I am writing this in Florida, looking out a window at the Gulf of Mexico. The warm, sunny weather is a welcome change from the cold and rain of March in Washington, and the respite has given me time to revise and nearly complete a book manuscript that I may entitle The World, the Flesh, and the Devil. It deals with worldliness—what it is, how to overcome it. It starts at the Garden of Eden and ends up in the new Jerusalem, the city of God. But enough of that.

This issue contains two articles evaluating the recent Bangkok missionary meetings of the World Council of Churches. The central issue, one that has plagued the Church for a generation, is that of the mission of the Church. It is possible to define the Church’s mission biblically and definitively without fulfilling that mission. It is also possible for the Church to make clear what its understanding of its mission is not in words but in activities and programs. Every reader whose denomination is related to the WCC will be interested in these analyses. Both will be included in a forthcoming collection of articles called The Evangelical Response to Bangkok, edited by Ralph D. Winter. The book will be available around mid-April from the publisher, William Carey Library (533 Hermosa Street, South Pasadena, California 91030), for $1.45.

Of anglicans can be said what Longfellow wrote of a certain little girl: when they are good they are very, very good (the Book of Common Prayer, Bishop Butler, Charles Williams, C. S. Lewis, John Stott), and when they are bad they are horrid (the Cambridge radicals, Bishop Robinson, Bishop Pike, Joseph Fletcher, Thomas Altizer). It was therefore with ambivalent feelings that I attended the recent Inaugural Symposium at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, honoring the seminary’s new president and dean, Armen Jorjorian, known in Episcopal circles for a creative institutional-chaplaincy program in Texas. The Right Reverend John E. Hines was on hand to preach, while “futurologist” Robert Theobald served as main speaker.

To everyone’s surprise, Theobald appeared not in person but on videotape from Arizona to deliver his keynote address (and the moderator brought the house down by noting that this was being done “the Anglican way—via media”). Following the taped address, discussion groups met to pose questions to Theobald, and he answered them over a conference telephone circuit.

Theobald set forth his own approach ot the future against the background of three other current views with which he strongly disagrees. First, there is the “positive extrapolist,” such as Daniel Bell (Work and Its Discontents) who sees the future as a linear, positive extension and expansion of the present. This approach naïvely accepts a pro-Western doctrine of the inevitable progress of present technological society. In reaction, one encounters the “negative extrapolists” (the SDS mentality) who agree with the positive extrapolists that the future will consist of a larger-than-life present, but believe this will be an inferno, not a paradiso. Face to face with this overwhelming technological cacatopia, some opt out: the third futurology, an “intra-worldly mysticism” classically expressed by Charles Reich in The Greening of America, proclaims the gospel of “do your own thing” and expects some extraordinary mechanism to set things right.

For Theobald, a socio-economist by training, these three models of the future are hopelessly simplistic and fatalistic. A strong fan of science fiction, he shares its perspective of an open future, capable of multifaceted development.

As his views are set forth in his recent work An Alternative Future for America II and his anthology Futures Conditional, Theobald holds that we are entering a world where the goal-oriented Protestant work ethic is being replaced by a “process-orientation.” No absolute and inevitable goals force mankind into Skinner boxes. Maslow’s self-actualization thesis is correct: we can and must “invent the future.”

According to Theobald, the answer to the future is not destructive revolution but constructive evolution, through such changes as the guaranteed income, the blending of work and leisure, the creation of larger social units than the “nuclear family,” and the development of new dwelling patterns suitable for these units (such as modifications of the Navajo “hogan”). We must take the Whole Earth Catalog seriously when it says: “We are gods and we might as well get good at it.”

The discussion after the lecture predictably elicited a variety of reactions to Theobald’s model of the future. Old Testament scholar Harvey Guthrie solemnly asserted that it is legitimate biblically to say “we are gods” (Ps. 82): “the image of God is a role thing.” “But how about humility?” a member of the audience asked. This gave Theobald a chance to expand on his theology:

My view of human nature is Chardin’s: as man conceives the future so he will become. I don’t know the distinction between God and man any more. Where two or three are gathered in the name of cooperation, God is there. We must be humbler gods.

Thomas Altizer said he was “much disturbed” by Theobald’s views. Theobald offers a “new gnosticism,” he said, particularly reprehensible because it rejects revolution: “We must have revolution, for the Christian can only choose death, not life.” Altizer rang the changes on his ninetenth-century revolutionary view of religion, setting it forth in even more radical terms than he did during the death-of-God controversy in his book The Descent Into Hell. Only by Hegelian dialectic process and Nietzschean eternal recurrence can we “arrive at a new, revolutionary view of consciousness.”

The only put-down to the diffuse theologizing of Altizer and of Theobald came—of all places—from the University of Chicago Divinity School’s Don Browning. Concerning Altizer:

Don’t take him too seriously. The church must not make his mistake of using terms loosely or in the next ten to fifteen years we will lose even more of our credibility.

Of Theobald:

It is good that he rejects the ecological mysticism our church people are falling into, but while we are trying to dig ourselves out of a mastery of life motif, he challenges us to develop new models of mastery. Religion for him is a vast control device. He may be a good Jew and a good Greek, but he is not a very good Christian.

A small black woman in the audience added the only other word of gospel to appear in the entire session: “You must be born again and not try to do it all yourself.” I heard her mutter to herself on the way out: “I can’t stand any more of this; I’m going home.”

Let us hope that she is not one of the last true Episcopalians. Seabury-Western had ninety theological students ten years ago; today it has sixty—and this decline is reflected throughout the Episcopal seminaries of America. That once noble church has so weakened that it could not even discipline Bishop Pike, who denied the incarnation and the Trinity; a death-of-God theologian is still considered one of its luminaries; and it can hold a symposium on the future without once mentioning the return of our Lord Jesus Christ to judge the quick and the dead. The Episcopal liturgies remain magnificent, but, to use Pike’s famous line, they are sung, not said—regarded aesthetically rather than as affirmations of factual truth.

During the inauguration of Seabury-Western’s president, the new incumbent was presented with a Bible and exhorted: “Be among us as one who proclaims the word.” The New Testament lesson was Second Timothy 3:14–4:5: “The Scriptures are able to make you wise unto salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.… Preach the word.… The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.… They shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned to myths.” Is anybody listening? The future depends on it.

The Battle For Africa’S Mind

A Nigerian doctoral candidate at Dallas Theological Seminary, Byang H. Kato, was elected as the first African general secretary of the Association of Evangelicals of Africa and Madagascar (AEAM) at its General Assembly in Limuru, Kenya, last month. Altogether, 143 delegates attended, representing sixty-six churches and missions in twenty-seven nations from Egypt to Madagascar and Senegal to Tanzania. It was the second triennial assembly since AEAM’s founding in 1966.

“The spiritual battle for Africa this decade will be largely fought on theological grounds,” said Kato. “I have personally been challenged by the fact that most theological writing by African authors, at a scholastic level, is by liberals or those sympathetic to liberal theology.” He warned that New Testament Christianity in Africa is threatened by theological and biblical ignorance. “Christians in North America and other countries should be alerted to the dangers facing the tremendous work they have built in Africa over the years,” he said. Kato is a graduate of both the Sudan Interior Mission’s seminary in Nigeria and London Bible College, and was formerly general secretary of the SIM-related Evangelical Churches of West Africa.

Delegates rejected the popular cry among ecumenical churches for an “African Theology” and stressed the need for a biblical theology expressed in the context of African culture. They set up a theological commission and charged it with seeking accreditation for Bible colleges and seminaries, coordinating news and information, and upgrading theological training. Establishment of a post-graduate course for all of Africa along the lines of Yeotmal Seminary in India was also proposed. A newly organized Christian education commission plans to set up a research center to help make teaching in the churches relevant to local needs and to encourage better leadership training.

The need for money was the subject of considerable discussion in view of the new commissions and other developments. AEAM president Samuel O. Odunaike declared:

The Church in Africa must bear responsibility and not depend on missions all the time. We are thankful when missions can help, but let us not say we cannot do anything unless missions help. Africa is not a continent of beggars.

And as for theological awareness:

Some have ridiculed us by saying we have no mind of our own or that we are not truly African. They do not think we can see the dangers of liberal theology ourselves and make our own decisions. Let us not be swayed by these accusations. We must be tactful and patient, but let us not be afraid to take a stand and declare our faith.

Far from feeling that the day of missions is over, some delegates chided mission agencies for an apparent withdrawal from the work. Mission leaders explained that they are not withdrawing but are stepping into the background as national leadership emerges. The delegates went on to endorse this as a wise policy in the light of national development. An American observer said the assembly was proof of the strength of the national leadership in some countries, particularly Nigeria, home of both Kato and Odunaike. (AEAM is comparable to the World Evangelical Fellowship; it is composed of national fellowships across Africa.)

While the delegates took note of the suffering in Africa, including Burundi, and the relief work being done following peace in Southern Sudan, they expressed the feeling that social action is a human concern, not an exclusively Christian concern. Therefore, they cautioned, while Christians as individuals should help overcome society’s ills, the Church itself should not become involved in political action. “The danger is that either the Church becomes an arm of the government, as in some countries now, or the government becomes an arm of the Church, as in medieval Europe,” stated Gottfried Osei-Mensah, a Ghanaian who is pastor of the Nairobi Baptist Church.

If Africa becomes a theological battleground, AEAM will, it appears, be in the thick of the conflict.

W. HAROLD FULLER

‘Civil Religion’: An Uncivil Challenge?

Madalyn O’Hair, the atheist whose suit brought about the Supreme Court’s ban on public school devotional exercises, is going after even bigger game. She filed suit in federal court in Washington, D. C., last month against President Nixon, the treasurer of the United States, the Senate and House chaplains, and other congressional officials for allowing religious services in the White House and the Capitol. She accused the President of being the “central figure” in an effort to “make Christianity the official ‘civil religion’ of the United States.”

Mrs. O’Hair wants the courts to rule unconstitutional an assortment of religious practices because they “interfere with the free exercise of religion on her part as a federal taxpayer, and … all federal taxpayers.… and … contribute to an establishment of religion” contrary to the First Amendment. She acted as her own attorney in initiating the litigation.

Southern Presbyterians: The Deepening Rift

Southern Presbyterian moderator L. Nelson Bell is appealing for reconciliation following significant new separatist moves in his denomination.

“It is my sincere hope and prayer,” Bell said, “that those who have already left the church may be led to reconsider their action. And I hope with equal fervor that those who shared in making them feel such action was necessary will realize that we together have a share in the privileges and responsibilities of our church and that loyalty to her historical position is to be commended, not denounced.”

Twenty churches and five ministers in western Alabama severed ties with the denomination last month and banded together in a newly organized, independent Warrior Presbytery.

A few days later, the Steering Committee for a Continuing Presbyterian Church announced plans to hold a constituting convention later this year for a separate denomination “loyal to the Scriptures and the Reformed faith.”

A broader conservative coalition, the National Presbyterian and Reformed Fellowship, is trying to get representatives from eight denominations together for a discussion of future relations.

The Warrior Presbytery churches, which have a combined membership of 1,514, all got legal approval from the presbytery to which they had belonged, Tuscaloosa, to retain their properties. They also voted to establish fraternal ties with Vanguard Presbytery, organized last September with several breakaway congregations.

The 950,000-member Southern Presbyterian denomination, officially known as the Presbyterian Church in the U. S., is currently involved in discussions to merge with the much larger “northern” denomination, the United Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. A major issue is whether the merger plan will have a provision allowing dissatisfied congregations to withdraw with their property or will insist that they enter the union, like it or not. Steering Committee chairman Donald B. Patterson says that the negotiators’ failure to adopt an “escape clause” necessitated his group’s decision to go ahead with plans for a separate denomination.

Religion In Transit

The black Baptist Ministers Conference of the District of Columbia and Vicinity declined to endorse a proposed Washington crusade by Billy Graham, alleging the evangelist has failed to take a significant stand on racial issues and has failed to influence the White House on racial matters.

The fifty-first annual convention of the Episcopal diocese of Upper South Carolina passed a resolution naming evangelism as the diocese’s number-one task for 1973. The Episcopalians voted to set up a department of evangelism and to establish four new congregations during the year.

The creation-evolution hassle has spilled over the border into Canada. Neil Unruh, a Christian and Missionary Alliance pastor in northern Alberta, has formed a committee to oversee school texts and demand a fair presentation of creation.

Personalia

The new president of Bethany Bible College in Santa Cruz, California, is C. M. Ward, currently the speaker on the Assemblies of God broadcast, “Revivaltime.” Ward will continue his radio ministry.

Key 73 workers are being drawn from all ranks. In New Mexico, Governor Bruce King, a Baptist, chairs a statewide Key 73 committee, and in Florida, Governor Reubin Askew heads a similar state-wide group. Singer Pat Boone is the active Los Angeles chairman.

An Alabama-born black Roman Catholic was recently named auxiliary bishop of Mississippi. Joseph Lawson Howze has spent the last twelve years as a parish priest in North Carolina. He’s the third black bishop in the history of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States.

Chilean Methodists chose superintendent Juan Vasquez as a bishop in their first general conference held since the Chilean church became autonomous in 1969.

Another Olympic silver-medal star who witnessed for Christ in Munich has a busy speaking schedule among youth groups: George Woods, Southern Illinois University admissions counselor and member of Meadowbrook, Illinois, First Baptist Church, who missed the gold medal in shot put by less than half an inch.

Clinton M. Marsh, 56, black Presbyterian church-and-race staffer in Nebraska and former executive with the All Africa Conference of Churches, is the latest nominee for moderator of the United Presbyterian Church.

Director Lowell R. Ditzen of the National Presbyterian Center in Washington, D. C., host of “Issues,” a local telecast, has announced his retirement.

World Scene

The World Council of Churches asked its 263 member churches for $5 million to assist in “first stage” reconstruction and reconciliation of Indochina.

A U. S. Army hospital in Saigon has been leased to Seventh-day Adventists for one year. The church will have a renewal option on it until a new hospital is built. The Adventists built a forty-bed hospital in 1955 and will now have 150 beds.

A world synod of bishops has been called for 1974 by Pope Paul VI to discuss “evangelism of the contemporary world.” Observers think the theme may allow reexamination of celibacy and the role of women in the church.

Two Pentecostal laymen in the Soviet Ukraine city of Lvov were given “long” jail terms for engaging in evangelism, prayer meetings, and other “anti-social activities.” The judge also criticized local atheist organizations for their “inadequate campaign against religious superstitions.”

Greater Europe Mission will open the Greek Bible Institute in Athens this fall. It is GEM’s seventh such school in Europe. GEM has 170 missionaries in ten countries.

Some Belgrade Baptists are continuing to meet in the empty shell of their church after refusing to let the Yugoslav government take their property without adequate compensation. Members wanted another building in return but the government said no—and sent in the wreckers.

Hundreds of students have reportedly received Christ at Gaset University in Thailand. Campus Crusade for Christ, led by a university lecturer, is spearheading the movement, which has also accounted for scores of conversions at Chulalorngkorn University. The entire student body at Gaset heard a gospel presentation recently.

A new Methodist congregation of nearly 150 has been established in industrial Kohtla-Jarve, Estonia. Located in the heartland of Soviet Methodism, the church holds services in the Estonian, German, and Russian languages.

Wycliffe Bible Translators recently completed four New Testament translations for tribal groups in Mexico. WBT has 2,900 members at work in more than 550 languages in twenty-five countries.

Revival has come to many churches and towns in Luzon in the Philippines following devastating floods there, reports the Baptist World. It cites proliferation of home Bible-study groups, filled churches, spiritual renewal, and vigorous outreach accompanying relief efforts.

A statistical decline among Anglicans as recorded in the 1973 Church of England yearbook (parish rolls: 1.8 million, down from 2.6 million in 1968) was attributed to the pruning of “dead wood” from rolls of local churches. Income, however, was up by several million dollars.

Amid controversy sparked by Russian Orthodox Patriarch Pimen of Moscow, Archimandrite Anthony Grabbe of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia acknowledged his group plans to lease certain contested properties it holds in the Holy Land to a New York land developer and to develop other property for tourism.

The latest report from the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, in which 90 per cent of the population holds membership, shows that an average of about 100,000 of its 4.4 million members attended worship services during the year.

The Far East Broadcasting Company’s newest station is a 250,000-watter on Cheju Island off South Korea. Six hours of broadcasts daily will be beamed to mainland China, three to the Soviet Union and Japan.

Southern Sudan’s capital, Juba, was bedecked with flags and bougainvillea February 27 to March 3 to celebrate the first anniversary of the peace declaration that ended seventeen years of devastating civil war (see May 12, 1972 issue, page 38).

At the newly tarred airport in 105° heat, Sudan president Gafaar Mohammed Nimeri, a Northern Muslim, was welcomed by the nation’s vice-president, Sayed Abel Alier, a Southern Christian, who also is president of the Higher Executive Council of the Southern Region. The presidential motorcade proceeded through town on the city’s only tarred road—hurriedly surfaced for the celebrations—past armored cars and tanks.

In the Anglican cathedral, where thirty men were shot during the Juba massacre in July, 1965, prayers of thanksgiving were given for the peace that has come to the South’s four million people. (Five services are now held each Sunday morning in the cathedral.) “God has done a miracle,” remarked member Mading de Garang, minister of information. During the war he edited the Southern Sudan Liberation Movement’s paper, The Grass Curtain.

Approximately half a million persons died in the guerrilla fighting, and more than 250,000 refugees fled to Ethiopia, Uganda, Zaire, and the Central African Republic. Another half million who remained in Sudan became homeless when soldiers of both sides razed entire villages.

The Sudan’s resettlement commissioner, Sayed Clement Mboro, fears “a crisis in food and medical supplies” this month. To ease the problems, Sudanese ambassadors in Zaire and Uganda have asked those governments to extend their deadline for repatriation of all refugees by June 30. Transport problems alone would make that date impossible, they say.

One of several agencies helping the Sudan government in the complex task is the Africa Committee for the Rehabilitation of Southern Sudan (ACROSS). ACROSS was set up as a coordinating office for the relief work of several evangelical missions that worked in Sudan before the civil war: Missionary Aviation Fellowship, African Inland Mission, Sudan United Mission, and Sudan Interior Mission. It has received enthusiastic government endorsement. Several evangelical agencies are helping with support, including The Evangelical Alliance Relief (TEAR) Fund of Great Britain, the World Relief Commission of the (U. S.) National Association of Evangelicals, World Vision, and the German Missionary Fellowship.

“We are establishing a bridge,” explained ACROSS director Kenneth Tracey at operations headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya. “Evangelical Christians around the world are demonstrating their concern for people who have lost everything, and the resultant spiritual potential is unlimited. These are short-term projects with long-range goals.” He said there is immediate need not only for money but also for medical staff for the three hospitals that the government has asked ACROSS to reopen.

In Juba, ACROSS official Ashley Tuck said the first of ten proposed rural clinics is already in operation, and supplies are being moved in for another four. The political situation in Uganda, however, is slowing down the flow of supplies, which must come in from Mombassa Port, a tortuous thousand miles. Bandits along the route add to the uncertainty of arrival. Tuck says he’s worried about the lag in funds because only two months remain to get cement and lumber into the swampy Sud area before the rains start.

The government has shown enthusiasm for two ACROSS projects that missions used successfully after the Nigerian civil war. Under Operation Dorcas, tailors are trained and helped to set up their own shops. They earn their sewing machines by making garments for refugees. Operation Tool and Seed does the same for blacksmiths, who make hoes for the thousands of farmers returning to their land.

Both these projects do more than provide immediate relief: they help to rehabilitate the economy. The Canadian government has contributed money for cloth and iron but requires that funds be matched from other sources.

Students who fled the country during the hostilities to continue studies in neighboring countries are beginning to return—about 2,000 out of a total of 11,000 so far. A spokesman expressed the need for a youth training program to reintegrate these students into society.

Although peace is precarious (the vice-president’s chauffeur committed suicide last month after a coup plot was uncovered), the National Unity Day celebrations showed that Sudan is trying very hard to make the North-South detente work, and that sincere assistance is warmly appreciated.

“We are grateful for what ACROSS is doing,” vice-president Alier told me at Juba airport. “This is the kind of help we need.”

A Leveling Off In Japan

The growth of Christianity in Japan has slowed considerably. The Japanese periodical Christ’s Weekly says the total number of Christians increased by 640 last year, the smallest gain since the 1930s. The highest annual increase, 125,702, was recorded in 1968.

Christ’s Weekly reports there are approximately 1,095,000 Christians in Japan. That makes them about 1 per cent of the population.

There are about 5,000 Protestant churches in the country and some 119 Protestant denominations.

Reverberations In Belgium

Explo ’72, Campus Crusade for Christ’s student congress on evangelism (see July 7, 1972, issue, pp. 23, 31), set off a chain reaction of influence that is still being felt in places far from Dallas. Correspondent Bill Thomas interviewed Crusade staffer Ben Louwerse, who has been in predominantly Catholic Belgium just over a year, for this interesting sidelight to Explo’s aftermath.

Question: How have the Catholics of Belgium felt the impact of Explo?

Answer: While I was attending Explo ’72, I often asked myself: How could such an experience as Explo be a blessing in Belgium, a little country that’s so far away? After my return to Belgium, I met a Jesuit professor, Walter Smet. He had arrived in America the day after Explo and he read the newspaper coverage of the meetings. He was so impressed by what he read that he went to Arrowhead Springs to attend one of the training conferences, where he was deeply moved. On returning to Belgium he wrote a book on the Jesus movement, with one chapter about Explo and another about Campus Crusade. It will be out soon.

Q: How did you get involved?

A. Professor Smet put me in contact with several other priests here in Belgium who are quite open to the Jesus movement. Many of these were invited to attend the Brussels LIFE (Lay Institute For Evangelism), held at the Belgian Gospel Mission in Brussels in late fall. Two priests came and were quite thrilled by what they heard. Shortly after this, Professor Smet invited me to speak to about a hundred priests at the theological seminary where he teaches. On that occasion at the seminary I gave my personal testimony and shared with them about Explo ’72, the work of Campus Crusade, and also the Four Spiritual Laws.

Q: What was the priests’ reaction?

A. They were impressed that I shared my faith so personally. Shortly afterwards, I received invitations to speak in other Catholic churches. One church has invited my wife, Betty, and me to speak at a women’s group. And now there are a number of priests who are writing or calling in for our Bible-study materials.

Q: The Catholic community seems more open to Crusade’s ministry than many of the Protestants. Why?

A. My personal opinion is that since the Protestants in this country are a minority, they probably feel threatened by a new group and new ideas. In fact, the Protestant groups in Belgium do not find it easy to work together. This is one reason why evangelism here has not progressed as it should.

There have been campaigns with good results, but the average individual Christian rarely shares his faith.

Q: Are there other reasons why the Catholics seem so open?

A. I think there are two main reasons for the receptivity of the Catholic community. First, we always stress that we exist to serve Protestant churches but also Catholic churches. Consequently, these Catholic churches that we are visiting do not feel threatened by us. Second, Belgium is one of the countries where the Catholic Church is going through a time of crisis. Many adherents, especially young people, are rejecting the teachings of the church and much of its ritual and are beginning to ask just what the truth is. They have a strong desire to search the Scriptures for themselves. Because we have a program for lay training and good Bible-study materials, we are being asked to share our resources with them.

Q: Can you give another example?

A. One student from St. Joseph’s Catholic College in Aalst, near Brussels, attended a recent LIFE in Holland and gave his life to Christ during that week. At the end of it his comment was: “Now I understand that it is not the Jesus movement which is revolutionary and thrilling, but Jesus himself.” On returning to the college, this student started an MC group.

MAKING BOOK AT WOOK

Radio station WOOK in Washington, D. C., regularly aired commercials in which listeners were told that a reading of certain Bible verses would bring “financial blessings.” A Federal Communications Commission hearing examiner, however, found that the three-digit references were designed to get WOOK’s predominantly black inner-city listening audience not into the Bible but into the hands of the nearest friendly neighborhood numbers operator.

WOOK contended that the references were protected by the constitution. Not so, said the examiner, who ruled that the station management had a responsibility to know what seemed obvious enough to many Washington blacks: “that such advertisements would necessarily tend to encourage listeners to play the numbers game, in violation of the law, in order to receive the benefits described.” The broadcasts were “false, misleading, and deceptive and constituted an improper use of WOOK to further illegal gambling activities,” he said.

If the findings are confirmed by the seven-member FCC, station WOOK will be ordered off the air.

GLENN EVERETT

Q: What is that?

A. An MC group is a group that puts emphasis on Christ and on living a deeper and holier life. There are a number of such groups in Belgium. This student, with the approval of the priests of Aalst, has invited me to address the student body of about 1,000.

Q: You have hopes that a movement will start there?

A. Yes. And we expect March 25 to be an important date in Aalst. We’re planning to have a Jesus festival in a cathedral in Aalst that seats 1,400. Two Indonesian gospel groups will give their testimonies during the morning mass in local Catholic churches, then sing at the festival in the cathedral in the afternoon. Never has there been anything like this before in Belgium. We’re inviting the ambassadors of Indonesia and Holland and the people from NATO as well as church leaders.

Makarios Keeps Two Hats

Archbishop Makarios, under fire from church leaders for refusing to quit politics and from Greek Cypriot terrorists for refusing to unite Cyprus and Greece, won acclamation as president of Cyprus for another five years last month, when his opposition failed to field a candidate.

Makarios stood for a third term (he’s been president since Britain granted independence in 1960) in defiance of a Cypriot Orthodox Church demand last year that he resign the presidency and return to his duties as leader of the church. Makarios refused to discuss the issue, asserting that the word “resign” is not in his vocabulary. The demand came in a letter from three bishops who, along with Makarios, form the church’s ruling body, the Holy Synod. Makarios is ethnarch, or leader, of the autonomous Orthodox church. It is believed the bishops were pressured by the Greek government, which would like enosis, political union, with the island’s 80 per cent Greek population—a plan blocked as long as Makarios is in power.

Makarios, eyes firmly on the political situation, rejects immediate enosis on the grounds that it would cause a civil war with the island’s 20 per cent Turkish population and possibly lead to invasion of the island by Turkish military forces.

In the meantime, Greek terrorists used bombs in an effort to attain the archbishop’s resignation. But with another five years before him, the archbishop is as firmly ensconced today as he was in 1960, and enosis is still a Greek dream.

A young Bolivian faith healer, converted last year at a Kathryn Kuhlman service in Los Angeles, has drawn what are believed to be some of the largest crowds ever in Bolivia. Julio Cesar Rubial, 20, a layman who preaches simple Bible messages, filled La Paz soccer stadium (seating capacity 20,000) twice in January with equal sized crowds in a plaza outside. Other open-air meetings at the city of Cochabamba drew between 30,000 and 60,000, according to local press reports.

Bolivian evangelicals, meanwhile, are unanimous in their enthusiasm for what they call a moving of the Spirit of God in Bolivia. Said one mission director: “You wouldn’t believe the things that are happening here. Tremendous!” Local churches are making extra efforts to provide follow-up but were apparently unprepared for the large numbers resulting from the meetings.

Rubial publicly claims to be a Catholic, though his Christ-centered preaching and the absence of references to saints and the Virgin have gained him the enmity of some Catholic leaders. Many of his earliest healing services were held in a La Paz Catholic church but were stopped when the priest ordered him out. The young layman was also reportedly denounced as a non-Catholic in a surprising fifteen-minute radio broadcast by the archbishop of La Paz.

Despite official Catholic opposition, however, the Bolivian government has publicly given Rubial moral and material support. President Hugo Banzer’s wife was reportedly healed and made a confession of faith through Rubial’s ministry in her home. In gratitude, Banzer made the stadium available without charge and offered free government transportation to any part of Bolivia. Wherever Rubial appears, government officials accompany him on the platform.

Bruno Frigoli, Assemblies of God superintendent for Bolivia, ruefully confessed he’d been praying for revival in the South American nation and assumed it would be accomplished through a Protestant evangelist. “But the Lord chose a Catholic,” he said approvingly. Missions experts say it is the greatest revival in Bolivian history.

The revival has spilled over into the churches. One large La Paz Protestant church now holds morning and evening meetings every day of the week. A new suburban church with only four members two months ago now averages more than 200 in each service. Conversions are reported in the churches of Cochabamba and Santa Cruz. Unprecedented Bible sales have also been reported by the United Bible Society. At one meeting alone, missionaries of the Andes Evangelical Mission reported a sale of more than 10,000 pesos worth of Scriptures. (Average monthly pay for a Bolivian schoolteacher is 600 pesos.)

Rubial, son of a middle-class family from Sucre, was a pre-med student at Pasadena City College in California when he attended the Los Angeles service. He said he discovered his healing gift while speaking to a group on the street who were unable to get into the service. Later, he traveled in California Jesus-people circles before returning to Bolivia.

The two-month ministry in his native country is scheduled to be followed by similar crusades in Peru, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, and other Latin American countries.

Key 73: No Violation

United Church of Canada officials have replied to Jewish criticism of Key 73 by affirming that their church dissociates itself from “any tendency within the Key 73 program to single out any group as a particular ‘target’ for our evangelistic thrust.” The statement was in response to barbed comments from sources within the church and outside it. In commenting on the move, the Reverend W. Clarke MacDonald, deputy secretary of the Division of Mission in Canada, explained that some rabbis and United Church ministers felt there was an anti-Semitic bias in the North American Key 73 document used as a handbook for organizers.”

Dr. N. Bruce McLeod, moderator of the United Church, had earlier affirmed that his denomination “should have no part in any campaign that implies we want Jews to be converted.”

The statement went on to affirm that “we will continue to support those aspects of Key 73 which declare the good news of God’s love for all people, and to encourage their response as persons without violation of their own integrity.”

LESLIE K. TARR

Cash On The Road

Off camera Johnny Cash sings and narrates. His wife, June Carter, plays Mary Magdalene, and director Robert Elfstrom stars as Christ. The Gospel Road, Cash’s new movie on the life of Christ, which cost him over $500,000 to film on location in Jerusalem, purports to take Jesus to the people. As Cash told reporters, “A lot of people are doing films and plays on Christ, but I don’t think they have the results in mind I do. Our goal was based on the last great commission.”

The film premiered late last month in Charlotte, North Carolina, as a benefit for Baptist-related Gardner-Webb College, located nearby. (The school in 1971 awarded Cash an honorary degree.) Through the publicity the film generated, the school has already received a $25,000 gift. The premiere netted nearly $4,000 for the school.

Cash was not left in the cold. Twentieth Century Fox bought the film for an undisclosed sum.

MIGHTY MAN OF CLOTH

When Charles Chandler, a mild-mannered pastor, finishes preaching at First Baptist Church in Metropolis, Illinois, he ducks into a nearby phone booth and emerges as … Superman! The pastor, clad in the familiar blue and red costume of the man of steel, is part of a promotion by the southern Illinois community to put Metropolis on the map. Chandler is a look-alike for George Reeves, who played the comicbook hero in the early days of television. With the local newspaper changing its name to the Daily Planet, local church members are afraid Chandler will take up leaping the spire in a single bound.

Hotline

The first nationwide Christian hotline for drug users who need immediate counsel was opened by the church-related Melodyland Drug Prevention Center in Anaheim, California. The toll free number outside of the state is 800-854-3234.

Christian missionaries and evangelistic workers in Israel face an uncertain future now that the land’s fragile religious peace has been shattered. Arsonists last month set fire to several buildings that house Christian agencies, demonstrators protested missionary efforts, and the Knesset (parliament) reportedly agreed to debate the missionary question. Some Israeli leaders are calling for the ouster of missionaries and a prohibition against evangelism.

Representatives of six Knesset factions and four cabinet members met informally February 19 to discuss “the problem of mounting missionary activity in the country by fringe movements, such as ‘Jews for Jesus,’ ” the Jerusalem Post reported. The article said Moshe Baram, the chief coalition whip, had persuaded the other factions that the problem should be probed quietly, “avoiding the negative repercussions abroad” that might result from a full-scale Knesset debate. The full debate is still a possibility.

In a memo to Prime Minister Golda Meir, religious-affairs minister Zerah Warhaftig stated his concerns about the evangelistic activity and suggested countermeasures. These suggestions were not immediately disclosed, but the Ministry for the Interior, in cooperation with the Religious Affairs Ministry, has apparently already outlined steps to limit evangelism through a Christian-excluding application of the Law of Return, which guarantees every Jew the right to settle in Israel. (The law defines a Jew as a person born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism.) A number of Christians, primarily from America, have registered their “conversion” to Judaism in rabbinical courts and emigrated to Israel to engage in evangelism. These may have their conversions rescinded if it is proved they were obtained under false pretenses, then be ousted when their visas expire. Additionally, the visas of persons working independently, such as members of the controversial Children of God sect, will not be renewed, according to Post reporter David Landau. However, the interior ministry was reportedly holding off on immediate implementation at the request of the Foreign Ministry.

The Post said film producer Carole “Shira” Lindsay, 32, daughter of an American evangelist, was expected to have her conversion to Judaism rescinded. The Orthodox court in Boston that granted it did not know of her belief in Jesus, Israeli authorities contend. (It is known that rabbis in some cases have granted conversion credentials to persons confessing to be followers of “Jeshua” [Jesus], a practice likely to become rare if pressure from Israel persists.)

But Justice Minister Y. S. Shapiro came out against any use of the law that would deny immigrant status to Jews “who profess Christian ideas.” The fact that a Jew says be believes in Jesus does not necessarily mean he is no longer Jewish, he affirmed. The fact that evangelical preaching is a fundamental element in Christianity must be accepted in a tolerant country like Israel, where no state religion exists, he said.

IN DEFENSE OF THE FAITH

President Harold M. Jacobs of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America last month called on Key 73 leaders to help stop evangelism aimed at Jews. Despite stated intentions of Key 73 officials, he complained, “there has been a significantly increased effort to missionize among Jews and to encourage their defection from Judaism.”

But Rabbi Henry Siegman, executive vice-president of the Synagogue Council of America, charged in the American Jewish Congress newspaper that Jewish reaction to Key 73 is “accusatory and hostile,” and has “bordered on the hysterical.” This brought rebuffs from other Jewish leaders, including Rabbi Marc Tanenbaum. (Tanenbaum was reportedly outraged during a visit to a Key 73 planning session last year when a Methodist leader tried to lead him to Christ on an elevator. Since then, he has led the Jewish attack on Key 73.)

Jacobs went on to urge his people “to be alert and vigilant and to act decisively to thwart missionizing efforts directed to Jews and the Jewish community.” Some members of the hardcore Jewish Defense League apparently took the counsel literally. During a demonstration against a Jewish Christian mission in New York City, one of them assaulted the mission leader, sending him to a hospital with shattered glasses and a broken nose. He declined to press charges.

His remarks were akin to those made earlier on radio and television by Shlomo Hizak, director of the Mount of Olives International Bible Center, after the center was damaged by arsonists. Said Hizak: “A Jew can be a criminal Jew, an atheist Jew, a Communist Jew, and still be accepted. Why don’t the people accept a Jew who believes in the Messiah?” (Two Jerusalem yeshiva [seminary] students and four members of Rabbi Meir Kahane’s Jewish Defense League [JDL] were arrested in connection with the blaze, but Kahane denied JDL involvement in that and other recent arson attacks.)

Warhaftig does not buy the logic put forth by Shapiro and Hizak. Even Jewish-born “Jews for Jesus” are not believing Jews in any accepted sense, he says, and should be excluded. (There is a growing influx of Jesus-movement Jews from America, and an indeterminate number of immigrating Soviet Jews have turned out to be Christians.)

Rabbi Shlomo Lorincz of the Aguda (religious party) argued that Shapiro’s remark contradicts halacha (Jewish religious law). And Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren called on the public and authorities to act non-violently against the missionary activities.

Government officials, religious leaders, and the press have spoken out against the scattered incidents of violence directed at the Christians. The victims themselves seemed to be more worried about Israel’s image and possible anti-Semitic repercussions than about their losses. Hizak stressed that the violence was the work of extremists and that he had no criticism of the government’s handling of the matter. He said he had received calls of encouragement from many Israeli well-wishers. (Also the target of arsonists: the print shop of the Seventh Day Church of God in Jerusalem.)

One of the problems is that Israel has no constitution. Its 1948 Proclamation of Independence promised religious freedom and safety for “the holy places of all religions.” Jewish spokesmen explain that their understanding of religious freedom differs from the traditional interpretation. In their thinking, if a person is born, say, a Catholic, he is free to practice Catholicism within the bounds of ecclesiastical rules. It does not mean necessarily that he is free to change his religion or attempt to make others change their faith.

On the eve of Golda Meir’s visit to Washington, Dean Arthur F. Glasser of Fuller Seminary’s School of World Mission fired a letter to President Nixon. In it he said:

We deplore … the situation in Israel where the stated policy is freedom of religion and conscience, but where the actual practice is one of harassment, intimidation, and discrimination against those of other than the Jewish faith.… We categorically abhor and resist all anti-Semitism … [but] when a Jew or a convert to Judaism is persecuted and threatened with violence simply because he believes in Jesus, we see this as anti-Christian and feel we must reject it with equal vigor.

The Glasser letter urged Nixon to discuss the issues with Mrs. Meir, to consider internationalizing Jerusalem, and to evaluate future aid to Israel “in the light of Israel’s intransigence concerning other religions.”

CHRISTIANITY TODAY correspondent Dwight L. Baker attended a meeting in Tel Aviv between representatives Shaul Schiff and Eliezer Schaeffer of the newly organized Public Committee for Combating Mission (PCCM) and United Christian Council of Israel (UCCI) chairman Roy Kreider, a Mennonite, Baptist editor Chandler Lanier, and religious-affairs ministry official Michael J. Klein. The PCCM people requested a statement from the UCCI denouncing aggressive proselytizing activities and divorcing itself from the use of material inducements to woo the indigent, sick, ignorant, or children into the Christian fold. (Years ago, heads of the major churches issued such a statement.) Kreider promised to raise the issues at the next UCCI meeting.

For their part, the PCCMers denounced violence and JDL tactics. The UCCI concurred in disapproval of the methods of the Children of God, who have encouraged young Israelis to leave their homes in the name of Christ. Schiff and Schaeffer claimed to possess documentation that the Children were receiving money from Egypt, a common rumor in Israel, but did not produce it.

The meeting was reported in Ma’ariv the next day, serving to calm somewhat the troubled waters. Churches and mainstream missionaries, most of whom work among the Arabs, were portrayed as moderates not wanting to cause waves. Most knowledgeable government leaders don’t want to cause waves, either, thus they decline to endorse wholesale eviction of missionaries and crackdowns against churches.

An ominous note, however, was sounded by a Post editorial warning that evangelism is viewed by Jews as a threat “only a little short of physical murder.” It said:

It might be wise for the churches themselves to give some thought to the problem created by the fact that the active search for converts—never practiced by Jews—is looked upon with such abhorrence by religious Jews that it could in the end threaten the privileged and protected status of the churches in Jerusalem.

Baker attributes much of the turmoil to a “vast residue of insecurity” inherited from centuries of “Christian harassment of Jews in Diaspora” that Kahane “and his cohorts are churning up—with apparent success.”

Reinstating Natural Morality

The Ground of Christian Ethics, by N. H. G. Robinson (Eerdmans, 1972, 336 pp., $7.95), is reviewed by Norman L. Geisler, chairman of the Department of Philosophy of Religion, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois.

As the author acknowledges, this essay “is not primarily concerned with particular ethical problems.” Rather, it concentrates on the relation of Christian ethics to both theology and ethics in general.

Robinson finds fault with all four of the basic ways Protestants have viewed these relations. First, Calvin, whose method in ethics was “to collect from various places of Scripture a rule for the reformation of life,” is faulted because “not only is this view of the Christian life itself superficial and even mechanical, but it is tied to a whole fundamentalistic theology which is no more profound.”

Secondly, the naturalistic ethic of Kant, Sidgwick, and Rashdall is rejected because it offers “the discussion of morality on the basis not of revelation at all but of reason and conscience … in complete divorce from the beliefs and dogmas of religious faith.” Robinson admits that even though theology cannot be reduced to morality, nevertheless the Bible has “an all-pervasive moral quality.” For “in the Bible the moral and transmoral are inextricably intertwined.” However, the theologian cannot accept the thesis that “morality is wholly self-contained and … totally independent.”

The third view Robinson rejects is that of Bishop Butler, that “Christian morality is morality at its completely natural and at its best” as manifest in the example of Jesus. This view, notes Robinson, “may readily expose itself to theological criticism,” the charge that “it does not take a sufficiently high view of Jesus.” Robinson prefers a higher view of Christ than that of a moral example; he agrees that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.

The fourth rejected view is that of Schleiermacher et al., which “affirms in principle the necessary connection between dogmatics and ethics … that is to say, it takes over certain ideas from the Christian faith … and then in the field of Christian ethics it tends to immobilize the revelation upon which it professes to depend.” Thus the relative independence of ethics from theology “has the effect of … fossilizing the insights drawn from the [revelation].”

Robinson also rejects the Catholic natural-law ethic as neglecting the revelatory and redemptive aspects of the Christian faith. Natural law is “autonomous and naturalistic, but … also highly abstract.” Robinson agrees more with the New Reformation direction of Barth and Brunner but wishes to correct their distaste of natural morality. Kant, on the other hand, with his complete autonomy of goodwill failed because such an ethic is completely man-centered (though not necessarily self-centered) rather than God-centered. “Pure autonomy of the Kantian type,” Robinson writes, “is the concept of a law which is completely self-imposed” and “has proved itself … formal, empty and unsatisfactory.” And even Maclagan (The Theological Frontier of Ethics), who argues, differently from Kant, that “the self-imposed law is not invented by the moral agent but is discovered by him,” is rejected because this view “is conceived as static and impersonal [and] it cannot be properly identified with divine revelation.”

Robinson sees the answer to the problem of the relations among general ethics, theology, and Christian ethics in an ethical parallel to Brunner’s “dialogical truth,” that is, in a “bi-polar autonomy” in which “it becomes appropriate to regard Christian ethics as a part of dogmatics,” but also one in which “Christian ethics and general ethics occupy the same ground.” This means that “it is no longer possible to think of general ethics as did Haering or Alexander (Christianity and Ethics), who held that “Christian Ethics is a branch of general Ethics.” “Christian ethics can be and must be a separate study outside, over and above, general ethics,” says Robinson. For while Christian ethics occupies the same ground as general ethics, it “introduces a radically different conception of the moral life,” one of self-surrender of man’s autonomy from an anthropocentric to a Christo- and theocentric basis. So, Christian ethics is distinguishable but not separable from dogmatics and covers the same ground as general ethics but from a radically different, theocentric point of view.

Robinson’s major contribution is in the correction he provides for neo-Reformation theology by insisting that “Christian ethics discloses and demands for its articulation a context, a situation, a sphere, large enough to contain the divine grace” but one that also makes a distinction between “the grace which is constitutive of nature and the grace which is redemptive of the human world.” It is the former grace “which ensures that man the sinner, natural man, remains a moral being.” For “natural man is a sinner, but still is a man.” Of this grace constitutive of human nature it can be said “that there is no good amongst men apart from this grace,” but this natural grace “does not prevent men from turning human life and history into a thoroughly man-centered … enterprise.”

NEWLY PUBLISHED

Abraham Lincoln: Theologian of American Anguish, by Elton Trueblood (Harper & Row, 149 pp., $4.95). A case can be made for Lincoln’s being America’s greatest nineteenth-century theologian. Certainly he represents civil religion at its best. Trueblood helps us to appreciate him.

Protestant Thought in the Nineteenth Century: Volume I, 1799–1870, by Claude Welch (Yale, 325 pp., $12.50). A worthwhile survey that includes both Anglo-American and Continental thinkers and varieties of orthodox as well as unorthodox Protestantism.

The Religious Reawakening in America, by Gerald Snyder (U.S. News and World Report, 191 pp., $2.95 pb). Good journalistic overview of Jesus people, Catholic Pentecostals, occultism, Asian religions, and renewals in Judaism and black religion. The response of older religious institutions to the new ones is also reported. Illustrated and indexed.

Bare Ruined Choirs, by Garry Wills (Doubleday, 272 pp., $7.95). Well-written reflections on the current crises in Catholicism. Chapter titles include “The Two Johns,” “The Two Jackies,” “Prisoners of Sex.”

The Jehovah’s Witnesses and Prophetic Speculation, by Edmond Gruss (Presbyterian and Reformed, 117 pp., $2.95 pb). A Baptist seminary professor examines and refutes the Witnesses’ teaching regarding the second coming of Christ in 1914 and the expectation of Armageddon by 1975. Supplements his earlier standard general survey of the group, Apostles of Denial (same publisher, 324 pp., $6.50, $4.50 pb).

The Renewal of American Catholicism, by David J. O’Brien (Oxford, 302 pp., $7.95). Engaging reflections on various present currents in and prospects for Catholicism set in the context of its American past. The author sees major alterations under way but is hopeful for the future.

Oneida Community: The Breakup, 1876–1881, by Constance Noyes Robertson (Syracuse University, 327 pp., $9.95). Readable, documented account of the end of one of the longer-lived and better-known utopian and religiously based communes.

You Will Never Be the Same, by Basilea Schlink (Bethany Fellowship, 189 pp., $1.45 pb). On recognizing and controlling certain pervasive sins: absent-mindedness, anger, annoyance, conceit, self-pity, talkativeness, and two score others. Ouch!

The Study of Judaism, introduced by Jacob Neusner (KTAV, 229 pp., $12.50). Six carefully prepared bibliographical essays on Judaism from New Testament times to the present. For all theological libraries.

The Salvation Army in America, by Frederick Booth-Tucker (Arno, 175 pp., $11). Reprints of four reports made at the turn of the century by the commander of a then quite young evangelistic denomination with a pronounced concern for meeting temporal needs as well.

Religions and Spiritual Groups in Modern America, by Robert Ellwood, Jr. (Prentice-Hall, 334 pp., $8.95, $3.95 pb). After a brief survey of alternatives to Christianity throughout European history, the author, based conveniently at the University of Southern California, leads us on a documented group-by-group survey of current exotic religions, such as theosophy, Scientology, Satanism, Krishna consciousness, Baha’i, and many lesser-known ones. Selections from authoritative writings of each group are given.

Religion in the American Experience: The Pluralistic Style, edited by Robert Handy (University of South Carolina, 246 pp., $9.95; Harper & Row, $2.95 pb). A collection of documents ranging over the centuries and across the religious spectrum. Potential supplementary reading for a course in American religious history.

Studies in the Book of Daniel, by Robert Dick Wilson (Baker, 688 pp., $9.95), and A Commentary on Daniel, by Leon Wood (Zondervan, 336 pp., $6.95). Two stalwart conservatives on one of the most inspiring, and critically debated, books of the Bible. Wilson wrote over fifty years ago and deals with historical and literary questions. Woods gives a verse-by-verse exegesis.

Religion’s Influence in Contemporary Society: Readings in the Sociology of Religion, by Joseph E. Faulkner (Merrill, 578 pp., $9.95). A useful collection of previously published essays dealing mainly with the institutional churches in America: their members, structures, and relationships to class, politics, economics, and secularization generally.

The Coming of Christianity to England, by Henry Mayr-Harting (Schocken, 334 pp., $12.50). A major history of both Roman and Irish efforts to convert the fiercely pagan Anglo-Saxons. (Some would say the effort failed!) The development of Christian expressions in politics, worship, monasticism, and church policy up to about 750 is presented. Both documents and artifacts are skillfully employed.

Peace, War and the Young Catholic, by John B. Sheerin (Paulist, 109 pp., $1.25 pb). Although sometimes marred by selective and biased reading of history, this is one book from the anti-war camp that is generally balanced and confronts the reader with some of the reasons why pious Christians have fought as well as why others have refused to fight. A stimulating study guide.

Bible, Church, Tradition: An Eastern Orthodox View, by Georges Florovsky (Nordland, 127 pp., $5.95). Seven previously published essays of a leading historian and theologian, including “The Function of Tradition in the Ancient Church,” “St. Gregory Palamas and the Tradition of the Fathers,” and “The Lost Scriptural Mind.”

Religion and Society in the Age of Saint Augustine, by Peter Brown (Harper & Row, 352 pp., $12). Collection of eighteen previously published scholarly essays and reviews by a leading authority on the period.

Shapers of Baptist Thought, by James Tull (Judson, 255 pp., $10). Chapters on Smyth, Williams, Backus, Fuller, Campbell, Graves, Clarke, Rauschenbusch, and King. The omission of a twentieth-century conservative is regrettable, especially since that position is more representative by far of most Baptists.

The Supreme Court and Religion, by Richard Morgan (Free Press, 216 pp., $7.95). After a good historical survey, the author turns to arguing against the recent decision striking down various parochaid proposals.

The Ancient Theology, by D. P. Walker (Cornell University, 276 pp., $14.50). Authoritative studies of the attempt in early modern times to integrate Platonism with Christianity. The mixing of worldly philosophies and biblical doctrine is always with us.

Encounter With God, by Morton Kelsey (Bethany Fellowship, 281 pp., $5.95). A comprehensive discussion of Christian religious experience. Owes much to the psychology of Carl Jung and is weak on objective revelation.

The Religious Experience of Revolutionaries, by Eugene C. Bianchi (Doubleday, 223 pp., $6.95). A tour de force in which the author, a former priest, so loosely defines “religious” that he can plausibly describe Ché Guevara, Daniel Berrigan, M. L. King, Abbie Hoffman, and Frantz Fanon as religious seekers. Imaginative but misleading.

Living Is Now, by D. A. Blaiklock (Baker, 127 pp., $1.50 pb). Essays by a physician showing how Christian commitment helps to resolve personal and family conflicts, leading to psychological maturity.

The World Turned Upside Down, by Christopher Hill (Viking, 351 pp., $10.95). Mention of the contending forces in the English Civil War of the 1600s usually calls forth comment on various religious or quasi-religious groups with enticing names such as Levellers, Diggers, Fifth Monarchists, Muggletonians, Seekers, and Ranters. Here is an authoritative, documented, readable presentation of a time when Christianity and social reform were very much entangled, for better and for worse.

The Epistle to the Hebrews, by Homer Kent, Jr. (Baker, 303 pp., $5.95), and Our Man in Heaven, by Edward Fudge (C.E.I. [Box 858, Athens, Ala. 35611], 220 pp., $4.95). Verse-by-verse commentaries on Hebrews by members of the Grace Brethren and Churches of Christ, respectively, that are of interest to evangelicals generally.

A Companion to the Study of St. Anselm, by Jasper Hopkins (University of Minnesota, 291 pp., $10.50). Excellent guide to one of the most influential Christian theologians ever.

Massachusetts Bay: The Crucial Decade, 1640–1650, by Robert Wall, Jr. (Yale, 292 pp., $9.75), The Faithful Shepherd: A History of the New England Ministry in the Seventeenth Century, by David Hall (University of North Carolina, 301 pp., $11.95), and Their Solitary Way: The Puritan Social Ethic in the First Century of Settlement in New England, by Stephen Foster (Yale, 214 pp., $7.50). Useful additions to the continually growing body of literature on those who, for better or for worse, decisively influenced the development of evangelicalism in the New World.

Liberation Theology, by Rosemary Ruether (Paulist, 194 pp., $3.95, pb). Zero fidelity to historic Christian faith, trust in the birth of a new humanity via revolutionary liberation movements, and hostility to the “heresy” of Christ-centeredness characterize this exasperating book by America’s best-known radical Catholic spokeswoman.

Notes to the Overworld, by Carroll E. Simcox (Seabury, 127 pp., $4.50). Witty letters addressed to a host of departed philosophers, poets, writers, and statesmen by the editor of the Living Church (high-Episcopal).

However, this “law of man’s being is not his own but God’s, and as law and task is yet a gift of grace constitutive of man’s very nature.” Accordingly, the moral autonomy of a creature is derivative; “it is the autonomy of one whose nature is to stand by grace in the presence of God his Creator.” Hence, “by nature man stands in the presence of, or in relation to, God his Creator, so that for him there is no nature without grace.” And “it is because this grace is shared by Christian and non-Christian alike that there is a common ground for natural and revealed moralities.

Natural morality, however, is in need of God’s reconciling act in Christ, which “corrects, restores and fulfils it, giving its true centre in God.” So “the moral standards of society are not left inviolate by the action of God in Christ. On the contrary, they undergo a two-sided transformation, wherein also their frag-character is overcome” in “that Christ fulfils the law, fulfils and completes natural morality … and that in fulfilling the law Christ centers it once again in God the Creator.”

In my opinion, Robinson’s work makes a significant move in the neo-Reformation movement to correct the lack of a significantly positive relation between natural morality and divine revelation. I only regret that he postulates, following Brunner, an unnecessary opposition between personal and propositional revelation, and that he inconsistently finds minor contradictions in the moral teachings of Scripture. Robinson’s rejection of a Christian ethic “governed by an attempt to be loyal at all cost to the biblical witness” is the chief weakness of his thesis. Little wonder that he concludes “there are no infallible, divinely revealed, not-to-be questioned, solutions to our moral problems.”

Despite these significant shortcomings, Robinson’s book marks a welcomed reinstatement of natural morality in neo-Reformation thought, as opposed to the more radical disjunction made by Barth, from which Brunner never completely extricated himself, either.

A Theological Watchword

Beyond Cynicism: The Practice of Hope, by David O. Woodyard (Westminster, 1972, 112 pp., $2.95 pb), is reviewed by Edmon L. Rowell, Jr., minister, Lee Street Baptist Church, Danville, Virginia.

By now the statement “the hope of theology is a theology of hope” is a cliché. It may be, however, that in retrospect this cliché will be seen as the watchword of Christian theology in the seventies. Here is yet another book that attempts a redemptive word in the midst of the pervasive cynicism of our time. Its distinctiveness is that it is, not an attempt to set forth a “theology of hope” per se, but the articulation of the author’s own faith in God (and the Church) as he struggles to live beyond the cynicism to which so many in our age have succumbed.

Woodyard begins with the basic observation that there is always a distinct context from within which we approach the Christian message. For many today, he says, that context is the struggle to live beyond cynicism. He defines cynicism as distrust of man and his institutions, contempt of any good that may come of them, and a general pessimism about the future. Cynicism, he observes, leads inevitably to “futurelessness”—the contention that nothing will ever be appreciably different than it now is. The way out of cynicism and into the joy of God’s future is the Christian Gospel, attended by hope in God, who leads us into his future, within the context of the Church as the people of God who together practice that hope.

In chapter two the author observes that man’s humanness consists in his being the creature who hopes, whose attitude toward life is one of always “leaning forward” in passionate longing for the “not yet.” In chapter three he points out that hope is possible for man only when he overcomes the tendency to live in terms of the past and present and lives instead from the future, that is, when man lives by faith in God, who leads us into his future, which recreates our present.

In chapter four Woodyard contends that God is “partial” and that the Bible is, in fact, the story of the sides God has taken in history: God, he says, takes sides with those who in hope follow him into his future. In chapter five Woodyard interprets the Church as the community that lives from the future; it is, he says, a fellowship that lives in mutual confirmation of God’s future.

Finally, in chapter six, Woodyard suggests that the “suffering” of God in history is the understanding around which we must fashion our life of hope: he who brings the future must bear the tensions and consequences of the present (witness the Cross). The author concludes with the affirmation (following Paul in Romans 8) that the cost of hope (to suffer the tensions and consequences of the present) is as nothing compared to the joy to which we are called.

For me, the distinctive contribution of Woodyard’s book is in chapter one. Here he responds affirmatively to the contention (of Johannes Metz, among others) that the crucial task of Christian theology today is the “deprivatization” of the Gospel. The “privatization” of the Gospel, Woodyard contends, is the cause of our cynicism. He charges that the faith has been wedged into the lives of men at the point of their private struggles with guilt, death, and meaninglessness and that this constricted understanding of the Gospel simply does not sustain men at the intersection of their lives with the sociopolitical realities of life. Christian faith has a “public” context, he points out: the events of the Exodus and the Cross, for example, are decidedly social and political events. Society in general and politics in particular, Woodyard says, as well as the private lives of men, are within the area of God’s activity. If we are to reclaim the Christian hope for our day, then we must discover a “political theology” that applies the Christian faith to the public as well as private areas of life.

Woodyard points out that the “political theology” for which he calls is not a resuscitation of the social gospel. That, he says, degenerated into a synthesis of religion and society, Christianity and social progress, and tended to dissolve the tension between history and the Kingdom. A “political theology,” on the other hand, refuses to reduce the demands of the Kingdom to the historically possible: the future is not an outgrowth of the present but a movement from God. Our hope is in God and not in society or government. Yet the Christian faith is social and political in its implications and not just personal and individual. So, Woodyard suggests, we must “deprivatize” the faith and proclaim the public as well as personal areas of God’s domain if we are to speak a redemptive word to men today.

Some may not be convinced by Woodyard’s call for a “political theology” and may resent his charge that those who persist in relegating God to the private chambers of the soul in effect engender a practical atheism. If so, then his book will offer these readers a better understanding of that which is unconvincing and a better appreciation of their own convictions.

The author’s style is not always as clear as one might wish and sometimes requires a second reading. At those places he seems still to be struggling with the hope he wishes to communicate. Involvement in that struggle to communicate the Christian hope for our day may just be the hope of our theology.

But How?

Science Teaching: A Christian Approach, by Robert J. Ream (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1972, 130 pp., $2.50 pb), is reviewed by Wendell McBurney, coordinator for school science, Indiana University, Bloomington.

Robert J. Ream, a teacher in a Christian academy, here presents an extensive review of the scientific enterprise from a Christian point of view. Without ever establishing an operational definition of science, he evaluates its methods, limitations, and potentials, with assistance from numerous references to Scripture and related literature. Ream is to be commended for abstaining from the prolonged rehash of the creation-vs.-evolution debate too often typical of this type of book. His understanding of science is adequate, though his basic orientation appears to be that of a theologian.

I was disappointed that he did not spend more time presenting the practical application of his basic premise; he attends to the teaching of science very cursorily in the concluding pages of each chapter, seemingly as an afterthought to an otherwise comprehensive review of a Christian philosophy of science. His attempts to relate the discussion to Christian education serve only to reiterate the position that Christ must be central to all education (in this case science); he avoids the elusive specifics of how to do it. Omitting the word “teaching” from the title of the book would have resulted in a more accurate description of the contents.

This book could be of interest to anyone concerned about a Christian view of science, and it would be a suitable addition to the resource shelf of one who prepares students to teach science in a Christian school. But I cannot recommend its use (and perhaps it is not so intended) as a science methods text for the potential teacher; very few undergraduates would have patience with the author’s tendency to make his points somewhat laboriously, and with his heavy writing style. For example:

He thereby knows that that which sees the light, namely the self, cannot itself be the light lest the absurdity arise of the one doing the seeing being what is seen while at the same time he is the one seeing.

IN THE JOURNALS

So far a compiler of a directory of Spanish religious periodicals has found 1,000 of them. If you think he has missed some, send their names and addresses to Robert Joe Lee, 100 Stockton St., Apt. F2, Princeton, N. J. 08540.

The Latin American Theological Fraternity, an evangelical group, has recently begun two periodicals that all theological libraries should receive: Boletím Teológico ($2.50/four issues) and Theological Fraternity Bulletin $3/four issues). Write to Casilla 2475, Cochabamba, Bolivia.

The Pentecostals: The Charismatic Movement in the Churches, by Walter J. Hollenweger (Augsburg, 1972, 572 pp., $9.95), is reviewed by Russell Spittler, chairman of the Division of Religion, Southern California College, Costa Mesa.

What distinguishes this analysis is its comprehensiveness and its competence. For ten years (1948–58) Walter Hollenweger served as an able evangelist in the Swiss Pentecostal Mission. His six years (1965–71) as secretary for evangelism in the World Council of Churches enabled him to make on-site evaluations of highly varied sectors of the Pentecostal movement throughout the world. Since 1971 he has had academic leisure as professor of mission at the University of Birmingham. No other current writer on Pentecostalism has quite this balance of experience.

Not merely a history, this work provides also a social analysis of the movement. Moreover, throughout Hollenweger engages theologically with the movement he discusses. There is a strong—and many classical Pentecostals will say, regrettably negative—personal note. Hollenweger’s overriding purpose in the work has been the literary incarnation of his own life mission: to introduce the Pentecostal movement and the ecumenical movement to each other. For that, he will be both praised and damned.

The work is a bibliographic cornucopia, with frequent reference in the notes to his multi-volumed 1966 Zürich dissertation “Handbook to the Pentecostal Movement.” The thirty-five-page bibliography is only a sampler of the larger thesis.

Hollenweger’s first-hand travels allow him to speak more thoroughly than, for example, John Nichol in the recent reprint The Pentecostals (Logos Books, 1971; still a handy introduction to the movement). His wide competence in European languages gives him ready access to the sources he has marshalled.

Still, breadth is at times achieved at the price of depth. There are so many inaccuracies in his treatment of the American Assemblies of God (which I know best) that I can only hope the factual batting average is considerably higher in his treatment of other groups and continents. (For example, though in the preface he assures the reader his work has been brought up to date, he nevertheless uses the pre-1961 form of the doctrinal statement of the Assemblies of God.) Perfection on such detail in a book of these extensive proportions cannot reasonably be expected, however, and wise readers will help make a good book better by forwarding its author lists of discovered inaccuracies.

The astonishing amount of documentation will strike the reader at times as excessive, at other times as provokingly brief.

The work falls into two parts, nearly equal in length. “Part One—History” amply traces North American, Brazilian, South African, and European (including Russian) varieties of Pentecostalism. But little is said of Far Eastern Pentecostalism. Catholic Pentecostalism is too recent a phenomenon to have gotten a state-of-the-art treatment.

Moreover, in this English edition three chapters on German and Swiss Pentecostal history were omitted in favor of an equivalent treatment of British Pentecostalism. A similar loss of nearly 150 pages of Norwegian Pentecostal history occurred when Nils Bloch-Hoell’s The Pentecostal Movement was translated. There is a sharp need today in Pentecostal research for the translation of such regional history.

“Part Two—Belief and Practice” has the advantageous perspective of an erstwhile insider. Here the author chides classical Pentecostals for their “fundamentalism”—which certainly comes through as one of the major themes of the volume. Indeed, Hollenweger intends to engage Pentecostals in theological dialogue. With the recent surfacing of scattered examples of Pentecostal scholarship, the time has come for classical Pentecostals in particular to clear their theological throats and speak up.

Although more narrowly conceived studies like Vinson Synan’s The Holiness-Pentecostal Movement in the United States will have to be consulted, Hollenweger’s work is the most comprehensive and authoritative study of international Pentecostalism in print. It is, in short, a Pentecostal Baedeker.