Report from Bratislava: Czech Church Hopes—And Then the Tanks

The Rev. Jaroslav J. Vajda, editor of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod monthly “This Day,” wrote this report in Vienna, Austria, after his visit to a Slovak cultural conference on a scholarship from Comenius University in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, had been cut short by last month’s Soviet invasion:

The day after I completed investigation of the far-reaching effects of Czechoslovakia’s liberalization on its 510,000-member Lutheran Church, the scene was totally and abruptly revised with the sudden occupation by Warsaw Pact forces.

There was no immediate assurance of a return to the pre-occupation freedoms enjoyed during seven brief months under Communist Party Secretary Alexander Dubcek. In my week in the capital of Slovakia, I heard exciting signs of this atmosphere in announcements to congregations.

For the first time since 1948, parents would register their children for religious instruction with local church authorities; the previous practice of registering with public-school officials frightened and frustrated most parents from doing so. There would be no persecution of registrants as in the past, and the church could extend training to an earlier age.

Parishioners of the 10,000-member Bratislava Lutheran Church were asked to sign petitions to restore broadcasting of worship from the large 200-year-old mother church in the capital, where the pulpit microphone had not been used since 1951. More than half the 300 worshipers lined up to sign; a marked contrast to the quick scattering of churchgoers from a service I attended there in 1965.

The church biweekly, “Lutheran Messenger from the Tatra Foothills,” handed to members after services, was bigger than usual and carried a strong pro-Dubcek editorial appealing for dialogue between Marxism and Christianity. The paper’s former editor, Joseph Juras, was released from a six-year imprisonment just two months ago.

The edition also carried a defense of the late Bishop Vladimir Cobrda, former head of Slovakia’s Lutherans, who was tried for subversion five years ago at age 83. The onetime war hero, decorated for resistance to the Nazi occupation, got a suspended sentence and died, crushed, a short time later. His is one of thousands of names being rehabilitated after public disgrace under the Stalinist Novotny regime. Dozens of the nation’s 350 Lutheran pastors had been deposed or imprisoned; a few were beginning to return to their parishes.

The church rejoiced over the increase of ministerial students: eight a few years ago, fifty-two for the upcoming fall term at the Bratislava Lutheran Seminary.

There were hopes that charitable institutions confiscated by previous regimes would be returned. Publishing, down to a few hymnals and New Testaments, was also expected to increase now that the excuse of a paper shortage was no longer quoted. Lay officers (presbyters) hoped to be able to function without threat to their jobs or to the education of their children. Children of church members could now expect to enter college without hindrance. (Children of Lutheran pastors, prominent in national and cultural leadership far out of proportion to their numbers, were special victims of discrimination after the 1948 Communist takeover.)

Since January, the first youth programs in a generation had begun. Two hundred young people attended a Bible institute in one town, 120 in another. Youths who had previously taken the risk of enrolling for the two-year confirmation course did not even know the Lord’s Prayer.

As of August 18, the Lutherans had a leadership crisis. Of three district officials, one had died and had not been replaced. Bratislava Bishop Jan Chabada was on leave for illness. No general conference of clergy has been held for years. In the spring, church leaders issued a statement supporting Dubcek and pleading for correction of past wrongs and more freedom in the future.

I wrote down these encouraging reports Tuesday, August 20. That night at 11:30 the Russians began moving in. All night long they streamed over the Danube bridge into the city in endless lines of tanks and military vehicles. Airplanes unloaded troops and supplies, and by morning the city of 300,000 was completely enclosed in a trap of armor. From my dormitory window I saw tanks so numerous they could not move.

Such things happen in films. We could not believe they were taking place before our eyes.

At 7 A.M. the local TV station went on the air with bulletins. Government officials asked the people to remain calm and not provoke the occupiers. Although Soviet soldiers surrounded the studios and the announcer warned that each segment might be the last, broadcasts continued until 2 P.M.

At noon the entire country was asked to stop all activity for two minutes as a sign of support for the government. Whistles and horns were blown, and a church bell rang as I walked to Safarik Square at the base of the Danube bridge.

A group of youths carrying the Czech flag marched toward the circle of tanks chanting “Dubcek and Svoboda, this is our liberty.” (Svoboda, the president’s name, means freedom.)

In minutes a crowd of nearly 1,000 formed a human barricade and prevented military vehicles from entering the city. After a half hour an armored car drove into the crowd, firing shots in the air. The crowd separated but then began to clamor up the sides of the tank, throwing sticks and stones. Soldiers began firing over the heads of the crowd, and people ran in all directions. Two youths were said later to have been killed.

Low-flying jets buzzed the ancient city all afternoon as scattered shooting continued. A hundred yards from my dormitory window some boys rolled up a canvas banner, set fire to it, and stuffed it into the path of a passing tank, which was crippled.

By late afternoon every tank had been painted or chalked with a swastika or “Go Home.” A girl on the steps of the university administration building on the square shouted “Fascist” at a passing tank and was killed at the foot of a column. At 6:30 P.M., as we left the city with twenty-one American students in a hastily hired bus, we saw behind a Russian tank and gun the inscription a young man had chiseled into that column: “Here the Russians killed a 17-year-old Slovak girl.” At the foot of the pillar lay a bouquet and the scarf the girl had worn.

As we reached the Austrian border five miles west of the city we left a determined people, their dreams of freedom shattered, their intellectuals facing arrest, the night of terror they recalled from 1939 falling again with the Soviet invasion.

The border was still in friendly Slovak hands, just an hour before the first curfew. Night had already settled as we transferred to transportation that was still free. The border guards said, “Tell your people that we shall not give up.”

A part of our own freedom depended on that determination.

NEAR-SPLIT ON RACE-SPLITTING

Indonesians became unexpected mediators between South Africans and Hollanders at last month’s Reformed Ecumenical Synod, preventing a complete split between them and a predicted collapse of this small world confessional movement. The Asians proposed a marriage of majority and minority reports on race relations, one of which was too vague for many delegates, the other too explicit.

Several young churches were accepted at the RES meetings in Holland, making it an organization of thirty denominations with five million members. The synod has met every five years since 1948. Major members are the U. S. Christian Reformed Church, the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, and two of the three Boer churches—the large Dutch Reformed Church and the Reformed Church in South Africa.

Although members of the group share a deep love for the Bible, Reformed confessions, and presbyterian government, it soon became evident that they have grown far apart on such issues as ordination of women, the World Council of Churches, and—especially—apartheid.

The meeting drew scores of journalists, because the South African Dutch churches have had virtually no recent contact with other churches. For the first time since 1960, they discussed apartheid with fellow Christians in public.

The original study report on race was considered a rather weak piece of work. Professor J. van den Berg of the Free University of Amsterdam had added a strong anti-apartheid minority report. Yet South Africans, also dissatisfied, added their own comments. A synod advisory committee was also unable to write one report. A majority chose sides with the South Africans; a minority of Hollanders and Indonesians issued a strong minority report.

After one and one-half days of hard discussion, the synod followed an Indonesian’s original suggestion and appointed three “wise men” to seek a compromise: Professors Klooster of Grand Rapids, Sudarmo of Djakarta, and Helberg of Pretoria.

After eight continuous hours of consultation the three men proposed resolutions based on both reports. With amendments, their work was accepted by a simple voice vote, though South Africans still thought it went too far and the Dutch not far enough.

The document says, “Marriage is primarily a personal and family matter. Church and state must refrain from prohibiting interracial marriages”—a clear strike at South African laws. Moreover, the churches are advised to not only reject “every form of racial discrimination and racism” but also “subtle forms of racial discrimination found in many countries today with respect to housing, employment, education, law enforcement, etc.”

It was unclear whether South African apartheid had been condemned. A motion to spell this out was rejected, both by South Africans and by those who didn’t want to endanger the measure of unity that had been found.

On other subjects the synod spoke less unitedly. By 25 to 22, it supported the Free Church of Scotland’s opposition to women in “the governing or teaching orders of the Church,” thereby rejecting a committee proposal to study the issue.

With a somewhat bigger majority the synod repeated its advice to shun membership in the World Council of Churches at the present time. The same thing was said about the International Council of Christian Churches, with the addition that churches are free to decide this one for themselves. This was done despite the fact that three synod members are in the WCC and only one is in the ICCC. The synod, however, did ask members to investigate the ICCC role in church splits in Pakistan and Cameroun.

JAN J. VAN CAPELLEVEEN

PENTECOSTAL GROWTH IN CANADA

The Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada told tales of growth as 300 leaders celebrated an August golden-jubilee convention in Windsor, Ontario. Canada’s fastest-growing major denomination has added 5 per cent a year to its constituency since 1950. Last year fifty-seven new congregations brought the total to 745.

In a strong evangelism resolution, the group—counterpart to the U. S. Assemblies of God—called for a national program of personal evangelism, preparation of a manual, and increased instruction in methods at Assemblies colleges. They moved boldly into TV evangelism, with “Cross-roads,” a program sponsored by the Sudbury, Ontario, church, planned as a future national TV voice of the Assemblies.

At a jangling Offerama—in which Assemblies across Canada phoned in contributions to the 166 missionaries—$131,620 was contributed, nearly $30,000 more than the amount two years ago.

Looking outward, denominational Editor Earl Kulbeck said, “Like nearly all fundamentalists, we buried our heads for years and neglected social matters. But more recently we’ve decided that nobody should do better social work than born-again Christians.” A resolution opposed proposals by the nation’s new Liberal government to legalize lotteries and homosexuality and urged a “gigantic” letter-writing campaign against them.

Delegates also expressed considerable opposition to the Ontario government’s proposal to tax denominational property, but the convention did not take action since it was not a national issue.

The convention chose the Rev. Robert Taitinger, 41, of Edmonton, Alberta, as general superintendent, to succeed retiring ten-year veteran the Rev. Tom Johnstone, 65.

In near-100-degree heat August 24 the delegates decided to switch conventions back to the usual September date since “August is proving to be a very unsatisfactory month.” By Monday, temperatures were more comfortable, and they rescinded the action.

JAMES L. HUFFMAN

FUNDAMENTALISTS ON THE BEACH

President Johnson wired: “You go forth with the gratitude of this nation and the admiration of your President.” New Jersey Governor Richard Hughes, a Democratic vice-presidential possibility, welcomed “your large and distinguished international group.” Chiang Kai-shek said the organization is “known and highly esteemed around the world” for its fundamentalism and anticommunism.

Thus armed with establishment credentials, the International Council of Christian Churches’ August assembly at Cape May, New Jersey, proceeded to assault the religious establishment. The fundamentalist council had invited three of its major targets—Billy Graham, Carl F. H. Henry, and Eugene Carson Blake—to speak, but plans didn’t pan out.

The ICCC condemned the Roman Catholic Church, the World Council of Churches, the National Association of Evangelicals, the Revised Standard Version, and all Communists everywhere.

Although ICCC orthodoxy had held Tito-type Communists to be the same as the rest, the invasion of Czechoslovakia brought the assessment that peaceful coexistence is now a myth, “for they cannot even coexist as Communists.” The religious-liberty resolution was the only time non-Communists were condemned: several ICCC pastors have been jailed in the Cameroun, and the members think U. S. income-tax enforcement is loaded against conservatives.

The resolution on Roman Catholicism, more acid than the 1965 statement,The resolution said, “The whole ststem of Poperyis a system of nondage and tyranmy—the bondage and tyranny of anti-Christianity. By a colossal web of superstiton … Rome has enslaved millions of the human race. By the galkling chains of an intolerable priesthood, Rome has imprisoned the souls of those who have fallen prey to her blasphemies. By the cunning of her decits Rome has brought down whole nations to mental and even physical slavery …” etc. didn’t discuss the Pope’s current weak spot—the birth-control stand. It brought dissent by a moderate minority from Sweden, Holland, and New Zealand. No less anti-Catholic than the hawks led by Northern Ireland’s Ian Paisley, they sought to convince troubled Catholics rather than intimidate them.

The ICCC, ever alert to soft spots in the WCC, paid to bring as an observer the Rev. Apostolos Bliates, pastor of one of Greece’s biggest Protestant churches. The Greek evangelicals are restive about their WCC ties, partly because of the move toward Catholicism. But Bliates said that the resolution on Catholics was too strong even for Greek palates, and that the ICCC should be more careful about politics and more friendly toward non-ICCC evangelicals.

Most of the ICCC groups have pulled out of other denominations, and much of the council’s effort is aimed at getting others to follow suit, which makes for some tedious sessions. All thirty minutes of the British report were spent on the picketing and protests against “His Dis-Grace” the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Pope; nothing was said of evangelism or other church tasks. By contrast, many speeches offered an intelligent, forceful expression of biblical belief.

The ICCC never gives out constituency estimates, so it’s hard to guess just what the 480 delegates and 2,000 visitors at Cape May represented. But the movement is growing, fueled by such events as the WCC’s Uppsala assembly and the dismissal of heresy charges against Principal Lloyd Geering in New Zealand.

At the ICCC meeting the Rev. Carl McIntire was more omnipresent than his arch-rivals Blake and Pope Paul were at Uppsala or Vatican II. Dr. A. Rackotobe of an independent Reformed church in Madagascar exclaimed with enthusiasm, “The world is beginning to rot. Happily, Dr. McIntire is the salt.… Apart from Dr. McIntire the whole world is in deep darkness.”

At 62, McIntire is a hard-working, happy warrior. He has been ICCC president twenty years and is in his thirty-fifth year at the Bible Presbyterian Church in Collingswood, New Jersey, whose 1,800 members constitute nearly a fourth of that denomination. From there he puts out a weekly paper and a daily radio program he says is on 600 stations.

But Cape May is an increasingly important base. McIntire picked up the long-vacant 333-room beachfront Admiral Hotel for $300,000 and spent $1.5 million restoring its Victorian grandeur and putting up a large auditorium. Then he acquired several more Victorian buildings and—last December—the 100-room Congress Hall for $550,000. All this makes McIntire’s group the town’s biggest taxpayer. The Admiral’s summer conference features such speakers as Strom Thurmond, John Stormer, and Edgar Bundy. The bookstore sells Carleton Putnam’s notorious Race and Reason.

RICHARD N. OSTLING

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