Since the Tambaran meeting of the International Missionary Council, a difficult word has become popular. Wherever one moves in Africa and Asia or takes up a book on missions, the word “indigenization” crops up.

Since Tambaran there has been a growing stress that the Christian church, especially in Africa and Asia, must become indigenous, must become more fully rooted in the local soil and fit into each country’s or area’s specific cultural milieu. Somehow the Church is to reflect more fully than hitherto the human heritage of those among whom it has appeared, although basically it can be rooted only in Christ.

It was felt at the time of the council and is still felt that in most cases the Gospel was unnecessarily “foreign” not primarily because of its inherent foreignness but because it was presented in completely Western cultural garb to the peoples of Africa and Asia. Realization that the Church was often unnecessarily foreign and had too little understanding of or contact with the everyday life and heritage of specific peoples was long overdue. The Church’s liturgy, hymns and music, and sometimes even its language were strange. It was patterned after some Western mother church in Europe or the United States. The genius and the heritage of the people concerned had no opportunity for expression in the rigid form of a Church transplanted from Europe or America. Most missionary leaders agree that this state of affairs must change if the Church in Africa and Asia is to have a future. The change is especially necessary in an age when many African and Asian countries are experiencing a rising national conciousness. Too often we have failed to let these peoples share their “riches” with us; we have prescribed all the patterns in church life. Writing on the Church’s problems in Africa, T. S. Trimingham makes the following pointed observations: “Protestant Christianity has carried with it opposition to the basic elements of African religious expression. Its antipathy to emotionalism, its divorce from art, its lack of true understanding of ritual through which the African apprehends religious truths … are only a few of the things which have led to the arrest and sterility of the African religious genius. In consequence local churches are introverted in their life and deaf to the call of missionary encounter and outreach, hence, too, the birth of pathological forms of African religions.” He then asks how this type of Christianity can possibly counteract Islam, for example, which is expressed as a laymen’s religion, and also the African Separatist movements which, as the existing socio-religious structures break up, will flourish more than ever in rural Africa.

The history of the Church indicates at least five classical reactions to culture:

1. That of men like Tertullian and Kierkegaard can be described as Christ against culture.

2. That of Abelard and some early European and present-day American missionaries expounds the Christ of culture.

3. That of Aquinas is Christ above culture or the merging of culture with the Word Incarnate.

4. That of Augustine, Calvin, and Wesley declares Christ changes culture: he is its Saviour.

The accusation is sometimes made that in Africa we have followed the view of Abelard and the early Europeans; that is, we have made the Western way of life synonymous with Christianity but have viewed indigenous culture as did Tertullian the Montanist: being against Christ, it had to be destroyed. Because of this negative approach we failed to comprehend the relationships of those to whom we tried to bring Christ.

Indigenous forms of song, music, and liturgy must be welcomed into the life of the Church in Africa or Asia. But they cannot be forced from the outside. They must grow spontaneously out of the local Christian community. Only the native Christians can decide which of their customs are useful or to be incorporated into the Church without detriment to the Christian truth. They alone know how closely some particular, seemingly innocuous custom may be linked to paganism in general or to some specific pagan system. Where a close relationship exists between any social custom and paganism, it would be extremely dangerous to allow such a custom in the Church. But as J. H. Bavinck has said, and properly so, there are some things in the life of indigenous peoples of which we can take possession for Christ. He prefers the term possession to accommodation because it excludes any idea of compromise.

In the process of indigenization we must be very careful, however, not to accept indigenous cultures too readily, thereby gravitating to another extreme no less radical than Tertullian’s approach. We can become so “open” to indigenous cultures that we may fail to evaluate them in the light of and by the standards of the eternal Gospel. We must guard against what could be called the anthropological approach to indigenous cultures. This approach is legitimate enough within the limits of its subject matter. For the anthropologist every factor of an indigenous culture has supreme value, but he is primarily interested in what is and not in what should be. How different is the missionary’s approach. He is not and should not be interested primarily in what is, but in what should be according to the standards of the Gospel. While he must know and understand the culture of those he serves or tries to win to Christ, he can never “accept” a pagan culture but must judge and challenge it.

By our present reaction to a too-negative approach to indigenous cultures we may open the door to syncretism. Our too-negative attitude in Africa, for instance, encouraged the Christian church there to create various reactionary sects. We now have such groups as the Zionists, the Ethiopians, and the Millennialists. Usually these people use the vernacular, explain the Bible in indigenous cultural contexts, sing indigenous hymns, and so on. They have reacted to the “foreignness” of the usual church pattern. The urge to express their faith in terms of their own cultural heritage is very obvious. Unfortunately, witchcraft or ancestor worship plays a significant role in almost every one of these sects which, in truth, constitute a bridge back to paganism. We must undercut this development.

As has been indicated, we must not accommodate ourselves too easily to indigenous cultures, thereby risking syncretism. Always we must fight the insidious philosophy which says: “Every people has its Father Jacob, who left them a well.”

In a day of surging national spirit among many peoples, missionaries must examine as never before their approach to the indigenous church. No longer dare we to equate Christianity with a given way of life. On the other hand, a given way of life dare not compromise the uniqueness of the Gospel.

Professor of History of Christianity

University of Pretoria

South Africa

ECUMENICAL JOURNALISM—The Christian Century began the new year with a shorter page (formerly 12 inches, now 11) and a broader subtitle (formerly “an undenominational weekly,” now “an ecumenical weekly”). Commonweal, Roman Catholic lay journal, introduced a monthly column by Presbyterian theologian Robert McAfee Brown. Our Sunday Visitor, another Catholic weekly, featured an article on church financing by National Council of Churches executive T. K. Thompson, a Congregational Christian minister. Meanwhile, the Christian Herald for January raised many an eyebrow with a full-page advertisement promoting contraceptives. The Lutheran, most timely of the denominational news magazines, went from a weekly to a biweekly in a publications merger of the newly-formed Lutheran Church in America, which began functioning formally with the start of the new year.

PROTESTANT PANORAMA—Only 28 per cent of new churches of major Protestant denominations are being built in the suburbs, according to a National Council of Churches survey. The discovery is contrary to a popular idea that most new Protestant churches appear in suburbs, according to Dr. Glen W. Trimble, who reported to the annual assembly of the NCC’s Division of Home Missions. He said the overall tendency is to build few churches but to have them serve larger constituencies.

The United Presbyterian Board of Christian Education is launching a campaign to find qualified Negro pastors and teachers. A board announcement disclosed that there is a shortage of Negro seminary graduates to replace those who retire or die and to fill needs of integrated churches.

The Christian Index, official publication of the Georgia Baptist Convention, declared war on gambling and published the names and addresses of 702 purchasers of federal tax stamps for coin-operated machines and 76 others who bought federal wagering tax stamps.

Judson College, a new four-year liberal arts school under Baptist auspices, will open in September at a campus in Elgin, Illinois. It will replace Northern Baptist College, which has been associated with Northern Baptist Theological Seminary. The seminary, now located in Chicago, is moving to the suburbs.

The General Assembly of the United Church of Northern India, at its fourteenth session in Kolhapur, unanimously endorsed a plan of union that would form the United Churches of North India and Pakistan. It was the strongest support yet given to the plan, which is running into opposition among other churches participating in the merger talks.

Methodist mission leaders report that Brasilia, ultra-modern capital of Brazil, now has four Methodist chapels, five other preaching points, and four Sunday schools in the city and suburbs.

Campus Crusade for Christ International began operations at Arrowhead Springs, new headquarters site in San Bernardino, California.

An American counterpart to the International Council of Christian Churches’ youth commission was organized in Chicago last month. Albert F. Gedraitis was elected national chairman.

Talks aimed at creating a new cooperative agency to succeed the National Lutheran Council get under way in Chicago this month. Seven representatives each have been named by Lutheran Church in America, Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, and American Lutheran Church. Eight other smaller Lutheran bodies have been invited to dispatch representatives as well.

MISCELLANY—Ground will be broken soon for an interfaith “Spiritual Life Center” on the Washington, D. C., campus of Methodist-related American University. The $350,000 structure will feature altars for Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish services. It will be topped by a flame that will burn continually “symbolizing man’s belief in eternal life and eternal spiritual values.”

Christian Legal Society, a new organization offering fellowship for evangelical lawyers and a forum for discussion, stipulates that members must acknowledge the Bible as the inspired Word of God. The group also seeks to promote high standards of legal ethics and to encourage and aid deserving young students preparing for the legal profession. Gerrit P. Groen is first president.

A state study commission in Rhode Island recommended that parochial school students be furnished science, mathematics, and language textbooks on a loan basis, utilizing public funds.

PERSONALIA—Retired Methodist Bishop G. Bromley Oxnam underwent a rare brain operation last month to relieve Parkinson’s disease. The surgery involved pumping liquid oxygen into a section of the brain to freeze and destroy tissue that caused the palsy.

Two ordained ministers are among the top ten young men of 1962 chosen by the U. S. Junior Chamber of Commerce. They are the Rev. Robert W. Castle, Jr., 33-year-old pastor of St. John’s Protestant Episcopal Church in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Dr. Jim Turpin, a Methodist now in Hong Kong giving medical aid to Communist China refugees through Project Concern.

Dr. Everett S. Graffam was appointed executive director of Evangelical Foundation, parent organization of the Bible Study Hour on radio and Eternity magazine, both founded by the late Donald Grey Barnhouse.

Dr. James H. Landes, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Wichita Falls, Texas, was named president of Hardin-Simmons University (Southern Baptist).

Dr. Paul M. Limbert retired after 10 years as secretary general of the World Alliance of YMCAs, succeeded by Fredrik Franklin of Sweden.

Dr. Jerry Beavan, who more than any other man guided the public relations fortunes of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, resigned last month for personal reasons. Beavan’s most recent assignment was direction of the association’s British office.

In Minneapolis, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association announced appointment of George M. Wilson to the newly-created post of executive vice president and treasurer. Wilson formerly was secretary and treasurer.

Dr. Hunter B. Blakely retired as secretary of the Division of Higher Education, Board of Christian Education, Presbyterian Church in the U. S.

Dr. Alexander Mackie retired as president and director of Presbyterian Ministers’ Fund.

Charles H. Kellstadt, retired board chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Company, appointed chairman of the National Committee of Religious Leaders for Safety.

WORTH QUOTING—“Separation of church and state was never meant to separate our youth from God. This trend to extricate God and moral teachings from the school is a diabolical scheme and is bearing fruit in the deluge of juvenile delinquency which is overwhelming the nation.”—Evangelist Billy Graham, in a dinner address at the close of Youth for Christ’s Capital Teen Convention in Washington, D. C.

“The gravest error the preacher-prophet can make today in preaching the ‘good news’ of God is to assume that his proclamation is being heard in an atmosphere of Christian understanding and that what he is saying is accepted by his hearers as good news.”—Dr. Jesse Jai McNeil in The Preacher-Prophet in Mass Society.

Deaths

DR. LUDD M. SPIVEY, 76, president emeritus of Florida Southern College (Methodist); in West Palm Beach, Florida.

REV. GEORGE LIVINGSTON BAYARD, 90, Episcopal minister and retired chaplain credited as being the founding father of the General Commission on Chaplains and Armed Forces Personnel.

DR. ALPHEUS S. MOWBRAY, 103, retired Methodist minister and former district superintendent; in Belmar, New Jersey.

PROFESSOR KAROLY PROHEE, 88, called the “grand old man” of Lutheran theology in Hungary; in Sopron, Hungary.

A distraught band of devout Siberians knocked in vain on America’s door this month. Their plea, significantly like that of many early American settlers, was for religious freedom. In one of the most heartbreaking episodes of the cold war, they were turned away.

Thirty-two men, women, and children were in the determined party that set out for Moscow from the Siberian coalmining town of Chernogorsk. Some carried babies in their arms. The 2,400-mile trip took four days, and they arrived in the Soviet capital hungry and cold.

There was some light snow in Moscow on the morning of January 3, and the temperature was well below freezing. The group obviously risked their lives in surging past the armed Soviet militiamen who guarded the gates at the U. S. Embassy. They described in detail how they had been persecuted for religious reasons, and they pleaded for help from American officials. They were quoted as expressing a desire to leave Russia, and some reports said they wanted to go to Israel.

The group was herded into a lunchroom building on the embassy compound. They were served coffee and a snack while embassy officials summoned representatives of the Soviet foreign ministry. A bus arrived, too, followed by Russian plainclothesmen.

The embassy refused to let correspondents see the group. The plainclothesmen threatened to confiscate the camera of any Western photographers who took pictures (some were said to have been taken nonetheless).

The group consisted of six men, twelve women, and fourteen children. They described themselves as “evangelical Christians” and complained that they had not been permitted to hold worship services, that they had not been allowed to observe religious holidays, and that in some instances they had been barred from contact with their children.

The group emerged from the lunchroom early in the afternoon. The bus had been backed to the lunchroom door and wooden panels set up to block the view. The panels were removed, however, and correspondents got their first good look. Most of the women wore traditional peasant felt boots, cotton dresses, padded jackets, and shawls. Some of the children were obviously ill.

One man told an embassy official: “We don’t want to go anywhere. They will shoot us.” Another pleaded that they would be arrested.

As they boarded the bus still another man in knee-length boots and a long overcoat turned toward newsmen and cried in a loud voice:

“Those who believe in God and Christ help us. We ask it. We ask that those who believe in God and Christ help us.”

At this point, several men and women in the group wept openly.

The U. S. embassy apparently had offered them no encouragement. Said a spokesman:

“Obviously, we are not in a position to solve this kind of problem.”

He said another group of peasants from the same religious order forced their way into the British Embassy in Moscow last year, and some apparently were relatives of the latest group.

(The Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia said they had received copies of two petitions, including one signed by several thousand believers in the Tarnopol region, an unprecedented gesture in the Soviet Union. The petitions appealed to Premier Khrushchev to halt religious persecution. The synod’s office in New York charges that Soviet secret police persecution of monks at the famed Pochayev Monastery has reduced their number from 140 to 36.)

After part of the group had boarded the bus it drove outside the compound and stopped. Others balked, but finally they, too, walked to the bus.

When all were aboard, the bus drove off, headed for a railroad station and a train presumably bound for northern regions.

NEWS / A fortnightly report of developments in religion

EVALUATION OF THE INCIDENT

Evangelist Billy Graham said the Siberian peasants’ bid for refuge in the U. S. Embassy in Moscow was evidence that the restrictions on freedom of worship in the Soviet Union “are far greater than we are led to believe.”

“It is a tragedy,” Graham observed, “that the United States calls itself a Christian nation and yet seemingly is powerless to help so many millions who suffer loss of freedoms.”

Dr. Oswald C. J. Hoffmann, “Lutheran Hour” radio preacher, said:

“It is strange that the right to asylum should be granted for years to a Hungarian national because of religious persecution but not to Russian nationals appealing for asylum on similar grounds. The American embassy in Moscow owes the American public an explanation which goes beyond the bland statement that it was following a policy of undetermined origin in denying to these Russians a right recognized, and in recent years resolutely asserted, by the U. S. government.”

State Department press officer Lincoln White, asked to differentiate the case of Josef Cardinal Mindzenty, who took refuge in the U. S. delegation in Budapest in 1956 and is still there, replied:

“The United States, while not recognizing the doctrine of political asylum, has, in exceptional cases, granted refuge on humanitarian grounds to an individual in immediate and grave danger.”

White said U. S. missions abroad do not normally grant asylum, and the United States does not recognize the right of foreign missions in the United States to grant asylum.

White quoted a paragraph from the U. S. Foreign Affairs Manual which states that refuge “may be afforded to uninvited fugitives whose lives are in imminent danger from mob violence but only for the period during which active danger continues.” He left the impression that there were no other grounds for refuge.

Dr. Clyde W. Taylor, public affairs secretary of the National Association of Evangelicals, declared:

“It is lamentable that our embassy in Moscow could find no further means of assisting these evangelical Christians. This incident fits into the pattern of events developing in the Soviet Union in recent months. Numerous reports indicate increasing restiveness of Christians in that part of the world because of religious oppression. It is another indication that communism cannot afford a free and open contest of ideas which includes spiritual values.”

Shouts of “Guerra!” (war) rumbled out of Miami’s Orange Bowl stadium as President Kennedy addressed the just-released Cuban prisoners of war and more than 35,000 of their relatives and friends over the New Year’s weekend.

The cry voiced the determination of the survivors of the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion and their fellow refugees from Communist tyranny to return—they hoped soon—as a liberating army to their island homeland just 90 miles away. The whole setting hinted that U. S. involvement would go deeper than the scars of failure from the abortive action of 20 months before.

It was an ominous chant which spelled trouble for the more peaceful work of American churches. Slowly but surely they have been attacking the difficult problems arising out of the fact that more than 200,000 Cubans have piled into Miami in a three-year exodus from Fidel Castro’s lunacy.

Not that the thwarted invaders were any less spiritual than their compatriots. The Rev. Ismael Lugo, Catholic chaplain with the honored Brigade 2506, dedicated the men to God first and their country second in the invocation before President Kennedy spoke. And Juan Cabrera, a Free Will Baptist minister who was a regular soldier in the brigade, reported that worship services were carried on in the prison around a contraband Bible which miraculously appeared in their midst.

Returning prisoners appearing at a testimony meeting at the First Spanish United Presbyterian Church credited their release to answered prayer. And they told of instances of men in the prison finally turning to God.

Yet, for the most part, the prisoners, like their fellow refugees, were not dedicated Christians. Fewer than 50 were evangelicals, and at most 300 were knowledgeable, devout Catholics.

Problems of Resettlement

But the trouble signalled by the war cries stirred by the gallant band of soldiers is expected in resettlement programs stressed by the various church refugee agencies.

It took a year and a half to really launch the resettlement programs. It seemed impossible that the stream of refugees could continue for any length of time, let alone continue to swell. And, at first, many felt Castro’s downfall was imminent. So the Catholic Relief Services agency, the 18 denominations represented in the Protestant Latin American Emergency Committee and working through Church World Service, the Hebrew International Aid Society, and the International Rescue Committee were not set up to do much but offer emergency food, clothing, and medical and housing aid to the Cubans.

The attitude of the refugees themselves was that they could wait right in Miami for their relatives and friends, be on hand to return to their homeland as soon as Castro was overthrown, be among people whose customs and language were the same, and enjoy a climate just like home. They were disinterested in, or afraid of, being resettled in another part of the country where, among other things, their federal aid checks would be cut off.

Nationally, churches were slow to recognize the problem. Locally, churches were reluctant to lose the opportunity for evangelization of the newcomers or to deplete the new Spanish congregations by resettling established members.

But the continued flow of refugees at the rate of 2,000 a week, an increasing problem of unemployment in the city of Miami, and a growing threat of friction with the native population because of it, finally triggered programs for resettling the Cubans in other parts of the country.

Now more than 50,000 Cubans have been resettled, some going to every state except Alaska. A majority of them—30,000—have been resettled through Catholic agencies. Protestants have resettled more than 8,000, Jews nearly 2,000, and the non-denominational International Rescue Committee nearly 12,000.

Resettlement had reached a peak of nearly 1,000 persons a week—as compared with 2,000 refugees a week still pouring into Miami—just before the Cuban missile crisis changed the picture again.

The first effect was the end to twice-a-day commercial plane flights from Havana, which always had full loads of refugees. Some few other refugees still are managing to escape the island. Among the most recent is Dr. Pascual Herrera, director of the Baptist Hospital in Havana, who was forced by the government to stay on the job there. He escaped by boat to join his family, who had been in Miami for more than two years.

The most telling effect of the crisis, however, particularly since the release of the prisoners of war and the renewed talk of invasion, has been an almost complete halt of the resettlement program. Sensing a new hope of returning to their homeland soon, the Cubans are not willing to leave Miami.

Catholics Take the Limelight

The drying up of the pool of refugees willing to be resettled is bringing to the surface some of the frictions between Catholic and Protestant agencies in dealing with the whole problem.

The Catholic Church at first opposed resettlement; it felt it was easier to care for the refugees all from one center and to utilize the more than 100 Spanish-speaking priests and other religious persons who were among the first to be exiled. The large numbers concentrated in the one center also made a more dramatic story to encourage aid.

It was mainly the Catholic Church, along with city officials, that got the federal government interested in aiding the refugees. But Protestants resented the fact that government officials—in the beginning-talked only to local Catholic agancies and set up joint offices with the Catholic refugee center. Francis Cardinal Spellman was photographed handing a $10,000 check to President Eisenhower on the Augusta golf course for surplus food for the Cubans, and it was a front-page picture across the nation. But the same week the Southern Baptist Convention gave a similar amount of money through regular church channels and so got only a couple of lines in local papers.

Since a majority of the Cuban people are nominally Catholic (less than two per cent are Protestants), most of them would have registered for aid with the Catholic agencies anyway. Because of the way in which the government agency was set up at first, however, it was difficult for the Cubans to register with any of the other agencies. This situation was changed with time, and to date 68 per cent of the 150,000 refugees who have registered have registered with the Catholic welfare agency, 8 per cent with Church World Service, 2 per cent with HIAS, and 22 per cent with the International Rescue Committee.

Significantly, while the Catholics have registered nearly 70 per cent of the refugees, they have handled just 60 per cent of those resettled. Protestants have resettled more than 15 per cent, while registering only 8 per cent.

When Church World Service inaugurated the “flights to freedom,” in which planeloads of refugees were resettled in other cities, the Catholics would not make it a joint project and derided the whole idea as impractical publicity-seeking. Now the Catholics have their own “flights to freedom.”

Protestant spokesmen have charged that they could step up their resettlement considerably, but the Catholic agencies are reluctant to let refugees registered with them be resettled through Protestant-sponsored projects. The Protestants themselves have run out of eligible people of their own to resettle. Many of those registered are too old or unskilled to be resettled, or are wives and children who are waiting for husbands and fathers still in Cuba.

Dr. O. G. Grotefend, director of the Protestant Latin American Emergency Committee, emphasized, “We do not attempt to ‘buy’ new church members by assisting them to resettle. But in all honesty, we must admit that a generosity of opinion is generated toward our church by our actions and many of these people are joining Protestant communions. However, this is a result and not a motive of Christian action.”

Hugh McLoone, director of the Catholic refugee center, hotly denied that his agency has ever stood in the way of Church World Service in resettling any Cubans. “We have transferred without question as many as 10 or 12 cases involving 20 or 25 people a day. But many times cases we transferred come back to us after several weeks because they have not been resettled.”

A Successful Program

Despite the friction in the mechanics of resettlement, the resettlement of the Cubans themselves has proved to be highly successful. Both the Cubans and the American communities where they have been relocated are pleased.

Miami’s Protestant churches—particularly the Episcopalians and Methodists—are doing an outstanding job of preparing refugees for resettlement. They are teaching them English (the principal requirement for getting employment) and how to cook American foods, and are giving them medical aid and clothing.

More than half the Cubans aided in this manner are nominal Catholics who heard by word of mouth of the opportunities offered. Some did not know that the Protestant church even existed in their homeland, and others had been told that Protestants were worse than Communists. The Protestant centers do not push religion on the refugees, but they do make it clear that spiritual aid is available and stress that the centers themselves are spiritually motivated.

On the other end, it is the churches in the cities where Cubans are being resettled which are making the programs possible. Members of congregations take complete responsibility for the refugee families. They provide a house and furnishings, a job, friendship, and the promise of continued help until the Cubans become established members of the community.

The resettlement program has so impressed American communities that Grand Rapids, Michigan, for example, has a waiting list of homes who want to take in refugees, even though the Christian Reformed Church already has brought three groups of the Cubans to the city.

So it has been throughout the nation. More than 13,000 refugees have been resettled in New York, nearly 6,000 in New Jersey, nearly 3,000 in California, and more than 2,000 in Illinois. The only bad taste came with an early, poorly organized project in Cleveland which later worked out smoothly through the efforts, mainly, of the Protestant churches of the area.

Meanwhile the Miami churches have been rather successful with their type of local resettlement programs, integrating many of the more than 100,000 remaining refugees into the permanent population. Dozens of churches now have at least one Cuban in a position of leadership.

Nearly 300 Protestant families have provided foster homes for Cuban children separated from their parents. The Miami Diocese of the Catholic Church is aiding five times that number of children with an orphanage-type arrangement at three major centers. The Episcopal refugee center has provided college scholarships to 24 Cuban young people of all denominations, including one youth who will study for the Episcopal priesthood and whose Catholic priest teachers in Cuba told him the Anglican church did not exist in his homeland.

But the major portion of the Cubans still in Miami depend on the church refugee centers mostly for food, clothing, and medical aid to supplement the basic support they receive from the U. S. government—which, incidentally, foots the travel expenses of resettlement.

With the Cuban crisis still with us, 1963 promises to be a year of continued demand upon the chinches to aid and resettle the refugees. The Episcopal church alone has asked its members to contribute not less than $450,000 this year for this work. Baptists are asking their churches in each state to take one month in which they will contribute $10,000 cash plus clothing and food for Cuban relief. Other denominations have budgeted similar amounts for the work.

In addition, Presbyterians, with the aid of the National and Florida Councils of Churches, have prepared a series of radio and television programs to instruct local refugees as to what aid is available, encourage them to relocate, and offer them a spiritual lift. Other programs are designed to prepare other communities across the nation to join in the project and receive Cuban refugees. But the question now is whether the refugees will be willing to be resettled in the light of their hope that an imminent, U. S.-supported invasion will free their homeland so that they can return, many of them to a deeper spiritual life and more vigorous church life than their nation has ever known.

A. T.

LEISURE IN AN EVANGELICAL ATMOSPHERE

The “evangelical market,” associated mostly with literature and insurance, broke new ground last month.

In Miami Beach, a ten-story oceanfront hotel opened its doors to a teetotaler clientele.

In Detroit, a “Christian supper club” promised the best in sanctified entertainment.

Both enterprises use converted facilities. The Miami Beach hotel, the Biltmore Terrace, was purchased by Chicago builder A. Harold Anderson, whose renovation program featured substitution of a citrus juice counter for the liquor bar.

Anderson, a layman of the Evangelical Covenant Church of America, arranged daily chapel services, but seeks to avoid the Bible conference approach. He said the hotel merely caters to those who prefer a non-alcoholic atmosphere, whether they be Christians or not.

Charles Pitts, noted Toronto builder and active Christian layman, is experimenting with a similar hotel venture in Fort Lauderdale.

The Christian restaurant in Detroit was the inspiration of Ed Darling, former leader of that city’s Voice of Christian Youth (Youth for Christ affiliated). It is known as the Crossroads Supper Club. Darling also hoped to begin a breakfast club broadcast for Christian women.

“We have labored all night and taken nothing.” So said some Roman Catholic bishops shortly before the Second Vatican Council suspended its labors until next September, after two months of work during which not one full decree or constitution was adopted. At first blush some may consider this a poor performance for what had been billed as the “best prepared” council in history. Even preparatory work of the past two years will be completely overhauled in the next nine months. The pope has created a control commission which will coordinate activity of the working commissions in the interim.

Only four drafts reached the council floor. These were the liturgical schema, the schema on the sources of revelation, the schema on mass communications, and the project, “On the Church,” which was discussed only briefly and in general.

Of the liturgical draft, the amended preface and the first chapter were voted on. Bishops with the approval of the Holy See may now change many parts of the Mass from Latin into the vernacular. The non-controversial draft on mass communications was quickly approved in principle and sent back for further study.

The schema on the sources of revelation—reportedly a high point of the council from the viewpoint of dramatic debate—was, in effect, rejected by a nearly two-thirds vote. Pope John’s intervention is regarded as a significant turning point. The question has been referred to a special mixed commission which has been enlarged by the addition of a co-chairman and a number of bishops who had been working with the commission for Christian unity. The place of tradition in regard to revelation is at issue.

Despite an apparent slowness of movement, Father Robert A. Graham, Religious News Service special correspondent, considers council developments “positive and encouraging.” He describes the “most important milestone” reached as the “clarification, scope and purpose” of the council. “Debates registered a dominant pastoral orientation of the Council Fathers. This concentration was sanctioned by Pope John in his directive of norms issued in the last days of the first session.”

Graham speaks also of “startling structural changes” witnessed by the church in council. One is the “tacit acceptance of the existence of national hierarchies acting as groups during debates on the liturgy. For instance, many bishops spoke on the need of allowing regional Church leaders to determine for themselves, even if with approval of the Holy See, what applications and modifications need to be made in liturgy conformable to specific needs of their respective peoples and faithful.”

A “most important structural evolution” of which “the record does not speak,” observes Graham further, “is the new relationship between bishops and the Pope. Hitherto, bishops’ contacts with the Holy See have been theoretically with the Pope but actually with the Papal Congregations or the administration of the Roman Curia.… At the Council this has changed, probably for good, as the Fathers now find themselves associated directly with the Pope in great decisions affecting the Church.”

Observers have noted hopefully the ready acceptance of the trans-Alpine prelates and their influence on the council. And the Protestant delegate-observers have been impressed by the fraternal treatment accorded them—as if they were members of sister churches. (No official position, however, has been taken to that effect. It is easier to fail to repeat an action than to revise a dogma.) Roman Catholics have in turn been impressed by the visitors’ “admirable discretion in delicate circumstances strange and unprecedented for all concerned.” The pope is said to have taken the side of liberal forces which wish to stress the affirmative side of matters rather than delivering anathemas. Thus the health of Pope John, who in 1962 became the first religious figure to be designated Time’s “Man of the Year,” could have vital bearing on the council’s future. As recess came, he said: “One year is a long time. I may not be here. If I am not, there certainly will be another Pope.”

Some have asked whether historical differences loom larger than theological, due to the current lack of significant interchanges between Romanism and Greek Orthodoxy, the latter being theologically closer to Rome than Protestantism. The situation is obscure, but ecclesiastical tensions are said probably to be due more to Athens than to Istanbul, Moscow, or Rome.

Protestants have their fingers crossed in regard to the whole field of Mariolatry, including the introduction of St. Joseph into the Mass—the council has not yet acted. And permissible marriage of priests and communion under both kinds are regarded as yet several councils away.

Protestant ecumenists are actually not expecting too much. They sense a danger of rising Catholic expectations that Protestants will return to union with Rome because of friendly treatment.

In the area of public relations, Protestants in general have been rather discouraged by the Roman policy of secrecy in matters of council deliberation. But the cloak has not been sufficient to hide the fact of internal Roman controversy. An eminent Protestant theologian has noted that the generous treatment given the Protestant delegate-observers has rendered it tactless for them to tell the world of “the tremendous contrasts and even hostilities they have observed.” But a Catholic bishop returning home told him of his surprise at the wealth of different opinions, and spoke of a prelate who went to the council with very definite orthodox views but had since changed his mind completely. This Protestant theologian comments that the Roman problems are those troubling churches everywhere: Scripture and tradition, Scripture and Church, inspiration and inerrancy. “The fight between Cardinals Ottaviani and Bea is paralleled by that between the fundamentalist and critical—not ‘modernist’ for modernism was ousted by Pius X—interpretations. ‘Critical and Catholic’: this program of Bishop Gore and the people around Lux Mundi would correspond to the Pontifical Biblical Institute. It will be a tremendous job for the newly-appointed commission to prepare statements which in the fall of 1963 will please all bishops, or at least a substantial majority. It is one of the most crucial years of the history of the Roman Church.”

And if the Roman prelates have grave problems in reaching agreement among themselves in this area, the orthodox Protestant who would like to look hopefully upon the council begins to envision the necessity for a few centuries of councils before agreement could possibly be reached on such great evangelical principles as:

(1) The authority of Scripture alone, which leaves no room for the Roman elevation of church tradition and “the living mind of the Church,” nor for the papacy either.

(2) Christ as sole Mediator, which renders superfluous a system of priestcraft, Mariolatry, and hagiolatry.

(3) Justification by faith alone, which means that while good works have a place in one’s salvation, they have nothing to do with his justification.

The anathemas directed by the Council of Trent at Protestant theology have never been withdrawn.

F. F.

The Brink Of Violence

Police moved in swiftly last month when an “anti-proselytizing” outburst in Jerusalem threatened to get out of hand. The incident occurred at a center operated by the Hebrew Evangelical Society, a Protestant group, in the Mushara section of the Israeli city. The area is densely populated by Orthodox Jewish immigrants, mainly from Morocco.

Trouble arose after Yaacov Goren, director of the center, and an official named Elzam, both converted Jews, had invited neighborhood children to a Chanukah celebration, reportedly without the consent of their parents who were attending a local synagogue.

When the parents emerged from the synagogue and began looking for their children, they found them chanting Chanukah and Christmas songs. Stones were thrown, and one of them struck Goren’s wife, Leah, wounding her slightly. Order was restored when police arrived and took two men into custody. During the ensuing weekend, the mission was placed under strong police protection.

Another minor incident occurred when a man said to be drunk tried to interfere with a Christmas celebration to which about 50 Indian-born Jews had been invited.

In an editorial on the earlier incident, Yediot Aharonot, an evening newspaper, called on the government to put an end to “missionary soul-hunting.” This came after the National Religious Party had made special mention of the missionary society in a strong attack against the “unholy alliance” between missionary groups and other elements opposed to religious reform in the Jewish state.

The Hebrew Evangelical Society, founded in 1931 by Arthur Michelson, has its headquarters in Los Angeles. It was registered in Palestine in 1946. It is not affiliated with the United Christian Council in Israel which represents about 20 major Protestant communities and societies. Dr. Maas Boertien, secretary general of the council, has on several occasions criticized “tactless, aggressive” methods used by certain missionary groups.

Since the establishment of the state of Israel, the Hebrew Evangelical Society has been engaged mainly in distributing clothes and food parcels to new immigrants. Allegations that it engaged in blackmarket operations have been made. One official, Ralph Bong, was deprived some time ago of his temporary residence permit.

In an interview, Goren praised the “correct” attitude of the police after the stone-throwing incident. At the same time, he denied reports that the children who came to the Chanukah party had done so without their parents’ consent.

“Indeed,” he said, “some of the parents attended the party.”

Claiming that the mission center’s relations with the people in the neighborhood were “quite good,” Goren said the “trouble-makers” had come from out-the area. He added that the children’s party was in a “strictly Jewish style” and no attempt was made to mingle Christmas and Chanukah observances.

Goren stressed that he did not mix philanthropic activities with his missionary work. He said that he did not have a congregation in the strict sense of the term and that he belongs to a Baptist church.

The Alternate Course

A Jewish-born Catholic monk, whose petition to claim Jewish nationality under Israel’s Law of Return was rejected, applied last month for the status of permanent resident as a non-Jew.

Father Daniel, 40-year-old Carmelite born of Jewish parents in Poland, applied for an Israeli identity card at Haifa as a first step toward possible application for citizenship by naturalization.

Automatic Israeli citizenship is granted Jews under the 1950 Law of Return. The high court, in a 4–1 decision, ruled that the law does not apply to Jews who abandon Judaism for another religion. However, the court said, it does apply to Jews who profess atheism.

A government official indicated that Father Daniel’s application for resident status would be granted. He would be registered as Catholic by religion, but the nationality section in his identity card would be left blank, the official said.

Father Daniel, who was born Oswald Shumel Refeisen and who came to the Haifa Carmelite monastery three years ago from Poland, had petitioned the court to grant him citizenship on the basis of his being Jewish in the national, rather than the religious, sense.

There was widespread press controversy over the court’s rejection of his petition, with some publications siding with Judge Haime Cohen, the lone dissenter in the majority ruling. Judge Cohen had upheld Father Daniel’s claim, stating that Jewish nationality should be defined without regard to religion.

A guiding principle on Jewish identity was given by the Cabinet to the Interior Minister on July 20, 1958. It stated: “One who in good faith declares himself to be a Jew and is not a member of another religion shall be registered as a Jew.”

Cohen, in dissenting, held that the Cabinet had exceeded its authority in including in its definition the phrase “and is not a member of another religion.” He said: “If the Legislature wished to restrict the compass of the law to Jews who are not members of another religion … it could and should explicitly have said so. Since it has not said so, the law must be interpreted and implemented literally, in a manner that does not inform the term Jew with any religious content or attach to it any religious reservations.”

The majority opinion, on the other hand, declared that “a Jew who has gone over to another religion has excluded himself not only from the Jewish religion but also from the Jewish nation and has no place in the community of Israel. In the mind of the Jewish people, a Jew and a Christian cannot dwell within one person.”

The Park At Katerini

In the picturesque Aegean seaport of Katerini, the Greek Evangelical Church is appealing to the courts an order for seizure of a park which has been the basis of a long-standing dispute. To the 600 families which make up the evangelical community in that town of approximately 30,000, the park is an all-important symbol of their religious freedom. The evangelicals have indicated several times that they will fight to protect their claim to ownership. Latest incident last fall saw evangelical women and children swarm into the park to challenge armed police carrying out the seizure order. The women subsequently set up a round-the-clock vigil to thwart any further seizure attempts. Tents were erected to protect them from the rain. Authorities held up the seizure attempt pending a court decision expected March 5.

Meanwhile, a furious attack against the persecution was undertaken by the only two local newspapers, both published by evangelicals. Their opponents, lacking a medium for rebuttal, decided to publish a newspaper of their own at the biblical city of Thessalonica, some 65 miles to the north. Returning to Katerini late one night with a cargo of opposition newspapers, Constantine Papatheodorou, editor-publisher, was burned to death with two companions following a highway accident.

“This misfortune deeply grieved the evangelical people here,” said the Rev. Athanasios Elias, acting pastor of the Greek Evangelical Church. “They have learned to pray for their enemies and have never missed the opportunity to offer help to those who persecute them.”

A leading state official, a Greek Orthodox, was not as kind:

“The Lord looked upon their injustice and burned them alive.”

Relief In Spain

The Spanish Embassy in Washington advised the National Association of Evangelicals last month that steps have been taken to relieve the situation which led to the court martial last year of a Protestant soldier, Jose Cabrera Romero, for failure to kneel during a Roman Catholic mass he was obligated to attend as part of his military duty.

Missionary News Service reported that in reply to an inquiry, Alonzo Alvarez de Toledo, secretary of the embassy, said:

“While pertinent legislation is being studied, the Spanish government, desirous of avoiding further inconveniences to non-Catholic soldiers, has directed that in the future non-Catholic soldiers will be excluded from duty involving ceremonies of the Catholic faith. Furthermore, a new wording of the pledge of allegiance to the flag has been drafted that will not offend the religious beliefs of non-Catholics.”

“Although these measures have not yet been enacted as law,” the secretary added, “they have already been put into practice.”

Meanwhile, a report made public in Madrid by the International Commission of Jurists said that the Roman Catholic Church in Spain enjoys freedom of expression and association, but that other religions have only a limited freedom of worship.

The report declared that while the Catholic Church has a “strong position,” this is exceptional, since any general exercise of the freedom it possesses “has for years been rendered impossible” by legislation under the Franco regime.

Charges in the 153-page report, entitled “Spain and the Rule of Law,” were promptly denied by the Spanish government. A dispatch from Madrid said the government branded it as “another useless bomb in the anti-Spanish campaign,” while Minister of Information Manuel Fraga Iribarne said it was “plagued” with errors.

The International Commission of Jurists is a non-governmental, non-political organization holding consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations. It is supported by some 40,000 lawyers and judges in about 90 countries.

The Catholicity of the Spanish state and the position it bestows on the Catholic Church “inevitably weaken constitutional guarantees of religious freedom,” the commission’s report declared.

“Something even more open to criticism,” it said, “is that freedom of conscience, meaning that none shall be molested on account of his religious beliefs, is not firmly respected.”

The report said ample evidence of the Catholic Church’s strong position was provided by its criticism of the state’s social policy, and the support given by Catholic organizations to the strike staged by the Asturian miners last April.

“The Church,” it said, “did not even hesitate to postulate the act of striking, under certain circumstances, as one of the rights of workers, even though legislation for the protection of the state has equated a strike with a military rebellion.”

“The Church’s intervention in social policy discussions,” the report went on to note, “is based on the encyclical, Mater et Magistra. This encyclical, which met with an enormous response in Spain, enables the Church to claim undisturbed propaganda of Catholic social doctrine as part of its apostolate, the free exercise of which was guaranteed by Article 34 of the concordat (between Spain and the Vatican).”

It comes as a shock to a minister to learn that a pulpit committee has overlooked his dedicated endowments and rejected him, considering him to have a negative personality. Church leaders recognize that an unattractive personality hurts a cause, and they dislike to recommend to any field a man who has neither a balance of good traits nor a graciousness of spirit. They seem to know that the personality and the preacher are not separable identities, that the man rises or falls, emerges to new heights or sinks to levels far beneath his capacity, because of the enhancement or the neglect of his identifying qualities. And it brings one up with a start to realize that his worth to his Lord is measured by the factors in his makeup.

So many aids to pastors fix attention on sermon preparation, administration, or program development that we are tempted to overlook the factor which often makes or breaks a minister—the effective use and enhancement of his personality. Until recently even divinity schools have failed to realize that an unconsidered and undeveloped personality may militate against all that they have sought to develop in their students. Today, in the midst of terrific competition for the minds, bodies, and souls of people, serious attention should be given to the person and the presence of the minister. For the man of God, it may be a time for soul culture—a big, personal landscaping operation.

“You either have it or you don’t!” is far too simple an appraisal of the personality. “Either a preacher’s got it, or he hasn’t” fails to consider that many ministers are not only making the most of what they have, but are zealously building personalities which enrich the trust given to them. Beecher admonished the young man with ministerial aspirations that the vision of “P.C.” which he claimed to have seen in the sky may have meant “Plow corn,” rather than “Preach Christ,” but plowing corn might be the foundation upon which to build a distinguished ministry. Memorable, enduring personalities are made.

Prima donnas exist, those who fulfill every whim of the congregation—that is, for a time—but these have no lasting place in the ministry. We are not pleading that the church raise up a breed of these. But men with marked identifying traits, whose gracious manners match their devotional life, whose bearing and presence bring dignity and honor to any occasion, whose physical appearance and strength of being bring confidence and hope—these are the need of the churches today.

Developing Desirable Traits

The theme of this article, however, is here: this inestimable, important characteristic in a minister—a balanced, attractive personality that appeals to, and impresses others—can be developed. If it is true that “life is a landscaping job,” then a minister’s life is a total of qualities that have been carved out of rugged and often unyielding terrain. The difficulty lies in the fact that no one seems to tell the preacher so. No institution attempts to provide the pastor with a training-school for this important phase of life.

The pastor steps into his field with high hopes, only to stumble upon such distressing appraisals as, “Oh, if he’d only have his clothes pressed,” or “Where was he brought up? His conduct is so crude,” or “People quit coming to hear him; his pulpit manners are atrocious,” or “He expects us to send for him when his bedside presence is obnoxious.” How many have been offended for whom Christ died!

It is dead wrong to conceive that personality traits cannot be improved on the part of those who have been long in the ministry. Perhaps it is a little more difficult to alter those ingrained traits which distress a congregation. Even here, however, one can be made a new creature in Christ Jesus. It is true that some of the brethren come from such crude backgrounds that they have considerably more improving to do, but there are often qualities so precious that the greater effort to uncover them is rewarding.

Members of a congregation often pause before calling attention to a minister’s fault because of his sensitivity. One obvious reason why personality limitations are not brought to the attention of the pastor is the member’s fear that the minister will think the person to be “against the program.” Furthermore, too often the pastor will shut off all channels for personal improvement by little but quite vicious defense mechanisms. These only penalize those who are near to him and who would seek to befriend him by a suggestion. He becomes “conditioned” to his unhappy patterns of action and behavior, and woe be to the one who would help him.

How fortunate is that man of God who comes from a background that is steeped in good manners! Such homes, where gentle ways are expected and practiced, make their basic contribution to the Kingdom of God. But since so many of the brethren, as is expected, come from backgrounds which are unacquainted with the qualities essential to a minister’s effectiveness, the average pastor has a lot of soul-sculpturing to do. And since these unfortunate traits are unrecognized by the man himself, indeed are often held to tenaciously, their uprooting is difficult at the least.

“He’ll always be crude, because he won’t put forth the effort to replace his graceless, tactless ways with manners which mark a gentleman,” was said with such finality that a pulpit committee went to the next name. Pathetically enough, here was a man who might have given to that field a magnificent service. And just as pathetic was the fact that nowhere along the line of the man’s training was he taught the laborious task of substituting gentle virtues for crude ones. It is as though those influences which build men for the ministry had conspired to withhold the disciplines and corrective measures which might have made brilliant a diamond from the rough.

Said one of the most prominent ministers of this generation, “It seems that I make the same grammatical errors my mother made before me, and, believe it or not, down the years of my preparation no one, or no class work, either pointed these out or impressed upon me the importance of their correction. And what pains me is that my entire ministry has been adversely affected.”

Many people—for whom Christ also died—simply do not like and will not tolerate a crude minister. Tragically enough, the minister who gives every evidence of poor breeding can’t interpret his own plight. Moreover, he interprets his rejection as something far remote from anything displeasing in his nature.

If only a fraction of the time that a theological student spent on his Greek or his mathematics could have been given to structuring his personality, so much of what now offends congregations would have been eliminated.

As a result, if a preacher is to learn the more beautiful and attractive qualities which will enhance his ministry, he must do it the hard way: wrest it out by himself. By God’s help, and through ruthless searching, this tool of the spirit may be made more worthy. Where, then, are the areas of the personality which may be in need of landscaping?

A List of Virtues

Pulpit Manners. How often should one be told by his instructors in speech that a minister should keep his feet on the floor! Fidgeting and wiggling are inexcusable. The gestures should be deliberate, measured, and eloquent. In the pulpit—as everywhere—the minister should be a gentleman.

Speech. The minister must deliberately take himself in hand and weed offensiveness from his conversation and public speech. The task is not an easy one.

Appearance. People like to be proud of their pastor. They will not tolerate an inexcusable appearance for long.

Bedside Manner. A gracious, well-mannered call will be a blessing to the sick. The fitting, cheerful word will be in order, and brevity will be the rule.

Conversation. If there is one thing psychology may teach the minister in human relationships, it is to let the other person do the talking. There is enormous skill in drawing the other person out, that he may be at his best in expression.

Emotions. There are some who wear their emotions on their sleeves. Let us learn the beauty to be found in restraint.

Friendliness. If all these personality hallmarks demand discipline, certainly this one does: the art of being friendly. It is a beautiful trait.

Mood. “Be of good cheer!” is the theme of the Gospels. The negative mood, with its attendant attitude, can be a devastating influence upon a whole congregation.

Snobbery. Of all of the personality characteristics attributable to certain ministers, this one is most difficult to whip.

These are some of the negative characteristics which have unbecomingly clung to ministers. They have not only hurt the man but the cause he represents. Unfortunately, their opposites are not learned in the divinity school. They have to be wrought out on the hard anvil of experience. It is, however, a part of soul cultivation and a place where the man of God may set the example for his flock and for his fellows. F. B. MCALLISTER Cincinnati, Ohio (Retired Baptist pastor)

Only a few years ago the words ecumenical and ecumenism meant nothing to the average laymen. They were just so much Greek, in the real sense of the word.

But now we are confronted with these words in sermons, in literature, and in church courts. It is therefore important to know what they mean, what they imply, and how they are used today.

Ecumenical means worldwide or universal, and, in relation to the Church, implies the oneness of Christians in the faith and all which flows therefrom.

Ecumenicity is not a religion. Rather it is a fruit or manifestation of Christianity. It is a spiritual reality separate and distinct from organizations or the manipulations of men. It is Christian unity which crosses all social, racial, denominational, or national barriers.

All of this being true, why are there those in the Church who have real misgivings about what is now known as the “ecumenical movement”? If true ecumenicity has existed since the beginning of the Christian church, should it not be fostered?

In order to clarify the matter it is necessary to define terms. I believe that the ecumenical movement is something separate from ecumenicity, just as the “fundamentalist movement” is separate from historic evangelical Christianity, or fundamentalism.

The ecumenical movement, as it now exists, is a relatively new phenomenon. With the Reformation there came into being a number of denominations, most of them established by men convinced of the importance of some particular doctrine or teaching of Scripture. The force was centrifugal—away from centralization—often independent, and sometimes divisive in effect.

However, in recent years the pervading force has been centripetal, towards cooperation, union, and unified action.

Unquestionably the pendulum of divisions swung too far, although there is too much evidence of the blessings of God on separate denominational activities for us to deplore the major divisions.

Nevertheless, a movement designed to draw Christians closer together and to present a more united front to the world should be questioned only where there is evidence that it is a movement implying more than appears on the surface.

There are two basic questions; these require clear answers. The first of these is whether the ecumenical movement sacrifices essential Christian doctrines on the altar of expedience, for the sake of organizational unity. The second has to do with the leadership of the movement.

From the standpoint of Christian doctrine the ecumenical movement refuses to make doctrinal deliverances, insisting these are the province of the constituent groups. The approved doctrinal statement of the World Council, interpreted at its highest level, still leaves room for dangerous heresies and has inexcusable omissions. For the sake of an outward facade of unity this movement has shown a lamentable willingness to emphasize organizational structure and a united witness, without a corresponding spiritual unity or a definition of what the content of the Christian faith really is.

Despite their weaknesses, the fact remains that the convictions characteristic of early denominational leadership, and loyalty to those convictions, are not in any impressive measure a characteristic of many who lead the ecumenical movement. A great number of these men are professional churchmen who apparently look with complacency on those who frankly question or reject the clear statements and doctrines taught in the Scriptures.

Considering itself as riding the wave of the future, the ecumenical movement seems oblivious to the fact that doctrinal laxity may dash it on the rocks of God’s judgment.

But there is a true ecumenicity (distinguished from the ecumenical movement, as such, and the spirit of ecumenicity abroad in the world) which began in the early Church, has continued throughout the centuries, and is growing today.

This ecumenicity is spiritual in nature, catholic in faith and practice. It is that unity of the spirit which springs eternal in the hearts of those who know and love the Lord Jesus Christ, a faith which unites believers even when they are separated by man-made barriers or secondary considerations.

These ecumenicals are, many of them, working loyally within denominational bounds. Others work in smaller, often interdenominational or non-denominational groups. These look for and accept Christian faith wherever it is found. They rejoice in the truth and are anxious to share in a witness to the saving power and work of Christ.

Strange to say—and possibly it is very revealing—the ecumenical movement often seems to deny its own nature in its attitude toward these true ecumenicals. We know of many instances where some in the ecumenical movement have been very unecumenical in attitude and action to those who for conscience’s sake have remained outside the orbit of the movement’s influence and ecclesiastical power.

Like the “fundamentalist movement,” which is far removed from true fundamentalism, the ecumenical movement is far removed from—and actually often hostile to—true ecumenicals.

The “fundamentalist movement” is distinguished from historic evangelical Christianity by its lack of Christian love. Contending for the faith becomes contentiousness, even to the point of impatience, unkindness, jealousy, boastfulness, arrogance, rudeness, irritability, resentfulness, rejoicing in wrong, tale-bearing, and believing, distorting, and passing on everything evil about a Christian brother. Some seem in danger of pulling up wheat in their zeal to destroy the tares.

The true ecumenical is at the same time a true fundamentalist. Loyal to his church, he believes that her mission is spiritual and her message of vital importance. For that reason he is far more concerned about the content of the Christian faith than about the organizational structure of the Church. So long as organization does not affect the message, he will go along with the organization. But when the content of the message is made secondary, he looks with genuine distrust on those who make it so.

We believe there is a true and straight road which the Christian should walk, one on which he rejects some trends of the ecumenical movement and also of the fundamentalist movement while at the same time bearing a clear testimony to the fact that the Gospel of Jesus Christ has changed his own life and is capable of changing the lives of all who will believe.

This walk must be dominated by a sound faith, clear convictions, and Christian love with humility.

We believe that the future of the great Church Universal rests in the hands of those who so walk.

Today many newly constructed houses of worship are reaching skyward, and many pastors and church officers are realizing the rewards as well as the trials of building programs. That these programs will exert a great influence on American church life goes without saying. The momentum a church generates by successfully completing a new edifice often can be felt for several years, and many pastors look forward to leading a congregation in building new or enlarged facilities.

It is natural for both pastor and people to want a breather after the strain of a building program, and to take their ease in Zion, as it were, by rejoicing and luxuriating in their achievements. Religion, however, is far more than physical facilities. The main task of the Christian church is not to erect impressive structures that bear glorious but mute testimony to the call of Christ to service and sacrifice. Unless a congregation’s qualities and attributes are of more than material significance, its new building will become but an empty shell that once housed a living organism of spiritual strength.

That religion is more than a building is apparent if we realize that without a congregation’s loyalty to God, a church building is but a mockery and a sham. The Old Testament records the story of the Tower of Babel, a structure that was intended to draw men heavenward to God, but which was, in fact, a useless idol. We read, too, of another building that was fashioned according to the commandment and will of God. On its day of dedication by King Solomon, God said concerning the Temple on Mount Zion, “… I have hallowed this house, which thou hast built, to put my name there forever.… And if thou wilt walk before me … in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, … then I will establish the throne of thy kingdom upon Israel forever.… But if ye shall at all turn from following me … [and] go and serve other gods, and worship them: then will I cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I have hallowed for my name, will I cast out of my sight …” (1 Kings 9:3 ff.).

Unfortunately, in his old age King Solomon’s heart was “turned away … after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God.” Thus the king’s idolatry became the seed of Israel’s destruction.

Each day the church of Christ faces the same danger. Will its program and mission be centered in undivided allegiance to God, and in confidence of his blessing? Or will the church place its expectation in its own handiwork, thus belying the hopes and glorious vision that first inspired believers to sacrifice for the erection of a beautiful structure? Will the church praise God primarily by the beauty of its buildings, or by the purity and loyalty of its members?

A minister in the Church of England has analyzed the temptation that often confronts churches in Europe whose lavish structures have become a financial burden. Writing for the World Council of Churches, Frank C. Bennett describes the problem as follows: “We remain obsessed with our heritage of apparatus and buildings. Thus the Church now finds itself like some indigent nobleman who must make a show of preserving the family mansion and retainers, lest he should seem to have become less noble. This becomes his life work; it absorbs him. So the Church is under temptation to be absorbed in maintaining itself and to compromise the Gospel in order to entice those who will have none of the Gospel but have the money. Not the preaching of Christ crucified is presented as the objective, but something entitled ‘spiritual reconstruction,’ ‘spiritual values’ or whatever it may be.… For in such circumstances the Church has to choose between a measure of prosperity and the life which can only come by death and resurrection. The latter is the choice of faith” (The Church’s Witness to God’s Design, p. 68).

Congregations that anticipate years of usefulness from their new buildings must choose loyalty to Christ as the proper inspiration for their people and for their program.

Further, that a building without purity of life is a lie and a deception is seen in the tragic history of the prophet Jeremiah, who lived in the last hectic days before Judah’s captivity. All the signs of the times should have warned the people of impending disaster and judgment. Instead of returning to God, however, and confessing their sins as Jeremiah exhorted them, the people simply responded by pointing to the Temple in their midst. In this context Jeremiah’s words ring out: “Trust ye not in lying words, saying, The temple of the Lord, The temple of the Lord, The temple of the Lord, are these. For if ye thoroughly amend your ways, … then will I cause you to dwell in this place.… Will ye steal, murder, and commit adultery … and come stand before me in this house …? Is this house which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes?… But go ye now unto … Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel” (Jer. 7:4 ff.).

An imposing and beautiful building, a full program of church activities, and a highly organized ecclesiastical machine are no substitute for personal commitment. Even the arduous labor or final satisfaction of completing a new church building is no reason to overlook the basic requirement of Christian discipleship. Do we who call Christ Lord and in his name build beautiful edifices really do what he commands?

As recorded in the book of Acts the first miracle performed by Peter and John took place at the gate of Herod’s temple against a dazzling display of elaborate furnishings and services. There the apostles found a lame man begging for alms, and with Christlike concern turned their attention from the splendor of the surroundings to the needs of a lowly individual.

As a church erects walls, its members ought to know what they are “walling in or walling out,” as Robert Frost would say. Scores of men and women outside the church long to know peace, assurance, and faith. A congregation must choose between making its church building merely a shelter from the storms of life or a base from which to minister to needy and hungry men.

Long ago at a strategic time in British history John Milton reminded his countrymen that “much remains to conquer still.” Similarly even after church construction is completed, “much remains to conquer still”—in allegiance to Christ, in obedience to his commandments, and in service for his name’s sake.—The Rev. KENNETH E. WILLIAMS, Minister, Ashbourne Presbyterian Church, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania.

For Toastmasters

This is the banquet season. A former college admissions officer admitted to me that it was unnecessary for him to have anything home on the range from January till March. Sometimes he attended two dinners and a banquet in one evening.

Since dumping the farm surpluss abroad might dislocate world markets, there seems to be only one remaining disposition of the excess: the expanding frontiers of the American waistlands. The motto at banquets, dinners, luncheons, brunches, and potlucks is: Spread America First with Seconds. Hearty trenchermen aim to reverse the myth of the vanishing American.

A dedicated band of gastronauts fearlessly leads this attack on inner space. Automation has not yet reached the toastmaster. He must get up alone when the chops are down. He must be unfloppable. His jokes may be duds; he may forget the name of the speaker, and plant his elbow in his cottage cheese salad. But how does he respond? In just this situation a missile engineer made a quick sketch in his pocket memo and announced, “I’ve got the picture now. It’s called, ‘The missileman on his pad—after launch.’ ”

When you are asked to serve as master of ceremonies for the Men’s Fellowship banquet, remember that you stand in a long tradition. Toastmaster-General M. C. Megabohr tells us, in an intriguing study of “The Emcee Beecee,” that Samson’s riddles reveal an emcee craft that was centuries old when the Israelite judge first attended a Philistine banquet. Who could count the dinners that have been seasoned with the wit of Solomon’s aphorisms?

If you lack Solomon’s wisdom and Samson’s wit, don’t despair. Announce seconds on pie à la mode. If all else fails, turn to paper-folding. Have the guests make missiles from the banquet programs. Award first prize to the one whose programmed guidance system first lands on target in the speaker’s water glass.

Or announce a buzz session. In a four-minute conference each table must choose a speaker to present his favorite quotation. (If only stock-market quotations are offered, announce a prize for the best-dressed olive.)

Is there a chance that the organization of the Ecclesiastical American Toastmasters could lead the way to second thoughts about banquets as well as second helpings? Jesus attended many dinners, often to the disgust of his critics, but his after-dinner remarks were anything but traditional. Suppose we remembered what he said, not only about seating arrangements, but about inviting the hungry and the wicked (Luke 14:1–24; 15:1, 2, 22–32)? If our banquets were patterned more on heaven’s, they would cease to be boring.

Disputed Generalization

I am interested in the assertion (Editorial, Dec. 7 issue) that there was a time when the American people quite generally knew what was right and what was wrong. Could you give me a specific date for that?

My area of concentration in graduate school was British and American history, so I am very eager to learn just when that situation prevailed. In the most religious section of the country, the South, Negro slavery was quite generally considered right and worth fighting for, and thousands of ministers were proving it from the Bible.…

And if there was such a time, do you mean to imply that men lived up to what they knew was right?

Pardon me if for some reason there comes to mind a quotation from Flaubert: “Our ignorance of history causes us to slander the present.”

Los Angeles, Calif.

• We hope the editorial on page 26 of the January 4 issue cast light on the question.—ED.

Joy In The Bleachers

In reading … “Plastic Gods and Robot Men” (Editorial, Dec. 7 issue) one can only say that of all the many writings and sermons one has ever heard and read from all the sects in Christendom [the editorial] is the most prophetic utterance of all times.

Philadelphia, Pa.

I wish this editorial could be read by every citizen of our entire country. A Christian cannot but fully agree.… The god of pleasure and sport seems to dominate our entire land. An hour of formal worship is painfully spent in the house of God, while four and even more hours are joyfully spent on the bleachers of the athletic stadium—even up till midnight.…

Minneapolis, Minn.

Ecumenical Fellowship

“Joseph … a fruitful bough … whose branches run over the wall” (Gen. 49:22).

The division walls of our Protestant denominations, built by their founders, were … so tall that members on each side … could not view the beauty and symmetry, nor smell the fragrance of each other’s garden. Secluded from one another they became so nearsighted, or narrowminded, that some hyperdenomi-nationalists nurtured the belief that the sun of righteousness shone only on their particular garden, while dark clouds of ignorance covered the neighbor-gardens of faith.

Communications media have contributed to tearing down of denominational barriers as the pollen from the tree of knowledge has blown freely and the fruit from the tree of life been shared in interdenominational fellowship. Crusades, such as those held by the Billy Graham Team, have nurtured this fellowship between Christians of all evangelical faiths.

Emerging from seclusion we have begun to see not only the good of other denominations but also our own defects in clearer light.

The theological wall of Calvinism vs. Arminianism, for centuries … an invisible “iron curtain” of ill will between Christians, is now beginning to crumble. Theologians today are more and more unified in the concept that God’s sovereign will is not limited by man’s free will to accomplish His purpose, neither is God’s sovereign will responsible for the fate of man’s disobedience in his free will.…

Differences of temperaments amongst Christians tend toward separation and is also one contributory cause of the rise of denominations.… Casting out our evangelism net “on the right side” of our boat, in obedience to the Lord’s command, will give us the kind of fish destined to be ours in our particular church. Specialists for reaching different social strata of unsaved mankind are necessary in the King’s business.…

If that tasty fruit of the Spirit called “longsuffering, gentleness, … meekness” could be grown on a denominational branch so high that it would reach over the wall into other groups of denominational faiths we should see the miracle of a Christian “common market” with a spiritual prosperity in our Protestant communities never seen before.…

A warmer climate of mutual understanding has come to the Christian church on the interdenominational level in these latter days. Now is the time to cultivate that vine on which the fruit of God’s Spirit grows. May it grow so high and extend its branches so wide that it reaches the other side of the wall where “goodness” can be shared with men of every true evangelical faith, while the fruit of “faithfulness” be not neglected on the inside.

Our common Saviour, Lord and Chief Shepherd of “one fold,” is “the true vine” who is planted on each side of the denominational wall. If or when that wall crumbles into dust, this vine still stands, but not as a wall of division but as “the tree of life” who gives us all life, “in whom we live and have our being.” Let this divine Denominator become the Solver of all our interdenominational problems, the Crucified One who when “lifted up” will draw “all men” to himself into the mystic union of true ecumenical fellowship.

The Evangelical Alliance Mission

Brooklyn, N. Y.

The First Amendment

Could you not use the following from Christian Economics, October 30, 1962, titled “Free Exercise of Religion”: “The First Amendment reads: ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.’

“Congress has made no such law, and there was nothing on that subject on which the Supreme Court could properly rule.

“The Supreme Court ruling against the saying of a simple, non-sectarian prayer in the schools of New York was an act ‘prohibiting the free exercise (of religion)’ and is therefore a flagrant violation of the Constitution.

“The New York teachers and the pupils had not violated the Constitution in saying the prayer, but the Supreme Court in ruling that they had no right to do so did flagrantly violate that great document which it is their supreme duty to uphold.”

Thank God there is the Supreme Judge to judge and reward the judges!

Pittsburgh, Pa.

Note For Divinity Halls

“Can We Weather the Storm” (Editorial, Nov. 23 issue) is the most forthright that I have seen. I would comment that the use of terms of the theological school weakens it for both ministers and laymen. Such terms do not register dynamically.

Emeritus Professor, History of Religion

Drew University

Madison, N.J.

Report From The Echo Canyon

Strange, but I hear the same echo from opposite directions. “Why did not the World Council speak out forthrightly against Russia’s offensive buildup in Cuba?” (Editorial, Nov. 23 issue). “If the World Council expects its judgments to be taken seriously, it should deal as sternly with Soviet duplicity as it has with an American response to such duplicity” (The Christian Century, Nov. 14, p. 1377).

Assembly of God

Grafton, Ill.

A Flag Of Green

I am writing concerning the use of professional fund raisers by our churches. I have been a minister for more than 17 years; in that time I have seen three charges come out of dire financial straits into positions of financial strength. I … have seen my own denomination go through three great attempts to raise million-dollar funds. I know something about the matter of fund-raising.

There is no doubt about it, the professional who knows his business can come into a congregation and raise huge funds. Only rarely can the local pastor match his efforts.…

Money is certainly needed—but sheer money, the funds, the budget, the bookkeeping, such things must always be kept in their rightful places. Ours is a greater task. Yet the concepts of … money-raising are built around the central idea that money is our goal.… The professional’s sole emphasis is that of raising money; he has no other purpose.…

Even the services of divine worship must be geared to the professional’s methods. While he is present, everything about the church is branded with a dollar sign.

First, membership lists are made up—grouped according to income! Leaders are chosen for their ability to lead others into giving.… We do not actually replace the cross upon the altar, but honesty might suggest a flag of green, waving over a pile of silver. Thirty pieces would be about right!

… Sermons are preached on the joys of giving, and literature is passed out at the door. Laymen speak on the blessings of tithing, as if tithing would settle every financial problem. The pastor finds his flock boasting of pledges made, or … received.… Progress charts are posted on the walls. The Almighty Dollar reigns supreme!

… Techniques … demand the choosing of the more wealthy members as committee chairmen.… Soon we are duped into promoting the idea that the greatest in the Kingdom … are those whose possessions are great. The widow of 2,000 years ago, with only two mites to give, could have no part in our campaign. But then—Jesus Christ might not fit very well into the pattern of our ministry, either.

Now, I must admit that the church needs money. Our program would die without it. But money is a means, not the final end of our program. We raise funds in order to serve; we do not serve our fellow man that we might have an excuse for raising funds! In the words of an old poem, there are “ways and ways, and a Way,” but when we choose the professional, we have chosen the wrong way. In the words of a preacher much greater than I, “you cannot serve God and mammon.”

The Methodist Church

Hillsdale, Ill.

At Nicaea, No Mystery?

If by “soft on trinitarianism” (Editorial, Nov. 23 issue) you mean we Southern Baptists don’t harp on that time-worn cliché “God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost,” then the answer is a resounding yes! But if you mean we don’t believe in the Trinity, then the answer is a resounding no! It’s just that we prefer the biblical mystery rather than the Council of Nicaea’s “elucidation” (?).…

I believe that God, the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are one, yet with distinct personalities and manifestations. How? I don’t know. It’s a mystery which I can’t explain and won’t try to, but even though it is a mystery, I’d rather accept it by faith than abandon my intellectual integrity and deny it.

Columbus, Ohio

Room For The Needy

“Go Away!” (A Layman and his Faith, Dec. 7 issue) vividly describes the true situation of the whole society of the world today. If Christendom begins right here as you mentioned in your article to give room to those needy ones, Communism would not be a problem to us.…

Chinese Executive Secretary

The Reformation Translation Fellowship

Los Angeles, Calif.

In Windows, Use Caution

What is the significance of the use of the name of “Eutychus” in the heading of your section giving excerpts from letters?

Until I learn, I shall continue to wonder if your said use of the name … indicates that you think that the writers of the letters need to be awakened lest they be harmed by their attitudes.

Long Beach, Calif.

• The title “Eutychus and His Kin” is employed for letters to the Editor because Eutychus is an apostolic symbol for one made drowsy under the long exhortation of others, or providentially awakened to new opportunities. Except in the case of Eutychus, whose identity is already established (cf. Acts 20:9), communications must be accompanied by the name and address of the writer.—ED.

Glad Reunion

I have been without CHRISTIANITY TODAY for over a year and have greatly missed it. I have found myself especially lonely for your news and book review sections. In fact, I feel I have been a less informed, less adequately prepared pastor for not having had your excellent evangelical journal on hand.

First Baptist

Grand Marias, Minn.

Things are better now that your magazine is on the scene, but I still pray for a periodical which is broader in outlook. There are evangelical scholars who are trying to wrestle with new ideas.…

Seattle Pacific College

Seattle, Wash.

I am going to be moving to San Jose, Costa Rica, the latter part of December where I will be engaged in the work of the Oriental Missionary Society.…

I subscribed to your magazine while in seminary and the pastorate and I feel that some of its articles and missionary emphasis have helped lead us to the foreign field.…

The Oriental Missionary Society

Los Angeles, Calif.

Straw In A Hurricane

Your editorial “Hope in a ‘Post-Christian’ Era” (Aug. 3 issue) set me thinking.… The Christian Church is supposed to be a fellowship of believers. But most of us know that it is also a fellowship of status seekers, custom followers, and unenlightened, confused sheep.…

The number of believers in the church whose lives have been radically changed by the acceptance of Christ and who walk daily in his presence must be shockingly and heartbreakingly small. They will be a straw in the hurricane of secularism and materialism. They will be laughed at, ridiculed and constantly persecuted.…

But why should we be so surprised? The Bible says, “For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” Many are called but few are chosen. Christian belief, then, along with the joy it brings, often brings pain, too.…

Leesville, S.C.

To Say Howdy

I am a theologian, a member of the Anglican church.… I am a “shut-in” so most of my work is done by letter or (now it’s easier) by tape recording.

I would like to have as many correspondents as would be kind enough to write me or as many tapespondents as would like to reciprocatingly exchange views by this exciting new medium. I have a CSR 1 and take spools up to 7” (3¾ and 7½ speeds). I am a Jewish convert to Christianity and so if you … know of any other converts who would like to say howdy, I’d be grateful.…

Wellington, New Zealand

• Mr. Rodman’s address: 67 Pirie St., Wellington C.4., New Zealand.—ED.

No Time For Its Giver

And it came to pass that a certain man appeared before the Lord of Life and said, “I come from mankind, who are Thy creatures, Thy servants, and Thy children, to present this request: Thy law states that we shall labor six days, but that the seventh day shall be set apart for rest and for communion with Thee. But, O Lord, life has changed radically down on earth. When life was simple and the pace was slow, the law of the seventh day was indeed a fair law. But now we find a whole day for rest and communion with Thee too much.”

Now the Lord of Life was gracious and said, “I would not have my laws be an unnecessary burden to mankind. Would you be willing to set aside one hour a week?”

The representative of mankind was elated. “That’s more like it! One hour a week we shall gladly give Thee.”

But, lo, before the moon had waxed and waned, man was back again, and said, “O Lord of Life, we find that our lives are busier than we dreamed. One hour a week for rest and communion with Thee is too much. It is a burden.”

And the Lord of Life said, “I would not burden those I love. Would you be willing to set aside five minutes a week?”

Man cried out, “Five minutes! There is no one who cannot honor Thee with five minutes a week!” And with great rejoicing, man returned to tell his fellows of the great concession he had won.

But, behold, before the silver sickle of the moon had become a golden disk, man was back again, and said, “O Lord of Life, we find that even five minutes a week in our busy time is a long time, far more than we can spare for communion with Thee for spiritual rest.”

And the Lord of Life replied, “I see your predicament clearly. You want all time for yourself. Then, perhaps the best thing I can do for you is to give you all time, to do with as you will.”

Man leaped for joy and shouted, “That is what we need, all of time! We praise Thee! We glorify Thee! We shall never be back again.”

And in his hurry to get back to his fellow men with the good news, he did not hear the Lord of Life say, “You will be back.”

And, behold, it was so. Before the moon had marked another phase of time, man was back again, saying, “O Lord of Life, Most High, Thou hast been most considerate of our needs. Thou hast not only granted us six days for our own use, but Thou hast given us seven days, and every hour and every minute of those seven days. But, O Lord, we have decided that what we really need is an eight-day week.…”

It was then that somewhere someone touched a button. There was a worldwide explosion. Time ceased to be.

The Presbyterian Church

Wabash, Ind.

The Preacher:

After accepting Christ at the age of 13, Benjamin Chew studied medicine and graduated in 1929 from King Edward VII College of Medicine in Singapore, where he is associated with The United Pharmacy Ltd. An elder of Bethesda (Katong), a Brethren assembly, since 1947, he was appointed a minister of religion of the State of Singapore and is active as a Bible teacher and preacher. He heads the Directors of Singapore Youth for Christ, is advisor to the Malaya Evangelistic Fellowship, and is part-time lecturer in the Singapore Theological Seminary.

The Text:

Matthew 5:3–12

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

The Sermon:

Many of us in Singapore and Malaya are familiar with the traditional Chinese New Year greeting with its threefold meaning of congratulations, happiness, and prosperity. This particular expression we find nine times in what are commonly called the Beatitudes, a passage which introduces the Sermon on the Mount. The word blessed has the same meaning as our Chinese New Year greeting! Here are some of our scholars’ translations of this meaningful word, makarios: “happy, blithesome, joyous”; “to be congratulated”; “enjoying enviable happiness”; “spiritually prosperous.” The word, therefore, has the meaning of happiness, felicitations, prosperity.

Are not these the very things we all want in life, and, what is infinitely more important, that God desires for us all?

We must note most carefully, however, that our Lord is referring to the highest kind of happiness, one which has a true and lasting quality. When experienced and exhibited here on earth, this happiness of heaven transcends every fleeting pleasure.

We need to remind ourselves also that at the beginning of his ministry, before he ever proclaimed the Sermon on the Mount, our Lord preached repentance. “Repent,” was the message, “for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 4:17).

Before any of us can ever correctly consider the meaning of true happiness, there must be personal repentance, that is, a radical change of mind and heart. This comes when we deliberately turn away in true sorrow for our sins from our own wayward and evil way, and purposefully reach out in our need towards God for his redemption and rule in our lives. The person who has taken this step no longer compares himself with other men, but stands in God’s holy presence to be ruled and judged by him alone. On the other hand, the person who has not experienced this turnabout in mind and attitude will find these beatitudes paradoxical and incomprehensible. He will dismiss them as impractical and impossible or at best will regard them as unattainable idealism. The man who has his face towards God and heaven, however, grasps something of our Lord’s definition of true happiness and spiritual prosperity in the introduction to this great and gracious, and completely authoritative, discourse.

These beatitudes reveal a very remarkable order and step-by-step progression. The first three speak of the happiness of humility. The next three define the happiness of holiness. The last three express the happiness of harmony. And in applying the final beatitude we find the happiness of hope.

The Happiness Of Humility

First of all, the happiness of humility: “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.”

These are the ones who stand and shall stand before the Lord in all his majesty and power. The very opposite in spirit, heart, and action, however, is the man who turns his back to God. Such a one is as proud as Lucifer, for pride is the sin of Satan. He exults in his achievements, often to the embarrassment or disgust of others. He is self-centered and self-assertive. How universally common are these characteristics! In New Testament times the Roman was proud of his brutal military power and rule. The Greek was proud of his philosophy and wisdom, the Jew of his religion and knowledge of God. Things are no different today. Pride remains essentially unchanged in the human heart. So hardened are we to pride that we only joke about it when we notice its grossness in others. There is pride of face in trying to keep up with the “Lims” and the “Tans.” And the pride of race, the curse of communalism and racialism in a polyethnic, multiracial population like ours, is with us, too. There is also the pride of place in the constant struggle for position, prestige, power. If one could speak at all of “degrees” of wickedness, there is also the worst kind of pride, the pride of grace in hypocrisy and intolerance as seen in the Pharisee, who thought himself better than the publican and sinner. This kind of pride of superiority expresses itself today in the highest religious circles. How necessary it is that we measure it is that we measure ourselves against the standard of heaven, namely, Jesus Christ, and stop deceiving ourselves by comparisons with those who are less privileged than we!

The Bible records many striking examples of true humility, occasions when men were confronted by God himself. Isaiah prostrated himself when he saw God’s holiness and glory and exclaimed, “Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips.… Mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts” (Isa. 6:5). And the Apostle Peter, a confident and aggressive man, similarly exclaimed when he saw the power of Christ: “Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). Something of Paul’s humility is evident in his describing himself as “the least of the apostles, not meet to be called an apostle,” and “less than the least of all saints,” the chief of sinners.

All of us have sinned and come short of God’s glory; we are all tarred with the same black brush and therefore totally unfit for heaven. Having come to the Cross in our sin and worthlessness we have come to the place of beginning. “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The word poor means total poverty, destitution, and bankruptcy; this extremity we acknowledge in ourselves as we receive the second beatitude: “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.”

Happy mourners! Not condolences but congratulations to those in sorrow! How completely paradoxical! As humans we do everything possible to avoid mourning. Only at the Cross can we become clearly convinced of sin’s wickedness and pollution, and thereupon sincerely mourn over the fact that it was our sins that wounded and nailed the sinless Son of God to the Cross.

In our innermost mind, will, and being, it becomes our true and constant witness that:

Nothing in my hand I bring,

Simply to Thy Cross I cling,

Naked, come to Thee for dress;

Helpless, look to Thee for grace;

Foul, I to the fountain fly;

Wash me, Saviour, or I die!

The mourner is blessed because he receives complete forgiveness and cleansing. Made a new man, he now possesses a new life and a new power, that of the risen, living Christ whose matchless love now constrains him. This blessed mourner is comforted with the peace, joy, and strength of the Holy Spirit of God, who comes to indwell forever every newborn child of God.

Now, even in the face of ridicule and reviling and in times of severe persecution, this man’s outstanding characteristic is meekness. This again is not in the least a natural disposition but rather the Christlike quality which the Spirit of God works out in the Christian. The meek man will not be sensitive, for he knows that in himself he has absolutely nothing to his credit; he has no personal rights save those which his Master has graciously given him. Being down and out, he knows he deserves no favors except those extended to him in the love, grace, and mercy of God. He therefore has nothing, and yet as a son and a subject of the Father’s kingdom he possesses everything of the abundance and riches of God. The Apostle Paul described such a one “as having nothing, and yet possessing all things” (2 Cor. 6:10). “… All [things] are yours; And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s” (1 Cor. 3:22, 23).

In the economy of God, this earth does not belong to the proud tyrant, nor will the cruel oppressor permanently possess it. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”

The Happiness Of Holiness

Next we consider the happiness of holiness. “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.”

Said the great gospel prophet, “We are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags” (Isa. 64:6a). We know how true this is. Which of us would want all our thoughts to be openly exposed? But what a marvelous change comes about when a man receives Christ and is made a new creation in Him! Now recognizing the supreme standard of the Spirit of holiness, he realizes that only Christ’s righteousness (rightness) in him is acceptable to God. By faith he knows that this righteousness is imputed to him and imparted to him in sovereign grace; he knows it can be implemented in a practical way in thought, word, and deed in his daily life only by the power of the Spirit of God. A “hunger and thirst after righteousness” now possesses him, a new desire to be more and more like his beloved Lord. Accordingly he strives to put away sinful desires and habits—anything which suppresses this spiritual appetite.

He delights in the Word, because he longs to know the wonderful Christ of the Word. As he partakes of it day after day, he is filled with milk and meat far “sweeter” than “honey and the honeycomb”; he is blessed with the fullness of Christ. In this way the longing for Christlikeness brings happiness to dwell in the human heart.

Micah utters these profound words: “He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” (6:8). Holiness and humility are requirements of God, requirements that are bound up with the love of mercy. Like his Lord, the Christian is full of mercy. Jesus said on the cross, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Stephen prayed for his murderers as he fell under a shower of stones, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” This is the Christian’s attitude—no anger, no resentment, but rather a deep sorrow for the sinner, even when justice must be meted out to him. This is mercy. Shakespeare was right when he spoke of mercy as a heavenly quality! This quality of mercy is inseparable from inward holiness. A pure heart filled not with stringent and pharisaic correctness but with mercy is what is needed to see the Lord in all his loving mercy and holiness. It is at the Cross that all hearts can be cleansed; it is God who cleanses in order “to sanctify the soul, to pour fresh life in every part and re-create the whole.”

The Happiness Of Harmony

Thirdly, there is the happiness of harmony: “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.”

What causes tension and war? Why did the League of Nations fail? Why is the authority of the United Nations so often flouted? The basic reason is the fact that the Lord’s principles and prerequisites of happiness have been disregarded. Where there is no humility and no holiness, there is no harmony. Just as this holds for an individual, so it is true for nations of the world. Jesus Christ alone is the Prince of peace. He is our peace, a peace we have through the laying down of his life for us. Satan has always been and is still the author of division and discord, and anyone who sows discord, says the Word of God, is an abomination. On the other hand, God’s child seeks to disseminate the peace that rules in his own heart, the undisturbed harmony in which he rests despite reviling, persecution, and calumny.

The peacemaker, however, cannot compromise with evil; neither can he ignore it. His task, in the final analysis, is to lead men who are at odds with one another to peace with God. This great work of reconciliation God has entrusted to the subjects and ambassadors of his kingdom. If any members are responsible for divisiveness and discord, however, judgment must begin, first of all, in the household of God. Only with the humility and holiness of Christ can we lovingly and in his power become true ministers of reconciliation.

The Happiness Of Hope

Our text closes with the happiness of hope! “Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.”

Addressing the saints at Colosse, St. Paul wrote of their faith, their love, and “the hope which is laid up for you in heaven.” This is the heavenly reward which abides forever and which makes microscopic this present temporary suffering. This hope goes far beyond the usual human expectation, the “hope [that] springs eternal in the human breast.” The heavenly hope of the Christian shines brightly as absolute certainty, even in the deepest gloom. It is the sure and steadfast anchor “within the vail,” for it is the ascended and exalted Christ himself who is the “hope of glory.” We wait in certain exultant hope for his personal return. Then he shall gather his saints, and bring to consummation all the promises and purposes of God for mankind. Then in all creation shall be completed the glorious work of redemption.

Amid our present perils, amid the problems of pain and sorrow that we are called to endure, we begin to understand something of God’s refining process in our own lives as well as in the lives of all the saints. Beyond all these temporal and trivial trials of earth shines the certain hope of heaven and of home with God.

We must not study these precious words of Christ in a coldly analytic spirit. Rather we must receive them as personal tokens from our Saviour, Lord, Master, and Friend. Daily let us receive in increasing measure from the Lord himself this blessedness of felicitations, of congratulation, of happiness, and of prosperity. As we daily come to an end of ourselves and are filled with his humility, his holiness, and his harmony, may Christ in us be the hope of glory, and through us, that hope to others.

END

It was a Jewish army doctor who caused me to take a second look at fasting as a religious exercise. As a boy, I had fasted one day to test my willpower. As a seminarian, I had skipped the noon meal for a week to know something of China’s hunger and to contribute to its relief. As an army chaplain, I had observed the fast of Yom Kippur to encourage the Jewish men to keep up their religious practices. It was in that connection that I was speaking to our medical officer.

“Yes, I’m keeping the fast,” he said, “not as a religious exercise, but purely for hygienic reasons.” That made me wonder about the religious value of fasting. 1 knew the old answers—that it is better to do something positive than to deny something; that ours is a joyful religion—the Kingdom has begun; that the man who boasted of his fasting twice a week is to be despised. But I also reasoned that the same man made a boast of his tithing, yet that has not stopped us from taking up offerings. Ours is a joyful religion, but we also know humiliation and repentance in it. And Jesus said, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself.…” Maybe denying oneself of food would be the easiest step in learning to discipline oneself in the service of One who asks for complete commitment.

This reasoning sent me to the Bible. The first reference to fasting comes in Leviticus 16:29, although we might well presume that in the great mournings of Abraham for Sarah and of Jacob for Joseph there was an abstaining from food. On the Day of Atonement, the people were commanded “to afflict” their souls, and this became “the fast” for the people of Israel. Later special occasions brought forth additional fasting—as when Joshua lay on the ground before the ark of the Lord after the defeat caused by Achan’s sin (Josh. 7:6), when the men of Israel fought against the children of Benjamin (Judges 20:26), when David fasted during the illness of his child by Bath-sheba (2 Sam. 12:16). (The fastings of Moses and of Elijah for 40 days were miraculous occurrences.)

When the Jews returned from captivity, the bitterness of those experiences was commemorated in additional fasts (Ezra 8:21; Neh. 9:1; Esther 4:1–3). Zechariah lists four (Zech. 8–9), but the emphasis was placed on the deliverance from these experiences—therefore, they should be of joy and gladness and cheerfulness. As the Jews continued to experience troubles, additional fasts were prescribed. By the time of the Herods and the Caesars, many Jews fasted twice a week (Thursday and Monday) in addition to all the others; for working men and women these must have been “heavy burdens” (Matt. 23:4).

Like the prophets before him, Jesus warned against the mere external observance of religious forms. In the Sermon on the Mount, he warned against wrong motives in almsgiving, praying, and fasting. If we do any of the three for the show, then that show is exactly what we will have and no more. But if we keep a steady countenance before men and “fast unto God” in secret, then we shall receive an open reward in that fasting (Matt. 6:16–18). Note also in this reference, Jesus said, “When ye fast …,” which implies an assumption that we shall fast.

In secret, our Lord must have fasted as well as prayed; he was not afraid of hunger (John 4:32) and commended fasting to those who would do his work (Matt. 17:21). When the disciples asked why they could not cure the afflicted boy at the foot of the Mount of Transfiguration, Jesus replied, “Because of your unbelief.… Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.” There would be hard tasks for the followers of Jesus—tasks that would not be accomplished but by prayer and fasting (race problems, inter-church relations, war and peace for examples?).

We have no reason to doubt that Jesus and his disciples kept the Fast of the Atonement and the other regular fast days of the Jewish faith, but he added no new ones—which might have been expected of a new teacher to show his religiosity—and disregarded the additional ones which others had added. (The fast days became so numerous that after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus it became necessary to list the days when fasting was forbidden.) The Pharisees and the disciples of John did not charge that Jesus had broken the law of Moses, which they would have if he had neglected the Fast of the Atonement; rather they were offended that Jesus did not make his disciples conform to their customs and practices. This was the rub of their complaint: that the disciples did not fast as they did (Matt. 9:14). Jesus could have rebuked their self-righteousness, but instead he spoke of the bridegroom’s presence. The Messiah’s kingdom was a time of joy and cheer, of feasting and fellowship; all the best pictures of human happiness are used to describe this most joyful spiritual fulfillment—and so the fasting would be out of keeping. It was not the time of forms but of fellowship, not the place for tears but for laughter and joy. But listen to the Master: “… The days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast” (Matt. 9:15b). Surprising, isn’t it?

And that time came. The disciples needed no one to tell them to fast after the crucifixion; thoughts of food must have escaped them, and only in the presence of a Risen Lord and when he himself had first eaten could they eat again. Then after he was “taken up” from them, there must have been fasting with their praying as they tarried in Jerusalem. It seems to have been a regular part of preparing for any special task, such as the setting aside of Paul and Barnabas (Acts 13:2, 3) and the ordaining of elders (Acts 14:23). Paul speaks of “[giving] yourselves to fasting and prayer” in special seasons and occasions (1 Cor. 7:5), and also of ministers of God approving themselves in fasting along with the watchings and labors (2 Cor. 6:5). These references seem to indicate that fasting is to be a part of the Christian’s spiritual discipline until the Lord returns in triumph. The rejoicing of the disciples in the physical presence of Jesus was a foretaste of our eternal joys—but until then, shall we not discipline ourselves to serve him by abstaining from food as the need and calling arise? Can it not be inferred that Jesus expects his followers to fast: “… When the bridegroom shall be taken away … then shall they fast” (Luke 5:35)?

A Religious Exercise

I am confident that we need to take a second look at fasting as a religious practice. Like John’s disciples, we are prone to increase external forms; we had rather create new departments in our denominational work, or have special Sundays, or new programs, more meetings, higher goals, new drives, and so on. These are our “fasts” today, and they have been multiplied until somebody ought to designate some Sundays when we can be free of these “drives” and just enjoy our religion. Today, fasting itself is not fashionable—rather we like the easy-smiling, winsome, popular appeal of optimism and confidence. Maybe we need the affliction of soul, the humiliation of spirit, the emptying of oneself. We ought to consider it. After all, did not Jesus say, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself …”? What a rebuke to some of us who are out to make a name for ourselves or to get ahead or to be a success or to look out for Number One. And what have we ever denied ourselves; come, now, tell it? What do we know of denying? Perhaps to deny oneself of food and drink “from even to even” would be a first lesson.

Of course, the condition of the body affects the soul. Once a British actress told me that when she was learning a play she ate no potatoes or bread—only fruit, eggs, vegetables, and a little lean meat. And I have found that during times of examination, and when I am preaching, it is better not to eat much. We are keener of mind and heart when not so full; a big meal brings drowsiness and sluggishness. (Aren’t you glad that you preach to your congregation at eleven o’clock rather than at one? Somehow, we have found eleven o’clock—with a little edge of hunger—better suited to religious purposes than one o’clock when we are stuffed.) If these observations are valid, don’t they suggest that fasting might hold special religious significance for us?

As Americans, we are known for our much eating. In France during the Second World War, we were told: “You Americans eat everything—even horses’ food (corn)—and all the time. You have a big breakfast; then, a snack (coffee break); after which comes an enormous lunch, and another snack (Coke break); and a big dinner, and then a bedtime supper—and yet you are not satisfied; you have something to put in your mouth which keeps your teeth going up and down all the time (chewing gum).” It might help if we knew something of hunger. For one thing, we would “feel” better, and it undoubtedly would aid our health. (Long ago James Morrison said: “There are multitudes of diseases which have their origin in fulness, and might have their end in fasting.”) Fasting would sharpen our sympathies for the unfortunates of our own society and for the hungry of the world. Fasting would help clear our minds and spirits as we face great problems and tasks. It also affords a lesson in thanksgiving for food—and sheer joy again of eating. Some have said primitive man abstained from eating that he might better eat his god. We, too, want God to abide within; can physical hunger prepare the soul to receive him?

Now, I am not advocating a special “Fast Sunday” or anything like that. It is not something to be required, but in preparation for special revival services and on other special times (as when I preached on segregation), I have invited members of the church to share in a fast—and I have been amazed at the ones who whispered in my ears that they had been blessed in it. And more—there were “open rewards” from it.

This is enough. Take another look at this ancient practice, or better, just try it. There is no telling what the Lord will do for you, if you fast “unto thy Father which is in secret.”

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