Dear Foes Of Tars And Nicotine:
Pity the poor cigarette manufacturer. Not only must he label cigarettes as hazardous to health, but the F.C.C. has recenly ruled that opponents of smoking must be provided air time to offset commercials for cigarettes. Now comes a new plan from Baptist pastor Wilbur E. Rees that may further shred the profits of the tobacco industry.
Suppressing an urge to launch a tirade against tobacco, for which Americans annually spend nearly $3 billion more than they spend for all religious and charitable causes, this Pocatello, Idaho, minister suggests that each denomination market its own brand of cigarettes. Says he: Lutherans could come out with “Martin Luther Kings” (giving 10 per cent to the SCLC for use of the name). Episcopalians could produce “Lucky Pikes,” known for doing a slow burn. The Mormons could advertise “Come on over to the LDS side.” Presbyterians could sell “Calvin Cools” and the Catholics, “Vatican Viceroys.” The Baptist pitch could be that theirs is the only one guaranteed to burn under water.
What a boon the Rees plan would be for the churches! Revenue from cigarette machines in the narthex would make the every-member canvas unnecessary. Smoke would fill the temple every Sunday. Ushers would no longer have to sneak a smoke outside. In fact, they could be replaced by cigarette girls who would pass ash trays rather than collection plates. Nicotine-stained teeth and yellowed fingers would become signs of piety, and emphysema the mark of utter saintliness. Though the sanctuary’s blue haze would dim parishioners’ view of their pastor, he could, between drags, remind them that “it’s what’s up front that counts.” Genesis 24:64 (look it up in the KJV) would become a favorite sermon text.
Let’s forget the Surgeon General’s report and develop our own sanctified cigarettes. Coupons on the backs of packs could finance a mission to pagan tobacconists in North Carolina. Holy smoke, what a creative ministry!
Your filter-brained friend, EUTYCHUS III
Evangelical Togetherness
Your plea (“Somehow, Let’s Get Together,” June 9) to discover our agreement on the essentials of Christianity and then find the organizational form for a general cooperation is excellent and very much needed.
Indeed, your idea is one of the most exciting propositions to come my way in a long time.… The kind of fellowship you are suggesting would give men like me not only a voice but a witness.
Let us make sure that the purpose of getting together is not to oppose any other group. Let there be room enough that it never becomes narrow or overly dogmatic. Let it emphasize not only commitment but joy.
BISHOP GERALD KENNEDY
The Methodist Church
Los Angeles, Calif.
I was appalled by your editorial. As a theological student and an evangelical I resent the implication that evangelical theology must manifest itself in such blatant sectarianism.
You are asking evangelicals to deny the very tenets which make them evangelical.… It is the Church, its ministry and sacraments, which is the basis and focal point of all truly Christian fellowship.
RICHARD A. BOWER
Pasadena, Calif.
Indeed, we must get together. Christ himself gave us the reason when he prayed “that they all may be one … that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.” …
Can we afford to ignore the legions of skeptics who challenge the validity of a faith which seemingly cannot engender peace or unity of spirit among its adherents?
PAUL RADER
Director
Reality Evangelism
Minneapolis, Minn.
The item in the current Newsweek magzine, [reporting on your suggestion for] a coordination of the fundamental denominations, was excellent. I wholeheartedly endorse such a move toward a closer relationship.
O. H. BERTRAM
Good Shepherd Lutheran
Toledo, Ohio
I agree wholeheartedly. Undoubtedly there are many likeminded. But the big question is the “How.”
HAMMELL P. SHIPPS, M.D.
Vincentown, N. J.
This country’s evangelicals have needed a “voice” to speak out clearly that they might rally around a common cause! The clarion call should do the following in progressive steps: (1) Raise pertinent questions which will evoke response and discussion; (2) provide the “machinery,” formal or informal (I prefer the latter), to set in motion a tremendous witness to the power of the Gospel through the lives of individual Christians who are one in purpose and essential doctrines; and (3) arouse our nation’s evangelical believers from lethargy, apathy, and/or a state of perplexity in order to demonstrate their faith and works as the answer to the folly of a diluted Gospel and Bible.
Step one has been taken boldly, yet wisely, in my opinion, by your editorial.… I am registering my keen desire and anxious hope that CHRISTIANITY TODAY has sparked, and will continue to kindle, a fire of unity and love that will cause millions of evangelicals to step out together as a spiritual force in America, not unlike that unity which was brought about at Pentecost by the Holy Spirit.
WALTER W. SCOTT
Executive Vice-President
American Sunday-School Union
Philadelphia, Pa.
Evangelicals need a unity that produces the same dynamic of Holy Spirit baptism which was experienced in the early Church interpreted and applied today in whatever frame of reference our various disciplines may require.
The Berlin Congress was a solid thrust. It was the work of God through his Son and the fervency of the Holy Spirit in action. This is what the Church needs today.… I always say, “Expect a miracle.”
ORAL ROBERTS
President
Oral Roberts University
Tulsa, Okla.
There is a real ringing note sounded in this article that is drastically needed in our day.…
During the summer of 1966 we were able to rally together some concerned evangelicals, and we began to press forward to begin an area-wide fellowship. September of 1966 was the beginning of such a group, and it has been just fantastic what has happened since. The group is called “The Hudson County Evangelical Minister’s Fellowship” and serves the twelve communities of the county encompassing a population of almost 611,000. There have been between twenty-five and thirty clergy who have shown an interest in the organization since its inception.
RONALD H. BROWN
Summit Avenue Baptist
Jersey City, N. J.
You said that “particularly among young evangelicals” there is a beginning of real interest in this type of fellowship and cooperation. In my connection with the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship, I have found that one’s denomination is of very minimal importance. What is important, however, is that one is a Christian. From this frame of reference, the campuses of some thirty nations are being evangelized. And in the United States, splendid work has been accomplished because young evangelicals have put aside petty differences and emphasized their spiritual oneness in Christ.
EDMUND C. DE LA COUR, JR.
Providence, R. I.
The editorial is very provocative and specific. I feel that it will be of benefit to the evangelical cause.
CHARLES W. CONN
General Overseer
Church of God
Cleveland, Tenn.
The fragmentation of evangelicals and their resultant limited influence and power derive from several facts, in my judgment:
1. The evangelical “movement” (which has never really been a “movement”) has been associated with aggressive individualists who have built programs around themselves, the maintenance and survival of which have become their major concern, and have isolated them from leaders of like spirit.
2. Evangelical bodies, such as those comprising the NAE, have often so zealously committed themselves to narrow theological positions or stereotypes that they regard with mistrust any group which diverges the slightest degree from their criteria. This has made genuine integration of effort on the part of the fundamentalist-oriented groups of evangelicals all but impossible.
In consequence of the above, the “major denominations” have looked askance at the “evangelical bodies,” and the latter have set about with perfervid zeal to demonstrate to the former what they, “the great unwashed,” can accomplish! This puts it a bit strongly, to be sure, but the great gulf has been fixed.
Taking such matters of common observation into account, I would urge an evangelical movement which would include the large sections of the “major denominations,” as well as the saner leadership among the presently self-isolated “evangelicals.” Billy Graham has done much to demonstrate the strength of effort which can be realized by across-the-board cooperation. Such fine evangelical causes as the Gideons draw their membership from churches of the large denominations as well as from the so-called sects. Referring to the chart on page 25, the strategy I urge would involve a total constituency of something like 40,000,000 Protestants.
THOMAS B. MCDORMAND
President
Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary
Philadelphia, Pa.
My conception of the togetherness of Christians does not involve the idea of organic union. The respective denominations should be a fellowship based on the things they hold in common as believers in Christ Jesus. Their method of approach and different interpretations of life’s problems should not be discouraged or destroyed, but they should make Christ the center.
J. H. JACKSON
The National Baptist Convention, U. S. A., Inc.
Chicago, Ill.
Viet Nam’S Offensive
Please stop talking about Viet Nam (Editor’s Note, June 9). What you say is extremely offensive to me and all other liberal evangelical Christians.… There are so many people who equate evangelical Christianity with Puritan ethics-theology that it behooves us Christians to keep our heads in the mainstream of twentieth-century thought.…
People, even Christians, who think in terms of black and white, “Communist aggression” and “American benevolence,” offend me. However, I think that with Christ’s help I can overcome this prejudice. It would help immensely if my favorite magazine would stop printing such … material.
ANDY FINCKE
Havertown, Pa.
Cannot the label of “aggression” be more properly attached to a foreign power which foists an unpopular and corrupt military dictatorship upon a country that has done it no harm, and then devastates that land by bombing and burning for not accepting such a magnanimous gift?…
It amazes me that intelligent evangelicals like yourself can be aware of widespread moral corruption within this country (and not least among its legislators) and apparently quite unaware that American activities elsewhere in the world could be other than benevolent.…
I do not see why I should assume that in 1967 Communism is to be equated with the devil as wholly unmitigated evil.
D. W. DOERKSEN
Madison, Wis.
Pentecostal Pluses
The article on the “pluses” in the Pentecostal churches (“What We Can Learn from Pentecostal Churches,” June 9) should certainly make us perk up our spiritual antennae. May we have more along this line. I was happy to see that Dr. Bell had an excellent discussion on this theme in his layman’s column.
KEARNEY FRANTSEN
Makoti Lutheran Parish
Makoti, N. D.
J. S. Murray certainly brought many matters into sharp focus, and wrote most helpfully.…
One wonders at times if Pentecostals have a creed based more on experience than on the Bible. It is apparent that their experience is regarded as standard. This and this alone is “the full Gospel,” and every saint in church history, regardless of the greatness of his life and deeds, if he did not have what they are pleased to call “the baptism,” both the man and his works are somewhat deficient.
Like J. S. Murray, nevertheless, I wish to learn from them, for God is working in their midst, though I do not regard this as his endorsement of all they do and say.
HARRY B. MORRIS
Belle Mead Baptist Church
South Somerville, N. J.
I was very happy to read more on the Holy Spirit. As a member of the non-Pentecostal portion of Christianity, I feel a void in understanding on the part of laymen and ministers about the Holy Spirit or the Spirit of Jesus Christ in the world today.
JOHN P. RHODES, JR.
Memphis, Tenn.
Of Thermodynamics And Entropy
A. E. Wilder-Smith (“Darwinism and Contemporary Thought,” May 26) wrote that Pierre Teilhard de Chardin “postulates all this [complexity-consciousness tendency in matter] without a single reference to the laws of thermodynamics, which govern the behavior of all matter as we know it today.”
If Dr. Smith had read the index of Teilhard’s The Phenomenon of Man (Harper, 1959) he would have found three references to “thermodynamics” and five to “entropy” (the second law of thermodynamics). If he had read page 65 he would have seen Teilhard’s attempt “to explain the interplay of tangential arrangements in terms of the laws of thermodynamics.”
I agree with the basic thesis of Dr. Smith’s article. But we need not make a magician-entertainer of God in order to believe the creation account.
Dr. Smith effectively demolishes a Darwinism which postulates a “spontaneous” generation of life, but he throws Teilhard into that class unadvisedly, I think. Perhaps he should write a separate critique of Teilhard—after reading him.
EDWARD H. PITTS
Editor
Present Truth Messenger
Live Oak, Fla.
There are specific reasons for thinking that the spontaneous appearance of order is compatible with thermodynamics. Dayhoff et al. (Science 146:1461, 1964) have calculated from thermodynamic principles and experimental data that starting with certain proportions of carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen in the gas phase at 277° C and one atmosphere pressure, there form spontaneously small amounts of hosts of complex molecules, among them pyruvic and lactic acids and alanine. The experiments of Miller and Urey (Science 130:245, 1959) show that under hypothetical primitive earth conditions where the products of gas reactions can condense biochemically interesting molecules form, and the amount of alanine becomes quite large. Fox (Science 132:200, 1960) reports the spontaneous formation of small protein molecules from a mixture of amino acids heated dry at temperatures between 150° and 200° C. The point of quoting these experiments is that they show the spontaneous appearance of order under conditions where “intelligent technique” is not employed.…
We must distinguish carefully what a biologist friend of mine, Dr. Robert MacArthur, calls the Little Theory of Evolution from Grand Theories of Evolution. The Little Theory is purely scientific, limited as science is limited. A Grand Theory, such as the one Simpson espouses, consists of the Little Theory plus a faith statement, such as, “That is all the explanation there is.” Clearly a Christian Grand Theory is possible where one accepts the Little Theory and adds the faith statement, “And that is how God does it.” When one sees this distinction one realizes there can never be a head-on collision between Christian faith and science but only between Christian faith and other faiths, such as scientism.…
C. P. S. TAYLOR
Asst. Prof, of Biophysics
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, B.C.
One of the objections … against the evolutionary progression of biological organization is that such a concept violates the second law of thermodynamics.…
However, fundamental to this line of reasoning is the assumption that the earth is an energetically isolated system. This is clearly not the case. For example, virtually all energy used by organisms in maintaining life processes is derived from outside the earth through the steady influx of solar radiant energy. Green plants “fix” this energy photo-synthetically. Bound up chemically in plant tissues, it is then available to animals as food energy for maintenance, daily activity, growth (an increase in organization), and, according to current theory, gradual change with time. As long as the system has an energy input, the objection to evolutionary concepts on the grounds that they ignore the second law is not pertinent. This vitiates Wilder Smith’s main thesis.
The implication here is not necessarily that evolution has occurred. But it is not possible to utilize this particular argument to show that evolution has not occurred.
LION F. GARDINER
Department of Biology
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Woods Hole, Mass.
Unfortunately, Dr. Wilder Smith has misunderstood or misrepresented current biological theories.…
The earth has never been considered a “closed” system with respect to energy (which is the issue at stake in entropy). Nor is a living organism closed to energy. Life would cease to exist were it not for the continuing flood of energy from the sun. (The origin and maintenance of life “costs” the universe.) Furthermore, there is adequate experimental evidence that more complex molecules are formed from simpler ones if energy is added to the system.
When biochemists learn to put together a self-reproducing molecule that can be described as “living,” they will be manipulating raw materials and energy, but they will not “react with” matter in any meaningful sense. In my opinion, it is either nonsense or heresy to say that God “reacted” with matter.
I have found that a more adequate approach to my colleagues has been to point out that Huxley, Shapley, and Simpson are talking religion and not science when they deny the existence of God. My colleagues understand this distinction, and it provides an excellent opportunity to discuss the meaning of the Christian faith.
V. ELVING ANDERSON
Professor of Genetics
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minn.
Dr. Smith has, in keeping with fundamentalistc tradition, made the unnecessary assumption that creationism (an unfortunate word) and evolution are alternative and mutually exclusive views. This of course is a direct consequence again of failing to make the distinction; evolution is one thing, evolutionism quite another.… Science works of course by both inductive and deductive reasoning. As a result of induction, one proposes a model, an hypothesis, which seems to fit most of the evidence and on the basis of the model deduces certain predictions. Science is full of such models, which are just tentative explanations or interpretations of observed phenomena.… No one who is in the least bit self-conscious of the method he employs in science regards these models as anything more than tentative explanations; they are not facts but scientific interpretations of observed phenomena.
My point then is this: To consider a scientific model which seeks to make explanations exclusively at the level of the natural world as an alternative to a world-and-life view, which seeks ultimate explanations, implies a serious misapplication or misunderstanding of the methods and ways of science.
CALVIN D. FREEMAN
Asst. Prof, of Biology
Cleveland State University
Cleveland, Ohio
“First” Error
My reference (“The Canadian Churches,” March 31) to the first religious service in Canada being conducted at the present site of Fort Churchhill, Hudson Bay, in 1619, is in error. The Rev. Douglas Dittrich, St. Jude’s Pro-Cathedral, Anglican parish of Frobisher Bay in the Arctic Diocese, has informed me that Sir Martin Frobisher’s chaplain conducted the first Canadian service at Frobisher Bay in 1578.
JAMES R. MUTCHMOR
Toronto, Ont.
