off on Viet Nam, narrowly rolled back a resolution supporting conscientious objection to a “particular” war, plunged anew into civil-rights and urban-renewal endorsements, and took a critical—but brief—look at ministerial racial discrimination.
Since the Christian Churches emerged out of nineteenth-century frontier America, the loosely federated congregations simultaneously have prized Christian unity and their own independence. The new “Provisional Design” could be adopted by the ICCC in Kansas City next September. Restructure will allow the local congregations to retain property, call pastors, and determine membership standards. But subsequently, the 1.9 million-member denomination would follow a centralized, representative government at regional and national levels.
Floor debate against restructure was mainly confined to a half-hour speech by the Rev. Tom Parish of Wichita, Kansas, speaking for the conservative Atlanta Declaration Committee. His contention that restructure was a “return to rigid sectarianism” was rebutted by Granville T. Walker of Fort Worth, chairman of the 130-member Restructure Committee. Said Walker: “The ancient and historic rights of congregations … are explicitly safeguarded.”
Alarmists immediately warned that one-third of the 8,000 congregations will bolt the “Brotherhood”; officials said no more than one-fifth.
Some delegates expressed fear that restructure will deliver the Disciples “holus-bolus” into the Consultation on Church Union. COCU advocates (by far a convention majority) admitted restructure “will be an aid to COCU,” but demurred about the merger matter. It won’t be decided right away, they said, so why worry about details now? Leaders of a unity workshop alluded to baptism, communion, bishops, and “mutual interchange of members” as major issues to be ironed out with the other nine COCU bodies.
Eugene Carson Blake, general secretary of the World Council of Churches and a native of St. Louis, spoke twice at the assembly. At a church-unity luncheon, 800 diners rose to applaud the gravel-voiced churchman. He said the ecumenical movement, far from being a failure, is “On the threshold of a new great development” with changes “no one would have dared predict.” Forecasting some unions within ten years, he urged Disciples to “press on patiently.”
Blake told newsmen, however, that he was impatient with those who say the Church should “stick to religious matters.… Life has changed; you’ve got to be political and economic.” Blake used a sunrise prayer service—preceded by a peace march of about 500 from downtown hotels to the Kiel Auditorium steps—to propose that the United States let a high-level conference of free Asian and Pacific governments decide whether American forces should pull out of Viet Nam. He also rapped U. S. policy there as “unilateral,” said the bombing of North Viet Nam should cease “unconditionally,” and urged government spending on poverty and race problems rather than war.
The convention took a tempered “dove” stance on Viet Nam during the final business session. A resolution that an opponent said “indicted our government as no good” (it included a critical statement by the National Council of Churches) was remanded to committee. But the final form was essentially just a rearrangement of the paragraphs. It carried easily after doves convincingly argued that the document requires the Brotherhood only to “study and discuss” the NCC material and “the basic justice of U. S. involvement.”
Chaplain E. T. Carroll, who recently returned from Viet Nam, was credited with persuading the ICCC to reverse last year’s stand and vote down support for conscientious objectors to “particular” wars. The resolution stirred explosive debate and a fairly close vote. Carroll asserted that bona fide objectors have an out under existing draft law.
Turning to urban problems, Disciples passed a resolution calling for solution to the crisis of American cities. A floor effort to join the Episcopal Church in its new $3 million-a-year urban program failed when it was pointed out the assembly couldn’t obligate agency or congregational money.
Continued existence of a separate Negro structure within the Brotherhood, the National Christian Missionary Convention, piqued some delegates of both races but didn’t stop election of NCMC officers. A resolution asked congregations to hire ministers without regard to race; a vociferous minority wanted a much stronger statement. Amiable convention President Forrest L. Richeson—no parliamentarian—finally gaveled down debate. Los Angeles layman Vance Martin, Jr., reminded delegates of the painful fact that last year’s lone Negro Disciple seminary graduate couldn’t find a church and finally became a Navy chaplain. Calling the Negro segment a “nineteenth-century cameo,” Martin declared Negro ministerial candidates will get the message.
Behind convention main events there was a ripple of discontent and impatience. Restless young liberals agonized over the seeming inability of the church to reach thinking, sensitive people on the fringe. Two hundred activists seeking “renewal” responded warmly to the waspish words of Albert Pennybacker, pastor of a church in wealthy Shaker Heights, Ohio. He warned that “in the shadow of hypocrisy,” restructure may be “enormously dull” and may be met with a “mighty ho-hum.” Then he challenged the renewal group (which formed officially on the spot with $50 annual memberships) to “get going on the serious social problems of race, war, and poverty.”
Pennybacker and other backers started zeroing in on the Great Society with action-program proposals. Some topics: world hunger, automation, guaranteed annual income, and controversial justice ministeries in Milwaukee and in Delano, California.
A Sunday-morning ecumenical youth service in the civic hall also pointed to where many younger Disciples think the action is: modern liturgy in contemporary argot, highly charged symbolism, and fervor for political action. Human Rights Director Ian McCrae of the United Christian Missionary Society gave a rambling sermon out of a newspaper. He told 700 teen-agers that the U. S. Department of Defense is more blatantly pornographic than the worst smut slicks. Then he mapped a political gospel: “The young Christian not in politics in 1967 isn’t working with God.… Decide where God is working in the political scene, then join in ‘Making Whoopee’ for God.”
If there was a hang-up among ICCC delegates, it was over the crisis of authority. Many, worried now about structuring and delegating power, will be still more queasy under the impact of their avant-garde theologians. A sample: The Rev. Robert A. Thomas of Seattle’s University Christian Church told a late-night discussion session that there are no longer any absolutes. This includes the Bible, which gives “no authoritative plan of salvation.”
The ICCC also:
• Heard the president of the Methodist Council of Bishops, San Francisco Bishop Donald Harvey Tippett, praise “new patterns of ministry” such as the Glide Foundation (which this month adopted a policy boycotting firms that discriminate against jobless homosexuals.)
• Heard a “State of the Church” message by Executive Secretary Fiers in which he said 4,823 participating congregations have only 3,157 pastors, and seminary graduates are too few “just to hold our own.”
• Appointed seven new missionaries and commissioned one.
• Named Myron C. Cole, Hollywood pastor, president-elect.
SYNOD STORM ON MIXED MARRIAGE
Europe was hit by a powerful 100-mile-an-hour gale October 16, but a storm raged even harder in the corridors at the Vatican Synod of Bishops. It reminded observers of the black week in November, 1963, during Vatican II.
Dutch labor reporter Richard Auwerda was the first to discover the mess of intrigues that surrounded drafting of the report on mixed marriage. Before the bishops came to Rome they had received a document drafted by Cardinal Ottaviani’s Congregation of the Faith. The men of Cardinal Bea’s Secretariat for Christian Unity didn’t know whether to be more upset by the paper’s conservative tone or by the fact that they had been bypassed, even though they had discussed the subject for months with leaders of the World Council of Churches (see “Mixed Marriage Rules: An Ecumenical Flaw,” April 14 issue, page 50).
Those unaware of the power struggles within the Roman Curia would have expected the secretariat to write the report. But Ottaviani came out on top and did his conservative best to propose as few changes as he dared. Bea’s men weren’t easily defeated, however, and threatened to send the bishops a minority report.
The Pope came up with a very Pauline solution. He ordered a mixed group of Ottaviani and Bea men to work out a compromise. Then came the question of who would introduce the compromise report, and some saw Paul’s hand in the choice of Cardinal Marella, head of the Secretariat for Non-Christian Religions, who had nothing to do with either the old or the new draft.
The report tries to combine the same two views present in discussion of canon law: defense of abstract faith (Ottaviani), and defense of the rights of men, who have the responsibility to decide whether to be Catholics, non-Catholic Christians, theists, or nothing (Bea).
The ire of some bishops was caused not by the report but by the way Marella introduced it. Not only did he tell the bishops what questions they had to discuss, but also supplied the right answers. And his speech was full of quotes from the original, rejected draft. His argument against change drew extensively from Old Testament bans on intermarriage between Jews and pagans. Informants said Marella made no distinction at all between marriage of Roman Catholics to Christians from other churches and to non-Christians. Protestants who had hoped the turmoil would result in a good discussion and an acceptable solution were extremely disappointed. Mixed marriages are a growing problem, particularly in Europe. In Germany, 40 per cent of marriages cross the Protestant-Catholic line.
The speakers were organized so that the first came from countries where mixed marriages are rare. Most of these wanted to continue the rule that a marriage is valid only if instituted by a Catholic priest.
Evidently there was no agreement on the related issue of requiring the non-Catholic partner to promise that children will be reared as Catholics. Only the Vatican can give dispensations, but the Dutch bishops have found a loophole somewhere that lets them decide, if the number of requests gets sufficiently large. So six of the seven jurisdictions don’t bother to ask Rome anymore, requiring only an “evangelical”—that is Christian—education for the children.
Dutch Cardinal Alfrink raised another point. He asked recognition of civil marriages, which involve the question of validity. The permissibility of marriage is a separate question of faith, he said.
Discussion of a less noticed synod topic, seminaries, showed uncertainty about the function of priests and orders and about the value of educational methods of the past. Suggestions included deemphasis on the cloister ideal, specialized training, and great freedom for bishops to work out programs needed in their own areas. A few bishops touched on celibacy, even though the Pope hadn’t put this on the agenda.
Meanwhile, a twelve-man body was at work rewriting the synod’s first document, on doctrine. The men chosen were quite progressive, and there were no professional theologians or Curia members among them. The Pope reportedly has accepted the bishops’ line of thinking—that dangers to the faith should be approached from a pastoral rather than a judicial view.
JAN J. VAN CAPELLEVEEN
OTHER ROME DOINGS
Various side events in Rome stole some attention from the Synod of Bishops. First, the Italian parliament voted a compromise motion seeking talks with the Vatican on revising the concordat between Pius XI and Mussolini. The main irritation is the treaty’s absolute ban on divorce, but it also makes Catholicism the state religion and gives it special privileges.
Then a communications symposium in Rome sponsored by the World Council of Churches and the Catholic International Documentation Center attacked the strict secrecy policies of the synod: Since the Church is “a public community … secretiveness within the Church is a denial of its very nature.”
Then 2,500 delegates to the third world meeting of Catholic laymen heard Pope Paul warn against lay attempts to “act without the hierarchy or against it.” The advice seemed forgotten when the final resolution said laymen want “a clear stand by the teaching authority of the Church which would concentrate on fundamental moral and spiritual values while leaving the choice of the scientific or technical means of realizing responsible parenthood to the parents, acting in conformity with their Christian faith and on the basis of trained medical and scientific advice.” The Vatican press later interpreted the statement as being no more than a repetition of what Pope Paul and Vatican II had said on the matter of birth control.
NO ‘SI’ ON SIGNING
The conflict between Spain’s 31,000 Protestants and the Franco government is fast coming to a head. By December 31, non-Catholic churches must register under the new “religious freedom” law or be illegal. But last month the Federation of Spanish Evangelical Churches, which represents the nation’s Protestants, opposed the registration requirement. Most churches are now expected to refuse to sign up.
Previously, the Spanish Baptist Union had recommended that member churches not register. Outgoing President Juan Luis Rodrigo said, “We must be prepared to pay the price that will have to be paid. Some churches will suffer more than others because some areas are more liberal than others. We need to be united and firm in our loyalty to the Lord.”
But disunity between Protestants and Seventh-day Adventists increased when the latter decided to seek recognition in Spain. Ironically, government officials privately expected mainstream Protestants to accept the law while the sects would refuse and could then be outlawed.
Jose Cardona Gregori, a Baptist who directs the interdenominational Spanish Evangelical Defense Committee, is optimistic. He predicts the Protestants’ conscientious objection will force the government to extend the deadline. The pessimists point out that Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, now next in line to Franco, is the strongest foe of religious liberty in the government. There is some hope that negative world opinion might soften the strict rules in the new law, which requires churches to hand in membership lists and financial records to the government. The European Evangelical Alliance issued a statement opposing the law, pointing out it contravenes the decrees of Vatican II.
Meanwhile, Father Carlos Giner de Grado, editor of a progressive Catholic monthly, was acquitted on charges of damaging the reputation of police in Barcelona. His paper had criticized tactics in putting down a student protest march.
LAYMEN DEFEAT RACE RESOLUTIONS
Thanks, said South Africa’s Prime Minister John Vorster when lay delegates to last month’s Anglican Synod squelched an anti-apartheid resolution. You have “the real interests of the country at heart.” Vorster admitted some of the worst foes of the government’s racial separation policies are Anglican clergymen.
The laymen defeated three motions on apartheid from the House of Clergy. The action followed a strong condemnation of apartheid on opening day from the Archbishop of Capetown, Robert S. Taylor. He said it is impossible to estimate the amount of suffering the racial laws cause, and charged that the promised “equality with separation” has not occurred.
Taylor said the recent deportation of Bishop Clarence E. Crowther was similar to the treatment of Old Testament prophets. But Vorster said clergymen “have been kicked out of South Africa, leaving the country better for it.”
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The canned music had just switched from “Pale Hands I Loved” to a thoughtful rendering of “Mexicali Rose” as the plane taxied to a halt at Tokyo’s airport terminal. A tall, fair-haired figure appeared on the gangway and waved up at the spectators’ balcony, where many colored flags were being waved. The Salvation Army band launched into “Onward Christian Soldiers.”
“Is it Billy Sunday?” asked an American matron on whom the insidious diet of treacly ballads had done its work. But it was Billy surnamed Graham, being met by Dr. David Tsutada and others who had planned the evangelist’s October crusade in the Japanese capital.
Here was a place where mention of Billy Graham had generally meant nothing. Twiggy they knew, and British pop singer Cliff Richard (both were also in town). But the Graham name automatically opened no doors. “What is he, a fighter or a miler?” asked the custodian of one hall in this sports-geared nation.
During his eighteen-month preparatory stint, Crusade Director Dan Piatt had talked about a “city of unlimited impossibilities.” For this is not Kansas City or London or Copenhagen. The difficulty is not just a matter of the wily Oriental and the utter folly of trying to hustle the East. The East often gets things done just as quickly and effectively, albeit in its distinctive way. (Norman Vincent Peale is said to have found it hard to think positively in a Tokyo taxi.) And this great civilization that is 99.5 per cent outside Jesus Christ has a morality and a courtesy from which the Christian West could learn much. Moreover, there are no street beggars and little unemployment.
Graham’s hotel room came equipped with The Teaching of Buddha as well as a bilingual Gideons New Testament. This underlined one of the greatest obstacles to an evangelistic crusade: religions in Japan are not mutually exclusive. One can be both Buddhist and Shintoist. A pre-crusade anxiety was that unless the uniqueness of Jesus Christ were carefully explained, the innate politness of the Japanese might move them to go forward at the invitation, regarding Christ as one more deity to be taken into their system.
A further difficulty is the reserve of the Japanese. They hesitate to confront others on too personal a level, and this naturally affects their attitude toward personal evangelism. Nonetheless, crusade workers visited a staggering total of 3,500,000 homes prior to the crusade to leave literature and an invitation to the meetings. Even before opening night 15,000 cards were returned requesting further information about Christianity.
Another breakthrough by local Christians is financing. Previous mass evangelism in Japan has been subsidized from overseas. “We decided to change all that,” said Tsutada. “God has enabled us to raise the necessary money [$140,000].” Those who have worked here for many years regard this achievement as miraculous. Tsutada hopes it will be a “pacesetter” for future policy in other lands.
Team members engaged in a wide variety of pre-crusade activities and unanimously reported an awakening interest in Christianity, not least among high-school and college students. Graham addressed a banquet for 150 tycoons (“their names read like a chunk of Japan’s Who’s Who,” marveled one observer). They listened with rapt attention and appeared to have genuinely valued an address that dealt with the essentials for true peace and the necessity of a John 3 type of rebirth.
Opposition was slow in making itself felt. A crowded press conference docilely accepted Graham’s refusal to be drawn in on the Viet Nam controversy, though a major demonstration against the war had taken place at the airport the previous week. One team member recalled that when he participated in Tokyo meetings five years ago Communists secretly ordered large blocks of tickets and greatly reduced the attendance by staying away. Moreover, they got press space to advise the Japanese first to go to the cinema to see “Elmer Gantry” and find out for themselves what a “Christian crusade” was really like.
This was the background when Graham began giving his invitation the first night. Before he had finished a young student with books under his arm walked briskly to stand in front of the platform. Graham finished, and for ten seconds there was no response. Then hundreds suddenly rose as one from all over Budokan Hall, and before long 677 of the 14,000 persons present were down front.
Attendance at the first four meetings—including an afternoon youth rally with Cliff Richard and Bobby Richardson—totaled 62,500. Inquirers at the three regular meetings totaled 2,744, and there were 2,867 more at the youth rally, where filling out of cards replaced coming forward.
Local Christians were amazed at the response. One left-wing newspaper compared Graham’s visit with General Booth’s sixty years ago and said both spoke with “an imperative Christian voice.”
LATE RETURNS
As Billy Graham faced Japan’s challenge, words came of after-effects from his first visit to a Communist nation, Yugoslavia. At two baptismal services last month forty-six persons—more than half young people—were baptized into church membership. Both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox press have carried favorable commentaries on Graham’s visit. In America, the lovelorn column “Dear Abby” carried a letter from a mother of four who wanted a divorce but hung on. She was glad she did, she said, because her husband’s life changed after he accepted Christ while watching Graham on TV.
LEIGHTON, MYRON
Canadian evangelist Leighton Ford held the last of his national centennial crusades last month in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, with repeated overflow crowds, total attendance of 73,800, and nearly 1,000 commitments to Christ. Even live radio and TV broadcasts of the services did little to cut attendance.
The day Ford’s effort closed, President Myron Augsburger of Eastern Mennonite College in Virginia filled the famous Shakespearean Festival Theater in Stratford, Ontario, on the opening night of the first evangelistic series ever held there. The elegant 2,258-seat theater, built ten years ago, has become a major Canadian culture center. The week-long Augsburger crusade was sponsored by local and district councils of churches in an area where many Mennonites live.
EXPO REINCARNATED?
As Expo 67 closed in Montreal October 29, city planners scurried to save many of the buildings for a permanent fair. The city approached the ecumenical Christian Pavilion and the evangelical Sermons from Science about keeping the buildings up, which will save the churchmen thousands in demolition costs. And “Sermons” could even do a rerun of its shows next summer.
Christian Pavilion leader H. E. Bartsch, a Missouri Synod clergyman, said 1.3 million persons visited the presentation of man’s plight by Protestants, Catholics, and Orthodox. The budget of $1.3 million is in the black, in contrast to the Protestant-Orthodox effort at the New York World’s Fair.
Besides that, Bartsch maintains that the controversial pavilion was “just what we wanted”—something people would “go home and talk over.” He said many unchurched people, stimulated by the pavilion, have sought out pastors for counseling and are now in church membership classes. The presentation got one of three awards from Photography Today because it used photos for great impact in showing an “imperfect world” and “man in need of help.”
Bartsch said Christians in Japan had asked for beams from the pavilion’s ceiling for their 1970 Osaka fair effort, but the city’s plans have changed that.
“Sermons” attendance was nearly 840,000 with more than 250,000 persons staying for an evangelistic “after-show.” Some 4,200 persons expressed commitment to Christ. Of the $700,000 expenses, met mostly by Canadians, about $100,000 was unpaid as the fair closed, a little better showing than in New York. Fund-raising luncheons in Boston and Chicago this month, plus Thanksgiving offerings, are planned.
COMMUNISTS HARDENING
Czechoslovakia, which is applying pressures on intellectuals, is preparing a new ideological drive against the Church, the New York Times reports. A secret document whose authenticity is denied by the Czech embassy says Roman Catholics have quietly evangelized professionals, including Communist Party officials. The document also notes “some negative movements” among other Christians. The Vatican has carried on long negotiations with Czechoslovakia over appointment of bishops and other disputed points.
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“New Breed” churchmen, given the upper hand at a major strategy conference in Detroit last month, proposed a general 24-hour strike as a means of protesting future U.S. escalation of the war in Viet Nam.1The same week, 107 eminent Americans led by former Presidents Truman and Eisenhower announced support of U.S. policy. Included were Negro Baptist leader Joseph H. Jackson, who heads NCC’s second-biggest denomination; exlogical Seminary, New York; Edito-in-Chief Thurston Davis of America (Jesuit); and President Abraham Hecht of the Rabbinical Alliance of America. They also spoke approvingly of a domestic revolution in which open violence is deemed justifiable.
The National Council of Churches, which sponsored the five-day U.S. Conference on Church and Society, is now asked to “announce to the churches and to the nation escalation measures where the line must be drawn, such as: 1. the use of nuclear weapons, 2. the land invasion of North Viet Nam, 3. intentional direct military offensive action against China, 4, the bombing of the major Red River dikes in North Viet Nam.”
Should any of these occur, religious leaders are asked to “call upon the people of faith … to close their businesses and industries, their transportation facilities and schools for one full day, calling on all sympathetic citizens to join in this action.”
Eleven pages of recommendations came from a twenty-five-member work group on Viet Nam which was obviously dominated by social-activist radicals. The suggestions are in no way binding upon the NCC, but they provide wide visibility for the New Breed under the tutelage of Harvard Divinity School’s Harvey Cox (see story, next page) and give fresh respectability for its revolutionary motif.
A work group on “the role of violence in social change” released a paper asserting: “One criterion for judging violence is whether or not the violence seeks to preserve privilege based on injustice or to redress wrongs. The former is unjustified violence. The latter can be justified.”
The paper adds that violence, “to be effective in social change needs: objectives, strategy, disciplined effort, action-troops, people willing to sacrifice life, and a high degree of secrecy.”
The espousal of violence follows a drift of thought which surfaced at the 1966 Geneva Conference of the World Council of Churches. At that meeting, Princeton’s Richard Shaull said that “there may be … some situations in which only the threat or use of violence can set the process of change in motion,” and a report developed at Geneva saw Christians involved in violence as an “ultimate recourse.” Shaull was on the planning committee for the Detroit conference.
The Detroit meeting included some 700 clergy and lay participants, including a Vietnamese Buddhist monk, several Roman Catholics, and a number of Protestant clergymen from denominations not members of NCC. Dr. Foy Valentine, head of the Southern Baptist Christian Life Commission, was a member of the planning committee.
Conference concerns covered a wide range of subjects from politics to economics, and included consideration of a number of sticky ethical issues brought about by advances in technology, medicine, and urbanization.
As conferees met, Israeli and Egyptian troops exchanged fire in the Holy Land, which placed an added burden of responsibility upon a work group devoted to Middle East problems. The work group came up with a series of general recommendations which Cox called “disappointing.”
The Viet Nam paper includes a long list of “action proposals.” Local churches are asked to set aside time in each Sunday service to give “current ecumenical views on Viet Nam information and historical background” and to make buildings available as sanctuaries for draft resisters. News media are urged to “stop ‘Red-white’ oversimplification of the war, specifically the identification of the NLF and Viet Cong as ‘Communist.’” The NCC, it is suggested, should set up a “free pulpit fund” for pastors and others threatened with financial handicap for speaking out on Viet Nam. Denominations are called upon “to examine the propriety of clergymen being in the employ of military forces.”
The work groups—there were twenty-nine in all at the Detroit meeting—made public their papers even though the opinions expressed therein did not represent even a consensus of their respective groups. Included in the Viet Nam group was a State Department representative who disagreed sharply with the mimeographed findings. No plenary action was taken on the papers, and it was not immediately clear what would be done with them.
It is doubtful that there are more than 1,000 hard core activist clergymen of the New Breed variety identified with Cox. The Harvard professor boasts, however, that in the past decade social-activist clergymen have “moved into key positions in churches, seminaries, and city-mission structures.” They draw pay from mainline denominations, but he rightly notes that few are parish ministers.
Cox says the New Breed includes “a sizeable minority of ministers graduated from the main interdenominational seminaries and some of the denominational ones in the past ten years.” The New Breed is also said to include some “educated laymen” who have been influenced in the years since World War II “by college pastors and professors of religion.”
A SPICY PROLOGUE
A film show with several segments in questionable taste accompanied the keynote address by Harvey Cox at the opening of the U. S. Conference on Church and Society.
One sequence showed an animated black-and-white profile of a couple engaged in sexual intercourse. Another, in color, a buxom stripper removing the last of her undergarments. Still another, the gyrations of a topless dancer.
More than a dozen conference participants walked out on the hour-long Sunday-evening show. It was unclear, however, whether they acted in protest or merely got bored.
The films followed a brief speech in which Cox warned that the “mixed-media presentation” might jolt the audience. A total of eighteen films were shown on a wide screen. At times there were four running simultaneously. A TV set also played throughout, accompanied by weird sound effects.
Most of the films took as their theme some aspect of the contemporary social milieu, but the net effect, probably by design, was confusion. A mixed audience of more than 700 viewed the film presentation, which was arranged by Paul Abels, a “director for the arts” of the NCC.
Cox, somewhat in contrast to the films’ mood of confusion, warned against fatalistic attitudes. “Although we seem to be in a power dive toward disaster,” he said, “we can still pull out.”
His critique focused upon economic realities: “Famine chokes off millions of lives while we employ our scientific wisdom to produce low-calorie vanilla fudge ice cream.… If the way we spend our money expresses what we value, then we think booze is more important than the education of the kids in our cities, and lipsticks and deodorants are more important than their bodily health.”
COX: PROMISE EXCEEDS PERIL
A visibly annoyed Harvey Cox held up a Detroit newspaper headlining him as a “top theologian.” “What will my peers think of this?” he asked.
Indeed, the 38-year-old Cox is not even a theologian in the precise theological sense.2Cox studied theology at Yale and has taught it at Andover-Newton and Harvard. But his Ph.D. is in the history and philosophy of religion, and he is now “associate professor of church and society” at Harvard. But insofar as the activist clergy of the Sixties have a theological undergirding, Cox holds the reputation for having provided it. Though at times ambiguous, he is unquestionably the leading theoretician of the movement and an appropriate choice to be de facto chairman of a Conference on Church and Society to devise strategy for social change.
“Although the present battle within the churches has profound theological significance,” he says, “it is not debated in overtly theological terms. Rather, the debate turns on questions of church strategy and policy.”
Harvey Gallagher Cox, Jr., grew up in Malvern, Pennsylvania, at the western tip of Philadelphia’s Main Line. In high school he was president of the student body and the senior class. At the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in history, Cox made the marching band—he plays a number of musical instruments. He saw a more raw side of humanity during his teens when he worked on cattle and relief ships to Poland and Germany. He is married to a drama major from Oberlin, and they have three children.
National prominence came to Cox with the 1965 publication of a 276-page paperback, The Secular City. The book, a surprise best-seller—more than a quarter of a million copies sold to date—attempts to tie together a lot of loose ends about modern man. It focuses upon secularization and urbanization as “the two main hallmarks of our era” and sees an emerging “Technopolis” wherein Christians are called to serve in new dimensions.
In secularization, Cox says, “the promise exceeds the peril,” though he concedes that perhaps it is in the realm of values and ethics that the nurture of secularization becomes most ambiguous and problematical. Cox rejects ethical and moral absolutes, arguing, for example, that it is hypocritical to expect premarital chastity when Christians have helped to create a set of cultural conditions that makes sexual responsibility difficult.
As a youth, Cox attended an American Baptist church where the pastor was a college roommate of evangelist Billy Graham. Cox retains little in common, however, with the evangelical tradition. He draws selectively upon scriptural themes and emphases but ignores considerations of the Atonement and afterlife. The big problem today, as he sees it, is that “we are trying to live in a period of revolution without a theology of revolution. The development of such a theology should be the first item on the theological agenda today.”
Cox calls the activist clergymen “the New Breed.” He tries to put them into theological and historical perspective in an essay that is part of his latest book, On Not Leaving It to the Snake. He sees the current movement as a “reclamation of the main stream of theology in America,” drawing from the spirit of the old social gospel but having some differences. World War I saw the fading of the social gospel with its view of the gradual social incarnation of God. It was displaced by the neo-orthodox ethic of Reinhold Niebuhr, who perpetuated many elements of the social gospel but, as Cox puts it, “was often critical of what he took to be its naïveté about power.”
Cox declares that with the New Breed, “the Kingdom of God, which in the neo-orthodox period had become an ‘impossible possibility,’ has become once again something for which to work.” Still, there are differences: “The views of the New Breed tend to be more provisional. They do not believe that one push will bring in the Kingdom. They tend less to identify particular utopian schemes, such as socialism or pacifism, with the gospel. They are more appreciative of secular allies and see the church more as a supporter and strengthener of movements already underway than as a vanguard. They rely less on preaching and are more willing to lead the institutional church directly into the struggle for power for the poor.” Cox affirms “a deeper realization of the intransigence of evil and a more realistic idea of power and how it functions.”
Cox is not as vocal as some activist churchmen in condemning so-called American power structures. Neither is he overly enthusiastic about the socialist-Communist rationale, in which he finds the messianic element objectionable. But he does see a massive task for activist Christians in reforming society.
“God has taken the mad risk of putting himself and his cosmos at man’s disposal,” Cox told the Detroit conference. “He has identified himself unreservedly with the chancey experiment called man, and the results are not yet in.”
MARCHING TO THE PENTAGON
Seminarians and clergymen were liberally sprinkled among the estimated 50,000 persons who rallied at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C., last month and then marched on the Pentagon in the largest anti-war demonstration in U. S. history.
One of the most prominent was Yale University Chaplain William S. Coffin, Jr., who spoke at the Memorial, urged young men to turn in their draft cards, and helped arrest a Nazi counter-demonstrator, but did not join the surly throng that assaulted the Pentagon. The protest was engineered over several months by an organization known as the Washington Mobilization Committee to End the War in Viet Nam.
The University Christian Movement—which includes campus-ministry groups from all major National Council of Churches denominations except the Negro Baptists and Methodists—supported the confrontation, during which 647 persons were arrested.
Similar anti-war demonstrations were held elsewhere in the nation. In New York City, twenty-eight Union Theological Seminary students surrendered draft cards, and faculty members Robert I. Miller, Tom F. Driver, and Paul Lehmann joined others in a “complicity statement.”
As the Pentagon protest plans took on “direct action” overtones and a hardening militancy, several church-related groups backed out at the last minute. Some said they were not pleased with the apparent take-over by the new left. L. Doward McBain, president of the American Baptist Convention and a critic of U. S. war policy, issued a strong rebuke of the “violent trend” in the anti-war movement, which he called “ridiculous and damaging to the cause of peace.”
ACTIVISTS OUT AND IN
Militant civil-rights action by two white Episcopal clergymen in St. Louis is cited as the cause of their dismissal last month. Bishop George L. Cadigan said he took action because of “procedural misunderstandings” but indicated privately that the pair had persisted in abrasive, bizarre tactics despite repeated pleas for moderation. About twenty members of the Christian Churches, in town for the national convention (see story, page 54), picketed Cadigan’s office.
The fired priests are Walter Witte, Jr., rector of predominantly Negro St. Stephen’s Church, and its curate, the Rev. William Matheus, a man who grunts earthy expletives. Shortly before the dismissal Matheus tangled with the Veiled Prophet Ball, an annual St. Louis social event he considers symbolic of “social bigotry and economic discrimination.” The stocky cleric has a record of arrests dating to 1960, when he pleaded guilty to employing a minor to sell liquor at his beatnik bar, the Holy Barbarian. Witte was arrested “crashing” the ball with Negro companions.
Taxes And Textbooks
The church-state controversy—at least as old as Caesar and Christ—may have moved one short, but important, step toward solution. The U. S. Supreme Court has decided to decide whether taxpayers can challenge federal grants to church-related institutions. The court last month tersely granted the appeal of seven New Yorkers who advanced a test case challenging the use of public money for instructional materials in parochial schools, on the ground that it violates the separation of church and state.
If the court rules in favor of the taxpayers, it will open the door to testing of a wide range of related government spending programs involving church-related organizations. A decision on the school-aid case is expected next spring. The court turned down a plea that it rule on the right of the Amish in Kansas to refuse to send their children to high school.
Pearl Birch Bests Baptists
Five California Baptist charities, including California Baptist seminary at Covina, lost a multi-million-dollar money grab in Dallas, Texas, last month when the court awarded the estate of the late A. Otis Birch to his widow, an exconvict. The church groups—which promised to contest the case—maintain that Birch left his fortune to them in an earlier will and was mentally incompetent when he wrote a second will May 14, 1966.
Pearl Choate Birch, a 200-pound nurse who once served twelve years in a Texas prison for slaying a former husband, married Birch last year less than a month after his first wife died. Birch died at 96 last March.
Mrs. Birch, who now lives in California, is free under $10,000 bond, posted on an assault charge for firing a rifle at a tenant in her Compton apartment house.
MARQUITA MOSS
But one clergyman won his battle. Channing Phillips, United Church of Christ activist in Washington, D. C., won cheers and congregational support after emotional dissidents asked for his resignation. Dissatisfaction with the Negro minister was heightened by a church appearance of revolutionist Stokely Carmichael at Phillips’s invitation last May.
‘SOULED’ OUT
A soul-searching look for evidence of the existence of the soul ended last month in Phoenix, Arizona. Harried Superior Court Judge Robert Myers, after seeking “divine guidance,” chose the city’s Barrow Neurological Institute from a field of 139 claimants as sole heir to James Kidd’s $230,000 estate.
The frugal copper miner—who disappeared mysteriously in mountain country east of Phoenix in 1949—left a handwritten will bequeathing his money to anyone who could scientifically prove or would research proofs for the human soul.
The claimants ran the gamut from the American Society of Psychical Research, headed by Gardner Murphy of the Menninger Institute in Kansas, to a frumpy New York waitress who said she was Kidd’s widow. The court ruled he had been a bachelor.
The thirteen-week marathon hearing included eerie tales of life beyond the grave, stories of persons transported to earth from other planets, and claims of the mistress of a dead “clairvoyant” Boston terrior that supposedly had “frequent contact with the dead.”
The Barrow Institute, research arm of Catholic St. Joseph’s Hospital, works in medical science, psychology, and psychiatry.
POLITICIANS ROAST ‘RELIGION’
Thousands of young people dramatically left a session of last month’s University of Toronto “Teach-In on Religion and International Affairs” to march in protest against the Viet Nam war. Unlike the Washington, D. C., protest the same weekend their march involved no violence, but tempers became heated and some shoving occurred.
The young adults who attended the teach-in, many of them high-school students, were respectably dressed, and hippies were noticeably absent. Over three days, they listened intently to more than ten hours of speeches, none of which had much to say about Christianity.
Violence and intolerance—inevitably linked with much of religion from the beginning of time—were not separated in Toronto either. The experts on religion included political has-beens with strange credentials.
V. K. Krishna Menon, former defense minister of India, was one of many speakers attacking America over Viet Nam. He charged that the United States is a power-mad nation perpetrating serious war crimes there and that it is also an imperialist figure in the Middle East. Yet in regard to India’s seizure of Goa from Portugal, Menon had declared, “We have not abjured violence in regard to any country who violates our interest.” When Menon was fired from the government, the New York Times breathed an editorial sigh of relief “in view of his record of official incompetence and his pro-Communist views.…”
The religious sparring between Menon’s nation and Pakistan gave Alex Quaison-Sackey a chance to point the finger. Speaking gently but firmly, he said partition of the two nations was the most glaring modern example of religion’s divisive power. Quaison-Sackey was foreign minister of Ghana during the regime of Communist-leaning dictator Kwame Nkrumah.
Poetry-writing Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, who now lives in Paris, was expected to bring a gentle message. But he startled teach-in officials by laying blame for the continuation of the war almost solely on the United States.
In a special film for the teach-in, United Nations Secretary General U Thant testified that his Buddhist religion “offers absolute truth.” He said “It is through the ignorance of the law of Karma [good and bad qualities carried on in reincarnation] that men do evil to one another, and thus to themselves” and that the Dhamma (absolute truth) is the only hope for finding “a solution to the problems that beset us.”
Rhodesia’s former moderate prime minister Garfield Todd, a Disciples clergyman, and Bishop Trevor Huddleston, who was ejected from South Africa for his opposition to racial separation there, talked with restrained anger of white supremacy. The Church was also represented by Canon Lewis John Collins of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, who issued another call for some form of world authority to prevent war. He is chairman of Bertrand Russell’s Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
Looking toward the future, Professor Richard Shaull of Princeton Theological Seminary urged young people to link themselves with the New Left and get more involved in basic issues. But from all evidence at the teach-in, the young people did not need his urging.
CANADIANS ELECT CLERGYMEN
In Ontario, where a government committee has proposed taxation of church property, voters last month elected three clergymen to legislative seats. In an upset, the Rev. William Ferrier, 34, of the United Church of Canada defeated Progressive Conservative cabinet minister J. Wilfrid Spooner. It was the first run for Ferrier, a Socialist (New Democrat).
Other seats were won by A. W. Downer, Anglican priest and former legislative speaker, who was re-elected for the Conservatives, and Fred Young, another United Churchman and a Socialist. Three other clerics lost, including Reginald Stackhouse, theology professor at Wycliffe College (Anglican).
LOSING AFTER THE WAR
Inter-religious affairs remain jumbled in the wake of last June’s Arab-Israeli war. To wit:
• Israel’s Supreme Court upheld a rule against Jewish children living in Christian orphanages, forcing probable closing of Beth-El Children’s Home in Haifa.
• Syria’s Education Minister Sulayman al-Khush boasted, “The era of missionary work in Syria has ended for good,” and the government confiscated all Christian schools.
• Vartan Sahagian, executive secretary of Jordan’s Bible Society, who was out of the country during the war, said he has been refused readmission to Jerusalem.
• Beirut Radio said Christians and Muslims plan to meet in Lebanon to plot a “rescue” of Jerusalem from Israeli occupation.
• Jews, able to visit Jerusalem’s Wailing Wall at Rosh Hashana for the first time since 1949, thronged plaza space where Israel had bulldozed sixty Arab homes. On the holiday Egypt’s President Nasser reportedly sent greetings to his country’s Jews.
• The American Jewish Committee issued a plaintive mimeographed rundown on the status of Jews in eight Arab nations and said strangely, “It is not to be released to the press, or the mass media, at this time.”