A thought-provoking letter in a recent Southern Baptist publication indicates something of the climate of opinion in the South these days toward the matter of segregation. It is written by a retired railroad conductor of Lebanon Junction, Kentucky, who writes that “Throughout the first 60 years of my life, I never questioned that Peter’s confession that ‘God is no respecter of persons’ referred exclusively to white persons. Nor did I question that segregation was Christian. Three years ago my views on this were completely altered, and I became convinced that God makes no distinctions among people whatever their race.” Certain things, he goes on, have convinced him that this is true, despite the fact that interpretations in the churches, i.e., white churches, have almost always either accepted segregation as right, or have ignored it all together.
The writer of that letter is disappointed that he finds no laymen crusading for integration, no pastors making an issue of segregation in their sermons, and no concerted action for integration on the part of the churches. And there is, he says, silence in the denominational papers.
This situation is true, not only of the Southern Baptists, but of other denominations. Perhaps most ministers in the South are troubled, like this layman, but they find other things to talk about in their sermons. Most of those who are vocal are so on the side of the citizens’ councils, to which organizations this reporter gave considerable space a short time ago. One pastor, that of Dallas’ Munger Place Baptist Church, recently insisted that “Now is the time for citizens’ councils to put pressure on your preacher,” and he even goes on to list eight, to him, reasons why it is not Christian to invite persons of the colored race into white churches.
The truth is that most denominations have, on a national level, declared themselves in support of the Supreme Court’s desegregation ruling, but such declarations have been attacked or ignored at the local level. The Catholic Church is the only one that has taken an unequivocal position on the matter, holding that segregation is an offense against Christian morality.
For foregoing is the sort of rationalization going on in the deep South today. A syndicated Southern columnist, John Temple Graves, summed it up saying, “With the brotherhood of man under God so precious in religious faith, no one says men of God should fail to oppose hate, intolerance, injustice, and discrimination.” And Dr. William A. Benfield of Louisville’s Highland Presbyterian Church put it more pointedly when he said in a recent sermon, “In some circles, religion has become an opiate of the people. Present-day Christianity is to many people tame and prosaic, prim and dull.… The Christian church has become too much an ambulance, dragging along behind, picking up the wounded, making bandages, and soothing hurt feelings, when the church should be out on the front line, getting hit in the face, but leading others and conquering the enemy.”
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In Nashville a suit has been filed protesting the reading of the Bible and the singing of hymns in public schools. Persons making the protest contend that this practice is a violation of the First Amendment, which forbids government to prefer one religion over another. Whatever may be our personal attitude toward the matter, it will help keep our thinking straight on the subject if we recall that a great justice of the Supreme Court once said that freedom of speech (and the same is true of religion) means not only freedom for the thought you like but equal freedom for the thoughts you hate. That may be pretty hard for some of us to live up to, but it is the American constitutional way.
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And while on the subject of the Constitution, it might be well to observe that court fights are ahead over the repressive laws passed by some Southern legislatures directed at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. These laws would penalize persons for belonging to the association. Persons and organizations serving notices of protest insist that this is a violation of the First Amendment, which protects the right of people peaceably to assemble, and it is difficult to see where it could be anything else. Up to this date, no news has come in that those same legislatures have entertained any idea of passing similar laws relating to the white citizen’s councils, which are making a veritable reign of terror for colored people in some areas of the Southern states.
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Sometimes perhaps ministers are expected to be mind readers, which of course they are not. The following item records an actual incident. A minister was met on the street by a parishioner who said angrily, “I was in the hospital all last week and not once did you come to see me.” When the minister asked if he had had a doctor, it sent the man’s blood pressure still higher. But the next question brought a reversal of temper, “How did the doctor know you were ill?” It might be well to keep this in mind when expecting of ministers and others performing personal services to do the impossible.
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The year before his death, Abraham Lincoln said:
“I see in the future a crisis arising that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working on the prejudices of the people until all wealth is concentrated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
Well, not exactly that has happened, but one is reminded of this trend in reading the current attempts to raise the first class postal rates from 3¢ to 4¢. These are the rates that you and I, the little people, pay for sending our letters. The argument is that such a raise is necessary to cover the deficit in the postal department. Well, a little checking reveals that first-class mail is the only class that is paying its way, while you and I, the taxpayers make up an annual loss of nearly $9 million for distribution of Life magazine, $6.5 million for the Saturday Evening Post, over $1.5 million for the Ladies Home Journal, nearly $5 million for Colliers, and over $3.5 million for Reader’s Digest. Furthermore, we pay a deficit of nearly $2 million annually for distributing the Chicago Tribune and almost that much for The New York Times. On these publications alone, there is a deficit of between $25 and $30 million. It would seem that those seeking to be fair about mailing privileges should look first at where the big deficits originate, instead of penalizing those of us who send only a few letters a week, and at that, the postage we pay takes care of all costs of doing so.
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Officials of both the Catholic and Protestant denomination churches say there is a serious shortage of clergymen in the United States. A survey shows that the demand for priests and ministers far exceeds the supply. Thousands of churches in all parts of the country are forced to get along with part-time pastors. As for the Catholic Church, the official Catholic directory says the ratio in its churches has gone up in ten years: one priest in 523 Catholics in 1945, to 700 Catholics today.
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Bishop Donald Harvey Tippett of San Francisco says the Methodist Church needs 2,800 new ministers each year to serve its steadily growing population.
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The Baptist World Alliance says five representatives of the Russian Baptist Union will arrive in this country on May 18 for a tour of the country’s Baptist centers. They will attend Baptist meetings in Washington, Kansas City, and Seattle, and will be in this country for a month.
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The National Religious Publicity Council has made awards of merit to three daily newspapers, and a weekly and monthly magazine. The awards are made in recognition of outstanding service rendered to organized religion through the pursuit of impartial journalism. Newspaper winners of the awards are the Nashville Tennessean, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and the Oakland Tribune. Magazine recipients were Life magazine and the Woman’s Home Companion.
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The chaplain of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, has been elected president of the National University Chaplains. The election took place at the association’s ninth annual conference, held at Vassar College, last Wednesday.
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Cardinal John D’Alton, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Armagh and primate of Ireland, has arrived by plane to dedicate an American hospital. Cardinal D’Alton came to this country to lead the dedication ceremonies today at the $6 million Cardinal Glennon Memorial Hospital for Children at St. Louis.
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A free-parking-for-churchgoers plan inaugurated in Washington last Christmas is paying off in church attendance. Capital parking lot operators say an average of 10,000 cars are being parked each Sunday morning. Non-churchgoers cannot sneak in. After the service, the parking lot attendants collect a copy of the day’s church bulletin from each motorist before he gets to drive his car out.
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In Cambridge, Massachusetts, Rev. Walter D. Kring, minister of the Unitarian Church of All Souls, New York City, has been elected president of the Harvard Divinity School Alumni Association. He succeeds the Rev. Dana McLean Greeley, of Boston.
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Canon John M. Burgess, the first Negro clergyman on the staff of Washington Cathedral, has been named archdeacon of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts. Canon Burgess, who is 47, was appointed by the Right Rev. Norman Nash, Episcopal bishop of Massachusetts. He will supervise 13 missions in Boston. He is the first Negro to hold the archdeacon post.
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The chief of U.S. army chaplains has reported improvement in the moral standards of U.S. soldiers in Germany. Major General Patrick J. Ryan says conditions have bettered since his last visit, November 1954.
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A Pacific Northwestern minister says the U.S. now has less religious freedom than it had 20 years ago. The statement is from Dr. Albert J. Lindsey, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Tacoma, Washington. He has also told the National Association of Evangelicals, meeting in Cleveland, that more and more channels are being closed to the intelligent religious discussions and dissemination of facts about religion. Dr. Lindsey adds they are being closed behind a smokescreen of supposed tolerance and broad-mindedness and false profession of religious freedom. The evangelicals have elected Dr. Paul P. Petticord of Portland, Oregon, as president. He is an Evangelical United Brethren minister and president of the Western Evangelical Seminary of Portland. The evangelical association represents about 40 conservative Protestant denominations, with a total membership of almost two million persons.
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Pope Pius XII has appointed two new prelates for Roman Catholics in the far Western U.S. The Very Rev. Richard Ackerman, national director of the Pontifical Association of the Holy Childhood, is to be auxiliary to Bishop Charles Buddy of San Diego. He will also have the rank of titular bishop of Lares. Monsignor Thomas Gill, rector of St. James Cathedral in Seattle, will be auxiliary to archbishop Thomas Connolly of Seattle. Monsignor Gill will also be titular bishop of Lambaesis.
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A retired assistant attorney general of Illinois is giving up a life of ease to become a Catholic priest. Donald John F. McGinnis of Alton, Illinois, will be ordained in the Benedictine abbey of Collegeville, Minnesota, on May 19. The 62-year-old Father Donald will say his first solemn high Mass two days later in Alton’s St. Peter and Paul Cathedral. That will be before the same altar where he and his late wife were married 38 years ago. One of Father Donald’s 11 grandchildren admits he is having a hard time changing from “Grandpa McGinnis” to “Father Donald.”
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Mayor Robert F. Wagner of New York City will be given the first Light of the World award today in New York. Leading educators, public officials, and spiritual leaders are to take part in presentation of the honors, which is sponsored by the World Academy in Jerusalem. The award notes the mayor’s outstanding contributions toward furtherance of the World Academy’s universal ideas. It aims to restore and regenerate the spiritual insights of the world’s greatest sages.