Page 6051 – Christianity Today (2025)

There was a time when a student of theology would wrestle with (or at least acknowledge) the moral implications of the Christian faith in one or more disciplines with such names as moral theology, moral philosophy, theological ethics, biblical ethics, casuistry. Although these names linger on in the curricula of some Roman Catholic and Anglican institutions, they, and the corresponding distinctions among the disciplines they name, have largely disappeared from the Protestant scene.

It is not my concern to argue that this disappearance is regrettable. Surely the dividing up of Christian moral concerns among moral philosophers, moral theologians, and casuists was often confused and arbitrary; and I, for one, have always had trouble keeping my biblical ethics from crowding in on my theological ethics, and vice versa.

However, anyone who wants the Church to take its moral task seriously will want to be certain that whatever scheme has replaced the older scheme(s) is one that, first of all, enables the Church to carry out that task more effectively, and, secondly, is not based on confusion over what that task involves. The newer schemes have opted for simplicity. Sometimes the questions that were previously divided among several disciplines are now considered as the domain of, simply, “Christian ethics,” a subject pursued in various ways and with differing emphases. Often one finds a further specification added, as in “Christian personal ethics” and “Christian social ethics.”

My present concern is to try to get clear about the nature of “Christian social ethics.” A reasonably intelligent person hearing for the first time that there is such a thing might have a hunch of what it is about. He might think that a discipline that has to do with “ethics” would involve the formulation, and clarification, of normative principles and claims, that “social” would restrict the problem-area to “interpersonal” or “community” relations, and that the “justification” of the principles and claims would involve an appeal, somewhere along the way, to biblical or theological data.

He might conclude, then, that Christian social ethics is a discipline that deals with these sorts of problems: (1) moral issues within the Christian community, such as what the Apostle Paul was worried about when he condemned the “vain babblings and disputings” in the Church, and matters of church discipline; (2) moral aspects of the relation of the Church and its members to the larger human community, as in the questions of whether the Christian ought to pay taxes and serve in the military, and of how the Church should aid the poor and the oppressed; and (3) the Church’s moral deliberations, and mission, in regard to problems of the larger human community as such, as in Billy Sunday’s denunciation of “gin mill” operators and Pope John’s straggles with nuclear proliferation.

But when one reads descriptions of Christian social ethics by many who claim to be practitioners of it, one finds that his hunch seems wrong. Consider this account given by Professor Walter G. Muelder in Moral Law in Christian Social Ethics (John Knox Press, 1966):

Christian social ethics is an interdisciplinary field and therefore is difficult to define precisely. Its component disciplines are all in the process of active development and reinterpretation. Negatively speaking, Christian social ethics is not theological ethics with applications to current social questions made apart from philosophical and scientific analysis. It is not—even when the problems discussed are social—a presentation of general theoretical ethics with biblical sanctions. It is not sociology of religion or any other behavioral science. It is, positively stated, interdisciplinary, which commits its practitioners to undertake joint, supplementary, or complementary theoretical and empirical studies in theology, philosophical ethics, behavioral and historical sciences. Christian social ethics seeks emergent coherence [p. 20].

He continues:

Most works in Christian ethics belong either in biblical theology or systematic theology. Such books are often perceptive in regard to social questions, but this alone does not qualify them in the field of social ethics, for to so qualify they must also exhibit a knowledge of the sciences specifically relevant to empirical and situational mastery of a problem.

Of course, in theological matters as in others, it is often hard to evaluate a claim as to what a particular activity is or is not. As an example: When a well-known (and controversial) bishop tells us that to recite the Apostles’ Creed is not to make a series of claims about what is the case (i.e., claims that are in principle verifiable or falsifiable) but rather to do something more akin to singing a battle-song, it is difficult to know just how to respond.

If he is telling us what he is doing when he utters the words of the creed, then there is no way to disagree with him short of questioning his honesty (and also the honesty of anyone who happens to agree with him). In one sense at least, a person can do anything he wants to do and mean anything he wants to mean. But if his claim is that everyone, no matter what he thinks he is doing when he recites the creed, is merely cheering the team (be it the Church or the world) on to victory, then this is open to dispute. And if he is saying, not that this is what everyone is doing, but rather that it is what everyone ought to be doing, or ought to think of himself as doing, there is occasion for considerable debate.

Now Professor Muelder, in the passage cited, doesn’t seem to be telling us merely how he prefers to do Christian social ethics; nor does he seem to be giving us an account of what really goes on when someone claims to be engaged in that discipline, despite what that person himself may say. Rather, he appears to be telling us how that discipline is properly pursued, how it ought to be understood.

If we were to accept his account as a description of the activities of any one person who is properly engaged in Christian social ethics, certain practical problems would arise. Anyone who even purported to enter this “interdisciplinary” endeavor Muelder describes would have to be considered the advance-guard of a new kind of intellectual. The prerequisites rival those necessary for entrance into the sparsely populated ranks of both the class of Platonic philosopher-kings and the ancient order of Melchizedek. And the fact that one so often finds theologians doing bad theology, philosophers doing bad philosophy, behavioral scientists doing bad behavioral science, and historians doing bad history, evokes gloomy images of the possible combinations that might result should a group of pretenders to this new rank ever descend upon us.

Of course, the fact that a discipline is extremely difficult is not enough to rule it out as an interesting and desirable possibility. The philosopher G. E. Moore once made this criticism of casuistry: “The defects of Casuistry are not defects of principle; no objection can be taken to its aim and object. It has failed only because it is far too difficult a subject to be treated adequately in our present state of knowledge.” I am inclined to think that this criticism applies to the conception of Christian social ethics Muelder describes. It would be ironic if, while other academic disciplines become increasingly more specialized, theologians should attempt to become more cosmopolitan in their skills. Since the clinical psychologist, for instance, finds it more and more difficult to keep abreast of all the developments in clinical psychology, to say nothing of experimental psychology, the goal of “interdisciplinary” competence appears elusive.

However, this is a somewhat unfair interpretation of the passage cited. For Professor Muelder is not saying that each person who does Christian social ethics must be competent in theology, philosophy, history, and the bahavioral sciences. Rather, he speaks of “joint, supplementary, or complementary” projects. It is improbable that any one person would be involved in the full range of the discipline. More likely, a given problem would be dealt with by a team consisting of, say, a theologian, a philosopher, a sociologist, and a historian, and each would contribute to a program that could be considered appropriate to Christian social ethics.

What, if anything, is wrong with this scheme? Suppose that a Christian were to attempt to decide whether the production and maintenance of nuclear-type weapons of mass destruction is right or wrong (or perhaps neutral). And imagine further that he arrives at an answer in this way: According to scriptural teaching, God’s physical creation is “good,” and man was created, in the image of God, with the capacity, and for the purpose, of being a “faithful steward” over God’s good creation. From this it follows that man’s large-scale production of weapons that could virtually destroy a significant part of the creation which it is his God—given task to replenish and maintain is a willful and irresponsible act of rebellion against the Creator. Hence, the production of weapons of mass destruction is morally wrong. (Someone might want to reply to this simplistic argument by citing additional biblical data to support the claim that it is often morally permissible, justifiable, or even necessary to use force in the service of a righteous cause. To this the proponent of the original argument might respond with questions as to the kind or limits of force consistent with Christian principles, and the debate could proceed. At any rate, it is not unthinkable that such a debate could be carried on by two persons equally committed to Christian principles who disagree over the implications of the data they both accept.)

Note that this example is in accord with our earlier “hunch” about Christian social ethics—it offers biblical data in support of a moral claim about a social matter. It also seems to fit one description of what Muelder says Christian social ethics “is not,” that is, “theological ethics with applications to current social questions made apart from philosophical and scientific analysis.” Now, once again, it would not be so bad if the writer were merely opposing his preferences to someone else’s. But by all indications he feels that what he has in mind is a more adequate way for a Christian to come to grips with a social issue. What our method lacks, on his account, is “a knowledge of the sciences specifically relevant to empirical and situational mastery of a problem.”

In what way would the “knowledge” he speaks of improve upon the simple piece of moral deliberation described above? Surely the “theoretical and empirical” studies would not alter the theological claims (“God’s creation is a good creation,” “Man’s task is to be a faithful steward,” and so on). Nor does one have to do very extensive research to know of the capacities of our present store of nuclear weaponry. It must be that what the writer has in mind is this: The argument as far as it goes is not necessarily ill-conceived, but there is much more that Christian social ethics must do.

Someone who feels that our hunch about the nature of Christian social ethics is correct might also agree that coming to a moral conclusion in the manner described above does not exhaust the Christian’s moral task. As Kierkegaard rightly observed in the preface to The Sickness Unto Death:

This relation of the Christian teaching to life (in contrast with a scientific aloofness from life), or this ethical side of Christianity, is essentially the edifying, and the form in which it is presented, however strict it may be, is altogether different, qualitatively different, from that sort of learning which is “indifferent,” the lofty heroism of which is from a Christian point of view so far from being heroism that from a Christian point of view it is an inhuman sort of curiosity.

The Christian’s moral reasoning will often be a concerned endeavor, one that will inevitably lead to witness and action.

However, more than this is suggested in Professor Muelder’s account. It seems that what he is saying is that Christian social ethics not only applies biblical and/or theological norms to current social problems but also formulates specific socio-economic, psychological, perhaps even political, schemes for solving these problems. But it is hard to see how this suggestion differs from the simple assertion that in addition to doing Christian social ethics Christians must also do philosophy, sociology, psychology, and the like. And this latter way of putting it has some advantages. Keeping Christian social ethics distinct from other disciplines that Christians should, and do, also engage in, enables the Church to take unequivocal stands without having to confuse its moral witness with specific social programs. This is not to say that the Church should remain aloof from specific programs, but only that these endeavors should be distinguished from each other. There are theological reasons for keeping them distinct. The Christian diagnosis of social ills must be spelled out with reference to concepts—such as man’s fallen condition and redemption through Christ’s atoning work—that are not reducible to the language of the sciences.

However, it should not be thought that the Church can make its diagnosis and offer its cure while Christians ignore the social, psychological, and economic conditions of men. This point is often missed in discussions of Christian duty with respect to the civil rights of human beings. We cannot preach to the slum-dweller that he has an obligation to rightly use, replenish, and enjoy God’s good creation, and to exercise his duties as a responsible citizen, and at the same time ignore the fact that very often certain practices and laws make it impossible for him to do so.

Finally, it is often necessary for the Church to take an unequivocal stand against prevailing economic, social, and political conditions, even where it is practically impossible to offer any solution rooted in sound “theoretical and empirical” analysis. If the Church commits itself to always offering the latter, it will of necessity remain silent at times when it has a prophetic obligation to speak. This is so because the Church’s “solutions” are such that they will often appear, from certain perspectives, “impossible.” And I suspect that the reason for this is that when the Church starts talking about what is “possible,” it inevitably gets around to speaking of a Resurrection.

—

BY FAITH, NOT KNOWING WHITHER …

Nor quinquireme nor caravel

Troubles these waters

With sail flap

And beat of many oars.

Only the small coracle

Rocks on the tide’s edge.

And I must put to sea.

The wind riffles the water

And the waves splat

Against the harbour granite.

I do not know where—

By what cliffs, what landfalls,

What unimagined shores—

I shall find the ultimate harbour,

But there is a wind that will take me,

And I shall go swift and far

At that wind’s urging.

There is no ship

That I may embark upon.

Between port and port

They ply a different journey.

But for this voyaging

Only the sea is wide enough

And the sky deep enough,

And enough, too, the small coracle

In the hollow of the wind’s hand.

EVANGELINE PATERSON

Among my New Year’s resolutions is one for fuller involvement at the frontiers of the current theologycrisis. The case for theism—or for the reality of God in modern life—is now “up for grabs,” and it would be high treason for evangelical Christians to keep their silence when Altizer, Braun, Cox, Dewart, Robinson, Van Buren—indeeed, an entire modern alphabet of speculative theologians—are now taking to the field aggressively. I have therefore decided to relinquish the editorship of CHRISTIANITY TODAY—with its necessary inroads on research time—and to give these next years to theological research and writing.

The July 5 issue will be the last for which I am to bear editorial responsibility, and it will signal my greater freedom for creative work. Besides other possibilities, I am considering an invitation by the Board of CHRISTIANITY TODAY to continue in a loose editor-at-large arrangement and receive a temporary, limited research grant in the area of current theological developments. The Board will soon announce a new editor.

To many whose faithful prayers have encouraged me in these years as editor, a heartfelt thank you, I covet your continued support for the members of our effectively trained and experienced journalistic staff, that CHRISTIANITY TODAY may always bear the stamp of God’s approval.

One of the most striking statements to come from the Second Vatican Council is found in the Decree on Ecumenism. Here we find the Roman church speaking of a hierarchy, not of offices, but of truths. In one place, Catholic theologians are reminded that a distinction between doctrines must be made in light of the fact that an order of truths exists within Catholic truth; the order is hierarchical in that the truths do not all bear the same relation to the fundamental center of Christian faith. This thought is expressed in connection with ecumenical dialogue; only in recognition of the hierarchy of truths, it is said, can the way be found to stimulate both sides to “a deeper knowledge and a clearer revelation of the unfathomable riches of Christ.”

It is no surprise that the introduction of this idea aroused considerable stirring in the council. The Italian bishop Pangrasio first proposed it in 1963, and it was included in the Decree on Ecumenism on October 7, 1964.

Pangrasio was moved to propose the hierarchy-of-truth idea by his intense concern about the divisions of the church. He thought the Decree on Ecumenism as it originally stood was too abstract; he wanted some kind of concrete indication of how the “separated brothers” could be reunited on the basis of the one and only foundation, Jesus Christ. When he suggested the notion of a hierarchy of truths, and when it was actually accepted, many people were surprised. And its meaning was not wholly clear. What was the actual significance of admitting a difference in order of importance between truths of the Catholic faith and the one foundational truth, Jesus Christ?

Since then this idea has been increasingly under discussion. In fact, someone is now writing a dissertation in which he attempts to show that the notion of a hierarchy has antecedents in the thought of the fathers and of St. Thomas. Many praised its inclusion in the decree. Rahner called it one of the great decisions of the council; Schillebeeckx speaks of it as a new conciliar development.

It was injected into the council quite unexpectedly. But Pangrasio apparently struck a sympathetic note with it, and found it receiving surprising acceptance. Rather than putting it into the hands of a committee and thus killing it until Vatican III, the council set it directly within the decrees.

With this, we see another sign of change since the encyclical of 1928 that was directed against the ecumenical movement (Mortalium animos). In that encyclical the notion of a distinction between fundamental and non-fundamental doctrines was rejected. Such a distinction was unacceptable: since all doctrines were revealed by God himself, none could be counted less important than any other. This had always been Rome’s understanding. So with the new decree a longstanding tradition was broken.

Luther and Calvin made a distinction between central and peripheral doctrines. And they knew (in regard to the Church) that not all doctrines lay equally close to the center, Jesus Christ. Naturally, the criterion by which the central doctrines are distinguished from the peripheral is not easy to determine. But anyone reflecting on the catholicity of the Church must come to a distinction similar to that made by Pangrasio, even though he may view the content of the hierarchy of truths quite differently.

And here lies the problem of all ecumenicity. Every church is involved with the problem in some form; each church is aware of the divisions and variations in doctrinal emphasis among the churches. For this reason it is of interest to us that Pangrasio saw his desire crowned with success, and that Vatican II acknowledged the existence of the problem.

The consequences of this admission are not yet foreseeable. There is, of course, no implication of a quantitative reduction of things the Catholic Church holds to be true. If there were, the statement would never have gotten into the decree. Pangrasio himself used the idea of primary and secondary truths—a distinction no more helpful than the Protestant distinction between fundamental and non-fundamental truths. But the significant thing is that the problem was raised and admitted, regardless of the questions remaining about the criterion for determining which truths are primary and which secondary.

Since the council, profound questions have been asked. For instance, is the doctrine of Mary less central than the confession of the Incarnation? Is the doctrine of Jesus Christ the only primary doctrine? Hearing these questions, a Protestant may be inclined to smile and say that they prove that, despite all the talk, nothing has really changed and nothing can really change in Rome. But if this were so, the statement would not have been included in the decree. That it was set within one of the major documents of the council shows how seriously it was taken. This was no mere tactical device; it shows that Rome is convinced that its former anathemas and censures are no longer useful, at least not so long as it is aware that Jesus Christ is indeed the foundation of Christian unity.

The Decree on Ecumenism sets the problem in focus; it does not give an answer. What its significance will be and how it will be applied is anyone’s guess. The future is never determined by the writing of statements. But the decree does put on the agenda a question that is the concern of every church in the crisis of our divisions. It touches on the depths of the mystery of Christ, on the reality of the one Shepherd, who himself talked about the one thing needful.

If this is what is involved in the conciliar Decree on Ecumenism, we can truly speak of a new and striking development. Pangrasio was not being a crypto-Protestant, to be sure. But he did point to a matter that involves Protestantism also: the mystery of Christ in the midst of our fallible and sinful human reality. Thus, it was not his problem alone; it is a problem that faces us all.

Pró•testn., an expression or declaration of objection, disapproval, or dissent, often in opposition to something a person is powerless to prevent or avoid.…¹The Random House Dictionary of the English Language.

Protest was Protestant word number one in 1967. And Viet Nam, more than anything else, was the target.

By last month even President Johnson couldn’t worship in peace without a clergyman criticizing his policies. But then the Rev. Cotesworth Pinckney Lewis of Williamsburg, Virginia, was only getting equal time for soothing sermons on the war preached by such Johnsonians as George Davis of the National City Christian Church.

From the National Council of Churches building in New York and other old- and new-left offices across the country came other critiques and plans for mass protest demonstrations and draft-card turn-ins. In a year of often bitter debate, the Defense Department provided comic relief by banning from military Sunday Schools a Presbyterian paper that printed a young girl’s anti-napalm poem.

Despite foot troubles, Father James Groppi applied King march strategy to Milwaukee, dubbed the “Selma of the North” for the ecumenical protest against the city’s refusal to pass a fair-housing ordinance. Nationally, Negro churchmen struggled to salvage gains with whites and to recast “black power” into a positive, legitimate concept in the face of incitement by extremists and the worst rash of riots in American history. Working capital for Negro self-improvement was the answer, many churchmen thought. In Project Equality, the anti-Kodak campaign, and other efforts churchmen tried for social leverage through church wealth.

For some, particularly those at the microphone at the NCC’s Church and Society Conference in riot-scarred Detroit, morally “justified” violence was the Christian answer to “systemic” repression in the society.

Other issues: Many Protestants lobbied against Catholics to liberalize strict state abortion laws. The Amish said state laws requiring high-school attendance violated their religious freedom, and many threatened to move to Latin America. Protestants—even Baptists with college and hospital budgets to meet—joined Catholics in the federal-aid lines. But in one of the year’s most dramatic protests, nearly three-fourths of New York’s 4.7 million voters rejected a new state constitution that would have eased a flat ban on aid to church schools.

As the year opened congregations faced a tight mortgage market; when it closed, missions suffered international financing woes as Britain devalued the pound sterling.

Evangelicals in the Church of England issued a comprehensive manifesto on social problems, and even the Southern Baptist Convention showed signs of social life. In his most important encyclical, Pope Paul VI made a moderate, Bible—quoting appeal for justice and compassion in world economics.

The biggest surprise of the year was the success of Israel’s six-day blitzkrieg after Arab goading. As soon as the world caught its breath, interfaith recriminations began rolling in, and prophetically minded Protestants cast a new look toward the Holy Land (see page 35).

In theology, the word was mod́•ern (adj., of or pertaining to present and recent time …). The star was semi-Bishop James A. Pike, who won every possible victory from his embarrassed Episcopal colleagues. The bishops made heresy action near-impossible and may yet say there is no such thing as heresy. Then Pike topped them by revealing he’s now a spiritualist. North of the border, Ernest Harrison, who headed the Canadian Anglicans’ new curriculum, published a book denying God’s past, present, or future existence. Polls of NCC assembly delegates and 7,441 clergymen showed considerable doubt about traditional Christian beliefs. United Presbyterians in the U. S. ratified a liberalized confession, and New Zealand Presbyterians exonerated the dean of their only seminary, who questioned Bible authority, the Resurrection, and the miracles. In a reaction against similar views in Germany, conservatives rallied to the new “No Other Gospel” movement.

As usual, the word for church affairs was ec•u•meń•i•cal (adj., of or pertaining to a movement, especially among Protestant groups since the 1800s, aimed at achieving universal Christian unity and church union through international interdenominational organizations that cooperate on matters of mutual concern …). But Rome was more and more in the picture, with some Anglicans and Protestants, maybe, hoping, perhaps, that the pope might be chairman of the board of Christendom someday. Catholic participation in the NCC and the American Bible Society increased. Biggest interchurch obstacles were Mary and marriage (mixed). Orthodox Patriarch Athenagoras made a historic visit to see his friend Pope Paul.

Intra-Protestant mergers proceeded, the Episcopal Church voted further work toward a mass U. S. union, American evangelicals moved toward more tangible unity, and the charismatic movement—now including some Roman Catholics—oozed through the Church.

In internal matters, Catholics continued to out-ferment the Protestants, with liturgical experiments, exodus of married priests, debates on celibacy and birth control, the National Catholic Reporter’s printing of the secret birth-control report to the Pope, a firing and rehiring at Catholic University, and a restructuring of the Vatican Curia.

E•vań•ge•lism (n., the proclamation of the Gospel) was bigger news than you might have expected. Indonesia’s post-Sukarno mass revivals put “Christian” nations to shame. Christians remained under pressure in many countries, but Billy Graham ventured his first sermons in a Communist land and conducted a crusade in Tokyo that netted nearly as many professions of faith as there were Christians living in that city, the world’s largest. Canada’s Expo 67 reflected the current theological cleavage in its two Christian pavilions. In the United States, evangelism was a prime topic at the U. S. conference of the World Council of Churches and the Faith and Order meeting, and the American Baptist Convention tried to figure out what it was.

Bomb(n., slang, an absolute failure; fiasco) of the year was Spain’s new “religious liberty” law, which put Protestants in a worse position than ever. Close runners-up: That super-secret first world synod of Catholic bishops. The little-noted nor long-remembered 450th anniversary of the Reformation, plus silly Communist stunting of the festivities at Wittenberg. The Communists’ celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of “freedom” while they continued repression of Christian and Jewish minorities. Superficial Christian—Marxist dialogues. The lack of religious reflections in Svetlana Stalin’s book. And the petty United Nations debate on a religious freedom charter.

PERSONALIA

Republican presidential candidate George Romney provided Look with his 1955–1966 income-tax returns. The Michigan governor gave 17 per cent of his $2,972,923.58 adjusted gross income to the Mormon church.

Evangelist Billy Graham was hospitalized with pneumonia and had to miss annual meetings of his board in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.

Francis J. Matthews, director of community relations for the Job Corps in Washington, D. C., resigned from the Roman Catholic priesthood and married his former diocesan secretary November 8. Last year he was fired as publicist for the St. Louis archdiocese.

Anglican Primate Howard H. Clark charged that the Canadian government could double its foreign aid by eliminating “unnecessary expenditures” at home.

Mrs. Hazel Jean Robinson won $35,000 damages in an auto-crash lawsuit in the Ontario Supreme Court, including $3,300 for the services of a Christian Science practitioner who prayed for her from Chicago by telephone.

Hugh McCullum, 35, a secular newsman, will become the first layman to edit the Canadian Churchman in the Anglican paper’s ninety-six year history.

Canada’s Supreme Court upheld Dutch—born metalworker Dirk Hoogendoorn’s religious refusal to pay union dues. The Christian Reformed layman, a member of the Christian Labor Association, says unions support “class struggle and socialism.”

Spanish author Vicente Silio, who wrote that Jesus had brothers, was acquitted of charges of “scoffing at the Catholic religion.”

Maharashi Mauessh Yogi, founder of India’s transcendental meditation cult, said he will “retire” next year. Mia Farrow, 22, estranged wife of Frank Sinatra, says she plans to visit the mystic for a month early next year.

The Dutch government attached the salary of Baptist pastor P. B. Huizinga, who withheld 15 per cent of his income tax to protest military expenditures.

The Danish Baptist weekly reports that a Baptist pastor in Burundi, W. D. Nyakamwe, has been jailed for an antigovernment statement in a letter the post office censored.

Archbishop George Hakim, 59, new Melkite Patriarch of the 500,000 Arabic Byzantine Catholics, faces a problem, since the two traditional seats of the Antioch patriarchate are in Cairo and Damascus, both hotbeds of anti-Israel feeling. Hakim, born in Egypt of Lebanese parents, once was an Arab nationalist but is now a citizen of Israel.

PROTESTANT PANORAMA

The Episcopal Church of Our Merciful Saviour, Louisville, Kentucky, is the first church to receive urban-renewal funds for building renovation, and an African Methodist church there hopes for a similar deal. The 3 per cent, $50,000 loan is under the 1965 housing act.

The Episcopal quarterly Church in Metropolis will now be sponsored also by United Presbyterians, Methodists, and the United Church of Christ.

Next month some 100,000 United Presbyterians will receive the first edition of a four-page tabloid, The Presbyterian Layman, published by the conservative Presbyterian Lay Committee. Layman Editor Howard Earl, formerly an editor of Science Digest, was not among the forty-two journalists who inquired about the job through a large “blind” ad in Editor and Publisher.

The Methodist social-concerns board joined eight other groups in urging the U. S. Supreme Court to review the constitutionality of treating drunkenness as a crime.

The Union, New Jersey, clergy association protested display of a nativity scene at the Municipal Building. Pending an Oregon Supreme Court ruling, the cross on a hill overlooking the city of Eugene is still glowing this Christmas.

A survey shows forty-five cooperative groups among the major Lutheran denominations are formed or forming in local areas.

The Church of the Nazarene gained 7,532 members in the United States and 12,938 overseas in the past year, for a world membership of 453,187. Per-capita giving increased to $190.13.

The parish council of Berlin’s historic Kaiser Wilhelm Church refused to let seven campus groups continue to meet there because “some student chaplains pay more attention to politics than to their spiritual duties.” Bishop Kurt Scharf condemned the action.

The Dutch Reformed Church voted to permit local churches to call women pastors.

St. Mary’s Anglican Church of Woolwich, England, wants a license to sell alcohol at a bar in the crypt to attract the sophisticated under-21 crowd and teach them to “drink sensibly.”

MISCELLANY

The entire Franciscan seminary in Santa Barbara, California, and the first two classes at San Francisco Theological Seminary (United Presbyterian) will relocate at Berkeley’s ecumenical Graduate Theological Union, which also encompasses Jews and Unitarians.

Civic leaders in Jackson, Mississippi, offered $50,000 for information on the November 21 bombing of the home of Rabbi Perry Nussbaum, who said, “I came within one foot of being dead.” Three days earlier local Methodist renewal-center director Robert Kochtitzky and guest John P. Adams, national Methodist social-concerns publicist, escaped serious injury when his home was bombed.

New York City’s Protestant Council refused to place the Lutheran film The Antkeeper (November 24 issue, page 42) on local TV, partly because it makes God too judgmental and the three-storied universe too literal. Strangely, the incarnational analogy was written by Rolf Forsberg, whose Parable film has been sold and rented to wipe out the council’s World’s Fair debts.

Portugal’s Cardinal Cerejeira, 79, a close friend of Premier Salazar since they were fellow seminary students together, urged the Church to stay out of politics and confine its work to spiritual matters. The sermon was considered an answer to Catholics who are critical of the regime on the basis of papal social encyclicals.

The leader of France’s 550,000 Jews charged that President de Gaulle’s recent statement that Jews have always been “an elite people sure of itself and domineering” was anti-Semitic.

Christians and Muslims appear to enjoy a thaw in relations with Yugoslavia’s Communist government, Religious News Service reports. Publicity about religious figures and events is increasing.

Hungarian ministers in the United States are protesting the reported arrest of three churchmen in Hungary: the Rev. Balint Kovacs, and two laymen charged with re-establishing banned youth groups.

The Russian Orthodox Church has permission to print the first complete edition of the Bible since the Bolshevik Revolution fifty years ago, Metropolitan Nikodim reported on his recent U. S. tour.

Indonesians are turning to Christianity on a scale unprecedented in modern times anywhere in the world. The Indonesian Bible Society counts 400,000 converts since 1965. It’s a “revival that seems to add another Asian chapter to the Acts of the Apostles,” said W. Stanley Mooneyham after a tour of the archipelago.

The conversions are particularly significant in view of Indonesia’s pagan past and its current place as the world’s fifth largest in population. Islam has been the dominant religious influence for centuries. There are more Muslims in Indonesia than in any other country.

Recently, Muslims have taken serious note of the Christian surge. One Muslim leader addressed an open letter to the Indonesian president, General Suharto, threatening “holy war” if the mass movement to Christianity in Central and East Java continues. On October 1, anti-Christian riots in East Indonesia resulted in the sacking of at least twenty-five Christian churches in and around the city of Makassar, Sulawesi. Smaller incidents had occurred a few weeks earlier in North Sumatra and even in Djakarta, the capital.

But Suharto has rejected demands of Muslims that Indonesian Christians be cut off from foreign help. For at least the time being, Indonesia will keep its doors open to missionaries. “Every faith is universal,” said Suharto, “and should be able to have international contacts.” He conceded a major point to the Muslims, however, in asking that the major faiths not proselyte from each other but instead turn their attention to the conversion of the heathen tribes.

Suharto spoke to Muslim, Hindu, Roman Catholic, and Protestant leaders who had been called together November 30 to discuss how growing tensions might be relieved. He said he came to the meeting himself because he fears a national disaster (for earlier reports, see story following).

On the huge island of Borneo there was violence of a different sort. Rampaging Dyak tribesmen descended upon resident Chinese, some of whom were Communists and Communist sympathizers, and drove about 40,000 from their homes. There has been an anti-Chinese campaign in Indonesia ever since 1965, when a Communist coup was averted at the last minute. The Chinese are often accused of economic exploitation. And dedicated Muslims resent their fondness for pork.

Despite the turbulence, the conversions to Christianity continue, with no material or social gain attached. The Indonesian constitution refers to “belief in One Supreme God” and the “freedom to every resident to adhere to his respective religion and to perform his religious duties in conformity with that religion and faith.” A Muslim daily said the storming of the churches was provoked by a Christian teacher who said Muhammad was an adulterer.

Mooneyham, an associate of evangelist Billy Graham, writes in the December issue of Decision that the revival “has reached flood-tide proportions.” He says the Indonesian Bible Society traces the start of it to a little boy who in 1964 returned from school for the holidays with a New Testament.

“Religious faith seemed moribund in his Communist village,” Mooneyham said, “but every evening the boy would read the stories about Jesus to his brothers and sisters. Soon some adults joined the group. Friends and neighbors dropped in.”

A preacher was brought from another town, and people were baptized. Before long twelve adjacent villages were asking for a preacher, and many more people were turning to Christianity.

Then came the failure of the Communist plot, which created an ideological vacuum that Christianity began to fill. Bible shortages developed. Churchmen trying to compile statistics could not keep pace with developments.

Evangelicals in other countries have watched the revival closely, but so far there have been no major crash programs to capitalize fully on the fresh Christian interest. Dutch Christians increased their missionary giving by 20 per cent, but Indonesian churches said more was needed. A 1968 drive will seek to double the budget to $5.5 million.

Billy Graham is weighing an invitation to travel to Indonesia between meetings of his projected Australia-New Zealand crusade to address an Easter Sunday rally.

As a direct effect of the revival, the Indonesian Missionary Fellowship has been formed, and before very long the country may be sending out its first Christian missionaries. Observers note that missionaries from Indonesia might have much greater success in other Muslim lands than white missionaries. Another possibility is Communist China, which is said to be taking in scores of Chinese from Indonesia every week. If Indonesia’s Chinese Christians volunteer, the Gospel may gain a major means of access.

THE MUSLIM BACKLASH

A Muslim backlash is sweeping across Indonesia after a wave of conversions to Christianity in that land of 160,000,000 people.

Contrary to the hopes of some, no relief of tension accompanied approval of plans by General Suharto, acting president, for the Indonesian Council of Churches to hold its triennial conference in Makassar October 29-November 7. Prior to that, Muslims had damaged a number of church buildings and schools in the Makassar area. Bibles, hymnals, and other Christian literature were burned.

The council meeting at Makassar drew 250 representatives from thirty-eight denominations, who agreed efforts must be redoubled to accommodate the needs of new converts and the requests of many others who wish to join churches. The former youth secretary of the East Asia Christian Conference, 34-year-old Soritua Nababan, was elected new general secretary of the national council. He is a member of Sumatra’s Huris Kristeen Batak denomination, and has studied theology in Germany.

Christian leaders are confident that the goal of the Muslim zealots, namely an Islamic state, will not be realized, but they do fear that a comity system might be forced upon Christians. This might mean that in certain areas no more Christian churches could be started.

Meanwhile, Indonesian Protestants are eager to evangelize while doors remain open and the Holy Spirit leads men to salvation as never before in the history of the country. Evangelist John Haggai of Atlanta returned this month from a two-week fact-finding mission to Indonesia, encouraged to conduct campaigns there in 1968. All the pastors, missionaries, and church officials he contacted urged him to come.

Muslim power is nowhere near its reported numerical strength (90 per cent of the population, according to the Rev. Alex Rotti of the Djakarta Regional Council of Churches). “They say that Christians number maybe ten million and the rest are Muslims, but this is not true,” said Rotti, who is also a leader in the Dutch Reformed Church. “Fifty per cent of the people of Timor, for example, are animists.”

A Christian government official said, “The Muslim group is now afraid because they see the tremendous increase of Christianity. They are looking for things that will put Christians in a bad light. For example, they are accusing the Christians of using all the gifts from Christians abroad to Christianize the country according to a set plan, a certain strategy made by the Christians.”

“Now they are trying to accuse us that we are on the side of Israel,” he added. “Since our country has no diplomatic relations with Israel, this would put public opinion against the Christians.”

The government official acknowledged that the greatest danger is that the Muslims might stop Christian evangelism entirely. He said, however, that “we have those on our side who are in the Nationalist Party, and they are fighting to keep our five basic principles, the first of which is belief in God. The definite act of President Suharto in stating that the council meeting had to proceed—the Muslims wanted it postponed or canceled—causes Muslims to feel that they lost.”

Now that Muslims know the attitude of the government, the official continued, they are looking for a way around it. They are suggesting that an assembly be established in which all religious groups will come together to discuss the situation. “We are guessing,” he said, “that in that body they will make a demarcation line to point out what areas are Muslim and which are Christian.”

GAINER BRYAN, JR.

ROUGH DRAFT

“You are here to do a solemn thing—to assert the claim of conscience above the claim of government, the claim of justice over the claim of order. In asserting these priorities you are in harmony with the biblical tradition.”

With these words, the Rev. Richard J. Neuhaus, pastor of a Missouri Synod Lutheran church in Brooklyn, New York, opened an interfaith draft-resistance service. Eighty-six men marched up the center aisle to deposit their draft cards in a brass alms basin.

Other “peace services” were held this month in churches throughout the nation. But simultaneous rumblings of a shift in war criticism were heard from churchmen in the nation’s capital and in San Francisco.

A service scheduled for St. Stephen and the Incarnation Episcopal Church in Washington, D. C.—which was to have included draft-card surrenders—was banned after official church pressure. Five men later turned in their cards at a religious service at Georgetown University’s Hall of Nations after six other churches turned down the anti-draft group, The Resistance.

And in San Francisco, Episcopal Bishop Kilmer Myers refused the use of Grace Cathedral for a “turn in or burn in” draft card service. The sponsoring Northern California Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Viet Nam later held the service on the steps of the Federal Building (in violation of the attorney general’s orders) as fifty-six clergymen stood by. Eighty-nine men plunked their cards into an offering plate belonging to the Howard Presbyterian Church and a chalice made by Vietnamese out of an army shell case.

Said Father Peter Riga of St. Mary’s College regarding the resisters: “They stand afoul of the law, but we appeal to a higher law.…”

Stanford’s Robert McAfee Brown said the cards were “symbols of coercion and force, suffering and killing … but in here [the chalice] the card becomes a message of peace.”

Other “services of conscience” were held in Los Angeles, where military opponents dropped their draft cards into a chalice of human blood on the altar of the First Unitarian Church, and in New Haven, Connecticut, where 1,000 demonstrators marched from Yale’s Battell Chapel to the courthouse to surrender draft documents.

Eleven young men left their cards in a collection plate at the Germantown Community United Presbyterian Church after giving anti-war speeches.

Conservatives regarded Myers’s refusal as a concession to heavy contributors who have been inflamed over recurring controversies. Grace Cathedral reportedly is $100,000 in debt.

In a curious twist, Neuhaus, speaking at a two-day symposium on “Who Speaks for the church?” in Washington, D. C.—not at the peace service in his church—said religious opposition to the war is frequently self-defeating because it focuses on policy decisions rather than moral principles.

And at the same meeting, Paul Ramsey, who recently slapped the World Council of Churches for venturing beyond its competence on social issues, declared church endorsement of specific policies was wrong both in strategy and in principle.

Some observers think remarks by Neuhaus at the symposium, and the barring of services in San Francisco and Washington that would have espoused breaking the law, are a sign that responsible liberals are now shifting from a particularist stance on policy decisions to a middle way.

Myers, explaining his position, said the Church, as an institution, should not lend itself to a polarization of extremes of the right and left. It should instead encourage a “rhetoric of the center,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Coordinating Council of the Methodist Church set February 1, 1968, as the suspension date for Concern, a denominational social-action magazine. The Board of Christian Social Concerns contends the controversial organ is devoted to a “secular mission” rather than promotion, as originally intended.

In another clergy-draft conflict, the National Council of Churches and the American Civil Liberties Union are seeking a court test of the re-classification of Cornell University chaplains Father David Connor and the Rev. Paul Gibbons and of University Christian Movement field director Henry Bucher. All three were reclassified from 4-D to 1-A delinquent after they turned in their draft cards.

An ACLU official said it entered the scene because of the “intimidating nature” of General Lewis Hershey’s draft-review directive. Hershey, incidentally, said nearly three-fourths of recently surrendered draft cards actually were business calling cards, drivers’ licenses or membership cards. “Many are protesters,” noted the draft director, “until it comes to the moment of truth.”

RUSSELL CHANDLER

KEY BRIDGE II

Twelve churchmen¹George A. Fallon, Leighton Ford, John F. Havlik, Carl F. H. Henry, Rufus Jones, David E. Kucharsky, Harold Lindsey, John A. Mackay, T. A. Raedeke, J. Sherrard Rice, Edward H. Rockey, Carl W. Tiller. met December 2 and 3 to carry forward the “Key Bridge” dialogue on possibilities of more tangible evangelical witness and unity in American life. They agreed on the general feasibility of a multi-faceted continental evangelistic drive cresting in 1973, subject to favorable conditions.

The meeting, following up a September session that was a first for cooperative-minded evangelicals, was again held at a motel adjacent to Key Bridge in Arlington, Virginia.

The latest conference produced the concept of a non-organizational “evangelical Christian coalition” to advance cooperative efforts. It also will seek to present a full understanding of what it means to be evangelical and relevant in the contemporary situation.

No decisions were arrived at, but significant progress was reported in discussions, and an enlarged meeting was projected for March 9 and 10. No significant differences were encountered in the discussions.

Participants, clergy and lay, came from nine major denominations, but as individuals and not as official representatives of their communions. They constituted a transdenominational dialogue that reached far beyond existing patterns of cooperation.

OUTLER OUTSPOKEN

Albert C. Outler, internationally respected Methodist theologian of Dallas, Texas, surprised Methodist Christian—education specialists last month when he declared that Methodism is in a state of malaise.

Although he is noted for his exhortations for Christian unity, Outler revealed at a Dallas education meeting that the pending merger with the Evangelical United Brethren to form the United Methodist Church upset him.

The outspoken theologian, who has been personally acquainted with ecumenical meetings since Edinburgh in 1937, told the group that only Eastern Orthodox churches are less inclined toward basic reforms than Methodists.

“Meanwhile, there is in the Methodist Church visible disaffection and mutiny swelling to epidemic proportions, a crisis in vocational identity and professional commitment that has already shattered the esprit de corps of our once proud itinerant system,” he said.

In part, the illness is due to the “peculiar and cherished Methodist constitution and policy—a policy which used to work so well but that now is no longer working as advertised,” he maintained. “There is a self-stultifying sullenness among the clergy, generated by the feeling that being ‘pastor in charge’ no longer means being ‘in Charge’ but rather being a high-class flunky of the hierarchy on the one hand and the official board on the other—a sort of residential chaplain.”

Outler charged that the Methodist system of appointment of pastors degrades pastors to a status of employes and robs them of initiative.

MARQUITA MOSS

SHOOTING DOWN .006

America’s 330,000 churches currently show a facility-utilization rate of about .006, and the figure is declining. This means the average church makes full use of its property and equipment about one hour for every 168 in the week. No other architectural structure is used so sparingly.

Evangelicals are responding to the fact of this waste by trying to make church buildings more functional, and liberals by seeking to reduce their number. The fewer-buildings bloc, which is also ecumenically inclined, finds its Exhibit A in the planned city of Columbia, Maryland, now under construction in the rolling countryside midway between Baltimore and Washington, D. C.

“We seem to agree that by investing less in bricks and mortar we will be able to spend more time and energy on mission and ministry,” says the Rev. Clarence Sinclair, who heads the Columbia Cooperative Ministry.

With the help of the National and Maryland Councils of Churches, Sinclair’s group is working out plans for sharing ministers and facilities. Thirteen denominations have thus far entered into a “covenant” to work together in Columbia rather than establishing competing churches. The first church building won’t be ready before Easter, 1970, but a congregation has been meeting in a town hall since September.

The Lutheran Church in America, Methodists, and United Presbyterians will share responsibility for ministerial leadership in the first village church. Village two will be American Baptist, Episcopal, and United Church of Christ; and village three, Church of the Brethren, Missouri Synod Lutheran, and Presbyterian, U. S. Roman Catholics will join the venture soon.

The cooperative venture was initiated by developer James Rouse, an elder in Brown Memorial United Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, who has more recently been attending the innovative ecumenical Church of the Savior in Washington. Rouse asked the National Council to arrange for the planning. Spokesmen for Rouse say he will also provide for churches that do not subscribe to the ecumenical compact.

GERMANY: THESES AND PROTESTS

“Jesus Christ ordered his Church to proclaim the great acts of God without fear of men. It is a mistake to think that the task of the Church is to turn the local congregations into experimental laboratories for conflicting theological ideas.” With these words the German Confessional (“No Other Gospel”) Movement closed a new protest against the “false teachings of a theology governed by the spirit of the present age.”

This protest document was released at a mass meeting of 8,000 persons late last month in Düsseldorf, where the movement was christened nearly two years ago at a meeting attended by 20,000.

In seven theses, the movement draws attention to biblical truths that it says are being impaired. The basis of evangelical teaching is being undermined, asserts the document prepared by forty theologians, pastors, and laymen, including Professor Walter Künneth of Erlangen University.

These men acknowledge faith in the work of the Holy Spirit through the testimony of the Bible, the deity of Christ, his substitutionary and atoning death, his bodily resurrection, his return to become universal Head and Judge, forgiveness of sins with the enabling gift of the Holy Spirit to obey God’s commandments, and the Church’s task of saving lost men by fearlessly testifying to God’s great acts.

The theses also dispute: that scientific study alone enables men to understand the Bible as God’s word, without the grace of the Holy Spirit; that the New Testament apostles dressed up their message in mythical language; that praying to Christ is wrong; and that following the Crucified One is possible without a tie to the Resurrected One.

The last protest reads: “Ecclesiastical preaching becomes unbelieving when the leading organs of the Church allow pastors to be ordained who haven’t accepted the Gospel in the sense of acknowledged confession, and who will say the Credo with the congregation but have at the same time inner reservations against it.”

JAN J. VAN CAPELLEVEEN

PHILIPPINES: COMMON BIBLE

Leaders of the Philippine Bible Society and the Roman Catholic Commission on Christian Unity are planning a common Bible translation. Joint efforts are now under way for a Bible in the Ilocano dialect, the language of the northern region of Luzon—largest Philippine island. Next May, a Bible translation institute will be held at the country’s summer capital of Baguio to prepare a Protestant-Catholic Bible for residents of the Tagalog area in central Luzon. A joint Scripture—distribution program through the PBS is also in the works.

THE CONGRESS THAT ALMOST WAS

The Third Evangelical Congress of Latin America, until recently slated to convene in São Paulo, Brazil, this month, has become “the congress that almost was.” It has been again postponed, now ostensibly for another year, while the ecumenically oriented workshops that were to precede it were scheduled for December 11–17 in Uruguay.

From the beginning, the congress has been beset with problems. At the second congress (Lima, Peru, 1961) the conservative domination was overwhelming, and ecumenical organizers decided the time was not ripe for realizing a dream of long standing—the unification of the various national church councils and federations in a single Latin American Evangelical Confederation. So this objective was postponed until the next continental assembly.

Responsibility for coordination and for promotion of unity, meanwhile, was assigned successively each year to a different national council. In 1966, convening the third continent-wide congress was to be the responsibility of the Evangelical Confederation of Brazil. But this plan for passing on the torch never got off the ground.

At the same time that the Committee on Cooperation in Latin America (CCLA) was dissolved in favor of the Latin American Department of the U. S. National Council of Churches, ecumenical leaders brought into existence several specialized agencies. They were ISAL (church and society), CELADEC (Christian education), and finally UNELAM (“Provisional Committee for Evangelical Unity in Latin America”). Chaired by leaders of weight and vision, these agencies (along with the older ones for university and youth work) have become the focal point of the ecumenical thrust in Latin America. UNELAM and its director, Dr. Emilio Castro, have been particularly active in the effort to promote the third congress.

But this became, for some Latin Americans, precisely the problem. Hardline conservatives began to fear an “ecumenical” takeover, and the anticipated São Paulo congress was at first treated with great distrust. Then it was discovered that the Brazilian confederation had no intention of being manipulated by ecumenists, and in the congress planning committee the Brazilians teamed up with conservatives from other parts of South America to write the program and call the shots in terms satisfactory to any evangelical.

The counter move was to schedule a series of consultations just prior to the congress under the sponsorship of UNELAM, ISAL, ULAJE, and CELADEC. There was good precedent for this—the program had been similarly structured six years ago in Peru. But because the alphabet of organizations now is longer and more impressive, the consultations may have seemed too risky for the conservatives to tolerate.

Deaths

CHARLES J. WATTERS, 40, Roman Catholic chaplin on a voluntary six-month extension of Viet Nam duty; hit by a bomb as he prayed with wounded men at Dak To.

J. KENNETH PFOHL, 93, veteran leader of the Southern Province, Moravian Church in America; in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

KARL GRAESSER, 64, president of the northeast district of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod; in Bronxville, New York.

DALTON F. MCCLELLAND, 77, YMCA representative at the United Nations and a longtime worker in India; while attending a meeting in New York’s Interchurch Center.

Consequently, the congress was postponed once again. The ecumenically oriented groups then withdrew their financial backing, which reportedly came from the NCC, and scheduled this month’s Uruguay workshops on such topics as church and society, social action, social service, community organization and development, migrant problems, youth strategy, and the role of women in church and society.

On the other side of the fence, the hard-line conservatives met October 25 at Rancagua, Chile, to issue a declaration to Latin American evangelicals everywhere, deploring the fact that “many groups supported by diverse agencies which are not identified with the church … are trying to lead the people of God,” and stating that “we do not agree with their actions or their political-religious publications.” They called for the formation of a committee with “firm evangelical convictions” to study the possible structure of a “South American Evangelical Confederation.”

What will come from the Rancagua manifesto remains to be seen. The suggestion was a planning committee meeting in March, 1968, followed by a South American Evangelical Conference in June of the same year. Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean were considered to be outside the pale of the self-appointed committee’s responsibility. The declaration was signed by eight conservative church leaders, several of them foreign missionaries.

Writes Castro, “If we take advantage of [the postponement] to study the preparatory documents, the delegations can approach the dialogue better informed, and we shall demonstrate to our surprise that our positions are not so different the one from the other. I am convinced of what our Latin American Evangelical Church needs is direct communication—personal conversations, common Bible studies. We must not grow weary in our common calling to testify to the people of Latin America concerning the integral salvation which Christ offers and the unity which he creates among those who accept him as Lord and Saviour.”

No one can be sure what will happen next as dedicated and sincere Christian men on both sides of the organizational fence seek to impose their own designs upon the Latin American evangelical community. And it is anybody’s guess as to when evangelicals may again meet in a continental congress.

W. DAYTON ROBERTS

This is the first Christmas with Bethlehem under Jewish political control, and Christians are making the most of it. Some 50,000 tourists, reportedly the largest number ever, were expected to flock into the little town to mark the birth of the Saviour at the place where it happened. To help control the crush, Israeli authorities planned to prohibit non-Christian visitors from entering Bethlehem during the holidays.

The big event is a midnight mass at the Church of the Nativity. This year it will be televised around the world via Telestar satellite, according to Religious News Service. Only 700 people can squeeze into the church, but in the adjacent square about 10,000 can watch the mass on a big TV screen.¹In years past Protestants have been barred from the church. In case of bad weather the Greek Orthodox group has invited them in.

For Protestants, the big events are in the Shepherds’ Fields adjoining Bethlehem. Part of the land is owned by the YMCA, and Christmas eve services are held in the same large caves where shepherds took refuge nearly two thousand years ago. The Christmas eve services include times of fellowship and partaking of bread together.

For the first time since Israel became a state in 1948, a considerable number of Christian Arabs who are Israeli citizens will be able to go to Bethlehem for Christmas. While Bethlehem was under the rule of Jordan, only a limited number of these Arab Christians were allowed entrance. Bethlehem came under Jewish control last June during the brief war in which Israeli troops swept eastward to the Jordan River, but its fate is extremely uncertain. Although the U. N. Security Council has agreed on delicately balanced guidelines for an indirect Arab-Israeli dialogue on the Middle East crisis, U. N. diplomats generally concede that things may worsen before they get better.

People from all over the world go to Bethlehem for Christmas. Evangelicals in recent years have shown a special bent for travel to the Holy Land, and the June war enhanced their interest not only in the geography of Palestine but in its history and, even more, its eschatology.

Curiosity has been centered on the question whether the Temple will be rebuilt. Israeli officials from Foreign Minister Abba Eban on down flatly deny any such plans. But rumors persist. A few years ago reports were widely circulated that a prefabricated temple destined for Jerusalem was seen at a port somewhere in Florida. More recently, just before the outbreak of the June war, an advertisement in the Washington Post invited correspondence from people interested in helping to rebuild the Temple. (A CHRISTIANITY TODAY inquiry went unanswered, and the Post refuses to identify the advertiser.)

In August, a Hong Kong missionary, Michael Browne, reported in The Christian and Christianity Today that “Israel government representatives have ordered 60,000 tons of finest Bedford stone from Bedford, Indiana, to be used in the erection of the Jerusalem Temple.” The report got major display treatment in the weekly evangelical newspaper, which is the British sister publication of CHRISTIANITY TODAY. Key industry sources in Indiana disclaimed any knowledge of the deal. But Dr. J. D. Douglas, editor of the London-based publication, stood behind the report and said a follow-up article is in the making.

Browne wrote that “five hundred rail-car loads of stone from Bedford, considered to be among the finest building stone in the world, are being freighted pre-cut to exact specifications, and one consignment has already been dispatched to Israel. Shipments are being handled by Pier 26 in New York.”

He cited a report from “authoritative sources in Sellersburg, Indiana,” adding: “Cornerstones for the third Jersualem Temple are already in Israel. Materials for this Temple have been secretly in preparation for seven years,” the report went on, “and it is believed American Jews are mainly responsible for financially undergirding the whole project. Strong rumors from other usually reliable circles say the two freestanding pillars for the new Temple have already been cast in bronze.”

Such reports are of unusual interest to dispensationalists, the eschatalogical monitors among evangelicals, who insist that Old Testament covenants with the nation Israel are yet to be literally fulfilled. A few dispensationalists regard the current state of Israel as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy, but most key thinkers of this school argue that the Jews there are still at the political mercy of the Gentile nations. The consensus is that the “times of the Gentiles” will not be concluded until the second coming of Christ, following seven years of tribulation after the rapture of the Church.

The brightest new exponent of this view, Dean Charles Caldwell Ryrie of Dallas Theological Seminary, discussed some of his convictions at a prophetic conference in Washington, D. C., last month. Like another speaker who said he was pre-everything (“I don’t even eat Post Toasties anymore”), Ryrie believes that rapture of the Church and seven years of tribulation will precede the end of “the times of the Gentiles.”

A Phi Beta Kappa from Haverford College with a Ph.D. from Edinburgh, the 42-year-old Ryrie typifies a moderating trend within dispensationalism. The swing away from the traditional seven distinct dispensations is underscored in the New Scofield Reference Bible (the first Scofield was the literary focus of dispensationalism for two generations). Ryrie defines a dispensation merely as “a distinguishable economy in the outworking of God’s purpose.” Unlike most dispensationalists of the past, he does not consider specific blocks of time as part of the system.

A 1965 book, Dispensationalism Today, lifted Ryrie to the role of scholarly spokesman of moderate dispensationalism. The tall, blond, quiet-spoken son of an Illinois banker was reared in an American Baptist church and now belongs to the First Baptist Church of Dallas, largest in the Southern Baptist Convention.

WHITEST CHRISTMAS

Christmas couldn’t be any whiter than it is in Labrador, that far-north tract of Canada which this year marked the seventy-fifth anniversary of the start of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell’s remarkable work. Today he is honored in many parts of the world as “the Good Samaritan of Labrador,” or even, without exaggeration, as “the creator of a new Labrador.”

The Grenfell saga began when he entered a huge tent-like building in London in 1883 and saw “an aged man … praying on a platform before an immense audience. The length of his prayer!” Then a vivacious person jumped up and shouted, “Let us sing a hymn while our brother finishes his prayer!” Since unconventionality, common sense, or humor in anything religious was new to Grenfell, he stayed to hear the speaker.

The vivacious man was D. L. Moody, accompanied by Ira Sankey, and that night Grenfell heard and responded to Christ’s call for a life of dedicated service. Although his father was a clergyman, Grenfell’s spiritual impressions lay dormant until Moody showed him that being a Christian meant “loyalty to a living Leader” who demanded “knightly service in the humblest life as the expression of it,” as Grenfell later wrote. He was “prejudiced for an adventurous world,” and after graduation from medical school and several years as a medical missionary to British fishermen, he heard of the plight of Labrador.

When Grenfell arrived in Labrador in 1892 he was charmed by icebergs flashing all the colors of the rainbow and by birds both familiar and strange hovering over dense shoals of rippling fish. But he soon realized that Labrador was a rugged paradise. Unlike the British Isles, it had no Gulf Stream to warm its coastline. Instead it was swept by currents from the North Pole, hidden often by fogs, and battered by icebergs. Its interior was little more than a vast rocky tableland covered with stunted spruce trees—a region of terror as well as wonder.

The climate notwithstanding, Labrador was, and is, a land of riches, though at that time its hard-working, poverty-stricken, shamefully exploited fishing folk seemed unable to enjoy them.

The year-round residents of the 1,100-mile coast were 5,000 Indians, Eskimos, and whites, but each spring 25,000 arrived in a fishing fleet from Newfoundland. With no doctors or hospitals, this large community was plagued by scurvy, tuberculosis, and rickets. A third of the infants died within their first year, and the mortality rate of adults was among the highest anywhere. Malnutrition and sickness earned for Labrador the nickname “Starvation Coast.”

For the next half-century, Grenfell and Labrador were identified. He started with a hospital, a small group of nurses, and a steam launch that he learned to steer masterfully among the treacherous currents and icebergs. The full story of his adventures would fill a volume.

Grenfell early started a campaign to prevent the fishermen from being exploited by unscrupulous traders. He established schools and two orphanages, cottage industries, and centers for castoff clothing. Today there are four hospitals with up-to-date equipment, fourteen nursing stations, and homes for the crippled and blind. Altogether the Grenfell Associations have a staff of 400, aided also by college volunteers. Grenfell Scholarships have enabled many Labrador young people to study abroad and return home as teachers, nurses, and clergymen.

Grenfell’s story is a notable example of the social impact of the Gospel through one man. Although he operated as a healer, not an orator, the lasting result of his work in Labrador is splendid service with a muted witness to the Leader who inspired it.

TROUBLES IN BURMA, INDIA

Fragmentary reports from Burma indicate that the country’s 230,000 Baptists—the world’s fifth-largest Baptist population—have been increasingly restricted by the Socialist regime, which banned all missionaries last year.

The Baptist World reports that a cooperative mission project between the Burmese and Indian Baptists in the Naga Hill area apparently has ended. The government reportedly recalled the missionaries for “security reasons.”

The Burma Baptist Convention—transferred from missionary to national leaders in 1958—may no longer be able to hold annual meetings; food supplies are short at Zomi Baptist Theological School at Falam (the school that trains pastors for 45,000 Baptists in the Chin Hills), and a village pastor in the Shan State was robbed and killed by bandits in an unexplained raid on his home.

Baptist work in Burma began in 1814 with the arrival of pioneer American Baptist missionaries Ann and Adoniram Judson. It has been one of the most rapidly growing Baptist fields in recent years.

Foreign missionaries in “sensitive areas” of India also are facing government restrictions, according to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. She told the Parliament that no new missionaries are allowed to enter the China-Burma border area because many of the Mizo and Naga tribesmen there are Christians and the missionaries’ influence is being blamed—in Indian public opinion—for tribal revolutionary acitvity.

Tribesmen along the border have been carrying on an armed revolt against the central government, demanding either an autonomous state or independence. The missionary controversy has been building for some time as certain political figures in sensitive states have called for deportation of foreign missionaries and their replacement with natives.

INSTANT MONEY HALTS MERGER

A “Save our School” movement—backed by $1.2 million of student-raised pledges—convinced the trustees of Kentucky Southern College in Louisville to withdraw from a merger agreement with the University of Louisville.

Last March the debt-ridden, formerly Southern Baptist college renounced its convention affiliation so that it could accept federal funds. The merger plan was announced November 1 to stave off impending bankruptcy (see News, Dec. 8, 1967, page 47).

Proclaiming the fund drive a student victory, backers of the small liberal-arts college said the financial support would ensure its existence as an independent Christian institution. Board chairman LeRoy Highbaugh, Jr., personally pledged $800,000 of the $1.2 million, and another drive was immediately launched to raise $6 million over the next five years.

JOHN F. NELSON

REMEMBER ADAM CLAYTON POWELL?

What ever happened to Adam Clayton Powell? He’s still in the Bahamas, by Bimini. But his woes are piling up like Christmas mail during a postal strike.

South Carolina Insurance Commissioner Charles Gambrell has charged that the longtime Harlem congressman’s Nassau-based insurance firm is illegally soliciting business through Negro churches.

The Inter-American Life and Casualty Company, which lists Powell as a director, is pushing a mail sales campaign that asks Negro church secretaries to serve as agents at $1 a month per family, according to Gambrell. An extra carrot is that the church is promised $200 if the policyholder dies. The beneficiary gets $300. Gambrell said he didn’t know what Powell might get.

Meanwhile, back in Miami, the unseated Democrat’s estranged wife won a default judgment in a separate-maintenance suit. Some Harlem Negro clergymen think it’s time to elect a new congressman, and Negro-rights celebrity James Meredith, who aborted an earlier campaign, announced he would again run for Powell’s seat.

Powell, pastor of the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, has not budged from Bimini since the House of Representatives charged him with misuse of funds and court defiance. Contempt charges would be pressed if he returned to New York.

BY FAITH, NOT SIGHT

Even though he can’t see, the Rev. Russell Reinert is a man of vision. He is the first blind man ever accepted for missionary service by Wycliffe Bible Translators, and one of only a handful of blind missionaries in the world.

Mr. and Mrs. Reinert are to be house-parents and teachers for children of Wycliffe missionaries on assignment in the Central American jungles. They were recruited for two-year service in Mexico City by the Christian Service Corps, a Washington, D. C.-based agency that provides skilled Christian workers for short-term missionary assignments—a “peace corps of the Church.”

Reinert, 26, has never been immobilized by his visual handicap. He attended college and seminary on a government scholarship, graduating summa cum laude from Gordon Divinity School, and has been pastor of the Gonic Baptist Church in Rochester, New Hampshire, for the past three years.

“I really don’t mind being blind,” he says, “for I’m able to help others ‘see’ spiritually.”

Reinert’s missionary enthusiam dates from his high-school days, shortly after his conversion: “It always has bothered me that maybe we have too many churches [in America] while some areas of the world have no witness at all.”

Although he had some eyesight during childhood, Reinert was blind by the time he was 17. His wife has normal vision, and their 17-month-old son has no handicaps. But Reinert had a rough time finding a mission board that would look at him.

“In a sense, I’m a pioneer,” he says. His performance will be a proving ground for himself and a test case for boards reluctant to consider the handicapped.

Reinert’s purebred golden retriever, “E-Z,” may be the first missionary seeing-eye dog.

Because of Wycliffe’s urgent need, Reinert bypassed the corps’s usual two-to three-month training program in Washington, D. C. In its first two years the corps has trained and placed eleven persons in ten countries and has another in training now.

Director Robert Meyers, a genial Presbyterian minister who proposed the organization in a 1964 CHRISTIANITY TODAY essay, emphasizes that skilled lay personnel are recruited and channeled “within the existing missionary structure of the Church.” Thus candidates are commissioned in ceremonies in congregations of their various denominations. The corps recently mailed an information sheet to more than 200 mission boards.

Similar interest in temporary missions work is seen in the 200 applications received by Short Terms Abroad since it was founded. Most were placed, but the Wheaton, Illinois, offices still report more than 600 openings.

This year the Southern Baptist Convention assigned two dozen new volunteers, including two newlywed couples, under its “US-2” program. US-2 is designed to help out career missionaries in the United States and provide two years of useful experiences for Baptists in their twenties. Baptist Press reports that seventeen of eighteen persons in the first US-2 class decided to enter seminary or graduate school.

Since 1948, the Methodists have recruited nearly 1,000 persons for special three-year terms overseas. Its US-2 program in home missions, begun in 1951, has involved more than 400 single men and women and married couples without children.

NO MORE LIFERS

The United Presbyterian Church will now appoint foreign missionaries for limited terms—some less than two years—rather than for life. The 1,000 persons already serving are not affected. Because of a salary increase, the mission board cut 1968 appointments from seventy to thirty-five. The agency, which pulled all its missionaries out of Egypt during the June war with Israel, has severed ties with the Coptic Evangelical Church to avoid “embarrassment” for the Egyptians.

CHURCH-STATE DEVELOPMENTS

The continuing American quest for answers on church-state separation took these directions in recent weeks:

• For the second time in 1967, the U. S. Senate passed (71 to 0) a measure to permit court tests of the constitutionality of public aid to church institutions. But House approval is questionable.

• The National Council of Churches filed a brief asking the U. S. Supreme Court to recognize taxpayers’ right to challenge such aid. The court will rule this term on the right to sue.

• The Supreme Court agreed to rule on the constitutionality of the Federal Communications Commission’s “fairness doctrine” on personal attacks on the air. The doctrine is generally opposed by broadcasters, including right-wing religious speakers.

• Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court upheld a law prohibiting most food stores from selling on Sunday, and Governor Shafer signed a bill prohibiting bias in all housing sales.

From N.C.C. To The Pentagon?

Newspaper reports this month listed J. Irwin Miller, former president of the National Council of Churches, as one of the men being considered to succeed Robert McNamara as Secretary of Defense.

The irony in that possibility was that Miller, 58-year-old Indiana industrialist, has been associated with NCC opposition to military escalation in Viet Nam.

Miller is board chairman of Cummins Engine Company, whose business includes a small number of defense contracts. He has long been active in the Christian Churches (Disciples of Christ) and has also served as an NCC General Board member. A recent issue of Esquire put his picture on the cover and cited him as Republican presidential timber.

FRANCIS CARDINAL SPELLMAN

The death of Francis Cardinal Spellman this month marked the end of an era in American Catholicism. The 78-year-old spiritual leader of two million Roman Catholics in the Archdiocese of New York was undoubtedly the nation’s most influential and famous Catholic clergyman.

His colorful career welded two disparate attitudes: utter modernity in things material and practical, and conservatism in things ecclesiastical and political. A militant anti-Communist, Spellman urged a role for the United States in Viet Nam back in the 1950s. As Roman vicar of U. S. armed services, for the past fifteen years the cardinal had cheered overseas troops with his annual Christmas visits.

Spellman was ordained in 1916. He went to Rome as a translator in 1925 and impressed the Vatican with American publicity techniques. Here he also became fast friends with the late Pope Pius XII, then Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli, who in 1932 consecrated the cherubic Spellman a bishop in St. Peter’s Cathedral. He was named archbishop of New York in 1939 and became a cardinal in 1946.

As dean of America’s cardinals, Spellman did much to shape the attitudes of his church and his country. Critics considered him somewhat anachronistic as the ecumenical movement gained strength.

He forbade Catholics to see movies he thought were immoral, opposed public aid for birth control, and urged federal aid for parochial schools. He once charged Eleanor Roosevelt with “discrimination unworthy of an American mother” for her opposition to state aid to Catholic schools. Although his church supported it, New York State voters this year rejected a new constitution that would have allowed such aid.

The prelate earned a reputation as a master builder. His promotion campaigns raised well over $500 million for ecclesiastical schools, churches, and institutions.

Two days before the Requiem Mass in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, attended by President Johnson, Archbishop Iakovos of the Greek Orthodox Church offered a requiem there, saying it was the first for a Catholic prelate by an Eastern Church official since 1054.

Archbishop John J. Maguire, coadjutor and vicar general of the archdiocese, was named administrator until Spellman’s successor is named by the Pope.

RUSSELL CHANDLER

PROGRESSIVE BISHOP QUASHED

Argentine Bishop Jeronimo Jose Podesta, 47, outspoken critic of the nation’s military regime, resigned this month upon the demand of the papal nuncio to the nation. The bishop, in revealing this pressure, said he had hoped for an audience with Pope Paul VI. But the Vatican merely announced his resignation without comment.

In his work with 900,000 Catholics in a suburban Buenos Aires diocese, Podesta had a reputation as a social reformer who often quoted Paul’s 1967 encyclical on economic justice. Critics of his political involvements linked him with exiled ex-dictator Juan Peron.

KING’S CAPITAL-CRIPPLING CAMPAIGN

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., plans to lead a massive civil-disobedience drive in the nation’s capital next spring to dislocate the government and city functions “until America responds” to the needs of the Negro and white poor.

King, who announced specific tie-up strategy this month at a Southern Christian Leadership Conference meeting, said some 3,000 demonstrators will be trained in non-violent disruption techniques. He admitted the campaign may be risky because of the “angry and bitter” feelings among some Negroes, but he said the program—also mapped for several other Northern cities—is a “last desperate demand” and the only alternative to the “worst chaos, hatred and violence any nation has ever encountered.”

EVANGELICAL HAWKS AND DOVES

“The college young people that I have to face every week are not worrying about the abstract questions we are discussing here, such as the doctrine of separation of church and state. What they throw at us are such immediate, concrete, urgent questions as, ‘What about this war in Viet Nam? Are we right in fighting there? Why is our country so divided on it? What stand shall I take?’”

Despite this pressing campus mood—described by sociologist Ivan Fahs of Minnesota’s Bethel College—theoretical discussion of war by forty evangelicals this month had its value. Host Myron Augsburger, president of Eastern Mennonite College, summoned the “peace seminar” partly because he is tired of Mennonites talking just with theologically liberal pacifists. So the seminar participants—half Mennonite and half from other traditions, hawks as well as doves—shared a common evangelical theology.

Many admitted they learned something from the other side. For instance, those outside the “peace churches” do not always recognize the distinction between two forms of opposition to all wars: “non-resistance” and “pacifism.” Mennonite theologian John C. Wenger said “pacifism as a movement does not always reckon as seriously as it should with the depths of sin and the human heart, and consequently is overly optimistic about the possible abolition of war.” While many pacifists labor humanistically for abolition of war and make international peace their major goal, “the New Testament non-resistant is concerned primarily to bring men and women to the experience of ‘peace with God’ through the Gospel of Christ in repentance and faith.”

Perhaps the sharpest cleavage during the probingly courteous three-day meeting came when “non-resistants” were told that the logic of non-participation in war requires non-participation in society and monastic withdrawal from life. The rebuttal was that it is difficult, if not impossible, to defend as righteous the promiscuously destructive character of war. The counter-rebuttal was that though war is never “righteous,” some unrighteous wars are justifiable.

The polarity (not explicit) was between the antinomianism of “just war” defenders and the perfectionism of the non-resistants. Willing involvement in unrighteous war seemed too complacent to the one side; the assumption that non-resistants can avoid all involvement seemed too optimistic to the other.

316 Million Protestants

The 1968 edition of the World Christian Handbook will show that since the 1962 compilation, world population has grown by half a billion, while Protestants and Anglicans now number 316,286,081, a gain of more than 52 million. The new Roman Catholic total is 581 million, with Muslims estimated at 465 million.

The handbook, released by London’s Lutterworth Press, may in the future be produced by a new church documentation center in the Netherlands, with both Roman Catholic and World Council of Churches backing.

The new fifth edition of the handbook reports country by country, with a breakdown of membership by denomination and mission societies.

Some “doves” were surprised that the most articulate defender of justifiable wars was free to concede that all wars are unrighteous. Some “hawks” were surprised that non-resistants did not attribute guilt to those who, in Christian conscience, participate in war.

Conservative Baptist Seminary President Vernon Grounds painted with some bold strokes on a big canvas in his talk on social responsibility: “Political action is a legitimate expression of Christian love, and is a self-justifying expression of that love. It is not merely a circuitous method of proselytizing, a technique for obtaining some sort of commitment.… At the risk of misunderstanding, we can affirm that social action as an expression of love is an autonomous activity which does not demand any end beyond itself.”

Baylor University historian James Wood discussed nationalism in Hans Kohn’s sense—“a state of mind in which the supreme loyalty of the individual is felt to be due to the nation-state.” Wood said nationalism, including American, “ultimately judges or tolerates all religion on the basis of whether or not it is useful to the state. So long as religion serves the national interests and programs of the nation-state it may be tolerated, even warmly embraced.”

In the discussion it was pointed out that Americanism easily leads unwary citizens into uncritical approval of whatever the government does—for example, Viet Nam.

In summary, Augsburger said substantial consensus was reached on these points:

1. The need for clearer recognition of the human meaning of the Old Testament and the humanity of the incarnate Christ, and of their implications for church ministry.

2. The universal character of the Church as it seeks to fulfill its mandate and follow, above all, Christ’s authority.

3. The urgent need that the Church express itself more clearly on the evils of social injustice and work against the causes of these evils.

4. The Church’s value in exposing the evils of idolatrous nationalism and in calling the nation to refine and restrict the claims it makes for itself.

5. War as a judgment of God upon sin; all war as a form of sin; a sense of penitence about the Viet Nam war; prayer and evangelical action as a deterrent to war through Christian redemptive influence.

Likely topics for an expected followup seminar are the doctrine of the state, what the Sermon on the Mount says about church and state, and the practicability of total Christian disengagement from war in modern democracies.

PAUL S. REES

Window On The World

The World Book Encyclopedia (Field Enterprises Educational Corporation, 1967, 20 volumes, $182.30, deluxe binding), is reviewed by David E. Kucharsky, associate editor,CHRISTIANITY TODAY.

An encyclopedia can break a budget, pad a library, illustrate a sermon, settle an argument, help make up for a scanty education, or prove you’re not an obscurantist. The World Book Encyclopedia can also add prestige to a home or a pastor’s study, though not as much as Britannica. But the reason for owning an encyclopedia is that regular referral cultivates the mind. And no encyclopedia invites continued use more than World Book.

World Book is currently the world’s best-selling and most widely used encyclopedia. It is a family encylopedia that is comprehensive and scholarly without being stuffy, and it is a delight to read. It costs less than a color TV or a good set of china or wall-to-wall carpeting, and it rates financial priority over all these.

But there is the theological problem. Can the evangelical trust World Book for balanced treatment of key issues in Christian thought and experience? Perhaps no better test could be applied than the question, “What think ye of Jesus?” Judge for yourself:

“Jesus Christ was the founder of the Christian religion. Christians believe that He is the Son of God who was sent to earth to save mankind. Even many persons who are not Christians believe that He was a great and wise teacher. He has probably influenced humanity more than anyone else who ever lived.…”

It is a succinct handling, though attributive in describing the most significant aspect of Christ’s person. The following passage from World Book’s article on the Reformation has a much surer construction:

“In Germany, the Reformation began in the heart of an Augustinian monk, Martin Luther. Luther based his thinking on the Epistles of St. Paul. They led him to conclude that only faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, rather than priests, sacraments, or good works, could ensure salvation. He also concluded that only the Bible, not the pope, was infallible, or free from error.”

It is gratifying to report that World Book editors have the help of some competent evangelical scholars. Among the 2,700 authorities who shape the content are Bruce M. Metzger of Princeton Theological Seminary, Earle E. Cairns of Wheaton College, Gleason L. Archer of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and Merrill F. Unger of Dallas Theological Seminary, all of whom are in the conservative Protestant tradition.

Jewish scholars Cyrus H. Gordon and Nelson Glueck are among the consultants and contributors. Top editorial rank among religion specialists belongs to William A. Clebsch, associate professor of religion at Stanford.

Assessing current ideologies, World Book takes a hard line against Communism:

“We call Communism totalitarian because it is total in two ways. (1) It controls and dominates all human thoughts and actions. (2) It uses any means to achieve its goals. Communism tries to regulate every part of a person’s daily life. It has no respect for family life or for religion.”

The article on evolution is a fairly typical modern secular treatment, but it is supplemented with a column headed “Unsolved Problems of Evolution.” A three-point indictment of the theory of evolution on religious grounds includes the assertion that “if man is in the process of evolving from a lower state, sin tends to become mere imperfection, and the Gospel of redemption from the guilt of sin tends to lose all meaning.” Objections to evolution on scientific grounds are noted also.

World Book is largely non-committal on the historicity of the Bible, except to cite the consensus of scholars. For example, the article on Isaiah says, “Scholars have agreed that it was written by a number of persons.” The repeated indication that current scholarly opinion is the final word is a weakness of World Book.

The big theological cleavages of our day have not yet found their way into this encyclopedia. The article on Karl Barth, however, does include an analysis of his thought, and runs a marked contrast to the article on Paul Tillich, which is mere biography.

A most rewarding aspect of World Book is its attempt to simplify the complex and to show rather than tell. Some may be repelled by what they consider oversimplification, but one can well argue that this extreme is preferable to incomprehensibility (an option more common than one might think).

World Book offers good Canadian coverage. It digs into obscure topics as well as offering fresh insights into the familiar. It includes review questions and helpful bibliographies, and is self-indexed. The current set is lavishly illustrated—25,000 illustrations with 7,300 of them in color and 1,900 maps. An exclusive feature is that its content is based on exhaustive research of school curriculums and informational needs in libraries and homes. It is also up to date and is continually being revised, going to press two or three times each year. And the World Book annuals help to keep the set current.

Churches would do well to seize the service opportunity offered by the fact that World Book is available in Braille and large-type editions. The Braille edition, a praiseworthy sign of the leadership of World Book publishers, is the largest project ever accomplished in Braille.

That the evangelical is taking an increasingly important part in the cross fire of intellectual conflict is evident in World Book. To be sure, the encyclopedia does not have anything resembling the Christian world view undergirding its treatment of the various disciplines. But here and there encouraging recognition is given to evangelical thinking. The entry on the ecumenical movement, for example, refers the reader to an article on the Evangelical Alliance as well as to one on the World Council of Churches. As evangelicals continue to make gains in the realm of ideas, recognition by the secular media will increase.

Christ Or Buddha?

Buddhism and the Claims of Christ, by D. T. Niles (John Knox, 1967, 96 pp., paper $1.75), is reviewed by Lit-sen Chang, lecturer in missions, Gordon Divinity School, Wenham, Massachusetts.

In the West there are increasing signs of a revolt against the uniqueness of Christianity, and a chase after exotic religions. There is an attempt to set aside the finality of Jesus Christ and to reduce Christianity to an ethnic basis in harmony with non-Christian religions. In the wave of humanistic syncretism and the advance of the philosophy of meaninglessness, this book, first published in Ceylon in 1946 for catechumens with Buddhist background, has become timely for the West, where Buddhism has been gaining converts.

Dr. D. T. Niles, author of many books on Christian missions and Oriental religions, is Ceylonese by birth, but he received his higher education in the West and has traveled extensively throughout the world. Out of this background that combines Eastern religious experiences with Western academic training, he is able to present Christianity in fresh thought forms as it encounters the essential tenets of Buddhism. By becoming a Buddhist to the Buddhists, he strives to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ in language familiar to and significant for Buddhists, with an understanding and friendly spirit, yet without compromise.

In the strategy of missions today, there are two extreme approaches. The “eclectic” approach overemphasizes general revelation at the expense of special revelation, and stresses the similarities of all religions, overlooking their striking differences. This approach inevitably leads to syncretism and creates the erroneous view that all religions are simply different paths to the same God and that the Church is “latently present” (as Paul Tillich puts it) in paganism. Thus it sets aside the uniqueness of Christianity. The “exclusive” or “expulsive” approach denies the value of general revelation and its relation to special revelation, and thus weakens the basis for meaningful discussion with non-Christians. This approach tends to suspend Christianity in the air and makes it appear irrelevant to the life of the world.

Niles’s approach is neither wholly “eclectic” nor wholly “exclusive.” Without attempting syncretism, he uses the cardinal concepts and idioms of Buddhism to convey the Christian message to Buddhists so as to help them “enter into a personal relationship with God in Christ Jesus.” Without completely denying the truth in Buddhism, Niles points out that it is the truth as man sees it from his predicament as man. It is only a protest, and no protest, however profound, can be turned into a true religion or can give hope to this perishing world.

Reading For Perspective

CHRISTIANITY TODAY’S REVIEW EDITORS CALL ATTENTION TO THESE NEW TITLES:

• The Wycliffe Historical Geography of Bible Lands, by Charles F. Pfeiffer and Howard F. Vos (Moody, $8.95). An informative text, excellent photographs, and useful maps highlight this reference work on ten Bible lands.

• Run While the Sun Is Hot, by W. Harold Fuller (Sudan Interior Mission, $3.95). Fuller’s challenging incidents and stories, gleaned from his travels to SIM fields in Africa, will create greater appreciation for the work of missions.

• Set Forth Your Case, by Clark H. Pinnock (Craig, $1.50). These studies in Christian apologetics offer solid evidence for the integrity of the historic biblical Gospel and show it to be rationally compelling and vastly superior to existential aberrations in contemporary theology.

Starting without a God and from a false perspective on life, Buddhism denies the relevance of the divine side of life. Once God is ruled out, death becomes the boundary of life. So Buddha, who claimed to be the “Enlightened One,” had never really been enlightened, for he knew only the law of death and not the Way of Life. The basic difference between Christianity and Buddhism, according to Niles, is this: Buddha saw that life was meaningless and set out to rescue men from this meaninglessness; Jesus, on the other hand, saw that life could become meaningful in God and set out to call men to share this meaning. “I am come,” he said, “that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”

Although this book offers a valuable refutation of Buddhism, it is not without weakness and distortion. As Niles strives to use the cardinal Buddhist terms to convey the Christian message, readers should always be aware of the risk of identifying Buddhism with Christianity. For instance, the author says: “For a Buddhist, taking ‘Pansil’ seems to have the same emotive value as the taking of Holy Communion for a Christian”; but actually the two rites have nothing in common.

In the latter part of the book, Niles says: “God forgives when I repent—that is Old Testament teaching; God has forgiven, before I repent—that is New Testament teaching (Romans 5:8).” This view dismembers the organism of Scripture. For God has a unified approach in his redemptive plan for mankind. Both in the Old Testament and in the New, God’s grace always precedes man’s action; nevertheless he also demands man’s repentance. When Niles speaks of redemption, reconciliation, justification, and propitiation, he emphasizes in each case that “it has been done.” Although he uses such terms as “conversion” and “evangelism,” he gives them special connotations. So to illustrate conversion he uses not the case of the prodigal son but rather that of the leper who had already been healed and simply “came back and gave God thanks.” This implies universalism, the dangerous notion that all men have already been saved—a great distortion of the Gospel.

Subjectivism Run Riot!

The Church Unbound, by Norman K. Gottwald (Lippincott, 1967, 188 pp., $4.95), is reviewed by Edward J. Young, professor of Old Testament, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

What is the proper relation between Church and culture? By carefully examining the relation between Israel and the nations “in biblical terms,” Professor Gottwald has produced an interesting and thought-provoking discussion of the question. On the basis of a study of certain passages from the Old Testament, he considers the Church as distinguished from culture, culture as attracted to the Church, the Church incorporating culture, and culture approximating the Church. This historical study is then made the basis for a consideration of Church and culture in our day.

That the study is grounded upon acceptance of the dominant school of prophetic study is bound to affect the author’s conclusions and his application of prophetic teaching to the present day. I myself am unable to accept any view of the prophets that does not regard them as spokesmen, who not only thought they were messengers (Bote) of the Lord, but had in actual fact received special revelation from the one living and true God. Therefore I cannot agree with the basic understanding of the prophets found in this work. I cannot accept the view that there was an “Isaiah of the exile,” for the whole denial of Isaianic authorship of the prophecy is based on a misunderstanding of the teaching of the book as well as on a flat repudiation of what the New Testament says about the book’s authorship. Nor can I accept what appears to be a false universalism. “If the covenant circle includes me in spite of my limitations and rebellion, in principle and intent it includes everyone.”

Gottwald’s view of the Church is not that of the New Testament. The Church, he says, is not limited to an institution or to Christians; “the church’s invisibility also refers to the activity of men in culture at large, which is in the character of the church but which is not consciously identified with the historic church.” Thus “the civil rights revolution may be church. Community organization of the poor may be church. Centers for dope addicts and alcoholics may be church. Student activities to gain constitutional rights on campus and to acquire a significant share in educational policy-making may be church.” But enough! “In each case the criterion for judging participation in causes must be the activity of God as best the committed church can discern it.” This is subjectivism run riot.

Strangely enough, the “activity of God” seems to be limited to causes that are presently dear to the hearts of political liberals. Would the “activity of God” ever be seen, for example, in an effort to protect the rights of property owners or to protect hard-working taxpayers from being compelled to support wasteful “welfare” projects that seem principally to benefit the shiftless, the irresponsible, and the indifferent? I have my doubts.

Far more serious, however, is the fact that this work does not recognize that man is a fallen creature who loves darkness rather than light. No human church or humanitarian effort can ever meet the deep-seated need of fallen man. “Cease ye from man,” said the Holy Spirit through Isaiah, “whose breath is in his nostrils.” From the easygoing humanism of Gottwald’s work we turn to the words of the late J. Gresham Machen: “Human goodness will avail nothing for lost souls; ye must be born again.”

Once Over Lightly

Highlights of Christian Missions, by Harold R. Cook (Moody, 1967, 256 pp., $4.95), is reviewed by Harold Lindsell, professor of Bible, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois.

This book has a special purpose: to give Moody Bible Institute students a quick survey of missionary endeavor from the days of the apostles. Within the limits the author sets, he fulfills his purpose.

The volume is divided into three sections. One treats the expansion of Christianity historically—in ninety pages. The treatment is consistent with the purpose: it is panoramic and thus sketchy. The second section deals with home missions and is oriented primarily to the American scene. It is quite general and is descriptive rather than analytical. Some basic problems are mentioned, but not much by way of solution is offered. The third part of the volume sketches the geography and missionary work of the Church in Africa, Asia, and so on. A short bibliography is appended.

The author hopes his book will be used in local congregations and has written in non-technical language. It is a good book for the lay reader who wants a quick, easily read overview of missionary endeavor. It is not useful to the informed reader or the specialist.

The publisher has done the author a disservice by overstating the usefulness of the volume on the jacket. It is hardly a “valuable resource volume,” and to call it “a comprehensive view of missionary endeavor which includes little-known men and events as well as those more widely reported” is to embarrass the author, whose own preface says something quite different. The blurb writer might have spent his energy more profitably in editing the book itself.

Conviction, Compassion, And Style

A Varied Harvest: Out of a Teacher’s Life and Thought, by Frank E. Gaebelein (Eerdmans, 1967, 198 pp, $4.95; also in paper, $2.45), is reviewed by Emile Cailliet, Stuart Professor Emeritus of Christian Philosophy, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey.

The browser who grazes among the shining leaves and twigs of our day’s inflationary output of printed matter is likely to ignore this title, possibly with the thought that here is another bundle of essays and addresses gathered together by one of those emeriti who cannot bear to think that any of their productions might be lost to posterity. Very well, then! Let prejudice have its way. We judge books. By certain books we are judged. Frank E. Gaebelein’s A Varied Harvest is a book for discriminating readers.

It has rightly been said that “the style is the man.” A personality comes to expression in these pages—one of the strongest, most persuasive leaders of evangelical Christianity in our day. From his early childhood his nurture has been Holy Writ. For forty years he was headmaster of the Stony Brook School, and during these years he came to grips with the problems raised by Christian education and youth, and coped with the intricacies of public affairs and social concern, of culture and taste. When he retired from academic life, CHRISTIANITY TODAY invited him to serve as co-editor, which he did from 1963 to 1966. He has occupied many pulpits in churches, colleges, and universities. Throughout this rich career he has been led to achieve a most impressive integration of evangelical thought in action, and it is this that comes to expression in A Varied Harvest.

No wonder the book is so strongly articulated. The sturdy, impelling ways in which paragraphs and chapters press forward the case for a working faith well bespeak the character of the fully surrendered soul who tells the story. We see him plotting a strategy for Christian education, taking full advantage of the educating power of the Bible, rallying men of good will with the outcry, “What are we doing to our youth?,” pleading for Christian compassion, exalting the Christian’s intellectual life, pleading for a recovery of taste, enthusiastically magnifying the Church and its ministry at work and, above all, the truth of God’s Word and the majesty of Jesus Christ.

Well might the reader get out of breath keeping pace with the man on his way, illustrating as he does Kierkegaard’s description, “Purity of heart is to will one thing.” Happily he gives the reader an opportunity to go with him on a vacation, and the section on mountain climbing makes for pure delight. But even then, the evangelical teacher allows his companions no rest from Christian instruction. The memory of a treacherous ascent of the East Ridge of the Grand Teton, alternating between difficult rock and precipitous snow as a storm howls along the sky, invites the “lesson” that “sometimes God puts us in places of severe testing.” There is no harm in this to be sure, except that one wishes at times through these particular pages that happenings might be allowed to speak for themselves. A point is reached where lecturing carries its stumbling block within itself. But then, to quote Kierkegaard again: “Purity of heart is to will one thing.”

Jaspers’ Wistful Dialogue

Philosophical Faith and Revelation, by Karl Jaspers (Harper & Row, 1967, 394 pp., $15), is reviewed by Stanley Obitts, assistant professor of philosophy, Westmont College, Santa Barbara, California.

Karl Jaspers’ Philosophical Faith and Revelation, translated by E. B. Ashton, is the eighteenth volume in Harper & Row’s prestigious “Religious Perspectives” series. The purpose of the series is to “present the numinous reality within the experience of man.” This work, described by Hannah Arendt as “the only authentic philosophy of religion written in the twentieth century,” is the final and systematic form of the octogenarian Jaspers’ almost wistful dialogue within himself between the siren call of the Christian believer’s cognitive revelation of God and the unescapable but philosophically limiting method of modern science.

Jaspers decides that the true philosopher seeking the whole of Being will neither ignore the two sides of the dialogue nor relinquish to either one his freedom of intellectual struggle. The withdrawnness of “transcendence” requires a “philosophical faith” in which the choice of what a man “will live by and for is his to dare and to destine,” declares this German existentialist. As anyone familiar with Jaspers knows, the notion of a “philosophical faith” is designed to avoid, on one hand, the irrationalism of Kierkegaard’s religious faith, with its “leap,” and, on the other hand, Heidegger’s curtailment of metaphysical speculation about the Being of the things-that-are to transcendental horizons projected by the self.

The more rational and optimistic Jaspers sees the self’s reading of its “general situation-limits” as directing its attention away from the “Encompassing” that it is and toward the other “Encompassing” that is Being itself, of which the self is a part. This latter, the Transcendent, is, as Heidegger would agree, not man’s object; but neither is it, contrary to Heidegger, just man’s creation or “interpretation.”

The person rightly beginning his quest for truth with the facts of empirical existence handled so well by the sciences soon discovers these to be only appearances of a Being continually eluding his grasp. The signs of the Transcendent’s manifestations must be read as “ciphers.” At this point the unwary may be deluded by the pretense of a historically factual revelation, the truth of which is authenticated by the witness of the Holy Spirit. But being unable to predict or comprehend revelation, reason cannot sit in judgment on it. God’s revelation, if it came, could never be enmeshed by the general concepts employed in philosophy. Hence, philosophy’s faith springs neither from the factual source and exact procedures of the sciences nor from the faith in revelation of theology. It is its own source; it is “philosophical faith”; and as faith in reason, it is affected by its opposite, faith in revelation. The two faiths must forever be willing to learn from each other, counsels Jaspers, even though neither one will be fully scrutable to the other.

He eloquently portrays the nihilistic bondage of man resulting from the scientific superstition and technological dominance of our day. But how free is a man, really, who is told that God is beyond all objects, “ciphers,” and categories of thought? If, as Jaspers claims, Being speaks in the ensuing silence as Transcendence “reconstitutes itself for Existence” and reaches those who have a “readiness for existential action in the world” within and without, philosophy being a “liberating force in its negations,” then what keeps Jaspers’ “philosophical faith” from becoming either a kind of epistemological voluntarism or else an incipient mysticism? If twentieth-century philosophy of religion in the Occident is as beholden to the post-Kantian tradition as Jaspers appears to think, then it is little wonder that the “honest” generation is giving Eastern religious thought such a serious look. But perhaps Augustine’s use of the Christian revelation as a basic source for philosophy, binding together philosophy and faith in revelation, is still a viable alternative.

The Cullmann Slant

Oikonomia: Heilsgeschichte als Thema der Theologie, edited by Felix Christ (Herbert Reich Evang. Verlag, Hamburg, 1967, 412 pp., DM 40), is reviewed by Ralph P. Martin, lecturer in New Testament studies, University of Manchester, England.

The name of Oscar Cullmann is internationally known among students of Christian theology. It is a further tribute to his fame and scholarship that after the publication of an important Festschrift to honor his sixtieth birthday there appears this volume to mark his sixty-fifth year. The earlier volume was entitled Neotestamentica et Patristica and was written by a representative group of international scholars. This new book covers a wider field, from Old Testament to dogmatics, from ecumenical studies to practical theology. And most of the writers are, it seems, scholars who have come under Cullmann’s direct influence. Indeed, most of them write from a distinctive Cull-mannian slant, expressed by the conviction that the magic word to solve the mysteries of the Bible and theology—and even some thorny matters such as the veneration of Mary—is Heilsgeschichte (salvation history).

Of the thirty-six essays (written in English, French, and German) that make up this tribute, we may select the following as representative, though not necessarily the most important. The opening contribution (in German) surveys the three motifs of Old Testament theology and history in the light of Heilsgeschichte, and finds that the ideas of creation, election, and exhortation in the Law were capable of perversion by exposure to the clangers of paganizing, ritualizing and legalizing. A discussion of the Temple-theology by Lloyd Gaston throws light on a central issue in Jesus’ ministry and early Christianity, while Robert Meye’s treatment of the messianic secret in Mark attempts to take the matter beyond where Wrede left it. Other studies in biblical theology are competent and full of insight. There are treatments of the wedding in John 2 and of the imagery of the vine in John 15, as well as of Paul’s apostolic awareness and teaching.

In the area of historical theology I. J. Hesselink offers a new understanding of Calvin, whose notion of “suspended grace” provides the clue to his view of the Old Testament as a preparation for Christ. The points of contact between second-century gnosticism and Bultmann’s theology (alleged by Cullmann) are examined (in German) by W. Rordorf. (A translation of this important study is in New Testament Studies, 13). T. F. Torrance has a long, erudite article on Clement of Alexandria’s knowledge of God. A critical inspection of Cullmann’s functional Christology is made by David Wallace from the standpoint of the Chalcedonian formula, though his discovery of “Hebrew metaphysical affirmations about God” sounds strange.

Two studies on the Virgin Mary make for unusual reading, and the attempt to find her a place in the heilsgeschichtlich program is not overly convincing. On the level of practical theology there are contributions on preaching as storytelling (in German), the place of the sacraments, and even the Passion music of Bach.

In all, this is an interesting compilation in honor of a prominent theologian, even if no single essay can be judged world-shaking.

Book Briefs

Dictionary of Christian Ethics, edited by John McQuarrie (Westminster 1967, 366 pp., $7.50). A useful book mostly by non-evangelical contributors, on ethical terms, concepts, and viewpoints; bibliography references reflect few conservative works.

Count It All Joy, by William Stringfellow (Eerdmans, 1967, 101 pp., $3). Against the backdrop of the Book of James, the author-attorney offers somewhat unsatisfying observations on wisdom, doubt, and temptation. Along the way he takes potshots at sectarianism as secularization, evangelistic crusades, pietism.

The Ongoing Purpose of God, by William H. Clark (California Lantern Press, 1967, 147 pp., $3.95). Strong sermons that bristle with faith and conviction from a respected Presbyterian missionary and pastor.

Hostage in Djakarta, by Harold Lovestrand (Moody, 1967, 215 pp., $3.95). A TEAM missionary vividly describes his imprisonment in an Indonesian jail. An inspiring story of a man’s faith and God’s faithfulness.

Alcohol Problems: A Report to the Nation, prepared by Thomas F. A. Plaut (Oxford, 1967, 200 pp., $4.75). That controversial report!

Peloubet’s Select Notes, 1968, by Wilbur M. Smith (W. A. Wilde, 1967, 432 pp., $3.25).

Christian Worship: Its Theology and Practice, by Franklin M. Segler (Broadman, 1967, 245 pp., $4.95). A sensible and practical book on worship: its biblical foundations, its theology and psychology, its forms and order.

The Apostolic Fathers, Volume V, by William R. Schoedel (Nelson, 1967, 130 pp., $5). A new translation with commentary of Polycarp to the Philippians, Martyrdom of Polycarp, Fragments of Papias.

In Defense of the Faith, by W. A. Criswell (Zondervan, 1967, 88 pp., $2.50). In five lucid sermons the pastor of one of the world’s largest churches confronts atheist, liberal, Communist, materialist, and sinner with the Gospel. Preached during the 1967 Easter season.

Paperbacks

Outside the Gate, by Carl McIntire (Christian Beacon Press, 1967, 351 pp., $1). A distorted and unreliable attack on the World Congress on Evangelism and particularly on its leaders, set to Carl McIntire’s theme song, “Only the ACCC is left” (or right)!

For God’s Sake Faugh!, by Nelvin Vos (John Knox, 1967, 75 pp., $1.50). From a Christian perspective, Vos examines the vital role of laughter in life. He views human laughter as a means of self-discovery and a balm of healing because God really has the last laugh. Incisive, stimulating, and entertaining.

A Comparison of World Religion, by Henry J. Heydt (Christian Literature Crusade, 1967, 112 pp., $1.75). An oversimplified survey of the history and literature of eleven world religions that compares their teaching on important topics and shows Christianity’s distinctives.

A Reader in Contemporary Theology, edited by John Bowden and James Richmond (Westminster, 1967, 190 pp., $1.95). A sampler of selections by Protestant and Roman Catholic theologians (Barth, Bultmann, Rahner, Van Peursen, Buber, and others) that consider biblical interpretation and the doctrine of God.

The Church: Design for Survival, by E. Glenn Hinson (Broadman, 1967, 128 pp., $1.95). A well-balanced book that rejects the current emphasis on secularization of the Church and points up the need for an adaptable and flexible Church that views its present mission in the lights of its biblical and historical backgrounds.

For All the World: The Christian Mission in the Modern Age, by John V. Taylor (Westminster, 1966, 92 pp., $1.45). A call for involvement by the whole Church in God’s mission to the world through proclamation, witness, and service.

Barth’s Soteriology, Bultmann’s Demythologized Kerygma, and Brunner’s Dialectical Encounter, by Robert L. Reymond (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1967, 41 pp., 30 pp., 29 pp., $.75 each). A scholar committed to the authority of an infallible Bible offers three penetrating critiques of crucial aspects of the views of Europe’s three most influential twentieth-century theologians. Recommended.

The Reluctant Worker Priest, by Eugene P. Heideman (Eerdmans, 1967, 106 pp., $1.45). Experiences of a Protestant pastor who takes an industrial job and finds it an avenue to Christian ministry.

What is the “state of the union”—as God sees it?

A few weeks from now a state-of-the-union message will be presented to Congress and to the American people. It will deal with domestic and foreign problems, war and peace, the economic structure of the country, the abounding social ills.

Political values and implications will probably be stressed, and outlines of legislation needed to accomplish changes and reforms will be presented. Material and secular problems and suggested solutions will dominate the message. All this is a part of the administration of a great democracy.

However, Christians must consider the state of the union, not from the human standpoint alone, but from God’s. His evaluation, the standards of which are revealed in Scripture, will take into account all those things in which we have sinned and come short of his glory.

The Old Testament prophets, inspired by the Holy Spirit, looked beneath the surface of national life to find the things that mar and destroy a nation. In their messages we see God’s diagnosis of sin, his hatred of it, and the certainty of judgment, all coupled with his yearning love for a wayward people and appeals to return to him and live.

The state of politics always seems confused. The tendency to “give the people what they want” is ever present, regardless of fiscal stability or moral rightness. In fact—and we must face it—some of the great projects now envisoned entail the spending of our grandchildren’s money, and are perhaps designed to win votes more than anything else. This form of bribery, or buying of votes, proves a temptation to politicians of every party, as well as to the people.

One of the greatest menaces of national stability is the fostering of the idea that the government owes everyone a living. Unquestionably the government owes every citizen freedom of opportunity, and this entails freedom from every form of discrimination. But in addition, individual initiative must be protected and promoted if our people are to be truly blessed.

The state of the union is affected by the soundness of our economy. Many citizens are rightly concerned about a tendency to appropriate and spend staggering sums without compensating income. This inevitably leads to inflation, which affects everyone, particularly those who are dependent on the savings of the past.

Primary considerations in any assessment of the state of the union are the growing tensions within the social order and the feeling of some that the social structure can be improved without change in the hearts of those who make up society. Many in the Church have been beguiled into believing this fallacy and are thus adding to the confusion of an already confused generation.

The state of the union is also in jeopardy because the basic concept of law and order has been undermined by willful activists who try to settle social problems in the streets. Their “peaceful” demonstrations too easily become violent and riot-like.

Those responsible for maintaining law and order have become targets of vilification and abuse. And often the law-breakers they apprehend either are released or are “punished” only by having to pay a piddling fine. A generation has grown up without knowing the wholesome discipline of the Bible—“Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him” (Prov. 22:15). Now, when confronted with restraint by those responsible for law enforcement, many cry out, “Police brutality!,” and many social “do-gooders” join them in their protests. What amazes me is the police restraint exercised in the face of violence and open face defiance.

The serious state of the union is reflected in the failure of the courts to enforce existing laws and the devious means used to thwart justice. There is a verse in the Bible that describes the situation perfectly: “Because sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the sons of men is fully set to do evil” (Eccl. 8:11). By a strange philosophy on the part of some sworn to maintain justice, the criminal is now given every advantage while the victim is often twice a victim—once at the hands of the criminal and again at the hands of the courts.

The state of the union is woefully evident in the growth and exploitation of lust under the guise of art and literature. Books, plays, and movies portray and often make attractive the vilest acts of which man is capable. No nation can long exist if such evil goes unrestrained.

Above all else, the state of the nation is reflected in the nation’s spiritual life, or lack of it. We have received the blessings of a godly ancestry, but the momentum of this is largely spent. The open immorality that flourishes on every side belies the widespread existence of spiritual convictions, on which alone the nation or the individual is secure.

On every hand men speak of the deceased influence of the Church. Some attribute this to lack of “involvement” in the social order. Others feel that the message of the Church has been watered down so that the secular needs of society are given priority over men’s need of Christ as Saviour from sin.

Within the Church there are deep cleavages—loveless pharisaism and hard orthodoxy on the one side, and sophisticated sadduceeism with rank unbelief on the other. In too many cases the battle has been waged in the strength of the flesh, without compassion and reliance on the power of prayer and the Holy Spirit, by which alone such problems can be resolved. The Church too often tries to solve spiritual problems by secular means.

This brings us to the source of hope, the way by which God can restore sinning men and nations. It is no platitude to assert that God has the answer. He has the only answer. Man is both stupid and blind if he fails to realize that for God there are no insoluble problems; he is hindered only by man’s perverse unwillingness to turn problems over to him.

The Bible states the nature of good and evil, of right and wrong. It lays down the principles by which men and nations are to live, and clearly states the immediate and ultimate penalties of those who go their own way, rather than God’s.

But the Bible does more than this. It reveals the One who came to make all things right through redemption and regeneration. It reveals the simplicity of God’s plan for making new men out of old, changing them into the image of his Son. It states in the clearest way possible what a man’s duty to God and his fellow man is, and reveals the source of power by which men and nations can obey and please him.

The state of the union is not good. But God can change the lives of countless individuals and through them bring glory to himself in the land.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ—preached, believed, and obeyed—can change the state of the union. It is our only hope.

Recently a reputable author of religious books spoke on the radio about a volume he had written on the Apostle Paul. Before Paul’s appearance, he said, the Christian Church had never expected to be anything but a small sect. This contention conflicts sharply with Jesus’ order to his disciples: “Go, then, to all peoples everywhere and make them my disciples.… And remember! I will be with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:19, 20, Today’s English Version). It conflicts also with Peter’s statement on the Day of Pentecost that God’s promise was “to you and your children, and to all who are far away” (Acts 2:39).

For centuries the Bible, speaking with what J. B. Phillips calls “the ring of truth,” has convinced men of its authenticity. But today many prominent scholars snap a lock on the Word so that it is not given a chance to speak for itself. And then they try to speak for it. The Word is light; it is a fire, a sword, a life-giving force, a purifying power—but to what avail, when the masses hear the words of men rather than the Word of God? One man said, “Prior to becoming a Christian, I faced the pulpit in my church a thousand times. I heard philosophy, psychology, literature, and theology—but never did I hear the Word of God actually proclaimed!”

The paradox confronting us, then, is that men inside the Church are confirming the unbelief of those outside it. These misunderstanders and misquoters of the Bible are heard. They have made formidable names for themselves. They write books that catch the world’s fancy and make statements that shock people. Their churches shelter goings-on that are nearly, if not actually, blasphemous.

The atheists of today must be greatly heartened as they see their cause supported by men who wear the robes of religion. All the while innumerable Christians writhe silently, embarrassed and angry, but with few outlets through which to reply to the enemies of the Word. When Methodism’s Christian Advocate published an article in which Charles Keysor pointed out the voicelessness of the multitudes in the denomination who embraced the Bible as God’s Word, the response was tremendous—so large that a “forum for scriptural Christianity within the Methodist Church” was founded, with a magazine called Good News.

Is it not high time that the millions in all denominations who believe in scriptural authority speak out? The false prophets loudly hawk their unholy theology from lofty places. The presses pour out print-rivers of heresy.

No valid reason exists for the success clever minds have had in silencing the Word—save that evangelicals may be allowing their slight theological differences to keep the gospel trumpet hushed. In their ranks are enough voices to shake the world! Let them but find a speaking-stand. Can we not afford to forget little family quarrels in the face of the far greater quarrel—with heresy?

We should not sound a call to some mere “protest” march; we need not exert our energy in diatribes against the foe. For false prophets will be unmasked and silenced when the lovers of truth outspeak them with the positive Word of God.

We have much to unite our spirits. The Christ, the Cross, the dynamism of the Spirit, the eternal Word, the Apostles’ Creed, the disciplines and confessions of the Church, mighty hymns with blessed history, the inspiring memory of those who died for the faith—all these should influence our creation of a global evangelical voice.

This is no time for petty claims or self-interest. We must open our hearts to all who still believe. We must not only stand up and be counted; we must stand up together. The false prophets are not kidding; they mean to have the world. Shall we let them? The longer they shout from the high places, the smaller our chance of being heard.

One trumpet note, sounded loud and clear, could gather the host at the Cross. We are restless, humiliated, frustrated, anxious to accomplish something large for our Lord in this time when he is being “crucified afresh, and put to an open shame.” We might move the world. We have the numbers, the sense of urgency. We have the Spirit and the Word. If only we could hear again the sort of cry that rose from a long-ago prophet: “Blow the trumpet in Zion … Call a solemn assembly: gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders.… Let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O LORD, and give not thine heritage to reproach.… Wherefore should they say among the people, Where is their God?” (Joel 2:15–17).

We are ready for a long charge. Will we hear a bugle blow a “forward” command? If so, we might give history a fresh start. The evangelicals did it in the early Church, and again in the times of Luther and Wesley. We might set the Cross over kingdoms, and kindle a hope in the troubled world. We might hear truth ring again “to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Is it not worth at least a Herculean effort? Not only might it be later than we think; more of the future might be on our hands than we know.

Where are adequate ethical guidelines to be found?

Distinguishing a right course of action from a wrong one is a vexatious problem none of us can escape. It is a recurring fact of experience that issues are not clearly labeled black or white; often a gray region makes the right difficult to discern.

Recent discussions of ethical principles and motivations that govern our Western society have thrown into prominence four competing views.

On the unreflecting level there is a style of life called hedonistic, the belief that what gives us pleasure is right. This attitude toward life runs through much of our Western social structure and comes out chiefly in the areas of sex and status-seeking. Advertisers on TV and radio have set this to music; the publishers of the “entertainment for men” glossy magazines and the producers of consumer goods are successfully persuading our generation that life demands an ever increasing satisfaction of the sex appetite and an ever greater supply of those gadgets that contribute to our material prosperity and pleasure. The chief count to be brought against this outlook is one of irresponsibility. It debases what is noble, cheapens all that is worth preserving in our national heritage, and is at root a selfish, “I-take-what-I-want” philosophy that is destructive of true civilization.

Another commonly accepted attitude toward moral decisions is called aesthetic. This approach says: What is nice is right. What is distasteful, ugly, or embarrassing is wrong. Canon Herbert Waddams (in A New Introduction to Moral Theology) comments on this view: “Deformed children and foetuses are rather disgusting to the aesthetic senses, and may therefore be abolished. A hanged man is equally distasteful and he should therefore not be hanged; the same principle applies to opposition to war and blood sports.” Along with this aestheticism goes the notion that every person can do what he wants to, provided he doesn’t cause a public nuisance and unduly offend society. An obvious illustration of this type of moral theory is the campaign to legalize homosexual acts between consenting adults.

Prescriptive ethics finds the genius of morality in the divine commands for human life. It appeals to some principle or set of principles as regulative for conduct at all times, though the degree of fixity and absoluteness is not the same in all areas of life. This is not the exaggerated legalism that Paul Lehmann castigates as “a standard of conduct which can be and must be applied to all people in all situations in exactly the same way” (Ethics in a Christian Context). Prescriptive ethics is a type of ethical thinking according to which human behavior must be shaped by the presence and authority of external laws. Sometimes these laws are indecisive in a given situation. Sometimes various principles conflict. Often, however, a course of action can be prescribed in advance in obedience to principles. For instance, adultery is wrong because it violates the seventh commandment; therefore the moral man, loyal to his prescriptive code (which he as a Christian finds grounded in God’s will for his life and human society), will never consent to or condone adultery.

In our day prescriptive ethics has come under heavy fire. One gun (inscribed Honest to God) is aimed at the transcendent character of God and his office as lawgiver. Another attack is mounted from the platform of man’s autonomy: modern man will not be told what to do—even by God! His experimenting with law-breaking has (he believes) succeeded, for sanctions and penalties that used to deter him can now be neatly averted. Thus sex taboos, for example, are now largely outmoded, thanks to penicillin and contraceptives. Not the least significant factor in the moral breakdown in Western democracies has been the exposé of the lapses of men in high office, as in the Christine Keeler-Pro-fumo scandal that rocked the British government and in the Bobby Baker and Walter Jenkins affairs on this side of the Atlantic.

Out of this moral collapse there has arisen a new “school” that claims to deal realistically with our predicament. Known popularly as the new morality, it begins with two assumptions: first, that all men do, as a matter of psychological fact, experience the transcendent claim of love in some personal relationship; and second, that provided men understand the facts of the situation, they need only ask themselves, What would love do here?, and the correct answer will occur to them. Joseph Fletcher spells out this philosophy: “Christian situation ethics has only one norm or principle or law (call it what you will) that is binding and unexceptionable, always good and right regardless of the circumstances. That is ‘love’” (Situation Ethics).

Here is the pith of the new morality. It says: No line of action may be prescribed before the event; and what is wrong in one set of circumstances and personal relationships (e.g., sexual relations outside marriage) may in another situation be a response to the claim of love. This ethical theory thrives by meeting the needs of a generation that eschews all external authority (the state, the church, the Bible, parents), yet seeks for a directive, albeit one that does not legislate in advance for moral choice.

Today the new morality is popular, but it is not to be accepted on that count. We do well to heed the protest the situationists are making. To dismiss the approach as only the “old immorality” is lamentable, for often there is a serious grappling with moral issues that makes some evangelical codes look trivial and antiquarian. Nevertheless, the approach they advocate must certainly be judged inadequate and their examples remarkably naïve and jejune.

First, the situationist assumes that men in general feel the undisputed claim of love upon them. This is a mighty assumption to make; indeed, it can be made only if we gloss over the real meaning of “love.” Love is a word batted to and fro like a shuttlecock in Fletcher’s Situation Ethics. Little attempt is made to give it a New Testament content by reference to the transcendent God self-revealed in Christ, the Son of his love. “God is love” is not the same, whether theologically or semantically, as “love is God,” and it is a disastrous mistake to say that love per se is the absolute norm for human conduct. The absolute norm is God’s will, albeit expressed in love. Once grant that and we are bound to ask: Can the will of God be read off from a set of human circumstances without reference to some prior revelation of that divine will, especially in Scripture and its witness to the perfect Man?

Second, situationism does not escape the charge of perfectionism, for it has an unbounded, almost naive confidence in human ability. But this overlooks human sinfulness. Man’s warped nature makes him adept at evasion, rationalization, and self-excuse. Situational ethics commendably deals with overt acts but culpably ignores man’s nature; and what he is delimits what he will do. A railroad ticket has only a token value to a man in jail. He would use it if he could!

Third, as an exercise in psychologizing, situational ethics—like all other existential systems—lies open to the charge of atomism. This descriptive word carries the idea that life is made up of a succession of independent and isolated acts. Fletcher’s book in particular forgets that life is a network of habits, dispositions, and desires, partly inherited and partly acquired, which we cannot shed as an old suit of clothes. And it overlooks the fact that acts that seem innocent to us may hurt others, even years hence.

A follower of true biblical ethics stands upon a far more adequate foundation. He recognizes the ethical norms of Scripture and submits to them as to principles which reveal the love and will of God. Where Scripture is not explicit he seeks God’s will in more general guidelines for personal and corporate conduct. The guidelines embrace such elements as: (1) the character of Jesus, who sets the standard and to whose attitudes we are drawn as we seek the mind of Christ, (2) our social responsibility for our brethren within society and especially in the household of faith (1 Cor. 8), and (3) a call to nurture the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22, 23), who seeks to shape our lives within the polarities of love (the first in the list of fruit) and self-control (the last fruit mentioned).

Love and self-control are perhaps the two aspects of Christian morality most in need of definition. The first word is so elastic in modern discussions that it has virtually lost its identity. Rightly Henlee Barnette says, “If love is not defined in terms of objective ethical guidelines, such as chastity, charity, and concern for others, and grounded in the living Christ, it has no adequate dynamic and dissolves into sentimentality” (The New Theology and Morality, p. 71). “Self-discipline” is a term not even used in the modern debate. Critics of the ill-timed British Council of Churches’ report on Sex and Morality have been quick to note this missing element.

It becomes clear that while there is no place in Christian morals for a legalism that leads to bondage and offers no guidance for circumstances not covered by the original prescriptions, still less is there justification for a vague situationism. What is needed is an ethic that is God—ordained and thus authoritative, and that offers direction for the needs of the future. We need deliverance from the clutches of subjectivism and relativism, from the tyranny of our whims and fancies, from the invitation to libertinism.

Legalism and libertinism, though they stand at opposite poles, are equally deplorable, because both are distortions of what is true. A true ethic finds its polarity in law and love, which are not opposites and which, held together in Scripture and in the actions of God, are the only valid basis for determining God’s will for man and his society.

TOLERANCE OR LOVE?

Not long ago someone observed that CHRISTIANITY TODAY seems not to view tolerance as a Christian virtue. And that set us thinking. Actually, tolerance is not a Christian virtue. Christians rightly condemn acts of intolerance and remember with sorrow centuries of religious persecution, often in the name of Christianity. Yet the word “tolerance” never occurs in the New Testament, and the great lists of Christian virtues omit it. The Middle Ages spoke of wisdom, justice, courage, temperance, faith, love, and hope. But not tolerance.

Is there a failure here on the part of Christian ethics? Not really, for tolerance falls short of Christian standards. Tolerance is ambiguous; it can be good or bad. It can mean a willingness to co-exist with vice or error as well as a proper accommodation of ourselves to other people. It can be a substitute for conviction, for courage in defense of what is right. It can even be a substitute for love.

The real Christian virtue is love, love patterned after the love of God for us and motivated by it. Such love is not intolerant. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. But it is not noncommittal. It learns from others. Above all, it seeks to lead men out of error and to introduce them to all that is good, particularly to the full salvation, liberty, and purity of the Christian Gospel.

LET’S HAVE THE FACTS

The irrational, ill-tempered, and illegal demonstrations of raw power that defiled American streets, campuses, and public buildings during the long, hot summer and cool, unruly fall of 1967 are far from finished. Americans must steel themselves to withstand even greater attempts at social disruption by young revolutionaries committed to breaking “the American system.”

A month after the Pentagon demonstration, Jerry Rubin, a leader of protests in Berkeley and Washington, D. C., urged New Left rebels to look forward in anger to a continuing program of “disruption as a leading strategy for the white peace movement.” His stated goal is “a massive white revolutionary youth movement which working in parallel cooperation with the rebellion in the black communities could seriously disrupt this country and thus be an internal catalyst for a breakdown of the American ability and will to fight guerrillas overseas. Thus defeated abroad by peasant revolutionaries and disrupted from within by blacks and whites, the empire of the United States will find itself faced with rebellions from fifteen different directions.” Rubin claims future tactics will be more militant and will include draft resistance, sit-ins, tax payment refusals, a nationally coordinated paralysis of major colleges, traffic disruptions, massive symbolic demonstrations, encouragement of young people to run away from their middle-class homes, and recruitment of “full-time revolutionaries” to transform “the peace movement into a liberation movement.” “That’s where it’s at,” said Rubin. “We’re angry. We’re angry like Che.”

Staging of simultaneous anti-American Viet Nam demonstrations on October 21 in Washington, the San Francisco Bay area, London, Bonn, and elsewhere points to the well-planned world-wide scope of these radical so-called peace protests. Recently House majority leader Carl Albert charged that the Pentagon demonstration was “basically organized by international Communism,” apparently basing his statement on information the President gave orally to congressional leaders. Minority leader Gerald Ford urged the White House to make public the information on the true nature of the Pentagon demonstration. Subsequently, he claimed, Attorney General Ramsey Clark visited him to argue against release of the information. Nevertheless Ford, on the floor of the House of Representatives, called for a full report so that the American people could know “the extent of Communist participation in organizing, planning, and directing the disgraceful display.” This disclosure, he said, would also be beneficial “to the well—intentioned Americans who participated in this demonstration not knowing who had organized the demonstrations at the Pentagon and elsewhere throughout the free world.”

The past rash of riots and violent protests has caused serious destruction and created disunity within the nation. Future radical strategies promise even more serious internal strife. If America is to prosper as a democracy, maintain her domestic tranquillity, and fulfill her commitments abroad, the government must make greater efforts to halt illegal protest activities that weaken our national fiber and aid and abet our enemies. One means is for the President to give the American people the full story of Communist penetration of disruptive social movements. If all Americans could know of the devious means now being used by Communists and their sympathizers to subvert the American way of life, the impact of such demonstrations would be significantly lessened, and fewer naive but loyal citizens would be lured into alliances with them.

The complex issues and increasing peril facing America without and within today demands not only that freedom to dissent be zealously safeguarded but also that our laws against civil disorder be stringently enforced and our enemies’ true strategies be clearly revealed.

ASYLUM FROM THE DRAFT

Secular religionists are reviving the sanctuary concept as a means of escape from the draft. Thirty-five clergymen promised sanctuary in churches and synagogues to young Americans who refuse military induction. Yale Chaplain William Sloane Coffin, Jr., said that “any man who asks asylum will be given it.” Last month the student body of San Francisco Theological Seminary (United Presbyterian) passed a resolution offering sanctuary “to those who in good conscience choose not to cooperate with the Selective Service System.” The offer was made in “a context of Christian fellowship in which this community can identify with those who have chosen” non-cooperation with the draft. Thirteen seminarians turned in draft cards; more planned to follow.

The modern version of sanctuary is hardly in accord with the biblical institution. The right of asylum is mentioned three times in the Old Testament—Exodus 21:12–14; Numbers 35:9–34, and Deuteronomy 19:1–13—and in no case is it ever made a right to escape from justice. It was a protection against revenge by relatives of a dead man for accidental homicide. It was meant to save innocent life. The Old Testament “cities of refuge” and medieval sanctuary were established to prevent vengeful killings and to insure justice.

American law allows conscientious objection to military service. But the secularists’ sanctuary policy affirms the sanctity of the dissenting conscience at the expense of law and order. It appears to be an irresponsible grandstand play to dramatize a questionable viewpoint. It can only hinder the Selective Service System, demean the Church’s reputation, and encourage disobedience of legally constituted authority.

Dear Ecumenical Humorists:

The holiday season makes us especially appreciate all men of good will, so today I as a Protestant want to call attention to a delightful new book of Catholic humor by a Jewish writer. The book is Cracks in the Steeple (World, 1967, $3.50) by Gerry Blumenfeld. Its four-sentence foreword has been contributed by that political funnyman, Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Here are some of the shorter cracks discovered by Blumenfeld:

• Asked how many people worked in the Vatican, Pope John XXIII answered good—naturedly, “About half.”

• A little Italian priest sat in Yankee Stadium when Pope Paul VI addressed the vast assembly. The priest said to his friend, “Isn’t it wonderful, at last, to have an Italian at second base!”

• After TV star Garry Moore received an award, he paid tribute to his writers. When Bishop Fulton Sheen next came forward to accept his award, he announced, “I also want to pay tribute to my four writers—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.”

• When little Margaret returned from church school she asked her father when their new baby would talk. He told her not for two years, since little babies don’t talk. Said Margaret, “Oh, yes they do. Even in the Bible they did.” “Who did?” asked the father. She replied, “Sister read the Bible to us this morning, and I heard with my own ears when she said Job cursed the day he was born.”

• Ten-year-old Peter was very interested in Bible studies. He asked his parents: “Which virgin was Christ’s mother—the Virgin Mary or the King James virgin?”

• A man advertised in the local paper to sell the Venetian blind that covered his picture window but neglected to tell his wife. The next day the doorbell rang and a woman announced, “I’ve come for the Venetian blind.” “Can you come back next week,” suggested the wife, “because we’ve just given to Catholic Charities.”

How about contributing to the Eutychus III charities by telling me about the farcical happenings in your part of the religious world? If men of diverse religious viewpoints can chuckle together over follies common to the religious species, maybe there’s hope that more of us can come together on the basis of the joyous truth of the Gospel.

EUTYCHUS III

Jocularly,

DETROIT REVISITED

I think you are hitting the right target when you go after the NCC and its revolutionary strategy (“NCC Hosts the Radicals,” News, Nov. 10, and “Too Bad About Detroit,” Editorial, Nov. 24). They are to be commended for their frankness, and what we see is the logical outcome of years of preparation. The utter bankruptcy of their cause and lack of spiritual dynamic is apparent for all to see. They employ situational ethics—that the end justifies the means—and forget that nowhere did the Lord Jesus use force or encourage force. They violate the concept of voluntarism. Even Paul, when he rebuked churches, did not use his apostolic office to force them. He used moral persuasion.… The glory of the early Church was its victory over Caesar by sacrifice, martyrdom—but never by force.

HAROLD LINDSELL

Professor of Bible

Wheaton College

Wheaton, Ill.

I have looked in the New Testament for the Christ who made no economic pronouncements, did not disrupt public life, never challenged practices used by governments nor engaged in civil disobedience. Perhaps if I look long enough I shall find him.…

In denouncing the Detroit conference, kindly refrain from placing guns in the hands of all “liberals” and NCC affiliates. We will try to avoid lumping you together with the most radical and unsavory of the self-styled “evangelicals.”

ALAN KIEFFABER

Franklin Grove, Ill.

Perhaps there is blessing in disguise. A few more such unchristian meetings sponsored by such unchristian people in the name of the National Council of Christian Churches should awaken the sleeping majority to what the irresponsible minority is trying to do.

Too bad that the conciliar church has become a sounding board for those who are opposed to what Christianity is all about. Too bad there isn’t a two-party system in the NCC, because it is high time that the conservative element should be in the saddle. Maybe Detroit will help?

NORMAN B. JEROME

Director, Literature Department

American Sunday-School Union

Philadelphia, Pa.

Is there a rather definite parallel between the total of the race conflicts and the total of the American Revolution? Was not the “Boston Tea Party” a rather definite economic upset against English business at the time? And did not the English government call out the “federal troops” to quell the riot? And had they been successful would not America still be considered a dependent race, a minority group, etc.? Following this line, would not a good solution to the problem be to avoid a split by welding the Negro into the white as an equal where he has equal ability and qualifications?

J. MORLEY NUTTING

Upper Sandusky, Ohio.

A QUESTION OF WHERE AND WHEN

CHRISTIANITY TODAY rightly points to an emergent anomaly in Detroit (Church and Society Conference) (“The Violent New Breed,” Editorial, Nov. 24): force viewed as deplorable in Viet Nam, violence somehow justifiable at home. By what measuring stick does one arrive at such judgments? For the objection apparently is not to violence as such, but only to violence at certain times or at certain places.

But there is the old stone-throwing problem for people in glass houses. Isn’t CHRISTIANITY TODAY caught in the same anomaly, only in reverse form—violence is justifiable in Viet Nam but deplorable at home? And again, what is the measuring stick? If “fallen man’s lot” means grin and bear it domestically, why not internationally? Conversely, if human depravity compels us to accept or resort to violence internationally, can’t the same case be made in domestic injustice?

I do not speak from a “plague-on-both-your-houses” stance. God only knows the depth and complexity of all these problems, and the puniness of all our proposals. Actually few people at Detroit were prepared to take the extreme position. Yet there is consistency, even in such a position. After all, “liberal” Protestants assume that norms must emerge historically with a somehow oblique relationship to Holy Writ. Nothing in the formula prevents a conclusion (which might be mistaken, nonetheless, on historical, tactical, etc., grounds) that violence in Viet Nam is wrong but right in the ghetto. “Evangelicals,” on the other hand, postulate a straight line from Scripture, and it remains an enigma as to how one gets from Jesus (assuming an evangelical Christology) to napalm in the jungles of Viet Nam. If the nature of the problem makes the difference, then how does one distinguish evangelicals from liberals?

PAUL PEACHEY

Assoc. Prof. of Sociology

The Catholic University of America

Washington, D. C.

• While the Bible nowhere authorizes use of power for unlimited destruction, it does approve the state’s use of force to restrain injustice. It does not approve the Church’s use of force for political objectives. There is a wide difference between the use of force where solution by persuasion and law is deliberately repudiated, and the use of violence where reliance on persuasion and jurisprudence remains a live option.—ED.

The cartoon on the cover, showing a gleeful man in clerical collar with a newly-arrived Tommy gun in hand, throws an underhanded, unchristian blow at the social-action movement in our churches.… Your cartoonist would do well to reread the ninth commandment.

ARCHIBALD W. MCMILLAN

Kettering, Ohio

Why not let CHRISTIANITY TODAY become a real place for dialogue among evangelicals for a more constructive advance of the faith? For example, you give only small reference to the EFMA report that “the evangelical mind-set … has inhibited constructive thought and action” (“Evangelicals Inhibited,” News, Nov. 24). That is what should have been headlined on your cover instead of that dubious cartoon cover of “New Breed violence”! This dialogue could be a positive contribution to a recovery of sanity and intellectual integrity within the evangelical camp, instead of this sick “I hate the liberals” campaign which seems to be so prevalent in many evangelical journals!

DENTON LOTZ

Hamburg, Germany

ACCURATE BUT UNCRITICAL

Dr. D. Elton Trueblood’s thesis (i.e., denominational loyalties are now irrelevant and outmoded) (“Post-Denominational Christianity,” Nov. 24) may be an accurate observation on the times, but to approve such a situation almost uncritically is, to my thinking, inexcusable. Had major denominational differences been resolved or reduced through careful scriptural study and struggle, the resulting rapprochement would be a victory for truth. But current evangelical “couldn’t-care-less” attitudes toward major issues that divided the churches are spiritual decline rather than advance.

J. PAUL MCCRACKEN

Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America

Cambridge, Mass.

Sorry to report that I was not charmed by Dr. Trueblood’s statement that “when people move from one neighborhood to another, they now change their denominational affiliation with ease and with no agony of decision.” This utterance did however rejuvenate my memory about the gentleman who was in the habit of rotating from one church group to another. One day he asked his present pastor what he thought about his joining another church. “I think it’s all right in your case,” he advised. “You see, it never hurts to change the label on an empty bottle.”

ROGER K. MOORE

Colorado Springs, Colo.

I enjoy Dr. Elton Trueblood’s articles appearing in CHRISTIANITY TODAY from time to time.

RALPH L. BRAMBLE

Warrensburg, N. Y.

WRITERS THEN AND NOW

I thoroughly enjoyed the beginning of the editorial, (“300 Years After ‘Paradise Lost’” Nov. 24)—the references to the greatness of Milton and his work, C. S. Lewis, and other “strongly Christian” writers. I envied their competence, their success, and lamented their passing.

The conservative Christian (Protestant) is handicapped as a writer. It has become a major achievement to secure either publisher or reader, virtually an impossibility, in fact.…

Have you noted the pattern of degeneration in all of man’s creative endeavours? Formlessness, rootlessness, purposelessness are snowballing in all areas of thought. This seems very plain during the past several hundred years; and in our time I find it frightening.… Thank you so much for your last sentence about “… conveying a sense of timeless values and a glimpse of God’s compassion and benevolent intervention in time for man’s salvation.”

PAULINE F. STACY

Meade, Kan.

FUEL FOR THE FIRE

It is good to know that the Holy Spirit did not retire or go on an extended vacation (“Fanning the Charismatic Fire,” News, Nov. 24).…

The statement … by David du Plessis is not factual. We have taught and preached that the “fruits of the Holy Spirit” listed in Galatians 5:22, 23 are the real proof-producers of a Spirit-filled life … First Corinthians 13 particularly emphasizes the great foundation principle upon which a Spirit-filled Christian’s life must be governed and based. We don’t think we have “arrived” because we speak in tongues.… There is a good deal of heart-searching going on in our constituency. We find that there is a great desire to have as the result of all our efforts for Christ, “that in all things he might have the pre-eminence.”

JAMES D. GAST

The Assemblies of God Church

Eagle Bend, Minn.

What was the context of David J. du Plessis’s statement? “Arrived” at the ultimate of Christian experience, or “arrived” at the threshold of a glorious New Testament experience of the life in the Spirit? If it’s the latter, I think he was quoted rightly. If the former alone, I think his statement was used to impugn the marvel of the glorious Pentecostal baptism which makes spiritual life truly meaningful.…

If you are going to quote one linguist on the nature of speaking in tongues as “nonsense” … wouldn’t it be fair to quote other authorities who roundly disagree with his conclusion? Don’t try to “laugh us out of court” just because you can’t explain us away. Pentecostals have been here … since the Day of Pentecost, and please God, we’ll be here until Jesus comes.

LEONARD PALMER

First Assembly of God

Taft, Calif.

The report … states: “Campus Crusade for Christ forbids its 1,100 staffers to speak in tongues, even in private devotions.” In First Corinthians 14:39b the Apostle Paul writes: “Forbid not to speak with tongues.”

It is apparent that there were two excesses in the early Church regarding tongues. There was the excess of the wrong or inappropriate use of this genuine gift. In First Corinthians 14, Paul seeks to correct this—but not to eradicate tongues, one of nine gifts that are “inspired by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.”

The other excess was to forbid the use of this gift. But Paul goes so far as to say, “I would that you all spoke with tongues …”

The Lord Jesus once reproved the scribes by asking, “Why do you by your tradition make the word of God of none effect?” Both fire and electricity are dangerous. We do not escape the danger by banning them, but by using them lawfully. Let us not quench the Holy Spirit. Let us not put his fire out.

JOHN MCCANDLISH PHILLIPS

New York, N. Y.

A TOP FLIGHT AIRLINE

Having had a few such experiences myself, I enjoyed your news summary, “Most Missionary Tales Have a Happy Landing” (Nov. 10). However … I am afraid that others who do not know the Missionary Aviation Fellowship operation will be misled into thinking that they are the ones Elden Rawlings referred to. The reference to “World War II-vintage” DC-3 planes clearly leaves out missionary operation, especially MAF, and demonstrates that it is referring to small, local, commercial airlines.

The reference to the first MAF crash at the head of the article is, I believe, the misleading factor, in spite of your praise of them in your article. I am sure that you will want to make sure that no false impressions are created concerning MAF. They are a real top-notch outfit in every way.

KENNETH D. BASSETT

Coco Solo, Canal Zone

• Agreed.—ED.

AM I RUNNING FROM YOU, JESUS?

Lord, I told them things they wanted to hear,

Safe things to say to college students:

That Birchites and fundamentalists are bad;

That sex is good;

The Establishment is the cause of everyone’s trouble;

The answer to the “root causes” of the world’s problems

Is to overthrow institutions;

And all it takes for people to do the good

Is for them to know they should.

Lord, I didn’t tell them what they didn’t want to hear:

That the trouble with the world isn’t simply

With oppressive structures and citizens of status quo;

The trouble with life is us;

That somehow although we know we shouldn’t be the way we are,

We still are,

And without your help we don’t really have the strength

To be any different;

That Jesus Christ was something more

Than a social revolutionary;

Somehow his life, death, and resurrection speaks

Directly to our plight of fear, weakness, and selfishness.

Lord, I told them what they wanted to hear,

And not what they needed to hear,

Because 1 wanted them—

I needed them—

To “dig” me.

Am I running from you, Jesus?

WARREN KISCH

Baptist Campus Minister

West Virginia University

Morgantown, W. Wa.