In sharp contrast to the attitude of many Protestant inter-church organizations in America, the National Association of Evangelicals took an unequivocal and aggressive anti-Communist position in its 18th annual convention in Chicago, April 26–29.
On the eve of the summit conference of the Western powers, NAE heard its president, Dr. Herbert S. Mekeel, pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Schenectady, New York, declare that atheistic communism is the gravest danger to the Christian church. Dr. Mekeel said Marxian ideology is based upon a concept of man which makes any kind of terror, hate or unscrupulous methods permissible to gain its ends. To trust the emissary of such a system is to court disaster. The Rev. Arthur Glasser of the China Inland Mission, whose immense Gospel program in mainland China was wrecked by communism, gave a realistic picture of the world conflict. John Noble, author of I Found God in Soviet Russia, and Dr. Fred Schwarz, Australian physician, stirred large audiences as they defined and described the Red menace.
Inspired by the “Emergency Christian Mobilization” program of its northwest regional organization, the NAE will make communism a nation-wide issue in the churches during the coming year. The program involves development of revived militant churches by prayer, Bible study and evangelism; classes and lectures educating the community in Christianity’s answer to the Communist threat; and an aggressive anti-communist crusade on local and national fronts.
A ringing resolution adopted by the convention said, “There is no such thing as compromise with communism.”
The NAE is best known in the United States as the conservative Protestant alternative to the National Council of Churches. The evangelical body numbers 41 denominations in its membership and hundreds of individual congregations and organizations serving a total constituency of some 10,000,000. Its potential for future growth may be seen in the fact that there are approximately 25,000,000 American Protestants who have not joined the NCC because of its liberal theological, sociological and economic views. “Cooperation Without Compromise” is NAE’s rally cry. Along with offering an alternative to the liberalism of the NCC, the NAE has served as a counter balance to the much larger organization in certain areas. It has opposed the NCC position on presenting religious radio and television programs only in public service time donated by stations, and has worked to offset community planning systems that would concede a monopoly to the major Protestant church council.
The NAE also jousts with the Roman Catholic church, especially through its Washington office which presents complaints of NAE affiliates about religious restrictions in Colombia, Spain, Italy and other predominantly Catholic countries to the U. S. State Department.
NAE’s radio and television arm includes some 150 leading evangelical broadcasters in the nation and has close relations with a network of missionary broadcasting stations.
The Evangelical Foreign Missions Association with its 100 boards is NAE’s service medium for world evangelism and aids about one-third of all American missionaries preaching the Gospel abroad.
The Chicago meeting was strong in its emphasis on evangelism. Leading evangelical evangelists participated in the sessions, including the Rev. Grady Wilson and Jerry Beavan of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. Dr. Graham, long an active member of the NAE, sent greetings to the convention.
Ten simultaneous “conventions within the convention” presented completed programs each morning. For example, three social action sessions dealt with campaign techniques to combat pornography. In one feature the mayor, city councilman, a police officer, and a state representative from Evanston, Illinois, told how obscenity challenged this American city and was eliminated. Workshops dealt with methods in education, summer camps, youth work, and other areas of evangelical concern. Over 100 exhibits presented a wide range of services being rendered the evangelical churches.
Major speakers included Dr. Paul S. Rees, Dr. Clyde W. Taylor, Dr. Vernon C. Grounds, and Dr. George L. Ford. The convention ended on a high note Friday noon with Dr. Bob Pierce inspiring the delegates to wider world vision and Christian advance.
The Rev. Thomas F. Zimmerman, general superintendent of the Assemblies of God, was chosen president for the ensuing year.
Nae Resolutions
Evangelicals at Chicago spoke in official resolutions which:
• Opposed election of any Roman Catholic as a U. S. prcsident;
• Deplored Communist infiltration of the churches and recommended that a study committee be set up;
• Hit federal aid to education;
• Restated strong orthodox position on the person and work of Christ;
• Urged the preservation of constitutional government with its guarantee of basic individual freedoms;
• Approved Bible reading in the public schools;
• Called for action to preserve the right of evangelicals to purchase radio and television time for the broadcasting of the Gospel;
• Opposed recognition of Red China;
• Warned against dangers to faith and freedom implicit in the United Nations and related world groups.
The New President
The Rev. Thomas F. Zimmerman, newly-elected NAE president, became general superintendent of the Assemblies of God last year. A native of Indianapolis, Indiana, he is the first representative of a Pentecostal denomination ever to be named to the NAE’s top office.
Zimmerman, 48, studied at Indiana University and was ordained to the ministry in 1932. He has held Assemblies of God pastorates in Indianapolis, Kokomo, Harrodsburg, and South Bend, Indiana, also in Granite City, Illinois, Springfield, Missouri, and Cleveland.
He was director of the Assemblies’ first radio broadcast from 1945 until 1949 and was made assistant general superintendent for the denomination in 1952.
Zimmerman, married and the father of three children, has long been active in NAE and has served a term as vice president.
Episcopal Address
“We have too many barren churches,” the Council of Methodist Bishops declared in a collective “Episcopal Address” at the opening of U.S. Methodism’s quadrennial General Conference April 27.
The address, two years in the making as a composite view of all Methodist bishops, noted that “the growth of The Methodist Church in recent years has not kept pace with the growth of the population in all places.”
“We have too many barren churches in which there are no new members being admitted on confession of faith,” the bishops said. “No Methodist church in a community of expanding population should be regarded as evangelistically awake unless it is winning people to Christ regularly and constantly.”
The address was delivered by Bishop William C. Martin of Dallas, chosen by secret ballot of his fellow bishops.
The 1960 address also commended the “general method and spirit” of a controversial report submitted by a special commission created four years ago to study the Methodist jurisdictional system.
“Without prejudging your action on its proposals,” the bishops told the conference, “we wish to commend the general method and spirit of the report and to say that in our considered judgment your dealing with it is the most urgent specific obligation of this conference.”
The report recommended retention of the present jurisdictional system which divides the church geographically, except for Negro congregations, all of which belong to the Central Jurisdiction.
While U. S. Methodism’s 49 bishops have no vote in conference proceedings, their Episcopal Address traditionally wields great influence.
Court Review
The U. S. Supreme Court plans to review the constitutionality of Sunday laws for the first time in history.
Arguments are scheduled to begin in the fall.
The nation’s highest tribunal has always upheld, in effect, the constitutionality of Sunday laws by refusing to hear lower court appeals on grounds that they did not present “a substantial federal question.”
Now the court says it will hear appeals of three merchants who have been found guilty of breaking state laws which forbid Sunday business. The merchants contend that such laws are unconstitutional and that their rights are being violated.
Protestant Panorama
• World Council of Churches headquarters in Geneva dispatched its associate general secretary, Dr. Robert S. Bilheimer, to South Africa last month to inquire into the effects of racial strife upon church relations. Bilheimer met with leaders of churches which are WCC members and which have been at odds over attitudes toward apartheid.
• The newly-appointed Treasury Minister of the West German Republic, Dr. Hans Wilhelmi, is a noted leader of the state Lutheran church. He is currently president of the Synod of the Evangelical Church of Hesse and Nassau.
• The signatures of 18 bishops of the Old Order Amish Mennonites appear on a petition which asks enactment of legislation to exclude their sect from participation in the social security program. The Old Order Amish oppose insurance because they feel it implies lack of faith in God’s judgments and that it yokes them with the unbelieving world.
• Three women were ordained last month by the state Lutheran church of Sweden despite persistent opposition from an element within the clergy. They became the first women ministers in the church’s history.
• A 90-ton vessel belonging to the Melanesian Anglican Mission was wrecked beyond salvage last month in an earthquake and tidal wave which hit the Solomon Islands area.
• The Minnesota Council of Churches plans to erect an $800,000 Protestant center in Minneapolis.
• Washington’s interdenominational Church of the Saviour opened a public coffee house last month as an “experiment in evangelism.” Workers from the church will staff the coffee house each evening and offer spiritual counsel upon request.
• A fire which destroyed Russwood Park, Memphis baseball stadium, also knocked out 300 windows of the 920-bed Baptist Memorial Hospital, located across the street. All patients escaped injury.
• A new library on the campus of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, contains a room devoted to preserving mementoes of the crusades of evangelist Billy Graham. Graham was scheduled to present the mementoes officially at a baccalaureate service May 9.
• Fellowship, official publication of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, interdenominational pacifist group, marked its 25th anniversary by publishing a double-sized issue May 1.
• A chapel-recording studio for “The Lutheran Hour,” largest private broadcasting operation in the world, was dedicated in St. Louis last month at the new headquarters building of the Lutheran Laymen’s League, which sponsors the program.
• Howard University’s School of Religion plans a $2,000,000 fund-raising drive to expand facilities on its Washington, D. C. campus.
• Seamen’s Church Institute of New York will construct a recreational and spiritual center this fall near Port Newark, New Jersey.
• Protestant ministers are joining Roman Catholic and Jewish clergymen in protesting curtailment of public library services in Boston. The curtailment grew out of drastic reductions in the municipal budget.
• Ground was broken April 30 for a $600,000 dormitory on the campus of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. The Presbyterian seminary, product of a merger of Pittsburgh-Xenia and Western theological seminaries, plans a long-range expansion program costing some $13,500,000.
• Representatives of the National Lutheran Council and the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod joined hands last month in placing a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery. The ceremony took place during simultaneous meetings of the NLC’s Bureau of Service to Military Personnel and the Missouri Synod’s Armed Services Commission.
