Like the inconspicuous, pensive Spotted Owl of the American West, the small church-related college is an endangered species. More than seventy private schools, the vast majority of them church-affiliated colleges, have folded in the last five years, and a number of others are in trouble. Still others have shed their denominational affiliations in a bid for broader support.

Despite the soaring costs and recruitment problems, however, there are significant exceptions to the trend. A CHRISTIANITY TODAY survey shows that many evangelical colleges are as strong as ever, and some are enjoying their best health in years.

The survey suggests that the more blurred a school’s reason for being, the poorer its chances for survival. In other words, evangelical schools may be making a good showing because of, not in spite of, their distinct Christian commitment.

Fiscal problems plague everybody, even the big secular schools receiving enormous injections of public aid. College costs for the student have risen faster than the Consumer Price Index: in the last ten years tuition alone has more than doubled, while the CPI has risen 66 per cent. Along with the tuition hikes have gone boosts in fees, room and board, books, and other expanses. College costs will be 6 to 8 per cent higher this fall than last, according to College Entrance Board findings. Tuition rates in excess of $3,000 per year are already the rule rather than the exception at private colleges.

The soaring costs undoubtedly have priced otherwise qualified and interested students out of the private-college market. Heavily subsidized schools like the community junior colleges can charge lower rates, hurting recruitment efforts of the church-related colleges.

Various remedies have been proposed. Last March the Carnegie Council on Policy Studies in Higher Education urged the federal government to increase its aid to private colleges and universities. The council suggested that “tuition equalization grants,” averaging about $750 a year, be paid directly to the student.

Among some 5,700 institutions eligible for federal aid are the estimated 700 to 800 church-related and independent Christian schools, according to Robert Andringa, a congressional staff specialist in educational affairs. Aid to religious schools is subject to limitations imposed by the principle of church-state separation, and some Christian colleges as a matter of policy have resisted all government funding other than scholarship and student loan programs. Direct grants to students would be a way around such funding problems and would provide a greater variety of options, similar to those enjoyed by war veterans under GI bills (many vets got their education at Bible institutes and Christian colleges that rejected or were ineligible for federal aid).

Student grants would also enable the private schools to stand more stably in the fiercely competitive recruitment marketplace. During the 1950s, says Andringa, private schools enrolled nearly 50 per cent of all college students, but that figure is now down to under 25 per cent. Competition, he points out, will become exceedingly stiff by 1980, when the number of prospective students will decrease by 25 per cent, reflecting the population decline. In some states the decline may be as high as 35 per cent. As of now, he adds, only about one-half of America’s graduating high school seniors enter college.

Andringa, a member of Fourth Presbyterian Church in Washington, D. C., foresees serious difficulties for the small church-related colleges that have lost their distinctiveness as Christian institutions. “If such schools offer no more than a public university does at a much greater cost to the student, they cannot hope to survive,” he asserts. Of the more than 700 church-related and independent Christian schools, he speculates, only about eighty show in classroom atmosphere and requirements a firm commitment to Christianity.

Until recently Andringa believed that evangelical schools could accept government support without compromising their Christian position. But now he thinks such schools “will be forced slowly and subtly into a secular mold if they continue to accept public aid.” College officials are also concerned about the prospect, and one dean says, “We’re all watching the developments very closely.”

Nearly every Christian college receives some form of governmental assistance, if only indirectly in the form of the National Direct Student Loan Program. There are other federal student-aid programs, and about thirty-five states offer student-help plans.

Advocates of strict separation of church and state argue that all public aid to religious institutions is a violation of the establishment-of-religion clause in the First Amendment of the U. S. Constitution. Americans United, based in Washington, D. C., has led many battles against such government funding. AU spokesman Ed Doerr says that the states of Washington and Nebraska have had their aid programs ruled unconstitutional within the past year. Maryland’s plan was ruled unconstitutional in 1966, but that decision in effect was negated last year in an action involving three Catholic schools. In Tennessee, AU fought a successful court battle in which direct aid to students who attend religious colleges was ruled unconstitutional. The U. S. Supreme Court will hear both the Maryland and Tennessee cases this fall in what may be a watershed decision, especially in light of the direct-student-aid issue. The survival of many religious colleges could depend on it.

(The 1966 Maryland decision established criteria for determining whether or not a private college can be considered a sectarian one. Among the criteria are board composition and the way the school is governed, entrance and behavioral requirements such as a profession of faith and compulsory chapel, and the image of the college in the community.)

Gordon R. Werkema, executive director of the Christian College Consortium, a twelve-member organization of non-denominational and church-affiliated evangelical schools, thinks the significant issue is not the first half of the First Amendment but the second, that the state cannot make any law prohibiting the free exercise of religion. For those schools in the consortium, says Werkema, religion and education are inextricably bound together. He fears that if government aid is granted only to secular institutions the subtle effect will be to sponsor a religion of secular humanism. What the state will be saying, explains Werkema, is that “since we’re supposed to be neutral, we’ll only support those institutions that appear neutral.” But in reality, he insists, secular institutions espouse secular humanism as a religious philosophy or world view.

Contrary to the trend of many church-related schools that are broadening their base to ensure public aid, the consortium schools are taking a firmer stand on their commitment to Christianity, says Werkema. Enrollments at the consortium schools are stable or rising (see chart, this page); some enrollments are constant only because the schools are operating at capacity and can’t take any more students. Also, the consortium schools are not revamping their liberal-arts orientation to accede to the mounting cries for a more vocation-centered education.

Dean Richard Gross of 1,000-student Gordon College in Wenham, Massachusetts, says that not only enrollment but also the retention rate is up at his school. He estimates Gordon’s retention rate as 92 per cent and says the average for most institutions is between 60 and 70 per cent. Rising costs have not hurt the school’s growth, he adds.

Admissions director J. David Yoder of 950-student Eastern Mennonite College in Harrisonburg, West Virginia, says his school maintained a constant enrollment from 1970 until last fall, when it dipped about 5 per cent.

The enrollment of 1,460-student Bethel College, a Baptist General Conference school, shot up 40 per cent after its move three years ago from downtown St. Paul, Minnesota, to the suburbs, according to Acting Dean Dwight Jessup. “We were simply at capacity level at our old campus,” he explains.

National studies show that enrollments decrease in small private schools as costs increase. But George Fox College, an Evangelical Friends school in Newberg, Oregon, with an enrollment of 470, is an illustration of the counter-trend going on among Christian schools. Costs have risen about 5 per cent annually for the past five years, but enrollment has increased at about the same rate. Gift income is also up (more than $2 million for the building program in the last two years). A school official gives credit to an aggressive development and recruitment program.

The 5 per cent rate of increase in both costs and enrollment also applies to 2,250-student Seattle Pacific College, says Dean William Rearick. Costs at 2,200-student Wheaton and at Eastern Mennonite have risen even more dramatically—about 50 per cent since 1970.

While the consortium schools are resisting pressures to have a more career-oriented curriculum, they are developing what Werkema calls “links” between the liberal arts and vocational courses.

For instance, Gordon plans to add finance and management courses to its economics major next fall, and it is emphasizing special education in its elementary education program. Officials are also looking into the possibility of a cooperative program with a secular university for students who desire an engineering degree. The first two years would be spent at Gordon, the last two at the university. But, says Gordon’s Gross, 840-student Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, has had this arrangement with Stanford University for several years and “not many students take the option.” (Several other schools are contemplating similar joint-education plans.)

Additionally, Gordon is expanding its fine-arts program (drama, speech, art), and its music program has accreditation pending by the National Association of Schools of Music.

Houghton College, a Wesleyan Church-related school in western New York, is also at near-capacity with 1,200 students. It is working with adult and continuing-education programs and is conducting career-motivation studies.

Some schools that have not had business or social-work majors are adding them. But other majors are suffering, especially languages. At Wheaton, German and Greek have been dropped as majors. A spokesman says not enough students chose these majors to justify their continuance. On the other hand, says academic dean Donald Mitchell, the new self-instructional language program has been so successful this year that faculty cuts in the language department may be unnecessary.

Special workshops and intern programs are two other ways in which consortium schools plan to help meet the career needs of their students.

Dean Ron Sider of the Philadelphia campus of 840-student Messiah College, a Brethren in Christ school near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, predicts more schools will create urban campuses, where students can live in a Christian community and still have the opportunity to major in such areas as film, radio, and television. Houghton already has a Buffalo campus, and Westmont has one in San Francisco.

All things considered, it appears that the evangelical colleges are not as endangered as many of the private schools whose religious commitments are less defined. But, administrators caution, it will take tight-fisted management to get by the difficult places. Expensive low-priority expansion plans are likely to be shelved, courses will be cut if student sign-ups are consistently low, and frills will be eliminated.

In the face of all this, Werkema sums up the attitude expressed by leaders of the evangelical schools:

“We’re concerned but not worried about the economic situation. We’re deepening our commitment to Christ, to community, and to preparing people to function Christianly in society. And we will not give up our distinctive mission as Christian institutions of higher education.”

REGRETFULLY YOURS

Vacationing professor Curtis Vaughan of Southwestern Baptist Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, was about to board an underground train in London when a man blocked his way. Two men behind Vaughan began to push and yell at the man blocking the way. Suddenly, the man steppied off the train and left with the other two.

Strange behavior, thought Vaughan. At the next train stop he discovered his wallet was missing. It contained identification cards, traveler’s checks, credit cards, and more than $300 in cash.

Later, he received in the mail a bulky envelope containing a wad of money and a note:

“From an apologetic pickpocket. Dear Rev. I am returning my share of the wallet. I apologize for robbing a man of the church.”

FOREIGN MISSIONS FIRST

Toronto’s 2,200-member Peoples Church (“the church that puts foreign missions first”) at its recent annual World Missions Conference received a record $960,000 in “faith promises” (pledges) for the congregation’s vast world outreach program. Of this amount, $ 169,000 came in response to a two-hour telethon SOS (Survival Or Starvation) appeal on four TV channels. Pastor Paul B. Smith said that all of the appeal money would be sent to the World Relief Commission of the National Association of Evangelicals for its sub-Sahara relief work.

The bulk of the faith-promise income, to be spread out over the next year, is for the support of 355 Canadian missionaries serving in sixty-eight countries under forty-two missionary agencies. The Peoples Church-supported force also includes 125 national workers, some of whom were at the conference.

One of the persons attending the conference was Peoples Church founder Oswald J. Smith, Pastor Paul Smith’s father, 84, who introduced the faith-promise idea back in 1933. At a conference that year $23,586 was raised. Since then, more than $8 million has been given to evangelical foreign mission work ($711,000 last year).

Both Smiths have helped other churches around the world implement similar plans, and the annual conferences always attract a number of American pastors who want to see the plan in action where it all began.

Religion In Transit

Oral Roberts University, founded by the evangelist known best as a faith healer, announced plans to build a $60 million medical school. Officials hope it will be operating by 1980, along with graduate schools of law and dentistry. An undergraduate school of nursing will open this fall.

A federal court jury dismissed a $1 million lawsuit against H. R. Haldeman and other former White House aides in connection with an October 15, 1971, rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, honoring evangelist Billy Graham. Eighteen anti-war demonstrators had claimed they were excluded illegally from the rally, which was addressed by then-president Richard Nixon.

Fundamentalist minister Carl McIntire is facing another fiscal crisis. A fund-raising letter indicates he needs $235,000 by May 27 or the bank will not renew the mortgage on his Christian Admiral seashore conference center and other New Jersey properties. He is asking for donations and short-term loans “at whatever rate you desire.” Tax officials said that as of January 1 he owed more than $220,000 in taxes on the Admiral and other property.

All twenty-four major-league baseball teams now have a Sunday pre-game chapel session when they are on the road, according to Baseball Chapel coordinator Watson Spoelstra. Total attendance for thirteen teams on the first Sunday of the season was 247 (home team Los Angeles held a chapel), four times better than last year.

Delegates of the 4,000-member Federation for Authentic Lutheranism (FAL) voted to merge with the 390,000-member Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod. The action must be confirmed by the eleven congregations of FAL, begun in 1971 by conservatives who left the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod over alleged liberalism.

The 4,825-congregation American Lutheran Church celebrated its fifteenth birthday with a special United Mission Appeal that has resulted in gifts and pledges of $30 million to expand the denomination’s ministries at home and abroad.

Executive Director James E. Wood, Jr., of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs in Washington, D. C., fired off a protest to the American Revolution Bicentennial Administration (ARBA). An ARBA plan would provide matching grants of up to 50 per cent of the total cost of bicentennial projects undertaken by religious and other private groups. Wood cited church-state separation issues.

Evangelist Bill Glass and 128 volunteers, including well-known sports personalities, conducted evangelistic meetings at three Florida prisons. An estimated 1,000 of the 4,600 inmates made professions of faith in Christ.

Personalia

Divinity professors James S. Stewart (University of Edinburgh) and William Barclay (University of Glasgow) last month became the first Scots to receive the annual Upper Room citations. Printed in forty languages, the Nashville-based Upper Room is the world’s most widely used daily devotional guide.

Presbyterian minister A. Donald MacLeod of Toronto has been appointed general secretary of Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship of Canada, succeeding Samuel Escobar, effective August 1.

Pastor Paige Patterson of First Baptist Church in Fayetteville, Arkansas, has been named the new president of Criswell Bible Institute, succeeding H. Leo Eddleman who has retired. The school is operated by the 18,000-member First Baptist Church of Dallas.

World Scene

The World Council of Churches will spend $479,000 to step up its antiracism campaign. Half of the money will go to groups seeking black majority rule in South Africa and Rhodesia. The American Indian Movement in the U. S. will receive $15,000.

Ecumenism seems to be ebbing in Northern Ireland. The majority of the Irish Presbyterian synods have endorsed a request calling for the withdrawal of the denomination from the World Council of Churches. The petition will be acted upon at next month’s General Assembly.

Ioan (John) Samu, perhaps Romania’s foremost Gypsy evangelist, has been jailed on charges stemming from his religious activities. He was fined many months of salary in past incidents.

DEATH

WILLIAM J. WALLS, 89, retired senior bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church; in Yonkers, New York, of a kidney ailment.

Discussion of marriage and family, whether by religious or by secular thinkers, seldom continues long without making disparaging statements about the nuclear family. The term itself has a negative implication. “Nuclear” suggests self-containment and lack of creative interaction with others of the same type.

The conventional wisdom is that the family consisting of two parents, permanently committed to each other, and their children is an institution out of keeping with the times. Such a family is considered to be a residential and inheritance group whose members have mutual affinities and interests so self-regarding that an adequate value system for the times cannot be transmitted in it.

Some think the monogamous family is totally inadequate to the task of meeting, not only social needs, but also the personality development needs of the persons involved. These include the romantic and sexual requirements of adult members and the needs of the young to develop young toward wholeness and creative adulthood. Many persons, including some Christians, feel that the conjugal family has been weighed in the balances at this point and found wanting.

Various remedial proposals are being made. The more moderate retain the basic features of the monogamous family; the more radical propose life-styles that frankly challenge and supplant it.

The moderate proposals are usually attempts to overcome the isolation that the conventional family is said to produce. This isolation is often identified with the separate family dwelling. What is proposed is an extension of the “family” that would involve monogamous groups in a network or grid of families, three or four being the ideal number, and would extend many aspects of the intimacy that belongs to conventional marriage.

What limits should this have? What degree of privacy is essential to meaningful marital life? What degree of unity among parental figures is necessary to the discipline of children? These are some of the unanswered questions.

Underlying this kind of proposal is the assumption that couples need some type of close exposure to other conjugal units, and that children need to be exposed to more than two parent-figures. These needs are held to overbalance the need for the privacy and compactness provided by the usual form of family life. These are, to say the least, major assumptions.

The various types of communes offer more radical solutions to the problems presumably posed by the nuclear family. Underlying most commune-forms is the view that it is emotionally and socially desirable for a man to love more than one woman and a woman to love more than one man. This love may or may not have a sexual aspect; certainly in many cases it is not ruled out.

Some communes claim a religious and spiritual basis, but the majority of the 3,000-plus operating in the United States apparently do not. There are both rural and urban communes. As a general rule, the religiously based groups are more stable than the others. Also, the rural communes suffer less from the incursions of transients, runaways, and drug addicts that plague those in urban areas.

One gains the impression that rural communes are more orderly. The relative degree of sexual permissiveness in the two geographic types is undetermined; there are evidences both ways. Many communes seem to subsist largely on romantic enthusiasm and novelty. If reports may be believed, many break up over sleeping arrangements.

A common denominator seems to be the desire to develop extended or group familial relationships. But some of the problems involved seem insuperable. The splitting of authority over children when there are multiple parent-figures, the normal desire for male certainty about paternity—these and other factors seem to lend at least some support to the view that the monogamous family is one of the Creator’s orders for mankind.

The story is told of the fond mother who sent the following message to her son’s schoolteacher: “DEAR TEACHER: If my Archibald is naughty—and he sometimes is—just whip the boy next to him. This will frighten Archibald and make him behave.” One is tempted to wonder whether the concerned attack upon the nuclear family, by writers of both religious and secular orientation, is an attempt to do something of this sort. The real target may be, not the nuclear family, but something much more profound.

Involved in many of the “new and creative life-styles in marriage” is the downgrading of what has been commonly accepted as Christian morality. In the United States, the attack upon this is much less vehement and virulent than it commonly is in Europe, where the one concerned to maintain such standards is dubbed a Philistine. Here, he or she is more likely to be called a WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant), and his or her ethical standards are likely to be termed “middle-class morality.”

While the defects of the controversial family are many, it is far from clear that the comparisons between it and proposed alternative life-styles are fairly made. The alternatives are often portrayed in less than realistic terms, designed to give a better impression than is warranted.

A case in point is found in an article in the January, 1975, issue of the Christian Home, publication in which three major denominations participate. The article, “The ‘Commune’ Next Door,” presents a glowing picture of Iris Mountain Community, a religiously based community of the less radical type.

Quite possibly the report is wholly factual. What is misleading is the implication that this is a representative commune. Nothing is said about the deeper familiar arrangements or the type of marital theory that underlies the community. In my view, it is grossly misleading to imply that this is a typical commune, and that communes in general are the idyllic places that the report suggests. If few are as perverse as Charles Manson’s, few seem as ideal as Iris Mountain.

Might not spokesmen for the Christian Church, instead of presenting glowing pictures of communes and favorable reviews of books such as Nena and George O’Neill’s Open Marriage, do better to recognize the “new life-style” adventures in marriage for what they are, namely, a rejection of structured relationships and of divine ordinances? And why not emphasize instead family life based upon fidelity, upon lifelong commitments made and kept?

We have had some staff changes of late—not so dramatic as the one that took place at a nearby office (the Oval) last year but important to us. Irma Peterson, my loyal, faithful, and very competent secretary, has retired and she will be returning to California. She left the Golden State nearly two decades ago to throw in her lot with CHRISTIANITY TODAY. Through the years she has occupied an office at the corner of our Washington Building suite, and it does seem as if we have lost a piece of our cornerstone. Miss Peterson takes with her our hearty affection and appreciation.

Stephen Wike, formerly our advertising manager, has been appointed business manager. We welcome him to this responsible new post. Melvin Sorenson has left the staff to join the Evangelical Foundation in Philadelphia. He did a great job for us, and we are sorry to see him go. Sterling Mehring is now our advertising representative, and Johanna Patterson is acting circulation manager.

Until this month the only ecclesiastical trial ever held in the Episcopal diocese of Washington, D. C., was one in 1898 when a rector (parish pastor) was charged with immoral conduct. Early this month another rector went on trial, charged with disobeying his bishop in a matter involving the ordination of women to the priesthood. Clergy and laity throughout the three-million-member Episcopal Church followed the nationally publicized trial with keen interest; the issues raised there have been the topics of intense debate in the denomination for some time, and some high-church leaders warn of schism if the issues are resolved against them. The trial even enmeshed Presiding Bishop John M. Allin (see following story). Ironically, he faces possible disciplinary charges for trying to keep out of the case.

On trial was William A. Wendt, 55, rector since 1960 of the controversially innovative Church of St. Stephen and the Incarnation in Washington. In November, against the instructions of diocesan bishop William Creighton, he had invited a woman, Alison Cheek, to celebrate the Eucharist at a Sunday morning service (see November 22, 1974, issue, page 63, and December 6, 1974, issue, page 45).

The Australian-born Mrs. Cheek, raised a Methodist, was one of eleven women deacons ordained to the priesthood by three retired bishops in a service last July in Philadelphia. The service was attended by nearly 2,000, including seventy-five clergy who joined in the laying on of hands. In an emergency meeting the following month, the House of Bishops ruled that the ordinations were invalid. The bishops, most of whom favor ordination of women, asked that no further actions be taken until after next year’s denominational convention when the issue will again be voted upon (it failed to gain approval at the 1973 convention).

Wendt had originally invited Mrs. Cheek, 47, a staff assistant at a suburban church in Virginia, to preside at communion in August but canceled her at the request of Bishop Creighton. After the November service Creighton expressed his disappointment but said he would not discipline Wendt. Some of Wendt’s fellow clergymen, however, preferred charges.

The three-day trial was held in the gothic-styled St. Columba’s church in Washington. The panel of five black-robed judges (three clergymen and two lawyers, one of them a woman) sat at a long table in front of the pulpit area. At their right sat their legal counsel, Edmund D. Campbell, the attorney who successfully argued the one-man, one-vote case before the U. S. Supreme Court. Attorney Llewellyn C. Thomas acted as presiding judge.

A folding card table served as the witness stand. Behind another table just inside the altar rail on the right sat attorney E. Tillman Stirling, the tall, youngish-looking church prosecutor who technically represented the group who lodged charges against Wendt. With Wendt at the defense table were attorneys Edward C. Bou, who is a member of St. Stephen’s, and the pint-sized William Stringfellow of Rhode Island, a noted lawyer and Episcopal lay theologian.

All the lawyers donated their services, though Wendt’s backers reimbursed Stringfellow for expenses.

A band of St. Stephen’s members sat in a wing to the right of the communion area. In the wing opposite them sat reporters and artists who sketched for TV coverage. Spectators, up to 200 or so, sat in the main pew section.

From the outset, prosecutor Stirling argued that only Wendt was on trial, not anyone else, with disobedience the only issue, not the ordination of women. “We can’t settle all the differences of the church here,” he said.

Stringfellow, on the other hand, insisted vigorously that the validity of Mrs. Cheek’s ordination was a central issue. The defense, he contended, needed to establish her right to celebrate the Eucharist as part of its case.

Presiding judge Thomas ruled that testimony on the ordination issue would be received subject to a decision later regarding its relevance.

The first prosecution witness was Bishop Creighton. He said he sent letters to both Wendt and Mrs. Cheek forbidding her from celebrating communion at St. Stephen’s, and he admonished Wendt verbally as well.

In cross-examination, Stringfellow inquired about the priestly vows of obedience to the bishop (see box, next page). “What on earth is a ‘godly admonition?” ’ he asked. Creighton hesitated a moment, then said, “I’m not sure, sir,” evoking laughter from the audience. Whatever, said Creighton, he expected the admonition to be obeyed.

An ardent advocate of women’s ordination, Creighton may have undercut the prosecution’s case. Probed by Stringfellow, he said if the church again votes against women’s ordination he will proceed to act on the issue himself according to the dictates of his conscience. This enhanced Wendt’s point that he too was acting on the basis of conscience, making the difference between them little more than a matter of timing.

Stirling rested his case after merely establishing that Wendt acted contrary to Creighton’s directives.

Stringfellow fielded an all-star cast. First came Bishop Robert DeWitt, resigned bishop of Pennsylvania who participated in the Philadelphia ordination service. He told of the months of talking and planning that preceded the service. No active bishop would join them, he conceded, and Presiding Bishop Allin had counseled against it. The ordinations were “irregular” but valid, he asserted. He said he acted in “obedience to the Holy Spirit.”

Under questioning, he told Stirling he had been an active bishop for fourteen years before the action. Asked how many women he had ordained in those years, he replied, “None.” “Didn’t the Spirit move you during that time?” Replied DeWitt: “The Spirit was moving for some time, but I didn’t move until July.” More laughter.

Stirling asked whether it would be good to do away with the canons (church laws) in favor of letting everyone do as the Spirit or conscience leads. No, said DeWitt, such defiance of law should be restricted to only the “most difficult” cases.

Asked about the meaning of “godly admonitions,” DeWitt seemed to imply that a priest is free to interpret which admonitions are godly ones and which ones are not.

Alison Cheek, chubby and clad in a light blue skirt and coat over a black shirt and clerical collar, told her story. It took her six years to go through Virginia Seminary instead of three because she had to look after her four children. Ordained a deacon in 1972, she soon found herself in a “crisis of integrity” over the women’s issue. When the Philadelphia opportunity was offered she took it as a way to be fulfilled, and the vestry (ruling board) of her church approved. “We must reaffirm and recapture the universality of Christ’s ministry,” she exhorted.

She conceded to Stirling that her diocesan Standing Committee had refused to give its consent to her ordination, basing its stand “on a sexist interpretation of the canons.” She also acknowledged that she had declined “to accede to requests” of the bishop of Virginia (he ordered her not to participate in the Philadelphia event), but again the questioning bogged down on the meaning of godly admonitions. “There is nothing godly in inferiorizing women and squelching their vocations,” she snapped. God is a God of love, she added, in whom there is neither male nor female.

Mrs. Cheek indicated that while she has not been invited to celebrate communion at any large public gatherings in Virginia, she does it regularly in small-group meetings.

Harvard sociologist Charles Willie recounted how he had resigned as Vice President of the House of Deputies (clergy and lay delegates) when the bishops invalidated the ordinations of the Philadelphia Eleven. He said it was his way of protesting the “inhumane treatment of women in the Episcopal Church.” He was the main speaker at the Philadelphia ordination service.

Why, Stirling asked Willie, did he not resign earlier—when Willie’s own House of Deputies failed to approve women’s ordination in 1973? Visibly discomforted, Willie said something about having a different strategy at the time.

Willie and other defense witnesses, including former presiding bishop John Hines, said their studies of the canons led them to conclude that the bishops’ action of invalidation was itself invalid, that they had no authority by themselves to legislate. They also maintained that there are no prohibitions against women’s ordination in the canons. Many observers concurred, saying the canons are silent except for the “he” pronoun, which could be interpreted generically.

(The normal requisites for regular ordination to the priesthood are as follows: The candidate must be at least 24 and serve as a deacon for one year, working on the staff of a church or church agency. He must be certified by his bishop and by his parish minister and vestry, then be recommended to the bishop by the Standing Committee of the diocese. Finally, there is the signed vow to obey the bishop.)

Lawyer Bou led Wendt through his background of work as a priest in the slums of New York and his involvement in the civil rights movement, including five arrests. Wendt was portrayed as one always out front fighting for the rights of dispossessed minorities. The decision to invite Mrs. Cheek to celebrate communion in November “was not taken flippantly,” said Wendt. There was a lot a prayer and a lot of consultation with many people, he said, with conscience being the final determinant.

Prosecutor Stirling recalled that Wendt had gone along with Bishop Creighton’s request to cancel a celebration by Mrs. Cheek in August. “Conscience persuaded you not to [let her] do it in August but persuaded you to [let her] do it in November?” “Yes,” replied Wendt softly. “Was the bishop acting in good conscience in making his decisions?” asked Stirling. “Certainly,” replied Wendt, launching into an attempt to explain why such dilemmas exist and how to cope with them. Some observers felt he was implying that bishops can act in good conscience but still be wrong because of their institutional trappings.

The trial ended much like it began, with Stirling objecting to all the “irrelevant” testimony on women’s ordination and asking the judges to rule strictly on the issue of disobedience. Stringfellow reiterated his points: Alison Cheek as a validly ordained priest had a right to celebrate the Eucharist, and Bill Wendt was justifiably bound by conscience to enable her to celebrate her priesthood.

A ruling by the judicial panel was expected within two or three weeks. A guilty verdict could bring Wendt censure or worse.

One of the important issues that surfaced in the trial was Congregationalism: To what degree can local churches order their own affairs? The high-church or Anglo-Catholic faction wants power concentrated at the top. The Wendt defense witnesses represent increasing numbers who have an opposite viewpoint, and it colors the way they see women’s ordination. Declares Bishop DeWitt, for example:

It needs to be said, clearly and strongly, that the place for the resolution of the ordination issue is wherever a congregation, or any comparable company of the faithful, desires the temporary or ongoing sacramental ministrations of a woman priest. The place is wherever a diocesan bishop who, with his Standing Committee, is convinced of the calling and qualifications of a woman deacon in his diocese, and proceeds to ordain her. And the time is now.

The Philadelphia Eleven have celebrated the Eucharist publicly in several cities (Rector L. Peter Beebe of an Oberlin, Ohio, church was scheduled to go on trial this month for action similar to Wendt’s), and other churches will probably invite them. “This is not a matter of schism or anarchy,” says DeWitt, “but the wide-scale expression of an emerging fact in the life of our church.”

As a sort of doxology, Bishop Creighton invited a woman priest to celebrate communion on May 4 at the Church of the Epiphany in Washington, D. C. She is Jane Hwang Hsien Yuen, 57, rector of the 2,000-member Holy Trinity Church in Kowloon, Hong Kong. In 1971 she and Joyce Bennett became the first women to be officially ordained to the full priesthood within the worldwide Anglican Communion. They were ordained by Anglican bishop Gilbert Baker of Hong Kong with the approval of their diocesan synod.

Miss Hwang is also the first woman priest officially to exercise priestly functions in an Episcopal church service in the United States, according to church sources.

This claim is disputed by Canon Charles H. Osborn, executive director of the American Church Union, a so-called high-church group. He says there is a question about the validity of these ordinations because they were not done with the approval of the church jurisdiction to which the Hong Kong diocese belongs.

The invitations to Miss Hwang are “additional coals heaped on the fire of divisiveness and unlawfulness,” says Osborn.

Miss Hwang doesn’t want to become entangled in the ordination controversy in America, but she says that “if women are not allowed equal positions with men, it means that a lot of persons have no opportunities to use their talents and to develop their potential fully in the fight against evil.”

ORDINATION VOW OF PRIESTHOOD

Q. Will you reverently obey your Bishop and other chief ministers, who, according to the Canons of the Church, may have the charge and government over you; following with a glad mind and will their godly admonitions, and submitting yourselves to their godly judgments?

A. I will so do, the Lord being my helper.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS

Convinced religious believers and convinced atheists have the least trouble in facing death, says psychiatrist Ivan K. Goldberg of the Columbia University medical school. “The people in the middle who can’t decide what they believe have the most difficulty,” he adds.

Goldberg believes terminally ill patients should be told by their doctors of approaching death. “There is evidence that patients who are told that they are dying are able to deal with the situation much better,” he says.

The basic approach for spiritual counselors, Goldberg points out, is to listen for clues of the patient’s awareness of his impending death (talk of not renewing a magazine subscription or seeing a wedding, for example). This usually indicates he is ready to talk about death. The counselor should show he is willing to listen (sitting relaxed by the side of the bed).

The process of dying, says Goldberg, involves the process of completing unfinished business and saying good-bye. Clearing up questions about the funeral and straightening out estrangements may be part of the unfinished business, he notes.

The Case Of The No-Show Bishop

One of the high-drama moments of the Wendt church trial (see preceding story) occurred on the final afternoon when the judges announced a citation of contempt against Episcopal Presiding Bishop John M. Allin. The court, at Stringfellow’s request, had issued a writ to Allin in early April ordering him to testify. Allin attempted to quash the subpoena on grounds he had no relevant evidence to give. Wendt and his lawyers insisted that Allin’s testimony regarding the bishops’ invalidation action was “absolutely essential.” On April 26 Allin announced, he was unable to accept the court’s “invitation” to testify because of prior commitments but would be happy to give testimony by deposition. The court replied sternly, pointing out the seriousness of the subpoena and Allin’s canonical obligations to show up. Allin again cited his prior commitments and failed to appear.

The contempt citation carries no power to impose penalties, but charges can be brought against Allin if signed by three bishops or at least “ten male communicants in good standing,” two of whom must be priests and seven of whom must reside in the diocese where the bishop lives. Allin lives in Greenwich, Connecticut, and at mid-month a group was gathering signatures for a formal complaint. The complaint would have to clear several formidable hurdles before leading to a trial. A guilty verdict could, as in the Wendt trial, result in anything from mild censure to defrocking.

Both Allin and his legal advisor, Hugh R. Jones, an associate justice of New York’s highest state court, replied to the contempt citation. They said Allin’s prior commitments included a commencement address in Canada, a visit there with Archbishop of Canterbury Donald Coggan, and a diocesan convention speaking engagement in Arizona. (Officials at the Wendt trial who were informed of Allin’s itinerary, however, say the citation was issued because Allin could have testified on the final morning and still fulfilled all his commitments.)

Jones argued that a diocesan ecclesiastical court could not compel the appearance of witnesses outside the diocese. Also, said he, the court had failed to give notice of intention to cite for contempt, thus depriving Allin of the opportunity to show cause why he should not be held in contempt.

The duty to testify at church trials, he said, “like other duties imposed on all of us, was necessarily relative rather than absolute.”

Wendt trial advisor Edmund Campbell disputed Jones’s contention that the court had no authority over witnesses outside the diocese. He quoted from the canons: “It is hereby declared to be the duty of all members of this church to attend and give evidence when duly cited in any ecclesiastical trial or investigation under the authorization of this church.”

Faults In The System

These are gloomy days for the 910,000-member Presbyterian Church in the U. S. (Southern). Wounds from the 1973 schism over doctrine, in which some 50,000 members left to form the Presbyterian Church in America, are slow in healing. An updated confession of faith, once scheduled for presentation to next month’s PCUS annual General Assembly, has encountered stiff opposition from conservatives who want some doctrines spelled out more specifically. The statement, now undergoing further revision, won’t be ready until next year at the earliest. In addition, recent restructure of the Atlanta-based denomination has resulted in management headaches and may be partly responsible for the latest PCUS woes.

Faced with a $2 million deficit, the seventy-two-member PCUS General Executive Board in a four-day meeting last month slashed salaries, personnel, and program activities. Salaries of both domestic and international staffers will be 5 per cent less for the rest of the year. The overseas mission force will be reduced by attrition from about 400 to 355 (sixty-five are expected to resign, retire, or complete their term; twenty missionaries will be appointed or reappointed). Sixteen domestic vacancies will not be filled, and ten staff employees will be laid off. In all, proposed expenditures of $9 million will be trimmed to $7.6 million.

Board spokesmen blame part of the financial crisis on accounting shortcomings. They claim they were not given proper reports in time to stop the overspending and to make other decisions. A fiscal report earlier this year indicated that denominational benevolence giving in 1974 was nearly 4 per cent higher than in 1973. Later computations, however, showed there had been a drop in giving instead.

The board voted 31–19 to adopt an Executive Committee recommendation to fire William F. Henning, Jr., as PCUS central treasurer and director of the Division of Central Support Services, one of five PCUS program divisions. “Areas of specific critical failure were found in relation to fiscal matters and in the delivery of necessary materials to the church,” explained the board.

Henning, 43, whose dismissal is effective in July, argued in vain that the system was at fault, with too much expected of his division. The division has oversight of PCUS finances and such major operations as John Knox Press, Presbyterian Survey, the denomination’s news service, the radio, television, and audio-visual offices, data processing, and the PCUS conference center in Montreat, North Carolina.

Some PCUS leaders reportedly feel Henning was made a scapegoat for the overspending of other agency heads. One high PCUS source insisted that Henning is a capable administrator but that his position constitutes “an impossible task.” Also, said he, the ouster is related “to some of the politics going on around here.” (Several of Henning’s fellow divisional heads expressed a lack of confidence in him at recent meetings.)

In another development, the board in February anounced the reelection of G. Thompson Brown as director of the Division of International Mission for a four-year term but announced a replacement would be sought for national mission head Evelyn L. Green—in effect firing her about three years short of retirement age. Arthur M. Field, Jr., a curriculum development executive, was selected to replace her on an interim basis, effective July 1. The PCUS Committee on Women’s Concerns this month went on record questioning the board’s action concerning Dr. Green, who has worked for the denomination for four decades.

A committee spokeswoman said the group is opposed not to the ouster of Dr. Green as such but to the evaluation process that led to the ouster. The forms used for evaluation, she said, are weighted toward a traditional male style of management and should be revised. The group, she added, is also distressed that a man has been appointed for the interim; this deprives women of representation on the PCUS six-member executive management team. Under the terms of restructure, one of the six is to be a woman, she points out.

EDWARD E. PLOWMAN

Kentucky Weekend

The following story is based on a report filed by correspondent Gregg A. Lewis.

Two big events took place in Kentucky on the first weekend in May. At the Kentucky Derby in Lexington, Foolish Pleasure was on everybody’s mind. But down around Wilmore, a little town less than twenty miles away, people were more intent on Simple Truth, Master Design, and New Directions. These were not horses but music groups on the program at Ichthus ’75, a Christian folk-rock festival sponsored by an Asbury Seminary student group.

In buses, cars, and campers they came, 12,000 young people and their leaders, from Florida, Wisconsin, New Jersey, Texas, Colorado, and most of the states in between. A tent city sprouted overnight at the Wilmore Camp Meeting Grounds on the edge of town, its population outnumbering the townspeople four to one.

Andrae Crouch and the Disciples, the Archers, and other musicians sang and played for fifteen hours. Inter-Varsity’s Paul Little spoke. Debbie Dortzbach, the missionary nurse to Ethiopia who was kidnapped last year by Eritrean rebels, told of her experiences as a hostage. There were seminars on spiritual growth and leadership, small-group Bible-study sessions, a session by Little for 200 youth sponsors, and opportunities to speak privately with roving counselors (120 in all). The counselors reported that they interviewed nearly 1,000 persons and that many of these made first-time professions of faith in Christ.

Ichthus, the sixth such annual festival at Wilmore, had evangelism and deeper Christian commitment as its twofold purpose. That has been the case each year from its beginning in 1970, when fewer than 1,000 attended. The crowds have gotten bigger each time. Preparations for the festival took almost a year, according to general chairman William Sommerville. More than 600 Asbury college and seminary student volunteers helped out, he said. Proceeds are to be channeled into special student-selected service projects, the largest chunk earmarked for the world hunger fund sponsored by the college and seminary.

Some of the townspeople seemed a little nervous over the huge influx of outsiders; others—including Mayor Joseph Thacker—threw out the welcome mat. “I’m thrilled by the potential this group can have for Jesus Christ,” said Thacker. Several residents were pleased at the upturn in customers at yard and sidewalk sales. The Ichthus security force of 200 student volunteers assisted local and state police in handling traffic and in general kept things running smoothly.

Rain fell intermittently on Saturday but failed to douse the joy and enthusiasm of the thousands who huddled beneath plastic sheets and umbrellas on the blanket-covered hillside.

“This weekend gave us a unity and a spirit like we’ve never had before,” beamed Associate Pastor John R. Smith of Peace Temple in Benton Harbor, Michigan, organizer of the largest single group to attend Ichthus (an eleven-vehicle caravan of 253 people).

“One of the boys who came with our group of twenty-five became a Christian this weekend,” said Pastor Charles Shaw of an inner-city church in Atlanta. “I think Ichthus will have a lasting, positive impact on the youth of our church,” he added.

Back on the highways heading home the people from Ichthus mingled with Derby stragglers whose minds were still on Foolish Pleasure.

HIGH HONOR

The Country Club Christian Church of Kansas City named one of its members, FBI director Clarence M. Kelley, a life elder, the highest honor bestowed by the congregation. In the Sunday-morning presentation service Kelley said everybody was so nice “I almost am tempted to tear up all the files I have on you.”

Switching to a serious note, Kelley said faith and the church had made “a very decided impact on me in my profession, on how I carry out my responsibilities, on the way I make decisions.” Spiritual faith, he asserted, can help public officials face the responsibilities and criticisms associated with their work.

Paul’S Most Personal Letter

A Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, by C. K. Barrett (Harper & Row, 1973, 354 pp., $8.95), is reviewed by Philip E. Hughes, visiting professor of New Testament, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Of the several volumes of Harper’s (Black’s in Britain) New Testament commentaries that have appeared so far, C. K. Barrett has written three—Romans, First Corinthians, and now Second Corinthians. These were preceded by the publication (in 1955) of his large commentary on John’s Gospel. This harvest of his submission to what he calls “the discipline of exegesis” has not only enhanced his high reputation as a scholar but also eased the way for many less well equipped students of the sacred text. This new volume; like its predecessors, is founded on an, impressive knowledge of contemporary literature and research and is distinguished by clarity of perception and economy of language.

Second Corinthians has suffered more than any of the other New Testament epistles at the hand of modern scholars. Some have cut it into pieces and then have rearranged the pieces. It is pleasing to find Barrett taking his stand with those who maintain the unity and integrity of the epistle—or nearly so, for he does suggest that there was a slight interval between the writing of the first nine and the last four chapters.

Barrett observes that Paul never wrote a more personal or more theological letter. His reconstruction of the situation that called forth the writing of this letter follows a pattern that is widely accepted today: Paul had paid an intermediate visit to Corinth, had been grossly insulted by a particular person without the intervention of the believers there, had departed without taking disciplinary action, had abandoned his intention of paying Corinth a second visit on this journey, and had subsequently written an intermediate severe letter (“intermediate” means here intermediate between the writing of our two canonical epistles to the Corinthians).

Far simpler and fully satisfactory is the solid tradition of the Church until comparatively recent times, in accordance with which Second Corinthians is explained in terms of the epistle of First Corinthians.

The purpose of Second Corinthians is to affirm the authenticity of Paul’s apostleship over against the claims of the “false apostles” who have invaded the Corinthian church—not for his own sake but for the sake of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which he preached there, and the authenticity of which is undermined if his own trustworthiness is discredited. “The apostle’s legitimacy,” Barrett writes, “appears not in the power of his personality, not in his spiritual experiences, not in his commissioning by the right ecclesiastical authorities, but only in the extent to which his life and preaching represent the crucified Christ.”

It is important to appreciate, as Barrett points out, that “no denial of a valid doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture is involved in the recognition that Paul’s theology evolved in concrete situations under the stimulus of events and especially of controversy.” Unconvinced though we are by Barrett’s hypothesis concerning the occasion of Second Corinthians, it should not be thought that he overlooks the importance of First Corinthians as evidence contributing to our overall understanding of the Corinthian situation; for he perceptively affirms that “it is Christology that binds together the two epistles and gives unity to their very miscellaneous contents,” and, moreover, that “Paul’s apostolic behaviour is a reflection of his Christology.”

In connection with the contrast between “letter” and “Spirit” in 3:6, Barrett rightly explains that “it was certainly not Paul’s intention to suggest that the Old Testament law was merely a human instrument; it was, on the contrary, spiritual, inspired by the Spirit of God (Rom. 7:14).” The context makes this perfectly plain; yet this continues to be one of the most misunderstood and perversely misinterpreted texts in the New Testament.

Paul’s distinction between the “outward man” and the “inward man” in 4:6 does not imply that he was under the influence of Greek dualistic philosophy. Barrett comments:

That Paul is using language that would be familiar in his non-Christian, and non-Jewish, environment is certain, but he supplies it with his own, Christian, meaning, which can only be ascertained if the whole range of expressions (not only outward and inward man but also old and new man—note renewed in this verse) is taken into account.… Inward and outward man are not the elements of a psychological dualism … but refer to the man of this age and the man of the age to come [p. 146].

Similarly, with Paul’s use of the term “naked” in 5:3, “though he uses in this context a quantity of Hellenistic language, he does not use it in its normal Hellenistic sense.” Unlike Philo, who “shared the Greek view of the nakedness of the soul as a desirable thing,” in Paul’s view “nakedness”—that is, a state (in the context, between death and the Lord’s coming) in which the soul is deprived of the body—“was to be abhorred and if possible avoided”; and it is “precisely bodilessness that makes this period of waiting undesirable in Paul’s eyes.” But how can Barrett suggest that “we must probably conclude that Paul had not yet fully integrated his eschatological program with his conviction that God was Lord over life and death alike and that those who were in Christ could not be separated from him,” when in verse 8 of this same passage Paul asserts that to be “away from the body” is to be “at home with the Lord”?

The menace to the Gospel and to the practice of authentic Christianity posed by false apostles is attested not only here and elsewhere in the New Testament and also in the annals of the post-apostolic Church, for, as Barrett insists,” that “the theologia gloriae they represent is a permanent threat to Christianity is written on every page of church history and is in itself a sufficient reason for the continued study of Second Corinthians.” Sage counsel indeed: let us act upon it!

Required Reading

The Clash Between Christianity and Cultures, by Donald McGavran (Canon, 1975, 84 pp., $1.75 pb), is reviewed by Raymond B. Buker, professor emeritus of missions, Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary, Denver, Colorado.

Fifteen years on a mission field where I was exposed to at least five major cultures and four other religions prepared me for this book. As I studied anthropology in its cross-cultural aspects and religions historically and existentially, I increasingly felt the need of a definitive statement on the uniqueness of Christ and the superiority of his way to all others in all situations. Despite the short length of McGavran’s latest book, it quite adequately fills that need.

Chapter one sets the problem: “Is it many ways or ‘one way’?” Cultures are many and rich, each with its values. We must approach them with neutrality, yet recognize the differences between learning, education, knowledge, and cultural mores. Humanism accepts the relative values of religion as equal in substance to the conclusion that all religions are equal. Cultural imperialism leading to religious imperialism is not to be accepted. When general revelation is rejected and the dictates of conscience are violated, then the only sure knowledge of God is his Word. The Word “asserts that God set forth the one way of salvation, the one path for men to walk in, the one pattern of righteousness pleasing to the eternal God, the one church, the one faith, the one baptism, the one sure knowledge about God.” The externals in the various cultures are unalike, but the essentials—the morals—are alike.

McGavran poses such questions as, Does Christianity change cultures? When Christianity and culture clash, which one gives way? The next four chapters are given to answering these questions.

Chapter two shows how attempts at a truce between cultures are valid to a certain extent but never to the modification of Christianity as revealed in God’s Word.

Chapter three clarifies the issues by dividing Christianity into four aspects. The first relates to its beliefs and is unchangeable from its biblical base. The other three aspects—the values or ethics, the customs of church ways, and the local habitat—are adjustable.

In his last two chapters McGavran deals with three proposals for resolving the clash between Christianity and culture. The first proposal assumes the necessity of a high view of Scripture and its inspiration. The low view of Scripture resolves nothing; it only compounds the clash. The high view alone guarantees the correct evaluation of culture. The last two proposals hold for a high view of cultures with latitude for differences of opinion but always with the guiding principle of God’s Word as the ultimate truth and guide.

This book is a brief presentation of a very important subject. From a background of twenty-two years in missionary administration and teaching, I heartily recommend that every missionary and missionary candidate read it.

BRIEFLY NOTED

Perfect Love and War, edited by Paul Hostetler (Evangel Press, 170 pp., $2.50 pb). Papers and responses to them presented by leaders who are in the Holiness movement and/or historic Peace Churches. A very helpful addition to the growing body of evangelical literature on social concerns.

The Practice of Death, by Eike-Henner Kluge (Yale, 250 pp., $10), Living With Dying, by Glen Davidson (Augsburg, 111 pp., $2.95 pb), A Boy Thirteen: Reflections on Death, by Jerry Irish (Westminster, 62 pp., $3.95), Helping a Child Understand Death, by Linda Vogel (Fortress, 86 pp., $2.95 pb), Fear Not: A Christian View of Death, by Manford Gutzke (Baker, 96 pp., $1.25 pb), God, Grass, and Grace: A Theology of Death, by Ronald Starenko (Concordia, 80 pp., $2.50 pb), and Preaching About Death, edited by Alton Motter (Fortress, 86 pp., $2.95 pb). Death has become in recent years one of the more popular topics to write about. Kluge, presenting a non-Christian philosophical approach, should interest many believers because his conclusions stress a return to “morality.” Davidson’s convictions on the morality of taking life are supposedly religious (he begins each chapter with Scripture), but his evaluations of terminal patients’ responses to death are more in line with a secular position. Irish, a religious-studies professor at Stanford, wrestles with the fact of his son’s death and attempts to find some meaning in it. Vogel grapples admirably with the various stages and approaches children take in learning of death; she offers some good suggestions for helping them learn. The last three books are theological examinations of death. Gutzke presents a study of various biblical doctrines concerning the sinfulness of man and Christ’s atonement as a prelude to a Christian view of death. Starenko presents death as a personal encounter with God, tracing this through history and philosophy. Motter offers eighteen sermons from Protestant, Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox pulpits, each stressing the hope of the resurrection.

Freedom Under Siege, by Madalyn Murray O’Hair (Tarcher, 278 pp., $8.95). See for yourself what America’s best-known atheist has to say. She ranges far and wide, with scarcely a kind word for her foe, and especially denounces tax privileges that religious bodies have (as do many other kinds of organizations, including her own). Most religious leaders probably wish they were in fact as influential as Ms. O’Hair alleges!

Discovering the Biblical World, by Harry T. Frank (Harper & Row, 288 pp., $16.95). Archaeological findings in the Holy Land, presented with colorful photos and maps, make more vivid the history of God’s chosen people from Abraham to the destruction of Jerusalem. A basically conservative, very readable narrative accompanies the visual aids.

A Complete Guide to the Christian’s Budget, by Michael Speer (Broadman, 170 pp., np., pb). A balanced and practical guide that combines biblical teaching with good management sense. Emphasizes Christ’s Lordship over all areas of life. Highly recommended.

The Foolishness of God, by John Baker (John Knox, 409 pp., $9.95). So much dross is mixed with some helpful insights that we cannot recommend this popularly written overview of doctrine.

The Lunn Log, compiled by the M. Lunn family (Beacon Hill, 303 pp., $2.95 pb). More than 1,500 pithy quotes in scores of categories from “abiding” to “zeal.”

Process and Permanence in Ethics: Max Scheler’s Moral Philosophy, by Alfrons Deekens (Paulist, 282 pp., $5.95 pb). For the philosophy student. Includes extensive bibliography.

Theology and Christian Ethics, by James M. Gustafson (Pilgrim, 315 pp., $8.95). Gustafson applies his theological ethics to social and moral life and to scientific fields. Technical in spots.

A Return to Christian Culture, by Richard Taylor (Bethany Fellowship, 95 pp., $1.25 pb). The author contends that Christians need to become more aesthetically and intellectually aware. “How” is less discussed than “why.” Curiously, his style often violates his own standards.

The Art of Christian Promotion, by Paul Moore (Revell, 127 pp., $4.95). Christians should apply certain “Madison Avenue” techniques in presenting the Gospel, according to this Nazarene pastor. Some forty fairly obvious principles (such as “go where the people are”) are fleshed out with his and others’ experiences. Worth dipping into.

Gods of Goodness, by Bruce Blackie (Westminster, 170 pp., $5.95). The pastor of First Presbyterian, Akron, reveals numerous subtle idolatries of the mainline denominations, such as prestige and power. Concludes with a brief appeal to return to the Bible. Evangelicals are not immune to many of these temptations.

Philosophical Essays, by Hans Jonas (Prentice Hall, 348 pp., n.p.). Eighteen previously published essays, mostly on Jewish or Christian thinkers such as Spinoza, Origen, Paul, the Gnostics.

The Wonders of Creation, by Alfred Rehwinkel (Bethany Fellowship, 288 pp., $3.95 pb). Staunch defense of the view that the world was created in six twenty-four hour days a few thousand years ago.

Confusion and Hope: Clergy, Laity and the Church in Transition, edited by Glenn Richard Bucher and Patricia Ruth Hill (Fortress, 128 pp., $3.50 pb). Eight essays by various authors on American Christianity from an ecumenical perspective.

Speaking of God Today, edited by Paul Opsahl and Marc Tanenbaum (Fortress, 187 pp., $6.95). A dozen essays by scholars from various branches of Judaism and American Lutheranism on law, grace, election, the state, and pluralism.

Journey With David Brainerd, by Richard Hasler (InterVarsity, 120 pp., $2.50 pb). Excerpts from the diary of the young eighteenth-century missionary to the American Indians stressing the importance of a committed devotional life. The full-length diary had great influence. This book can whet the appetite.

How to Manipulate Your Mate, by John W. Drakeford (Nelson, 166 pp., $2.95 pb). A psychology professor at Southwestern Baptist Seminary writes a book on personal change that is much better than its title.

The Love Formula, by Richard Andersen (Concordia, 163 pp., $2.50 pb). Philosophy and application of forgiveness of others and of yourself. Practical and simply phrased.

The Apostles, by Donald Guthrie (Zondervan, 422 pp., $8.95). A companion to his earlier book, Jesus the Messiah, this should be especially helpful to beginning Bible students. Traces the lives of Jesus’ followers correlating Acts with the epistles. Paul naturally has the leading role.

The Bible and Civilization, by Gabriel Sivan (Quadrangle, 524 pp., $15). The impact of what Christians call the Old Testament on moral, social, and artistic development is examined in this latest contribution to the “Library of Jewish Knowledge.” Insightful.

Once a Carpenter, by Bill Counts (Harvest House, 254 pp., n.p., pb). A Bible believer makes full use of his imagination to expand on the settings and to speculate on the feelings, attitudes, and the like of people involved in numerous encounters with our Lord throughout his earthly ministry.

A Light Unto My Path, edited by Howard Bream, Ralph Heim, and Carey Moore (Temple University, 529 pp., $15). Thirty-three scholarly essays on various Old Testament topics (e.g., ecology, Second Samuel 7, the life of Joel) in honor of Jacob Myers of Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary.

Powell: In Pursuit Of Paradox

No Easy Answers, by Enoch Powell (Seabury, 1974, 135 pp., $6.95), is reviewed by J. D. Douglas, editor-at-large, CHRISTIANITY TODAY.

Enoch Powell is an erstwhile brigadier general, professor of Greek, and British minister of health. He fell out with the Conservative establishment because he opposed its immigration policies and (later) its plans to enter the European Economic Community. As a latter-day Ulster Unionist he now represents a constituency in that troubled province.

As a young man, Powell tells us, he was convinced that textual criticism, history, and the psychology of religion had made “a clean sweep” of the gospel narratives. Twenty years and a world war were to pass before he perceived that “the assertions which the Church was making were not vulnerable to the weapons with which I had thought them demolished.” Not mystical experience, then, but that intellectual analysis so characteristic of the man made him embark on “the endless journey of exploration of the meaning and content of the Mass” as found in the higher reaches of Anglicanism.

These chapters, taken from public utterances on diverse occasions, are about his private beliefs, his public life, and how the two are connected. His biblical references are prominently listed as an appendix: five from the Old Testament, sixty-six from the New. His out-look is highly individualistic and totally bewildering. With original sin, the resurrecton of the body, and the eternal lostness of the unbelieving he has no difficulty. The “hard sayings” of Jesus he finds fascinating and on the whole acceptable.

Let no one be misled by this. Powell is uneasy about the Good Samaritan story; the identity of his neighbor is not all that simple. And Abraham was “only partially right” in his handling of the Dives and Lazarus affair. Moreover, the appearance of the word stauros, “cross,” in Matthew 16:24 Powell bluntly dismisses as “grotesque”; it should have been rhabdos, “staff” (cf. Mark 6:8). So much for our translations ancient and modern.

There are lively chapters on dialogues with Malcolm Muggeridge and, a more formidable adversary, antiapartheid champion Trevor Huddleston. Driven finally to defining his terms on racial equality, Powell denies the superiority of one race over another but seems to approve of “separation,” and affirms also that “in many contexts … one person is inferior in quality to another.”

Two impressions remain from a reading of Powell. First, controversy and publicity are meat and drink to him. He invites us to dislike him, and would crumble under compliments. He loves predicaments and would compass a continent in pursuit of a paradox.

Second, here is a man who sees no neat distinction between religious and civic duty, a position for which a good case could be made. The danger comes when such a man speaks with all the authority of a professional politician words that come from an amateur theologian. To decide what precisely pertains to Caesar and what to God is not easy for the Christian politician who is further inhibited by partisan loyalties, but there is at least an obligation to give Caesar no more than his due—and to subdue personal prejudices. The reader who pays more than a nickel a page for this book might wish that the questions to which Mr. Powell has no easy answers had been raised in a less disagreeable way.

Pascal Intriguing But Incomplete

Blaise Pascal: The Genius of His Thought, by Roger Hazelton (Westminster, 1974, 217 pp., $7.50), is reviewed by Charles MacKenzie, president Grove City College, Grove City, Pennsylvania.

The presence of genius in a human life always intrigues and astonishes us.” With these words Roger Hazelton, the distinguished Abbot Professor of Christian Theology at Andover Newton Theological School, begins what he hopes will be “a useful, reliable introduction to what may be called the genius of Pascal’s thought.” In six well written and interesting chapters he discusses Pascal the individual, the scientist, the humanist, the believer, the artist, and the philosopher. His thesis is that the theme of “man in relation to the infinite” unifies Pascal’s thought. The relation between infinity and humanity, he states, is the subject of the book.

Hazelton has for years studied Pascal and the vast literature about him, and he gives brief but excellent descriptions of Pascal’s key concepts. The three orders—the heart, faith, and reasons—are skillfully elaborated. Hazelton’s rich understanding of the history of ideas enables him to relate the thinking of Pascal to their historical stream of thought. For example, he compares Pascal as a creative social thinker to Plato, Hobbes, Machiavelli, Rousseau, Montesquieu, and Aquinas.

He does not hesitate to criticize. For example, he finds Pascal’s thought about human society “lacking in profundity. His categories are too few and narrow to probe the depths of social experience and his mind seems to be made up in advance on many of the most important issues.” Yet he appreciates the genius of Pascal and views him as a universal man, relevant to all ages.

His first chapter is a fine sketch of Pascal’s life. The chapter might have been strengthened had Hazelton recognized, at least in footnotes, some of the lingering historical questions (i.e., Pascal’s relationship with Charlotte Roannez, and his purported death-bed renunciation of Jansenism). Throughout the volume Hazelton seems either to avoid a number of these historical questions or to take a position without sufficient explanation.

My major criticism, however, is that he does not do full justice to his announced subject: Pascal’s understanding of man’s relation to the infinite. In his chapter on Pascal as scientist, Hazelton shows great discernment when he says, “One might wish, indeed, that he himself had explored more thoroughly the points of connection he intuited between the problem of mathematical infinity and the theological dimension of transcendence.” Hazelton, quite properly, sees “the Wager” as an attempt by Pascal to express an intrinsic connection between the two. Yet, having touched on this important note, Hazelton does not develop and interpret it. Pascal’s mathematical awareness of the infinite encouraged him to view the universe in its unity and wholeness. It whetted his appetite for the transcendent. The point merits fuller development than Hazelton gives it.

In his chapter on Pascal the humanist, Hazelton deals with Pascal’s words, “For what is man in nature? A nothing, compared with the Infinite; an all compared with the nothing.” Here he aptly elaborates on Pascal’s understanding of man suspended between the infinitely great and the infinitely small. For Pascal, the universe mirrored man’s contradictions and brought him to the realization that “man is not made but for infinity.”

As Hazelton probes Pascal’s understanding of man, he describes man’s predicament not only as he faces the physical universe but also as he is confronted by the moral plane of existence. Imagination, custom, and self-love deceive man. At this point, Hazelton does not follow Pascal in tracing man’s misery and blindness to their source in man’s sin. To Pascal, the sin of man, his distorted self-love, his proclivity to play god, are barriers separating man from the infinite. Yet Hazelton, strangely enough, does not relate the miseries of man to the sin that has alienated him from the infinite.

When Hazelton deals with Pascal as a believer, again he neglects Pascal’s consciousness of sin. In dealing with Pascal’s treatment of “the hidden God,” he has the chance to elaborate on Pascal’s thought that man’s sin, self-love, and pretensions to be God blind him to the truth of God. But he lets it pass with the observation that “God’s hiddenness … is also secondarily due to man’s contrary mindedness.” Hazelton mentions Pascal’s view of sin when he discusses grace, but even then he does not acknowledge Pascal’s teaching on the nature of sin, the effects of sin on the thought processes of man, or sin as a barrier between man and the infinite.

Another deficiency in an otherwise creditable chapter on Pascal as a believer is Hazelton’s neglect of Pascal’s view of the Bible and the Church. Pascal drew much strength, wisdom, and inspiration from the Bible, which he accepted as the unique, inspired, authoritative Word of the infinite God. Yet Hazelton gives little hint of this. Pascal also had deep convictions about the Church. Hazelton mentions those Gallican tendencies that led Pascal to see the authority of church councils as superior to the authority of the pope. But he shows little awareness that Pascal found fulfillment for his essential selfhood in the Body of Christ. Hazelton says, “One wishes that Pascal had distinguished sick self-love or amour propre from the healthy amour de soi … but he did not.” But he did! Pascal saw the Body of Christ as that fellowship which purifies one’s self-love and transforms amour propre into a healthy amour de soi: “By loving the body it loves itself because it has no being except through and for the sake of the body.… We love ourselves because we are members of Jesus Christ” (Pensée 688).

In dealing with Pascal the artist, Hazelton skillfully analyzes both Pascal’s art of persuading and the artistry he displayed in the “Provincial Letters” and the “Pensées.” When he deals with Pascal’s sources and models, he has an opportunity to analyze Pascal’s estimate of the Bible as a revelation of the infinite to man. But he does not do so. And so this chapter, though well done and informative, contributes little to Hazelton’s chosen thesis—man’s relation to the infinite.

Turning to Pascal as a philosopher, Hazelton aptly distinguishes Pascal from Descartes. He summarizes what he believes to be Pascal’s epistemology. And he accurately describes the dialectical and existential nature of Pascal’s thought. With great insight he speaks of Pascal’s “pensée de derriére la tête,” a type of presupposition underlying all Pascal’s thinking. The closest, however, that Hazelton comes to defining that “pensée de derriére” is an “idea of the whole.” He does not recognize that the infinite, the God of biblical revelation, is the basic presupposition of Pascal’s mature thought.

Consequently Hazelton makes the very unpascalian statement that faith for Pascal “remains an uncertain certitude.” He says, “If we miss in Pascal the decisive flourish, the conclusive word regarding truth, it may at least be argued that this lack represents an openness to truth on his part which cannot be found in those philosophies which claim to have defined it.” Such statements may have been true of the early Pascal but certainly are not characteristic of the mature man. Again, when Hazelton declares that “Pascal was not among those Christian thinkers who claim that Christianity is inherently superior to all other religions” he shortchanges Pascal, who was certain that Christ was the ultimate and absolute revelation of the infinite even though He cannot be completely identified with or separated from Christianity in general and the Church in particular.

Roger Hazelton’s book is an intriguing interpretation of one of the great geniuses of history. It contains a host of valuable insights, and as an “introduction to … the genius of Pascal’s thought” it is eminently useful. It could have become a high-water mark in Pascalian research if the author had really described the fullness of Pascal’s mature thought on man’s relation to the infinite.

However, this stated theme tends to get lost in the book. Much that Pascal said on the subject is neglected or is passed over lightly. The author fails to deal with Pascal’s understanding of the infinite in the finite, a presence that confronted Pascal in the contradictions of philosophy and the silent mysteries of science. He fails above all to describe the fullness of the revelation of the infinite, a revelation made throughout thousands of years of Jewish-Christian history, supremely given in the historical Jesus, and continuously offered to mankind through the Bible and the Church. Helpful and valuable as this book is, it gives us only a partial view of Pascal and of his understanding of man’s relation to the infinite.