Pilgrim’S Analysis
Now I saw in my dream that Christian entered again through a door with a brass plate on which was the name, Sigmund Schlaf, M.D.
Christian: Sir, my anguish of spirit has much abated since leaving the dungeon of the Giant Despair.…
Dr. Schlaf: So you feel you have responded to analysis. Are you able to take a balanced view of your earlier hallucinations?
Chr.: Whether the Giant Despair was but the creature of my sick soul I know not, but the blows of his cudgel were very real.
Dr.: And the Celestial City?
Chr.: I have come to bid you farewell. I must now resume my journey to the City of the Great King.
Dr.: I see. You don’t question the existence of this City?
Chr.: No longer, sir. There was a time in the dungeon when the City seemed a dream, but now I know it stands foursquare about the throne.
Dr.: I should like to refer you to a specialist friend at the Peacehaven Sanatorium. Peacehaven has the facilities for the therapy you should have at this time. If you sign this committal form …
Chr.: You still think me a madman.
Dr.: Not at all. At least not what that term implies. At first I thought you had the common symptoms of the normal modern neurosis, but the persistence of certain delusions.…
Chr.: What malady is this normal neurosis of which you speak?
Dr.: I was referring to existential vacuum. Nearly everyone has it. With the loss of instinctual behavior and the fading of social tradition, life has become aimless and meaningless for modern man.
Chr.: So it was in the City of Destruction. But do you point your patients to the Way of Life that leads from the little wicket gate to the garden of the Prince?
Dr.: Unfortunately mythology no longer serves the interest of adjustment to the real world. Retreat into delusion is the way of mental illness.
Chr.: Sir, think you that the Prince, too, is a phantom?
Dr.: I am a doctor, not a theologian. If you wish further treatment, I recommend Peacehaven. Goodbye, Mr. Christian.
Now I saw in my dream that Christian went forth upon the King’s Highway, singing this lament:
Destruction’s citizens do find
An empty vertigo of mind;
The doctor’s diagnosis
Is vacuum neurosis;
His learned perspicuity
Discerns complete vacuity;
He causes blinded minds to see
The darkness of reality.
O Great Physician, grant him sight,
And speak again, “Let there be light!”
EUTYCHUS
Torquemada’S Reaction
Your editorial in the May 25 issue entitled “Uncle Sam or Big Brother?” has been sent to me by my father. I want to commend you for some clear thinking.…
M. O. ALEXANDER, M.D.
Rockford Memorial Hospital
Rockford, Ill.
Your editorial expresses precisely the same viewpoint of Caiaphas. Just as Calvin put the torch to Servetus, he must have said, “Love, mercy, kindness and goodness are superfluous pieces of sentimentality in government.” I think Torquemada from his front seat in hell must have rejoiced in your Big Brother bit.…
O. CARROLL ARNOLD
First Baptist
Boulder, Colo.
The Legs Seem Flexed
The men who write of the “Free Church” in relation to ecumenism (May 25 issue) appear to be taking a longing look at the “Coming Great Church.” They’re not ready to jump on the bandwagon until certain assurances are made, but all the same, they seem as those whose legs are already flexed to make the hop.
Why? Their analysis of the ecumenical fever of our day is on a purely rational plane. Humanistically speaking, what could better meet the exigencies of the global situation than a “framework of collective influence”? But spiritually speaking, what could more flagrantly contradict the whole tenor of our faith than a man-made organizational unity never even hinted at in the Bible, except as an apostate end-time entity to be judged during the tribulation?
When our Free Church friends conceive of ecumenism in its biblical perspective as nothing more nor less than the existing spiritual oneness of the redeemed, they’ll quit worrying … about the feasibility of getting “Catholic and Reformed and Free Church Christians” on the shaky bandwagon of the “Coming Great Church.”
H. EDWARD ROWE
Church of the Open Door
Los Angeles, Calif.
Anxieties For The Church
“Calvin’s Influence in Church Affairs” by J. Howard Pew (May 11 issue) … expresses the fears and anxieties for our church and state of many laymen. From my observation, the church has lost much of its power because of its failure to believe the Bible to be the Word of God. I have been present in small prayer meetings and seen a young minister completely confused, and having to resort to vague and unsatisfactory answers when questioned by sharp young people present, all because he had no foundation Word of God from which to draw his answers.…
MRS. HARRY B. GAUSS
Washington, D. C.
Does Mr. Pew mean that the Church, including the clergy, must now cease its criticism of the United Nations? Should it be quiet about the Chinese government on Formosa? Can it no longer exalt the virtues of “free enterprise”? Must it be silent about the abuses of the Supreme Court?…
If Mr. Pew means this he is going to put a large number of conservative preachers out of business! These men are meddling with social, economic and political questions as has rarely been seen in the history of the church.
W. WESLEY SHRADER
First Baptist Church
Lewisburg, Pa.
• Mr. Pew’s essay registered no veiled plea for ecclesiastical meddling in behalf of conservative causes. His appeal to Calvin is unqualified: “… the Church should not become involved in outside affairs.… the Church has no scriptural authority to speak outside of the ecclesiastical field.… Meddling in politics is divisive and inimical to the success of the church.”—ED.
Howard Pew does beautifully! He shows the cause and power of the Reformation—in Geneva. And it was not a question of theology.
As it was power-organization then, so it is now. And so it is ever. Organization needs correcting balances. And when the balances fail, and the organization expands in power-application, then the Spirit is crushed. Luther was asked only one thing: “Will you obey the Church?” Right or wrong; creeds, orthodoxy, historical truth, had no part in the thinking and proceeding of the Church against him.
JOHN F. C. GREEN
Evangelical Congregational Church
McKeesport, Pa.
May I humbly suggest that the only error the church has shown … is that its efforts of witness in the social, economic, and political realms have been so weak, short-sighted, and without a Christ-centered aim that they have been far too little and too late, rather than as Mr. Pew suggests (without backing of any figures) an increasingly great involvement.…
RALPH F. HUDSON
Eau Claire, Wise.
Interpreting Genesis
The bulk of Dr. Klotz’s argument (“Evolutionary Theory: Some Theological Implications,” May 11 issue) … is a series of rationalistic conclusions from certain premises. It seems to me that theologically the single issue is this: What is the correct interpretation of the first 11 chapters of Genesis? In my opinion—and many of the professors of the seminary of which Dr. Klotz is a graduate share this view—the answer to this question has nothing to do with the arguments about the inspiration of Scripture. If the first 11 chapters of Genesis constitute a form of literature in Scripture that need not be taken as a straight historical account then there is no difficulty, theologically speaking, in accepting the teachings of science regarding the sequence in which various living forms appeared over long periods of time. To Dr. Klotz the fact that St. Paul refers to Adam and Eve proves that the Genesis account has to be taken as a historical one. It would seem to me that this is an assumption on his part which does not follow directly from Scripture itself.…
It is also stated that the doctrine of evolution is mechanistic and materialistic. There is one form of materialism which is to be condemned: this is the view that only material things are real. Since evolution deals with material things it has to be materialistic, in the same way that the study of the brain in terms of neurophysiology is materialistic. This, however, does not mean that those who study neurophysiology must reject the Christian doctrine of the soul. To reproach biology for being materialistic is just as meaningless as to reproach the astronomers for being materialistic.…
In this day and age when all Christians, and particularly young people, are assailed from all sides by materialism and unbelief it would be a pity to confuse them further by insinuating that their acceptance of certain scientific statements would put them outside the pale of Christianity. We live in a world of dualism—in that by faith we see God’s actions, but through the eyes of science we see connections between created material events. We had better face this because there are many apparent conflicts similar to the one about evolution. Viewed with the eyes of a scientist many events are determined by purely materialistic causes, whereas to a Christian they would appear as expressions of God’s will. It seems to me that if we cannot develop a world view that can embrace both our faith and the findings of science, which in my view are also gifts of God, we are doomed to failure in our communication to twentieth-century people.…
M. GERGELY
Retina Foundation
Boston, Mass.
Thank you for printing “Some Theological Implications” by Professor John W. Klotz. There are still some of us around who do not believe that we are “naive literalists” or “fighting fundies,” but we do believe that science needs to be checked and trimmed by Scripture, and not Scripture by science. We will not “interpret” the Bible to fit the world’s demands.
PAUL H. SEELY
San Francisco, Calif.
Gift Worthy Of The Magi
A Soviet clergyman, frustrated by the appalling shortage of Bibles in the U.S.S.R., challenged me: “Why don’t the visitors who come to our country each bring in and leave a Russian Bible?”
From this challenge evolved the offer of one free Russian Bible to each tourist who plans to visit the U.S.S.R.
Last year, many found this experience of participation meaningful and satisfying. Among them were businessmen, housewives, ministers, scientists, doctors, teachers and students.
If any of your readers plan to visit the U.S.S.R. this summer, each may receive one free Russian Bible by writing to: Box 3456, Grand Central Station, New York 17, N. Y.
STEVE DURASOFF
New York, N. Y.
Anti-Semitism
It was encouraging to read “The Theology of Anti-Semitism” (Apr. 27 issue), since this is a subject too long neglected by the Christian churches.…
One paragraph to which I take special exception, however, is the one that appeals to the sufferings and plight of the Jews as a continuing “object lesson” on the consequences of disobedience. While … we cannot rule out the element of divine judgment in Israel’s history, … God has made clear that he stands in universal judgment on all groups.… For Christians it is more fitting, and more true to the biblical spirit, to perceive the divine judgment that has fallen upon our own groups and institutions in the history of the churches and in present-day events. In a sense, Dr. Stephens comes almost to the point of saying this.… In an oblique way, for example, he seems to be stating a fundamental truth, namely, that sinful men are eager and content to discern judgment on the Jew …, while at the same time blindly resisting any application of the same biblical insights to themselves. The hostile reaction of any man to the Jews, therefore, is a self-blinding to the scriptural message, a running away from God and his demands for love, mercy and justice, and a refusal to confess and repent.… In short, the anti-Semite (devout Christian though he may profess to be), whether he knows it or not, in his rejection of the Jew is denying the validity and efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross.…
Christians today, especially in view of the tragic events in Germany, should thus reappraise what it is that God is trying to say to the Church … in preserving the Jews despite the many past attempts of Christians to get rid of them.
BERNHARD E. OLSON
New York, N.Y.
Do you agree that the Christian world owes the Jewish people an eternal apology for persecuting, tormenting and killing them during the last 2,000 years, because of a myth?
LOUIS BERGER
Santa Monica, Calif.
Pacifist Riposte
In the April 27 issue, an article appears entitled “Better Red than Dead?” … The article in question amazes me almost beyond description by saying: “The reasoning that love is the answer is next to preposterous … (Love) is not the whole of Christian morality”! And this in the light of Galatians 5:14 and related passages: “For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ ” We must understand that the heart of our Lord’s teaching on this subject is admittedly the “non-resistance” and “love-your-enemy” sections in Matthew 5:38–48 and Luke 6:27–36.…
DONALD K. BLACKIE
Calvary Reformed Church
Grand Rapids, Mich.
Certainly the issue presented by the question, “Why wasn’t this pamphlet given widespread coverage when Russia engaged in its recent testing program?” is [irrelevant]. I submit that the only reason for such a question is the highly unethical one of subtly suggesting Communist influence. Actually it is a silly question for the author to ask. If Russia is as thoroughly evil as he suggests, certainly arguments invoking the Christian gospel are not going to change her mind. On the other hand, we still have a certain amount of respect for Christian ideals in the United States, and there might be a little glimmer of hope that we could get our government to act in accord with those principles.
JAMES T. HENDERSON
The Methodist Church
Jeromesville, Ohio
Mr. Scutt asks: “Why wasn’t this pamphlet given widespread coverage when Russia engaged in its recent testing program …?”
The pamphlet was published and distributed toward the end of 1960! Not only was [it] distributed …, but in February, 1961, the journal Worldview, reproduced the pamphlet in full.…
I agree with Mr. Scutt that the … authors have not come to terms with the necessity of force in international affairs, but as between their position and Mr. Scutt’s rather casual dismissal of the suffering and destruction involved in a nuclear war, I would prefer the former.
HERMAN F. REISSIG
Council for Christian Social Action
United Church of Christ
New York, N. Y.
Critic’S Notebook
One violates a taboo among contemporary theologians and social prophets by raising the question whether, when a minister smokes, he is setting a very good example.
The current ideology in connection with this question is well known and well pondered. We are saved by grace, not good works. Legalism should have no place in our Christian admonitions. Will anyone call Spurgeon a second-class Christian, or deny to Jowett or Campbell Morgan the evangelical label? (Fundamentalism, too, is vulnerable here, especially in the South. It can hardly point the scornful finger at tobacco as the handmaiden of theological apostasy!) And time would fail us to tell of Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Barth, J. B. Phillips and C. S. Lewis who, pipe in mouth, have put to flight armies of aliens, et cetera.
Others, less famous but no less worthy of the praise of their colleagues for perspicacity and piety have reminded us that tobacco helps soothe nerves and aids in weight control, and that it is better to smoke here than hereafter; in other words (to paraphrase a bit loosely the apostolic dictum) that it is better to smolder than to explode. I expect to see many of these good men of moderation-in-all-things-carnal in heaven where, on good evangelical grounds, I can even conceive of myself (beam exchanged for gleam) as passing muster and gaining entrance at the Last Day.
But frankly I wonder often about this whole matter of smoking in its relation to the minister’s self-image and so make timorously bold, behind this veil of anonymity, to voice a few questions. For instance:
1. Why does one almost never come across a minister who has quit smoking? or, as a wholesome preliminary, who confesses humbly that he wishes he had the will power to do so? There are multitudes of laymen who are ready to testify to their deliverance from this admittedly bad habit. “It was tough,” say they with a bit of the martyr glow, “but I did it. Now I can taste food again!” Or if, as yet, the flesh still wavers and retreats from the awful prospect of life without nicotine, one hears the honest layman croak a warning to young men not yet trapped.
My first question, then, is why laymen who smoke do quit it, or advise young people not to start, while in my experience, which is fairly lengthy, I have never known a fellow minister to stop smoking and have never heard one who was a smoker advise young people to avoid beginning. Why this odd aversion to being candid, and calling a bad habit just that? For what lurking fear are we “over-compensating?”
2. Or take the stewardship implications of the question. Some of us eschew the ownership of a Cadillac or a Mercedes-Benz not because we can’t afford to drive a “fine car” but because we suspect that any symbolic lack of frugality would compromise our witness in a world where half the population goes hungry most of the time. And yet the sheer waste of money represented by the annual tobacco bonfire bill must make very strange incense to the nostrils of Jehovah. I recall a church men’s meeting which was being addressed on the subject of the Overseas Mission of the Church by an outstanding Christian layman, executive head of one of our largest merchandising corporations. The room was blue with smoke, and his audience puffed away without blinking while he pointedly talked about the relative amounts we spend in America on tobacco and on foreign missions. One does not need to insist on smoking as a “moral” question to recognize certain spiritual considerations in its use.
3. As for the health factor, this is a rather weak lever on most of us ministers who abuse our bodies with overwork and under-rest and by snatched nourishment at luncheon committee meetings! Yet one wonders whether we ought to be forever bringing up the rear when it comes to living the disciplined life and keeping the temple of the Spirit in good order. A recent AP news clipping informs us that the British government has launched a hard-hitting poster campaign against cigarette smoking.
“The government is using three different posters. Across the top of each is the word ‘Danger!’ ‘The more cigarettes you smoke the greater the risk of death from lung cancer, bronchitis or heart disease,’ one poster continues. The second version: ‘Heavy cigarette smokers are 30 times more likely to die of lung cancer than non-smokers.’ The third: ‘Deaths from lung cancer are nearly five times more than 20 years ago and they are still rising. The more cigarettes you smoke, the greater the risk’.… The director of a big London hospital called on the British Armed Forces to stop supplying troops with cigarettes.”
The fact that we limit our smoking to a pipe or occasional cigars may tend to increase our life expectancy over that of a fellow pastor who must have his pack or two of cigarettes a day. But this distinction is a bit too subtle for youngsters who are encouraged on every hand to discount what the American Cancer Society is trying to tell them in school health classes. “After all, our minister smokes … and our doctor smokes.” What more could a teenager ask who is looking for rationalizations wherever he can find them?
A syndicated newspaper column not long ago deplored the mounting tide of teen and sub-teen smoking. The author, an M.D., concluded with these words:
“For all this, I don’t want to appear as an apologist for these youngsters. But I must say you can hardly blame them when they see their parents, teachers, clergymen [italics mine], favorite actresses, actors and athletes smoking and endorsing cigarettes. And when they hear those of us who oppose smoking being attacked as killjoys, alarmists, fuddy-duddies and the like.”
4. Question four has to do with our sense of courtesy. There are plenty who are allergic to tobacco smoke, and many more, one suspects, who greatly dislike the smell. These “second-hand smokers” usually try to grin and bear it when subjected to third-degree suffocation. Some ministers consciously avoid subjecting others to their atmospheric tastes. Many do not seem to realize that anyone could possibly fail to enjoy their redolent self-advertising. Most smokers, religious or otherwise, settle euphemistically for a “You don’t mind if I smoke, do you?” If the victim were to say “Yes, I do!” I suppose we would put him in our little book as “maladjusted.”
I have an idea that preacher-smokers fall into three main categories:
1. Those who smoke in order to project a cherished self-image.
2. Those who without so intending have developed an addiction which is riding them whether they will it or not.
3. Those who smoke for pure pleasure, without particularly considering the allergies or scruples of others.
Before we all crowd into category three which is likely to look a little more ethical than the other two, let us briefly recall again that there are a lot of our less guarded parishioners who frankly admit being in category two. Like one of my members who has circulatory trouble and has already lost a couple of toes rather than give up smoking.
As for category one, who would admit such a thing! But I’d like at least to sow some seeds of dark suspicion. Are we a bit adolescent at this point? Are we perhaps trying to prove something which could be better proved some other way?
A PRESBYTERIAN MINISTER
