Des Moines: One of the largest church conventions in the nation is under way in Des Moines. Upwards of 8,000 persons are attending a six-day international conclave of the Disciples of Christ. A report dealing with racial practices in churches is on the agenda.
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Washington: An American religious leader says Christian leaders in Red China seem to be sincerely convinced that churches are getting along well under the Communist government. Dr. Eugene L. Smith, vice president of the National Council of Churches, quoted Dr. K.H. Ting, an Algerian bishop in Red China, as telling him “The church in China has freedom of worship, freedom to witness, to evangelized, to publish Christian literature without censorship, to conduct Christian work among students at the university.” And Dr. Smith said Bishop Ting seemed to reflect accurately the prevailing opinion of the Chinese churches.
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Boston: The American Foundation for the Preservation of the Christian Heritage is planning to reproduce in Southern California three cities in the Holy Land. They will be reproduced on a 2,000-acre site and the project will cost about $20 million. The cities that will be reproduced are the walled city of Jerusalem, the town of Bethlehem, and Christ’s hometown of Nazareth. It will be called “Christian Land.” Funds will be raised by public subscription.
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The head of the Methodist Church in the New York area predicts that Negroes and whites within the Methodist denomination will be integrated within the next 10 years. Bishop Frederick Newell, addressing a mixed audience, said they must insure that the move toward integration does not tear down the church, even though it should be carried out as quickly as possible.
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And along the same line in Washington, a prominent Negro bishop from Florida says Christian churches must act with vigor and determination to insure peaceful integration of the nation’s schools. Bishop D. Ward Nichols, of Jacksonville, urges a nationwide study of how many churches have met or have failed to meet the challenge of preventing racial violence.
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Again, Washington: It is reported that Lutheran Bishop Lajos Ordass may be restored to his full church rank soon by the Hungarian government. Dr. Franklin Clark Fry, president of the United Lutheran Church in America, says he has been corresponding with the Hungarian government and expects the restoration of Bishop Ordass any day. The Hungarian prelate was convicted on a charge of currency violation in Hungary. He has spent the past two years in prison.
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The general board of the National Council of Churches has voted to set up a special committee to coordinate relief needs of an estimated 1 million Arab refugees from Israel. The committee would recommend appropriate action by American Protestant churches to meet the need.
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Buffalo, New York: More than 10,000 delegates from 24 Catholic archdioceses and 83 dioceses are attending the Tenth National Congress of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine in Buffalo. Several high ranking prelates form Canada, Central and South America are attending. The conferences will end today.
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Some clerics and scholars of the Old and New Worlds are tying to find a way by which millions of Christians might re-enter the Roman Catholic Church. The sessions of the Unionistic Congress in the St. Procopius Abbey at Lisle, Illinois, this week aim to have some 200 million Eastern Orthodox Christians united with Rome. They would become Roman Catholics of the Byzantine rite or one of the other non-Latin rites that now have about 8 million members. The Eastern Orthodox Christians left the Roman Church about 900 years ago. That was the Great Schism of 1054, based on political, social, cultural, and doctrinal differences. The congresses aiming toward the reunion have been going on since 1907. Until World War II they were held in Czechoslovakia, where Saints Cyril and Methodius began Christianizing Slavonic peoples in the ninth century. St. Procopius Abbey has held a papal commission for 29 years to work for the rejoining. It now has bi-ritual faculties; that is, priests trained by it may conduct services in both Latin (or Western) and Byzantine (or Eastern) liturgies of the Roman Catholic Church.
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Pope Pius, through a special representative, has praised the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine as one of the two great treasures of Roman Catholics. The Most Rev. Monsignor Francesco Roberti names the other as the Catholic school. The monsignor is secretary of the Sacred Congregation of the Council in Rome.
More than 3,500 lay and clerical delegates are at the Tenth National Congress of the Confraternity, which is meeting in Buffalo, New York. On the agenda is a controversial new Roman Catholic hymnal prepared by a committee of the confraternity. The committee chairman, the Rev. John Selner of St. Mary’s Seminary, in Baltimore, Maryland, says opposition centers on omission of two hymns. Father Selner adds that some Protestant hymns may be included if they are found to be not native to Protestant worship.
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An official of the Disciples of Christ Christian churches says that denomination is doing some missionary work in full partnership with other groups. The information comes from Dr. Donald West, forum chairman for the World Mission division of the United Christian Missionary Society. Dr. West has told the World Mission leaders that such cooperation already is a fact in Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Africa. And in Nepal and Okinawa, representatives of the Disciples are working with other Protestant groups. The Disciples’ United Missionary Society met in Des Moines this week prior to an international convention assembly that began Friday. The United Missionary Society is an international board of the Disciples. It carried on a $5 million program in 11 overseas nations in 1955-56.
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Labor leaders and clergymen of Fresno, California, are planning a series of joint meetings. The National Council of Churches adds that delegates of the Fresno Labor Council will meet with ministers representing the Fresno Council of Churches and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Monterey-Fresno Council of Churches. The first topic of the labor and church assemblies will be Sunday closing of stores and businesses.
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A fabulous religious treasure of the British Museum is to get a modern printing. It is the Lindisfarne Gospels, an illuminated Latin manuscript of the Gospels made about 700 A.D. by Eadfrith, bishop of Lindisfarne, or Holy Island. The Gospels are famed for their elegance and precious coloring and are noted as a classic piece of Anglo-Celtic book illumination. The modern copies will be printed in facsimile in Switzerland for distribution in the U.S. The two-volume work will be limited to 680 copies, at $375 a copy. Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, and Mediterranean styles are combined in the words and decorations of these gospels. Its Latin text is very close to the original Vulgate gospels. The manuscript also contains four portraits of the Evangelists.
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The Unitarian Church recently observed a period of recognition of the importance of freedom of the press. This observance honors Elijah Parish Lovejoy who was one of the early martyrs for freedom of the press. He was anti-slavery when to be so was looked upon much as we – at least some of us – look upon subversion today. He was publisher of the St. Louis Observer. His plant was wrecked by a mob and he moved to Alton, Illinois. One press was thrown into the river en route. Another arrived and it was destroyed. In 1837 still another was purchased. The next day a mob attacked Lovejoy’s plant. It was defended by Lovejoy and a few patriots. Lovejoy was killed in the fray.
Why bring this up in connection with a religious news program? The reason should be obvious: A free people must have a free press. Without it and the other freedoms associated with it, it is difficult to see how we could have freedom of religion. Lovejoy was a man about whom it would be well for us to know more. In our day defenders of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are not always popular. But it is these who keep alive the flame of American liberties, which is probably the greatest single thing that distinguishes our system here from that among the dictators. And speaking of a companion freedom, that of speech, Woodrow Wilson made an observation that shows how foolish it is to try to curb free speaking. He said, “I have always been among those who believed the greatest freedom of speech was the greatest safety, because if a man is a fool the best thing to do is to encourage him to advertise the fact by speaking.”
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One very encouraging development this week was the ruling in New York by Federal Judge Palmieri that the one-time kingpin gambler, Frank Costello, could not be deprived of his citizenship through the use of evidence obtained by wiretapping. The judge went on to emphasize that he was dismissing the case without prejudice to reinstitution of action by the government. This leaves the way open for possible denaturalization and deportation if sufficient evidence is presented in the future to justify it.
The judge’s ruling was obviously made not out of any sympathy for the way the racketeer once made his living. Costello is now serving a five-year prison sentence for income tax evasion, and it is likely the judge would feel little sympathy toward this activity of Costello. The ruling came within the framework of the First Amendment, and also the Fourth Amendment, which is designed to make citizens secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Eager beavers who would like to expel persons of Costello’s caliber from our midst will criticize the court’s findings. Our own attorney general of the United States has urged upon Congress a wiretapping bill, with the excuse that such is necessary in order to detect criminals. However, most of us recognize that if an officer can tap our telephones without our knowing it, they can secure information, not only about crimes, but also about personal matters which we would discuss with no one but our friends and neighbors; that conceivably materials secured in this matter by unscrupulous people could be used for blackmail purpose; and, in short, that wire tapping would open a Pandora’s box of troubles which would be inimical to the tradition and mores of a free people. To put it bluntly, we think that what we discuss with friends – or enemies – over the telephone is none of the business of government. With so much talk about decentralizing government these days, is it not remarkable that those who do the most talk about it are the same ones that urge further centralizing government through giving that government the right to listen in on our most intimate conversation? Believers in the Constitution and its Bill of Rights will applaud Judge Palmieri’s decision, while at the same time condemning the activities of the individual against whom government attorneys tried to use this illegal evidence.
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Only once or twice on this program have I suggested that you write to me your opinion of it. Today’s broadcast completes two years of the program. It has been designed at all times to be a non-sectarian comment on items of religious significance that appear in the press from time to time. Several times I have had an impulse to discontinue it, for, regardless of its merits or lack of them, it does require considerable time to prepare script. There is no financial consideration involved, for I have never received or asked to receive compensation for what I have tried to do. WJHL has generously contributed its facilities for bringing the program to you. Do you wish the program continued? Whether it is or not will depend to a large extent upon your response to this question. Send a post card or letter to me at State College or in care of WJHL letting me know your wishes on the matter.