A pronounced shift toward conservatism—both political and religious—is one of the most remarkable characteristics of today’s ideological climate both in Europe and in America. England, faced by near financial collapse as a result of irresponsible socialist policies for a generation, has recently made a revolutionary shift away from Keynesian economics. On July 14, the singer chosen in France to lead the country in the “Marseillaise” over nationwide television was twenty-nine-year-old Michel Sardou, who has been called a fascist for such songs as “Les Ricains,” honoring the American-led Normandy invasion of 1944, without which “we would all be in Germany today.” The growth of Communist party strength in Italy can be accounted for only by the extreme ineptitude of the Christian Democrats, demonstrating little more than the common-sense fact that if the good guys are sufficiently stupid or corrupt, the bad guys can win by default (even if the pope is against them).

Religiously, the climate of opinion is going evangelical. Time magazine, whose articles on the conservative victory in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod have shown how little pleased it is with this trend, referred quite frankly, in its July 26 article on the current successes of evangelical publishing, to “the shift toward Evangelicalism throughout U. S. religion.”

To be sure, the most dramatic illustration of the new wave of evangelical influence lies in the American presidential campaign arena. All three prime figures who were in the race for major-party presidential nominations must be classed religiously within the conservative aegis: Ford, an evangelical Episcopalian, one of whose sons attends Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary; Reagan, whose conservative religious views have been duly noted by his critics; and Jimmy Carter, whose toothy smile alone would almost be enough to identify him as an “I’m-so-happy” evangelical, but who has (more importantly) spoken of his conversion experience in terms that have set some rabbinic teeth on edge.

If one’s own convictions are evangelical, one’s initial reaction is uncritical glee: finally the liberals are getting theirs, after years in which they have dominated the ideological and political climate with scarcely a nod to the existence of anyone else. But it is exactly at such a point that uncritical self-satisfaction must be avoided.

To put the question in the baldest and most irritating form: If, as seems inevitable, the occupant of the White House will be religiously conservative, should this be taken (along with the return of the Jews to the Promised Land) as a “sign” that millennial perfection is just around the corner? Answer: surely not.

In the first place, one of the defining marks of American constitutionalism is the limits it places on each major branch of government. Neither the executive, nor the legislative, nor the judicial rooster rules the federal roost. In the face of Nixon’s attempts to overwhelm legislative and judicial checks upon his activities, it seems likely that our new president will have to function within the clear restraints of constitutional separation of powers. In light, moreover, of the gross and disgusting immoralities of a number of our congressional leaders, evangelicals should realize that vigilance remains the price of freedom and that Congress and the courts, no less than the Chief Executive, need conversion from on high.

But even more significantly, the degree to which an evangelical president would influence the country toward biblical ideals would not be simply a function of his “conversion experience”: it would depend on whether his theological head was screwed on straight. A “converted” president who had never worked out the implications of his conversion theologically—who read the Bible “devotionally” but did not apply its specific teaching to his decision-making and policies—would be of little more consequence than an unbeliever in the same position. Indeed, he might be more dangerous, for anti-scriptural policies could thereby be cloaked with a veneer of piety “insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.”

A specific example of the relation between Christian principles and public issues is in order—and it should be pondered most carefully. The Bible stands absolutely against the killing of fetal life. Among Bible-believing theologians, Protestant and Catholic, this issue is no longer in dispute (if we discount, as we should, a semi-popular evangelical survey text on Christian ethics that relies on a misexegesis of Exodus 21:22, 23). For a genuine evangelical, there is no option but to regard the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade as monstrous—and no alternative, in our government of checks and balances, but to counter that decision by a constitutional right-to-life amendment, protecting the unborn child by declaring (as did the Fourteenth Amendment of the former slave) that he is a legal person deserving of full constitutional safeguards.

Where do the “converted” aspirants for the presidency stand on this issue? Both Ford and Carter “personally oppose” abortion, but neither favors a constitutional amendment outlawing it. In Carter’s case, does this remarkably irrational position stem from his having had his head melted by the dialectic influence of his avowedly favorite (neo-orthodox and ontological) theologians—Niebuhr, Barth, Tillich, and Kierkegaard? On the constitutional question Ford apparently goes a bit farther than Carter, in that he would favor an amendment permitting each state to enact its own abortion legislation. Note, however, that this approach still refuses to give the unborn any federal constitutional protections and leaves their lives to the whims of state politics.

The mush-headedness (should we rather say, political expediency?) displayed on this issue leaves one in real doubt that even with an evangelical in the White House the millennium is around the corner. But it should remind us that biblical revelation is the fundament of Christianity, not “experience,” however thrilling; and it should encourage us to pray that God will put not only a believer in the White House but a believer “sound in the faith, not given to fables and commandments of men, that turn from the truth.”

The following update is based on reports filed by correspondents Alan Scarfe and Robert D. Linder. Both have traveled in Romania and maintain contacts with Christian workers there. Scarfe is on the staff of the Keston College Center for the Study of Religion and Communism, located in the London suburbs, and Linder is a history professor at Kansas State University.

Romanian evangelical churches are increasing their membership at a rapid rate. In some parts the descriptive word is “revival.” In the northern city of Oradea, pastor Liviu Olah has seen his Baptist congregation grow from 600 to 1,500 members within a year. (Young people, especially students, are reportedly seeking to meet at every opportunity to study the Bible together and to pray despite intensifying pressure against religion in the universities—or perhaps because of it.)

The interest in theological training is high. The Orthodox Church accommodates 1,200 students in its university-level theological institutes, plus many more at seminary level. The Baptist seminary in Bucharest this year had ten times more applications than it could accept.

Interest in the Gospel on the part of young people spans the country. Nicknamed “the Revival People,” young people in many locales are extremely aggressive in their witnessing, and this has cost some of them any opportunity they might have had to attend a university. But alongside the youth at mass baptisms one sees older couples, too. And many entire families of Gypsies are active in the spiritual movement.

All this evangelical activity has disturbed Communist authorities, and it has not been without cost. In the fall of 1973, both state and church were challenged by a paper written by Baptist pastor Josif Ton of Ploesti on “the present-day situation of the Baptist church in Romania.” Among other things, it listed religious freedoms surrendered to the state by the churches (see November 22, 1974, issue, page 52).

A year later, with some of the issues raised in Ton’s paper resolved, he issued an open attack against the official state ideology of atheism (see March 26 issue, page 6). The arrest and imprisonment of Pentecostal worker Vasile Rascol revealed the existence of a new press law that banned unauthorized distribution of literature, including Bibles and Christian books. Ten leading evangelicals had their houses searched and their possessions confiscated. Ton, together with two other Baptists, Aurel Popescu and theologian Pavel Nicolescu, was being summoned to police headquarters regularly for questioning about his activities. The investigation of Ton was suspended last year.

Concessions gained through all this effort include additional religious services, the lifting of restrictions on baptisms, increases in seminary enrollment, and a measure of freedom to challenge the policies dictated by the Department of Cults (the government department responsible for overseeing religious affairs).

Individual leaders of the protest and their families are still harrassed and intimidated. Ton, for example, is constantly followed by the police; they are eager to find some excuse to bring charges against him. Another believer is in continual danger because of his work in biblical translation, and yet another because of his compilation of a new Romanian hymnal. Others have lost their jobs or been denied access to higher education.

Another crunch began to develop a year ago. The president of the Baptist Union, Nicolae Covaci, resigned. He saw signs of possible interference by the state into election affairs of the church alliance, and government officials had been uncooperative in requests for permits to repair, expand, or reconstruct church buildings. On both counts he feared rebellion within the ranks that would split the churches (some are more assertive in resisting state-imposed inhibitions than others).

New officers of the Union were elected last December with little outside interference. There were government stalling tactics, however, over recognizing those elected. The Department of Cults declined to accept the validity of the election of two leading members of the Union, Pastor Olah of Oradea and Pavel Barbatei of Cluj. Both are graduates in law. A third law graduate, pastor Vasile Talos, was also elected to the fifteen-member Union council. He set the pre-election tone with the presentation in a regional association meeting of an eighty-page paper on the relation between Baptist churches and the law. With “the legal standing of the Romanian Baptist churches” as the keynote of the election platform, says an observer, three lawyers would be more than the state could put up with.

The authorities argued that Barbatei had been involved in car speculating, and they claimed Olah’s election was invalid because a state representative was not at the regional meeting where he was chosen. Now they have an additional argument. This past July he organized an open-air baptism service for about seventy candidates. When he informed the local authorities of his plans, however, they requested him not to baptize in the river. Olah nevertheless went ahead with plans to meet at the river, saying the wooden structure of his church building might collapse under the weight of the anticipated crowds. Military officials then organized a counter-demonstration in honor of the centenary anniversary of the Red Cross in Romania—at the same time and place as the proposed baptism. With one day’s notice, Olah switched the baptism indoors, permitting only newcomers to enter the building; regulars had to listen to the service on four loudspeakers outdoors. Approximately 5,000 jammed the church courtyard and streets.

Following the service the Department of Cults announced it had withdrawn Olah’s permit to preach and to baptize because of his “intention” to disobey the law. At last word he was continuing his ministry in Oradea as a layman. Whether the suspension is only temporary remains to be seen, but it casts doubt on whether his election can be ratified by an upcoming assembly. (Olah was dismissed in 1973 as pastor of a congregation in Timosoara where, as at Oradea, he had an effective ministry among young people, especially students.)

The space problem faced by Olah’s congregation is a common one throughout Romania. Also, dozens of congregations still risk fines because their churches have not been recognized by the state and so their meetings are illegal.

Equally acute is the need to educate the many young people who have recently joined the churches. Educational facilities for the evangelical churches lag far behind those of the Orthodox and traditional Protestant denominations. The Baptists have 1,035 congregations with only 150 trained ministers. Based on current enrollment and projections over the next ten years, eighty will graduate from their seminary, but eighty pastors will have retired. Therefore lay training is vital if the churches are to continue their present growth. To bridge that gap without pushing the state’s guardians of ideology into worse repression is apparently the main challenge in the immediate future.

Although the local production of Bibles is still severely restricted, there has been an increase in the number of Scriptures available in Romania in the last two years. The United Bible Societies (UBS) report that the first half of an edition of 100,000 copies of the Bible is now being printed in Bucharest. This project has been largely the work of the UBS, which supplied paper from Czechoslovakia and additional binding equipment from East Germany. Moreover, the UBS arranged to have the actual printing done in the patriarchate printing house in Bucharest in cooperation with Patriarch Justinian of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Still, nearly all Romanian Christian leaders agree that they need many more copies of the Bible right away.

Several groups have been at work publishing and disseminating Christian literature in the Romanian language. For example, in the last five years the America-based Romanian Missionary Society has published or readied for publication thirty Christian books. In addition, there is a small but steady flow of Bibles and Christian literature into Romania by various undesignated means. All this goes on despite the 1974 law that makes it illegal to receive or distribute Bibles or other religious literature that originates outside Romania.

Another major means of proclaiming the Gospel in Romania is by radio. Many Romanians now have their own radios, especially portable transistors, which makes it difficult for the government to control the listening habits of its people. Several evangelical organizations or individuals are now beaming the Christian message into the country. For instance, between June 1, 1968 and June 1, 1976, the “Voice of Truth” of the Romanian Missionary Society broadcast 2,874 programs through HCJB, Quito, Ecuador. It also has weekly programs on IBRA, Lisbon, Portugal, while other evangelicals use Trans World Radio of Chatham, New Jersey, to penetrate the increasingly perforated iron curtain surrounding Romania. The Ministry of Cults recently became alarmed at the large number of people who listen to these evangelical broadcasts. It has attempted to impede their effectiveness by inducing the government to pass a press law forbidding Romanian citizens to write to foreign broadcasters. Therefore what was formerly a substantial flow of letters from listeners in Romania has become only a trickle. But all evangelical broadcasters report that they still receive a few from some courageous listeners.

The radio broadcasts have been part of a spark of revival that continues throughout Romania. However, most of the impetus in the current evangelical awakening in the country has come from the Romanian Christians themselves, particularly the Baptists and Pentecostals.

In the midst of revival and harassment, one major problem facing Romanian believers is beyond the power of friends outside the nation to help resolve. This is the understandable impulse on the part of many Christians, especially pastors and other leaders, to want to leave the country. The government has even offered to facilitate exit for some; it would like to be rid of these “troublemakers.” A few, having suffered much for their faith, have accepted the opportunity to depart for an easier life for themselves and their families. When Christian leaders leave, it weakens the churches and impedes the work of Christ—just as the government wants, say some observers.

Yet despite the pressures to cease preaching the Gospel, despite the discrimination they face daily because of their open commitment to Christ, despite official efforts to silence them by arrest, threat of arrest, or encouragement to leave, the Christians of Romania continue to work and witness for God. Perhaps the words of a Romanian believer in a recent communication to the outside world express the view of many Romanian evangelicals as to what Christians in the West can do for their fellow believers in Romania:

“Pray for your persecuted brothers in Romania! Send messages of Christian solidarity with the persecuted! Organize actions of protest before Romanian embassies! Request the leaders of the Romanian party and state to guarantee the reality of religious freedom! Request all non-governmental organizations in your countries, organizations which fight for the defense of the rights of man, to intervene! In the spirit of Christian love, show in this manner that we feel and pray for one another as those who are called by God to His perfect salvation and glory in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

The WCC: No Toning Down

Philip Potter, the general secretary of the World Council of Churches, believes that the crisis in the ecumenical movement won’t go away even if his organization discontinues its social involvement. A proper response to the crisis, he told 120 representatives of U. S. member denominations of the WCC, is in “reaffirming what we stand for and not toning down what we are doing.”

At the annual meeting of the U. S. Conference for the World Council of Churches last month on Saint Simon Island, Georgia, delegates seemed to agree. They said controversial aspects of WCC work should not be sidestepped. One means of confrontation suggested was participation in future meetings by representatives of the groups that get grants from the WCC’s Program to Combat Racism.

Georgi Vins, Symbol Of Soviet Repression

This photograph of Soviet Baptist leader Georgi Vins was taken in a labor camp near Yakutsk in Siberia earlier this year. He reached the half-way point of his five-year sentence on October 1. It is to be followed by five years of exile away from his home in Kiev. Vins’s family, including his mother Lydia, 70, had their annual visit with him in June. The outspoken Lydia, imprisoned in the past for her faith, fears she could be arrested again any day.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Congress approved a resolution calling for a broader practice of religious liberty in the Soviet Union and for Vins’s release. The bill was introduced in the House by Republican John Buchanan, a Southern Baptist minister from Alabama, along with 148 co-sponsors. Senator Henry Jackson led its passage in the Senate. It pointed out that Vins was arrested in 1966 while leading a demonstration for religious liberty and again in 1974 “for continuing to do the work normally connected with pastoral duties … preaching, teaching, writing, evangelizing.”

The photo, released by the England-based Keston College research center on religion and Communism, is believed to be the first close-up of a prisoner in a Soviet labor camp ever to reach the West.

Potter, in his address, rejected the criticism that the WCC is too involved with social issues and not paying enough attention to spreading the Gospel. “All the things we do are expressions of the Gospel of Christ,” he declared. “I say to you there is no going back. We must take hold of where we are and continue to be involved in the many ways of confessing Christ in the world today.”

There was some turning back in the council’s financial affairs, however. Delegates were reminded that giving has not kept pace with inflation and that many of the Geneva-based council’s programs are being eliminated or cut back because U. S. gift dollars do not buy as many Swiss francs as formerly.

The New York office of the WCC, a liaison facility at the Interchurch Center, had its functions cut at the meeting. The conference’s board of directors agreed to trim the task to soliciting contributions from North American churches, transferring those funds to Geneva, and keeping Geneva informed of North American events. Formerly, a principal function of the office was to interpret and promote WCC work to Americans. Next year’s central budget includes only $20,000 for the New York office, in contrast to the $100,000 provided in recent years. The facility is jointly operated by the U. S. Conference (which provides some funds independent of the central budget) and by the WCC headquarters secretariat.

Robert J. Marshall, president of the U. S. Conference (and of the Lutheran Church in America), reported that “part of the cut is [based on] the conviction in Geneva that less is needed in the way of staff in New York.”

The office at the Interchurch Center is actually one of two “New York offices” of the WCC. There is also a liaison office for the council’s Commission of the Churches on International Affairs near the United Nations headquarters. It too has been hit by the financial crunch, and WCC officials have been seeking special funding to assure its continued operation.

Honored

William A. Reed, Jr., veteran religion editor of the Nashville Tennessean, became the first black and the first Southerner to be elected president of the Religion Newswriters Association since the organization was founded in 1948. He was elected at last month’s annual meeting of the RNA, which is composed of more than 100 men and women who report religion full-time for the secular press. Reed succeeds Richard N. Ostling, religion writer for Time (and former news editor of CHRISTIANITY TODAY).

Death

F. GERALD ENSLEY, 69, retired bishop of the United Methodist Church, internationally prominent preacher, chairman of the World Methodist Council (WMC) evangelism committee; in Dublin, Ireland, of liver failure, following a major address at the WMC assembly.

In the annual awards competition, James Robison of the Chicago Tribune, Gerald Hay of the Hutchinson (Kansas) News, and the Arizona Republic, represented by Gene Luptak, took top honors.

Religion in Transit

Interim pastor Cynthia Jarvis of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Wooster, Ohio, on September 30 became the first woman to open a session of the U. S. House of Representatives with prayer. Another United Presbyterian minister, Wilmina M. Rowland of Philadelphia, was the first woman to open the U. S. Senate with prayer (July 9, 1971).

American Baptist executive Jitsuo Morikawa will serve for one year as interim pastor of the well-known liberal Riverside Church in New York City, and Southern Baptist pastor Jess C. Moody of West Palm Beach, Florida, has accepted the pastorate of the independent 12,000-member First Baptist Church of Van Nuys, California.

Lizzie Dotson of Seattle, a Louisiana-born black, celebrated her one-hundredth birthday last month. She attributes her longevity to living “close to the Lord.” A similar reason was cited by Southern Baptist evangelist James Fell Aker of Radford, Virginia. At 105, he still preaches three weeks a month and is booked for the next three years. He says he expects to be around “when the Lord returns.”

“The biggest deception ever perpetrated on the American media from a standpoint of missionizing the Jews.” That’s what the Jewish Post and Opinion thinks of evangelist Morris Cerullo’s filmMasada. The film is scheduled to be shown on 250 television stations, accompanied by a vigorous advertising campaign. Some Jewish newspapers have published ads. The B’nai B’rith Messenger of Los Angeles later apologized editorially, but the Detroit Jewish News said the film adheres to the traditional story of the martyrdom of 960 Jews trapped on a wilderness outpost by Roman troops. One of the people in the film is the well-known Israeli archeologist Yigael Yadin. He warned of legal action if a missionary message is injected into the film. On the TV show, Cerullo appears at the end of the film and appeals for funds and acceptance of Christ.

A fire of undetermined origin caused an estimated $1 million damage to the administrative headquarters of the Radio Bible Class in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Five video tape duplicating machines, worth about $100,000, were among the losses.

Personalia

Patricia Hearst, 22, has become “deeply devout” with strong “religious commitment,” according to Episcopal priest Edward John Dumke of Sacramento. A longtime friend, he visited her often after her arrest, offering counsel and communion, and he has traveled almost weekly to the federal hospital center in San Diego where Miss Hearst was ordered in April for psychiatric studies. Dumke says her acceptance of him as her priest and of Protestant communion (she partakes often) in no way involves renunciation of the Catholic faith in which she was raised, according to a New York Times story by Everett R. Holles.

American evangelist Howard O. Jones, the senior black member of the Billy Graham team, was the first clergyman ever to preach at independence day ceremonies in the Kingdom of Swaziland in southern Africa. During the program first copies of the Gospel of St. Mark in siSwati were presented to King Sobhuza II and the Queen Mother. About 50,000—or some 10 per cent of the nation’s population—attended.

Hugh Schonfeld, the Jewish author of The Passover Plot, professed Christ as Saviour as a teen-ager, attended a Bible institute in Glasgow, Scotland, and preached in the streets, according to old friend and classmate Ernest Sittenhoff, who is quoted in an article in Eternity. Sittenhoff, a semi-retired missionary to Jews, alleges that Schonfeld “became a renegade” after “his family worked on him.”

World Scene

Rhodesia update: Methodist bishop Abel Muzorewa, 51, one of the three main leaders of rival factions in the African National Council, returned from a fourteen-month self-imposed exile to a tumultuous welcome in Salisbury. He wants to have his say in talks with white officials on setting up an interim bi-racial government that will write a new constitution and prepare for black-majority rule.

At its recent annual conference, the Evangelical Church (Tin Lanh) of what was formerly South Viet Nam elected Ong Van Huyen, long-time dean of the Bible school at Nha Trang, as chairman, succeeding Doan Van Mieng, now vice-chairman. An official of the People’s Revolutionary Committee of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) reportedly met with the more than 300 pastors and lay delegates and reaffirmed the government’s “unswerving policy” to respect freedom of belief. A recently expelled Chinese pastor, however, says that pressure is building. All Tin Lanh military chaplains have disappeared, and pastors have been restricted in their travel and evangelistic activity, he says.

German churchman Helmut Frenz, 43, bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Chile until the government withdrew his visa last year, was appointed to an executive position with the German section of Amnesty International. Most of Chile’s 25,000 Lutherans split from Frenz and the majority of ELCC pastors over their anti-government stance following the fall of the late president Salvador Allende. The dissidents have arranged to obtain new pastors from a conservative theological academy in Basel. The new clergymen are connected with free churches in Germany and Switzerland.

Nearly 200 of the 450 pastors in the diocese of Gothenburg, Sweden’s second-largest city, have launched a campaign to prevent Church of Sweden mission funds from going to strengthen the ecumenical-development bank of the World Council of Churches. A church mission official defends the bank, saying its purpose is to help in community economic development, not to lend support to terrorist organizations.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses in Argentina, who have had a shaky relationship with the government for years, have had all 604 of their congregations closed by edict. The Witnesses have grown from about 1,500 in 1950 to more than 31,000 last year. Last month, Patricia Ann Erb, the 19-year-old daughter of American Mennonite missionary parents, was abducted from her home in Buenos Aires. She turned up later in good health in a suburban prison. She reportedly had been active in leftist politics at a state university.

Catholic bishop Adriaho Hypolito of a poor diocese north of Rio De Janeiro was kidnapped, beaten, and left naked on a deserted road, and his car blown up, apparently by members of an anti-Communist group. They evidently were upset by the bishop’s outspoken emphasis on human rights of the poor and his condemnation of the “death squads” that have been murdering alleged criminals and leftists.

Anyone who expects all of America’s evangelical Christians to vote the same way in the 1976 presidential election will probably be surprised when the votes are counted. As the campaign heated up during its last month it was increasingly evident that neither Gerald Ford nor Jimmy Carter could count on the highly touted “evangelical bloc.”

Issues connected with religion kept popping up as election day neared, and they were alternately helping and hurting first one candidate, then the other. Abortion, the hottest religion-related subject in the early days of the presidential race, had to share attention in the final weeks with other concerns. Taxes, foreign policy, and the use of earthy language were among the topics claiming the attention of the campaigners and those who will vote for them.

Shortly after Carter drew a barrage of criticism for his income-tax proposals, attention was directed to a statement he made on curtailing church property-tax exemptions. In an interview in the September–October issue of Liberty, a Seventh-day Adventist magazine on church-state issues, the Democratic candidate said he favored “the taxation of church properties other than the church building itself.” He was interviewed by a Liberty writer during the Ohio primary campaign last June.

After the Carter call for church property taxation appeared, he was attacked by Republican vice-presidential nominee Robert Dole. Declared Dole: “I find it incredible that Mr. Carter wants to impose taxes on church-owned hospitals, schools, senior-citizen homes, and orphanages. Is this really what he favors? Or is this just another case where Governor Carter has said something and may have to apologize later?”

Carter promptly issued a statement saying he never advocated taxing churches and as governor of Georgia tried to amend the state constitution so that sales taxes would not hit hospitals, nursing homes, and other church-affiliated organizations. He also pledged to try to protect the interests of charitable institutions in the tax-reform package he would propose as president.

At a White House meeting of his campaign committee on ethnic affairs, President Ford spoke to the issue: “Nothing could be worse for church-operated schools, hospitals, and orphanages, many of which face constant financial struggles to make ends meet. I can tell you unequivocally, emphatically, that this administration has neither plans nor supports any effort to tax churches beyond the present scope of federal taxation.”

Foreign affairs took up much of the time when a group of thirty-four evangelical broadcasters discussed issues with Ford just a week before his second televised debate with Carter. He said there was “only a 60–40 per cent chance of success” for Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s peace mission in southern Africa. He indicated it was worth the risk, saying, “If nothing were done by the United States it was likely that civil and international war would have erupted, with widespread bloodshed.”

Endorsing the President’s diplomatic initiatives in southern Africa during the White House meeting was Howard O. Jones, the senior black on the Billy Graham team and speaker on the “Hour of Freedom” radio program. Jones had returned to the United States the day before from three weeks in southern Africa, where he preached in Swaziland, an independent territory bordering on South Africa. “I told the President,” the evangelist said after the meeting, “that thousands and thousands of Christians in Swaziland were praying his plan would work.”

Carter meanwhile released the text of a cable of support that he dispatched to Donal F. Lamont, the Irish missionary bishop of Umtali, Rhodesia. The Roman Catholic prelate was convicted of aiding terrorists after failing to report the whereabouts of guerrillas who had demanded medicine at a church mission, and he was sentenced to a ten-year jail term.

Both major candidates continued to assure Jewish leaders of their interest in helping the state of Israel, but they also spoke of their support for the Jewish nation before evangelical audiences. Ford told the broadcasters that Kissinger’s efforts in the Middle East “have borne fruit and the tensions have been substantially diffused.”

(In the Liberty interview Carter said “a basic cornerstone of our foreign policy should be preservation of the nation of Israel, its right to exist, and its right to exist in a state of peace.” He added that he thought its establishment as a modern state was a “fulfillment of Bible prophecy.”)

The visiting broadcasters also heard a Ford pledge to maintain American troops in Korea at present levels. The President added that his administration would stand by America’s treaty obligations with the Nationalist Chinese government.

Members of the executive committee of National Religious Broadcasters formed the core of the group that met Ford in the White House Cabinet Room. Other station operators and producers of religious programs were added to that group to provide geographical and denominational balance, according to Ben Armstrong, NRB’s executive secretary.

Among the prominent broadcasters who came to Washington for the meeting was W. A. Criswell, whose weekly services are telecast from First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas. Criswell, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, had earlier been quoted as a critic of Carter’s Playboy interview. The President was scheduled to attend a Sunday service at Criswell’s church ten days after his White House session with the pastor. Criswell and other clergy among the broadcasters recounted details of their visit with Ford to their congregations.

The Playboy issue came up at the meeting with the president. Ford told his visitors that he had turned down an invitation to be interviewed by the magazine, which features a Carter interview in its November issue. Ford also denied any wrongdoing in the use of campaign funds while he was a congressman.

The broadcasters met with the President only a few hours before he learned of the obscene racial slur credited to Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz. While they were waiting to see Ford, Butz and other ranking administration officials talked with them. Ford later reprimanded Butz and subsequently accepted his resignation. He also sent an apology to the broadcasters for having Butz at their meeting.

When Butz entered the Cabinet Room he asked Armstrong to tell him who was sitting in the chair he usually occupied during Cabinet meetings. Armstrong told him it was Jones, who had just returned from Africa. The then-secretary of agriculture is reported to have said, “Dr. Jones, you’re sitting in my chair, and you grace it very well.” None of the visitors knew at the time of the remark that was to force his resignation four days later.

The White House staffer who escorted the broadcasters to the Cabinet Room and arranged other meetings with religious leaders for Ford was Richard Brannon, an ordained Southern Baptist minister who recently moved from the White House’s office of presidential personnel into the communications office. Brannon is also credited with preparations for the President’s appearances earlier this year at the Southern Baptist Convention and the joint convention of the National Association of Evangelicals and National Religious Broadcasters.

While paying some attention to the nation’s evangelicals, both candidates have continued to court the Catholic vote. On his way to the second debate Carter stopped in Denver for a speech at a Catholic Charities meeting. During Louisiana campaigning, Ford attended a service in the New Orleans cathedral.

Jeff Carter, the Democratic candidate’s youngest son, got his father in hot water when he brought up the name of evangelist Billy Graham during an Oklahoma campaign appearance. A Tulsa radio station recorded the remarks, in which the 24-year-old suggested that Graham had bought a mail-order doctorate for $5. In a later comment in Kansas City his wife, Annette, added fuel to the fire by criticizing Graham’s advice to voters to choose the best qualified candidate, whether he is a Christian or not. She said that was not “fair.”

Within a week another Carter son, Chip, dissociated himself from the Tulsa remarks of his brother. He told a South Carolina audience that his father had apologized to Graham. Actually, Mrs. Carter called; forgivingly, Graham said he was unoffended.

Meanwhile Christian voters across the country were getting advice from various sources on how to make up their minds. C. Welton Gaddy, a staff member of the Southern Baptist Christian Life Commission, wrote a series of articles for use in the Baptist press. One of his suggestions was expected to gain wide acceptance: “Southern Baptists must neither support nor oppose Jimmy Carter simply because he is a fellow Southern Baptist. Episcopalians should neither support nor oppose Gerald Ford because he is an Episcopalian.”

Hard Times In Hardenburgh

More and more religious, educational, community, and other non-profit organizations are buying up property in rural resort areas for camp sites, conference centers, and the like. Such property is removed from the tax rolls, and this increases the tax burden on private property-owners. The tax hikes can be stiff—and sometimes just too much to bear.

One example involves the 236 residents of Hardenburgh, New York. Their plight was detailed in widely published press accounts last month. The town is nestled on 54,000 acres of woodland, streams, and farmland in the Catskill mountains. The Boy Scouts, Zen Buddhists, Tibetan monks, and a conservation center own large chunks of the land. Of the $21 million assessed value of Hardenburgh, $5 million is tax exempt. Taxes paid to the school district where most of the tax-exempt property is located now equal more than $5,000 for each of the twenty-five students who live there.

One resident whose 192 acres of woods and fields have been in his family for three generations had school taxes of $450 in 1970 and town and county taxes of $350. This year his bill for school taxes is $2,000, and the other taxes are nearly that much. The stories are similar all over town. Breadwinners average between $6,000 and $7,000 income annually, and they are at the breaking point. Meetings with lawyers, local government officials, and legislators have brought no relief.

Hardenburgh has no business section, no stores, and no churches. A few residents attend church services in neighboring communities. More than half of the townspeople, however, are now ordained ministers. It all started when some people read about California entrepreneur Kirby J. Hensley and his Universal Life Church, which sells ordination certificates and honorary divinity degrees by mail. It looked like a way to get some tax breaks. For example, New York allows a reduction of $1,500 on the assessed valuation of homes owned by ordained clergy. (In practice, however, most local jurisdictions interpret the exemption narrowly, and property is totally exempt only if owned by a recognized religious group and used exclusively for religious purposes.)

There was discussion. “The question came up as to the ethics of doing it,” ranger Cal Crary told reporters. “But I question the ethics, for instance, of the conservation center that’s taken all that land.”

Plumber George McClain down the road in Liberty had become a “bishop” in Hensley’s “church” a year ago (by taking a mail-order course), so he conducted the mass ordination ceremony. About 300 persons, 150 of them from Hardenburgh, were ordained in the town’s community hall. Another batch was ordained later in a diner outside town. The only principle of the church, explained McClain, is that the rights of other persons are not to be violated.

“Hello, reverend,” the people in Hardenburgh greet one another lightly these days. “Have you seen the light?” they jest.

Thus religion has come to the Catskills at last. Relief from taxes may be another matter. If somebody organizes a “church,” he or she might try to exclude housing and utilities allowances from taxable income (as most bona fide active clergy do), but there are bound to be hassles with the tax people over it and perhaps expensive court battles (Hensley has won a key one in California). Commenting on the ordinations, New York tax official Thomas McGrath says, “Any person who thinks he can obtain a tax exemption through such a device is sadly mistaken.” The action, however, has served to call attention to the situation, say other tax authorities, and that may lead to the salvation of people like the Hardenburghers.

The Bell-Ringer Of Flat Rock

Norton Hawkins, 67, has been the bell-ringer at First Baptist Church of Flat Rock, Illinois, since 1939, and he rang the Methodist bell for fifteen years before that. In fact, he claims he’s been in church every Sunday since his birth in March, 1909, more than 3,500 Sundays ago. Once he landed in the hospital with a broken leg after being struck by a car, but with special transportation and crutches he was able to attend church two days later. Moreover, all his churchgoing has been in Flat Rock: he’s never been out of town on vacation.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1970 that tax exemptions for religious organizations are neither required nor prohibited by the First Amendment but are a matter of social policy to be determined by citizens and their elected lawmakers. An increasing number of voices are calling for the elimination of such exemptions in the face of tightened budgets and service cutbacks confronting local government bodies. Many church budgets, though, are in similar straits and cannot absorb big tax bills.

A better idea would be to expand taxing jurisdictions rather than eliminate all church exemptions, suggests Dean Kelley, religious-liberties expert on the National Council of Churches staff.

Abuses of tax privileges by religious organizations could bring on a full-scale tax revolt and the collapse of existing tax-exemption policies, warns executive director Andrew Gunn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. The Catskill ordinations, he asserts, “could be a shot heard around the world.”

Broadcasting The Good News

In 1972, a Japanese newsman was arrested for obtaining secret diplomatic cables that revealed among other things a special plea by then U. S. ambassador Armin Meyer to Japanese officials to allow Far East Broadcasting Company (FEBC), a missionary enterprise, to remain on Okinawa after the island returned to Japanese control. Under Japanese law, foreign-owned broadcasting is not permitted.

Stories at the time mistakenly attributed Meyer’s plea to the fact that FEBC was “owned” by a “relative” of then President Nixon. As a non-profit organization, FEBC is not privately owned, but one of Richard Nixon’s uncles, Cliff Marshburn, was an FEBC board member.

The Japanese reporter, Takichi Nishiyama, was found guilty in July of this year of violating a law that prohibits disclosure of government secrets. The ruling overturned a lower-court decision. An appeal to the Japanese Supreme Court is planned in the case, which has become a major freedom-of-the-press issue in Japan. The reporter was given a four-month suspended sentence.

FEBC was permitted to continue to operate its radio station after Okinawa reverted to Japan, but the FEBC people “worked out their own arrangement with the Japanese government,” says Meyer, who is now a Georgetown University professor and is the son of a Lutheran minister. Meyer explains that his appeal was a private one based on his interest in Christian work rather than an official request of the American government.

FEBC operates some thirty radio stations worldwide, beaming evangelical programs into China and the Soviet Union as well as into a number of other Asian, African, and South American countries.

It is not the first time that FEBC’s Okinawa operation has made the newspapers in other-than-routine coverage. Much earlier, a local paper told how some of FEBC’s programming on station JOTF originated with the U. S. Army’s Seventh Psychological Operations Group, located next door to the station.

A former Specialist-5 clerk who with other enlisted personnel in his unit helped to prepare daily Japanese-language newscasts last month confirmed the story. In an interview, Robert C. Ashby, now an attorney with the Department of Transportation in Washington, said he and others culled out wire-service stories for use by translators. Newscasts were produced under the direction of Alex Yorichi for broadcast to Okinawans. Ashby and his friends also delivered copies of two ten-minute newscasts daily to the FEBC station. The program source was not identified on the air, he said.

Ashby characterized the broadcasts as “good news.” Although the news was taken from straight wire-service reports, said he, “selection was used in what news items were included.” Items that reflected unfavorably on the United States or on U. S. relations with Okinawa and Japan were eliminated.” The subject matter “dealt with both international and domestic [Japanese and Okinawan] matters.”

Ashby said the delivery of the daily newscasts was “an ongoing thing” when he arrived in Okinawa in November, 1968, and continued until he left in May, 1970. The army unit was headquartered on Okinawa from 1965 until June, 1974, when it was deactivated.

Eugene Bertermann, director of Asian operations for FEBC, could neither confirm nor deny the existence of a relationship with the psychological-warfare unit. “I don’t have any information on that,” he said. Possibly the only one with answers was FEBC’s former chief of Okinawa operations, stated Bertermann, and he is dead. Army officials likewise said they know nothing of the matter.

Although some Washington sleuths tend to see the hand of the Central Intelligence Agency in the relationship, Ashby and other observers surmise it all may have begun as a favor between friends.

Bertermann says it is against FEBC policy to be linked with government agencies. He and other mission broadcasters do see a place for government, though. At a meeting of evangelical broadcasters with President Ford last month, Bertermann discussed with Ford the need for a U. S. foreign policy to protect overseas religious broadcasting facilities.

FEBC, headquartered in Whittier, California, was founded in 1945 by ex-serviceman John C. Broger, religious broadcaster Robert H. Bowman, and Los Angeles pastor William J. Roberts. Broger, FEBC’s first president, is now the Pentagon-based civilian director of information for the Armed Forces, and Bowman is FEBC’s executive head.

ED MURRAY and JEFFREY STEIN

Unjustified

Bishop Lucius S. Cartwright, 35, of St. Philip’s Pentecostal Church in Washington, D.C., and Albert Rufus Hamrick, 40, the church’s pastor, were sentenced to six months in jail each and fined a total of $7,000 following their plea of guilty to charges of defrauding the government of $262,775 in federal food-stamp funds. Cartwright will serve his term first, then Hamrick, so that the church will not be without leadership. Their full sentences had been for four years and two years respectively, with all but six months suspended.

The clergymen went into the food-stamp dispensing business on behalf of the church in 1972. Prosecutors say they delayed for months depositing receipts in federal accounts. During the four years, more than $5.5 million in food-stamp money was handled; the pair could therefore have gleaned considerable interest by delaying transfer of the funds. Also, say prosecutors, the pair diverted funds to pay for a lavish home, an ice-cream parlor, trips, a van, and even a former bank building that now houses their church.

Defense attorneys argued that there should have been more restrictive regulations to govern the situation. Cartwright’s lawyer said his client was “untrained, unskilled in handling this amount of money.” But, said the bishop to the judge, “I cannot justify my wrongdoing.”

A Mediator For Good Shepherd

The Vatican has ordered members of the progressive Good Shepherd parish of Mt. Vernon, Virginia, and conservative bishop Thomas J. Welsh of Arlington to submit to arbitration their two-year-old dispute over who should control local church affairs. The decision, believed to be the first of its kind in the history of American Catholicism, was issued in response to a petition sent to the Pope by a faction of the congregation last March (see May 21 issue, page 38). Signed by 704 of the parish’s some 1,400 adult members, the petition asked the Pope to appoint as mediator Archbishop William Borders of Baltimore, but the Vatican instead selected Bishop Joseph Hodges of the Wheeling-Charleston, West Virginia, diocese. He is considered more conservative than Borders.

Still, Good Shepherd’s people can claim a victory of sorts. Hitherto, a bishop has been seen as sovereign in his diocese. The arbitration order can be interpreted as denying that kind of ultimate authority to Welsh. If so, then notice has been served on all bishops that times have changed.

Disunited Presbyterians

United Presbyterians are proud of their Confession of 1967 and its principal theme, reconciliation. In the presbytery of Albany, New York, however, they are having to go to court to reconcile some evangelical congregations that are less than enthusiastic about the denomination’s doctrinal directions.

Seven churches in the upstate New York presbytery have been trying to leave the denomination, but the regional unit so far has shown no inclination to let them join a more conservative fellowship.

There is action in both the civil and ecclesiastical courts, and the issue is far from settled. A judicial commission of the Synod of the Northeast was scheduled to meet at the end of this month to hear one complaint against the presbytery’s handling of a dismissal request. Whichever way the decision goes, it is likely to be appealed to the denomination’s highest court, the General Assembly, which meets next May.

Thus far in New York litigation the decisions of church courts have been all-important in civil-court property cases. The first of the cases in the current Albany Presbytery controversy to reach the appellate level takes a new tack, however. The Kingsborough congregation of Gloversville is contesting a 1954 revision of state law that allows a presbytery to take over property of an “extinct” church. The congregation considers itself alive and well even though the presbytery has dissolved it officially and declared it “extinct.” Kingsborough has joined a presbytery of the small Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church. It did not seek Albany Presbytery’s permission to leave after the regional unit had voted to remove its pastor. Two other ministers involved in the attempted transfers have also lost their United Presbyterian ministerial credentials.

Not in court yet is the largest and most influential of the seven churches that are trying to leave the United Presbyterian fold, the 428-member First Presbyterian Church of Schenectady. At a presbytery meeting late last month an administrative commission reported that it had found no interest in reconciliation at First Church. The body that had been appointed to “take oversight” of the congregation did not propose any immediate legal action, however.

The presbytery has also dissolved and claimed the property of another Schenectady congregation, the Carman Church.

In two of the churches, Christ’s Church of Catskill and the Valatie Church, the congregations have not been unanimous. A substantial minority at Catskill wanted to retain ties with the United Presbyterian denomination, so the board of elders decided not to pursue the dismissal matter with the presbytery. The pastor has left the denomination. At Valatie a majority withdrew with the pastor and formed a new congregation.

One of the aspects of the controversy, which has lasted over a year, is that the churches seeking connection with the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC) requested transfers. Presbyterian law generally does not recognize the right of a congregation to declare itself independent, but transfers are often granted from one Presbyterian denomination to another. The issue in Albany is particularly sensitive since the United Presbyterian General Assembly has fraternal relations with the ARPC’s top governing body. It does not have such relations with the four-year-old Presbyterian Church in America, to which some observers thought the seven congregations might go. If all the petitions for transfer to the ARPC are denied, the action could be interpreted as a United Presbyterian determination that the ARPC is not a proper body for the reception of United Presbyterians. More reconciliation might then be in order.

How To Lead A Congregation

Creative Church Administration, by Lyle E. Schaller and Charles A. Tidwell (Abingdon, 1975, 208 pp., $4.95 pb), Church Planning and Management: A Guide For Pastors and Laymen, by B. Otto Wheeley with Thomas H. Cable (Dorrance, 1975, 218pp., $8.95), Managing Church Groups, by Norman M. Lambert (Pflaum, 1975, 85 pp., n.p., pb), Be the Leader You Were Meant to Be, by LeRoy Eims (Victor, 1975, 132 pp., $1.95 pb), Ideas For Better Church Meetings, by Jerold W. Apps (Augsburg, 1975, 128 pp., $2.95 pb), Now That You’re a Deacon, by Howard B. Foshee (Broadman, 1975, 136 pp., n.p.), and The Elders of the Church, by Lawrence R. Eyres (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1975, 69 pp., $1.75 pb), are reviewed by Richard Allen Bodey, pastor, First Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, Gastonia, North Carolina.

When is someone going to take pity on the parish minister? When will the modern church tailor his job to bearable—and biblical—proportions? No other professional in our society is required to wear so many different hats. Preacher, pastor, evangelist, trainer, youth worker, fund raiser, administrator, public-relations representative, promoter—he is all these and more. No doubt to some extent he always has been. But the difference today is that, except in large churches with multiple staffs, he is expected to perform each of these roles with the knowledge and skill of a specialist. No wonder men quit the parish ministry. The wonder is that the drop-out rate hasn’t soared much higher.

The latest demand of the secularized church is that the pastor be equipped with the management expertise of a corporation executive. Seminars, conferences, and books on management for the clergy sprout all around like dandelions in May.

One can hardly protest the introduction of sound principles of management into the church. The church is an institution with an intrinsic organizational character. And good management, like good preaching, is preferable to bad. No pastor can afford to be ignorant of administrative procedures. Most could profit from reading a few select books on the subject, or attending a management-training conference. Many seminaries need to upgrade their courses in parish administration.

But allowing all this, one still pleads for the recovery of biblical perspective. The church is essentially a spiritual fellowship, the living Body of Christ, not a corporation. And the parish minister is essentially a teacher-enabler, not a professional executive. Management is, after all, a very small piece of the ecclesiastical pie.

The first three titles listed above are designed to help both pastors and lay leaders adapt tested management principles to the operation of the local church. To their credit, Schaller and Tidwell, nationally known church planners and administrative consultants, recognize the limitations of good management in the church. It is, they caution, no cure-all, and overemphasizing it may prove counterproductive by blocking the Holy Spirit. Organization is meant to be servant, not master. Among sinful human beings, however, a role exchange tends to occur, as institutional maintenance and survival become the foremost concern. The authors appeal for a reversal of priorities, so that congregations focus their attention on the purpose and values for which their structures exist. Creative church administration, says Tidwell, enables “the children of God, who comprise the Body of Christ, the church, to become what, by God’s grace, they can become, and to do what, by God’s grace, they can do.” Viewed in this light, the pastor and other parish leaders serve an enabling function, in partnership with the Holy Spirit.

Wheeley and Cable, both industrial executives with extensive experience in church work, show the same sensitivity to the vital role of the Holy Spirit and stress the fundamental spiritual mission of the church. Lambert, a Roman Catholic layman of similar background, who is less influenced by the biblical norms in his understanding of the church’s mission, ignores the Holy Spirit altogether. The theology of church management is more marginal to his purpose than to that of the other authors.

Creative Church Administration is an apt title for Schaller and Tidwell’s work. While theory receives its due, they offer a wealth of practical counsel, based on the sifted experience of thousands of churches, that points the way to imaginative planning, laity motivation, leadership enlistment and training, innovative thinking, ministries development, membership recruitment, and program evaluation. The authors advocate participatory decision-making and program evaluation by the church members as an important means of promoting congregational vitality and involvement. Of special value is their analysis of factors in church growth, a subject about which Schaller has written several times before.

The major weakness of the book lies in its large-church orientation. Despite the publisher’s claim, it is difficult to see how many of the recommendations could be practiced in the average church with one pastor and 300 to 500 members. The level of lay involvement required would, in most small and medium-size churches, be found to be utterly unrealistic. Nevertheless, a serious attempt to follow the creative ideas of this book ought greatly to improve the church’s life and ministry.

Wheeley and Cable, adapting the “marketing concept” that began to evolve in business circles in the early thirties, develop an approach to church administration in which informed planning is the basic ingredient. In addition to the usual topics, this handbook includes a helpful chapter on constitution and bylaws. Also worthy of mention are the section on leadership development and the many charts, graphs, and exhibits. The entire treatment, however, is too closely tied to principles of Baptist polity, and the models used are almost all drawn from congregations in the American Baptist Churches. Such parochialism is unfortunate in a work intended for general use.

Much more limited in scope, Lambert’s Managing Church Groups describes the system of church administration known as “Church Management by Objectives and Results” (CMOR). Applying the principles and techniques of Organizational Development theory, CMOR places equal emphasis on task and process in church management, i.e., the needs of the organization and the needs of its individual members, as expressed in the way they feel, respond, and react to one another, their surroundings, and their task. Essential to CMOR, which operates on a developmental rather than autocratic style of leadership, is consensus decision-making. The system, Lambert admits, is not suitable to every church, and should be used only if it will help a congregation or parish organization achieve worthwhile results.

The concern of the CMOR approach for personal values in the operation of the church is commendable. But the underlying democratic concept of the church, with its circular model of authority and accountability—an anomaly in a Roman Catholic like Lambert—limits its usefulness in churches committed to other forms of government. Many of the techniques and procedures in areas such as developing objectives data, writing objectives, programming, allocating resources, and staffing can, of course, be applied universally.

Although the manual has a decidedly Roman Catholic flavor, Protestant church leaders with little knowledge of management will find it informative and stimulating. Learning sheets and exercises at the end of the chapters help the reader apply and practice basic management skills.

A different slant altogether is found in LeRoy Eims’s Be the Leader You Were Meant to Be. The author, director of evangelism worldwide for The Navigators, while recognizing the value of modern management, restricts his study to biblical principles of leadership. The result is a delightful gem of spiritual insight. “As practical and down-to-earth as everyday shoes,” this little book extracts basic principles from Scripture, then illustrates them profusely from the lives of biblical characters and shows how they are confirmed in personal experience today.

So, for example, from Hezekiah we learn what is required to make an impact for God: wholeheartedness, singlemindedness, and a fighting spirit. Nehemiah teaches us the importance of doing our homework; Moses, the need to focus on objectives, not obstacles, and how to resolve difficulties; Daniel, the place of purity and humility; David, the importance of attending to unpleasant duties; Elijah, the perils of discouragement. The ultimate secret of spiritual leadership, Eims maintains, is open-hearted fellowship with the living Christ. The wealth of biblical teaching about leadership is impressive.

Eims’s book is suitable for group study. A leader’s guide with visual aids is available.

For anyone having anything to do with church boards and committees, Ideas For Better Church Meetings is important reading. Every seminary student should be required to digest it. The book is not, as the title might suggest, another aid to improving programs; it is a compact guide to help decision-making bodies become dynamic, harmonious work forces that get results.

Apps takes the reader step-by-step the whole way from selecting committee members to evaluating meetings. He tells how to plan an agenda, analyzes the decision-making process, classifies group-member types, and gives tips on dealing with the various types, considers ways to involve members in discussion (he even diagrams seating arrangements), and describes the use of various visual aids. He discusses how to solve and prevent common problems. Nearly everyone would agree that church meetings often generate tension, strife, frustration, and boredom, and are a waste of time. This book shows how the wasteful can be eliminated and the necessary transformed into creative spiritual experiences.

With the rediscovery of the ministry of the laity has come an awakened concern for training church officers. The books by Foshee on the Baptist deacon and Eyres on the Presbyterian elder lend themselves to this purpose well. Both are comprehensive and practical, and both stress the spiritual qualifications required of these officers, who are viewed as partners with the pastor in the work of ministry. Eyres’s book is particularly valuable for its detailed examination of New Testament passages on elders. Contrary to the current trend, he insists that the Scriptures restrict the eldership to men. Every Presbyterian session ought to docket this study for serious discussion.

While these last two books are obviously directed to particular denominations, many of their emphases are equally applicable to the principal lay officers of any church. Pastors in all traditions will find material here readily adaptable to their own use.

True Spirituality

The Inward Pilgrimage, by Bernhard Christensen (Augsburg, 1976, 176 pp., $3.50 pb), is reviewed by Donald Bloesch, professor of theology, Dubuque Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa.

Bernhard Christensen offers a helpful commentary on a number of spiritual classics drawn from the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant communions. Among these are Augustine’s Confessions, Thomas à Kempis’s Imitation of Christ, Luther’s Christian Liberty, Brother Lawrence’s Practice of the Presence of God, Teresa of Avila’s Interior Castle, John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, John Woolman’s Journal, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together.

In Christensen’s opinion, a work of spirituality is primarily concerned not with ethics or doctrine but with the communion of the soul with God. Its chief aim is to lift the heart toward the Eternal, not to instruct the mind. Such works are especially profitable for those who seek to deepen their devotional life.

This book is a poignant reminder that the secret of Christian liberty is discipleship under the cross. Teresa of Avila perceptively observes that people really become spiritual “when they become slaves of God and are branded with his sign, which is the sign of the Cross, in token that they have given Him their freedom.”

In this commentary one is presented with the hallmarks of Christian holiness: upwelling joy, self-giving and outgoing love, boldness of faith, humbleness of spirit, and freedom to tread unknown paths. The saints unanimously agree that love is the highest of the virtues and that all other virtues are as nothing without love.

The author also reminds us that biblical holiness has a this-worldly as well as an other-worldly dimension. He quotes from Evelyn Underhill: “There is nothing high-minded about Christian holiness. It is most at home in the slum, the street, the hospital ward.” The Christian hope is not only the coming of the kingdom of God at the end of history but also the breaking in of this kingdom in the midst of history.

Although Christensen shows a definite openness to Catholic mysticism, there is no doubt that his primary loyalties are to the faith of the Reformation. He rightly points out that evangelical motifs persist in the tradition of Christian mysticism. Brother Lawrence, for example, maintained that all possible kinds of mortification cannot efface a single sin and that we ought to expect the pardon of our sins from the blood of Jesus Christ alone.

At the same time, it would have been helpful had Christensen delineated the areas of possible conflict between mystical and evangelical spirituality. For example, is the life of prayer an inner pilgrimage or a state of being grasped by a living Saviour who first stands outside us before he dwells within us? Do we meet Christ in the center of our being or in his Word as preached and read? Is prayer simply the recollection of God (as defined in the Eastern Orthodox Way of the Pilgrim) or heartfelt supplication and intercession (as with the Reformers)?

This book can be recommended to both clergy and laity as a valuable introduction to Christian spirituality and particularly to some of the great spiritual classics of the Church. Too often Protestants are prone to forget that Christianity concerns not only the descent of God to man but also the ascent of man to God, that personal holiness is not simply the evidence of justification but also its goal.

Pastors Are People, Too

They Cry, Too!, by Lucille Lavender (Hawthorn, 1975, 152 pp., $6.95), is reviewed by Cecil B. Murphey, pastor, Riverdale Presbyterian Church, Riverdale, Georgia.

This book ought to prompt a lot of people (especially clergymen) to say, “At last!” Lucille Lavender, the wife of a pastor, wrote it for laypeople in the church, telling her purpose in the subtitle: “What You Always Wanted to Know About Your Minister and Didn’t Know Whom to Ask.” She makes it plain: ministers are human beings. Their profession demands much from them—and many of those demands are the result of ignorance, insensitivity, or discourtesy.

I have a few minor criticisms. Some of the illustrative material seems extreme or at least overdrawn. A few stories tend toward superficiality and strain for credibility. She occasionally gets sidetracked. For instance, in the chapter on the pastor’s bank account she digresses to give a short lecture on stewardship. Not badly done, but out of place here. In a chapter on his preaching, she concludes with two pages about church attendance. And the last two chapters don’t really add much that hasn’t been said earlier in the book in slightly different ways.

Nonetheless, Lavender does a grand job. She has researched her material well, and she works on sound biblical and psychological principles. She reveals her theme as “a plea to put aside the artificial differences imposed upon a minister—and his wife.”

She asks questions like, How many hours a week does your minister “owe” the church? Must he be available twenty-four hours a day? Do you put him on a pedestal that makes him not quite human? How often do you think of his needs? Ever said, “Hey, pastor, I appreciate you”? She frequently quotes responses from questionnaires sent to clergymen. One of them answered, “My role seems to be an exercise in futility. I hate the loneliness.”

And thank you, Mrs. Lavender, for your chapter about the pastor’s wife and his children. They often undergo hardships worse than the pastor’s. How can a minister’s wife become Doris Jones, a person in her own right, and not just “Doris Jones, our minister’s wife”? Almost every P.K. has been reprimanded for being a normal child by a well-meaning soul who expected perfection. “After all, your father’s a minister!”

At the end of every chapter the author gives a “checklist” by which the reader can examine his or her attitude.

Here are a few samples of her suggestions: Do not confuse the man, who is imperfect, with the One who called him, who is perfect. And allow the pastor and his family to have close friends. Think of how you would feel if your career required that you not have any close friendships!

The book closes with a Pastor’s Responsibility Awareness Quiz, asking the reader to look at the various tasks assigned to the pastor and to assess the number of hours per week he ought to devote to each task.

She asks the reader to fill in the blanks: “As a regularly employed lay person I have —— days off per week. Total days per year apart from vacation: ——.” Then she asks the reader to answer this one: How many days off should my pastor have per week?

As a pastor, I hope my congregation will circulate this book widely in our church—and I intend to make it available. The reason is not that I want pity, but that it can help bridge the gap between the ordained minister and other people.

Briefly Noted

What do Augustine, Pascal, Blake, Kierkegaard, Tolstoy, and Bonhoeffer have in common? Answer: they have attracted the attention of one of England’s best-known journalists, who has become a Christian in recent years and who regards them as “God’s spies,” stay-behind agents in enemy-occupied territory, men of their time who seek to relate their time to eternity. A Third Testament by Malcolm Muggeridge (Little, Brown, 207 pp., $12.95) is a personal statement of faith originally prepared for television. Not everyone will agree that the author has given a fully adequate account of these “six characters in search of God,” but every Christian will rejoice to see the Good News being proclaimed so fearlessly and so beautifully in such an important sphere.

There Is a Better Way of Living by Sidney Gerhardt and Elizabeth McKay (Seabury, 128 pp., $5.95) is a reaction against interpersonal alienation and coldness. Though not studded with scriptural references, it is to be commended for its view of unconditional friendship as the cornerstone for close relationships. In our society we have stressed independence, but it is through interdependence that we enhance the quality of life together.

No one will ever mistake The Word Made Fresh for anything other than the freest of biblical paraphrases. Published in three paperback volumes by John Knox (Genesis-Kings, 249 pp., $3.95; Chronicles-Malachi, 294 pp., $3.95; Matthew-Revelation, 345 pp., $5.95), it is the work of Andrew Edington, a Presbyterian layman. It conveys the Bible’s message in a style reminiscent of Clarence Jordan’s Cotton Patch Version. Though certain to liven up family devotions and the local Sunday school, it is hardly likely to become a literary classic.

Whether married, single, parents, or children, we all live in a series of relationships. Family Life (Word, 245 pp., $6.95, $4.50 pb) concentrates on God’s view of these relationships. It is by Ray Stedman and five of his colleagues at Peninsula Bible Church. Their views on the biblical tenets of marriage correlate with those of another colleague. Bob Smith, who wrote Love Story, The Real Thing (Word, 97 pp., $2.95 pb). The longer book devotes interesting chapters to the relationships of single people and deals with such problems as masturbation, fornication, and homesexuality. An expanded view of the family within a larger community is presented at the end of the book to balance the roles in the nuclear family discussed earlier.

Child-rearing has never been an easy assignment. Very basic to building self-esteem are “significance, security, acceptance, love, praise, discipline, and God,” discussed in Seven Things Children Need by John Drescher (Herald Press, 152 pp., $1.95 pb). The words of this Mennonite pastor are a good start or review for any parent. Another need of children and adults is expressed in quite a different way in Caring, Feeling, Touching by Sidney Simons (Argus, 101 pp., $1.95 pb). We have a natural and wholesome need to touch and be touched that is often suppressed. Using excellent photographs, Simons clarifies this need and gives examples of how to help fulfill it, starting with one’s family.

The Episcopal Church’s recent decision to ordain women as priests makes particularly timely Women and Catholic Priesthood edited by Anne Marie Gardiner (Paulist, 259 pp., $5.95 pb). It is the proceedings of a Catholic Women’s Ordination Conference held in Detroit last November. Which requirement for its priests will the Latin church change first, celibacy or masculinity? For a high-low Anglican collaborative effort responsibly, though futilely, opposing women priests, see the expanded edition of Why Not? edited by Michael Bruce and G. E. Duffield (Marcham Books [Appleford, Abingdon, Berkshire, U.K.], 184 pp., $6.65 pb).

Most of what many Christians know about what Jews and Judaism believe comes from hearsay or from Christian sources. Rarely have non-Jews taken the trouble to read the Jewish sources for themselves. There is really no excuse for this approach today—if there ever was—since there are a host of non-technical books on Jewish faith and practice written by Jews. The Essential Talmud by Adin Steinsaltz (Basic Books, 296 pp., $10) offers a fascinating introduction to the codified oral tradition that provides orthodox Judaism its key to the Law of Moses and to daily life. A Modern Interpretation of Judaism by Charles and Bertie Schwartz (Schocken, 189 pp., $3.95 pb) bears the subtitle “Faith Through Reason” and is a lucid exposition of the Jewish religion from a layman’s viewpoint by a husband and wife (he is an attorney). Of a different nature is Judaism in America by Joseph L. Blau (University of Chicago, 156 pp., $8.95), a scholar’s account of the history of Judaism (as distinct from that of Jewish people) in its American expression. All of these will be found both interesting and useful by Christians who seek to understand and relate to Jewish neighbors.

Church leaders engage in a variety of types of “visitation.” Evangelistic visitation focuses on persons outside the congregation and seeks to draw them in. Pastoral visitation focuses on those who have some personal need or problem with which the pastor can help. Family visitation takes in all the members of the congregation, is carried out by all the elders, and does not wait for some pressing need to arise.

The denomination in which I serve requires that “the minister of the Word and elders shall conduct annual home visitation.…” In this it stands in the tradition of historic Christianity. In the early Church there was a conviction that the preaching of the Word should be supplemented with a type of spiritual care in which the members were contacted personally in their homes. Gradually a new view made headway: the sacraments were considered the primary way in which the Church dispensed grace to the faithful. But at the time of the Protestant Reformation there was a determination to return to a more meaningful pastoral ministry. John Calvin, along with others, broke with the system of the confessional and returned to the previous practice of visiting church members in their homes in order to exhort and stimulate them to spiritual growth.

Here are five of the benefits our church has found in a program of family visitation:

1. An atmosphere of supportive Christian concern is created. Although the Scriptures speak very clearly and frequently about the personal caring that should be exercised within a Christian church, in our impersonal society much of that caring does not come through. “I’m a lonely nobody!” is a cry that comes from many even within the church. This loneliness is enhanced by the mobility that marks our society. It is the responsibility of the Church to step in with warm pastoral care. It should create an atmosphere of fellowship in which each family can feel the supportive Christian concern the Church needs to function as the Body of Christ.

2. Problems can be detected before they become serious. No person or marriage or family is immune to the pressures and stresses of life in our world. If people are not part of a supportive and caring fellowship, they may not feel free to seek the help and encouragement they need when the stresses come. So the problems are buried for a while, only to reappear later, probably in a more critical form.

People often feel that their problems are not serious enough to need special attention, or perhaps are shy about asking for help; but if caring officers of the church visit them in their homes they may find it much easier to reach out for the help they need.

3. People are visited in their own surroundings. Often pastoral visitation or counseling is carried on in a “neutral” place such as a hospital room or a counselor’s office. That has the disadvantage of leaving behind the feelings and spirit of the home. To visit a family at home is to communicate with them in the context of their needs and feelings. The visitor may be able to help a family develop communication. Especially in a Christian family, members should feel a freedom and comfort in communicating with one another about matters that concern, irritate, and inspire them. Church officers, when they announce their visit ahead of time and indicate their concern for the welfare of the family, can be a healthful influence in stimulating family discussion.

4. Sustained contact with families and individuals is provided. Most problems and disorders do not appear overnight. And they often cannot be easily spotted in their early stages. If the same officers visit a family for several years and keep adequate records, they can encourage and help the family on the basis of long-term knowledge.

5. A large number of church leaders can be involved in the pastoral task. When most churches were small and in rural communities, the pastor was expected to maintain a great deal of social contact with all the members of the congregation. It was assumed that part of his calling was to have coffee in nearly every home regularly. But as congregations increased in size and became geographically diffuse and as the program of the church became more complex and diversified, this pattern became an impossibility. Therefore, the practice of regular family visitation really calls for a team ministry of pastor and elders.

The Scripture portrays church officers as “undershepherds” when it speaks of them in Hebrews 13:17 as those who “watch for your souls” and tells them in First Peter 5:2 to “tend the flock of God.” Elders are to function as representatives of the Chief Shepherd.

But they need training. Persons are often chosen and installed in office in the church with no training or orientation. They need information on matters of church government, but they also need some training in leadership and in understanding and helping others. Such training should be an ongoing process in a church.

A family visit is likely to be unproductive if the family has had no advance notice of the visit and its purpose. The church might well send an instructive letter to the family shortly before the visit, expressing the church’s concern for the members of the family, reviewing the general purpose of family visitation, suggesting that all the members be present, if possible, and giving some indication of the kinds of matters they might like to discuss. Confidential matters could be reserved for a more private appointment.

The visit at one home may follow quite a different format than that at the next home. In some there will be no difficulty in turning the conversation to substantial matters; in others it might be advisable, after initial friendly conversation, for the visitor to direct the conversation by suggesting the reading of a few verses of Scripture and a prayer for guidance.

A spirit of loving and supportive personal concern should always be shown. Sometimes it will take the form of interest in the home, relatives, jobs, and the like. Other times it will take the form of comfort in distress, or advice about impending decisions, or perhaps warnings about potentially dangerous trends evident in the lives of family members. When specific needs are raised, the officers should always be ready to offer the services of the church and to emphasize that members of Christ’s body stand ready to rejoice together and weep together. Still another element of the visit might be an inquiry about the effectiveness of the church’s ministry to this family, which could well lead to an evaluation of the church’s ministry as a whole.

The benefits of family visitation are potentially so great that the program is worth all the time and effort it demands.

—HOWARD VANDERWELL, pastor,

Bethel Christian Reformed Church,

Lansing, Illinois.

Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God” (Isa. 40:1). “Comfort one another with these words” (1 Thess. 4:18). “For thus saith the Lord, … As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you; and ye shall be comforted in Jerusalem.”

We cannot taste, measure, weigh this thing called comfort, but the word is connected with reality, not fantasy. God has commanded us to do many things, and one of them is to be involved in comfort, as comforter or comforted.

Have you a window, in reality or in memory, through which you can see a small child who with eyes shining, hair gleaming in the sun, is running in a field of wild flowers, or playing in the grass, on sand, or among pebbles? Watch while the child laughs and delightedly reaches out to pull some grass or flower, or to pick up sand or a pebble. Suddenly the pure bubble of joy breaks, and the shining moment is shattered by a scream and a doubling up in pain. A bee has angrily stung the little hand that squeezed it along with the grass, flower, sand, or pebble.

A quickly swelling hand indicates physical pain, but the weeping is for more than that. Shock and disappointment have brought a swift change to the smooth freedom of enjoying the sunshine and beauty of the day. The dismay and hurt are deeper than physical, and someone who is trusted, and who understands what has happened, needs to gather that little person up in his or her arms and administer comfort along with first aid. The little one, however, can do one of two things: kick and fight the proffered comfort, or cuddle up in loving arms accepting the comfort.

God is not talking in riddles, or in theological terms that cannot be understood, when he continually speaks of comfort in his Word. The ingredients are clear: there must be a comforter, and one who needs comfort. However, the comforter cannot comfort someone who does not see the need, or who will not accept the comfort.

Recently in Texas a friend of ours was preparing her home for our visit, and as a last touch she stepped out into the garden to turn on a light that would lift the night darkness and reveal the beauty that was there. As she put her hand up to the switch, she hit a swarm of hornets, which attacked her in concentrated fury. Many stings made her arm swell to double its normal size. Her pain was coupled with deep disappointment in this hindrance to an evening long looked forward to. Her sons were nearby, and they provided not only a quick drive to the hospital for injections but comfort in a variety of ways.

The “hornet stings” of physical pain, sudden illness, threat of sudden death, loss by fire, flood, and hurricane, have come in succession through the generations of human history since the Fall, when Satan succeeded in separating Adam and Eve from God’s presence. The threats to all parts of the world today (war, violence in countries supposedly at peace. Communist takeover or “coups” by various groups, rule by some sort of an elite, economic breakdown, inflation, a forced sharing of goods that curtails the freedom to build and create in diverse areas by choice) are buzzing realities, a swarm of hornets coming closer and closer. What kind of comfort are we to give, and receive?

There is a negative to be looked at before we can understand the positive thoroughly. Job’s comforters were the wrong kind. They told Job to examine himself and see what terrible thing he had done. They had neither real empathy with his suffering nor an understanding of Satan’s place in the attack. Job’s word was, “Miserable comforters are ye all.” David in Psalm 69:20 speaks of his looking for comforters and finding none, and Jesus as he died on the cross had no one to comfort him, as the Father turned his face away from the sight of our sin, which Jesus bore for us in his own body.

Amazing grace! Jesus went without comfort so that he could send us the Comforter. The Holy Spirit, Jesus said, would come to replace the comfort he himself was giving to the disciples as he spent time with them. “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever, even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you” (John 14:16, 17).

Jesus cares about our being comforted in the land of the living, in this period of history before he comes back. But not only are we to be comforted by the Holy Spirit who dwells in us; we are to have his help so that we can comfort one another. We need horizontal comfort, the comfort of other human beings.

Come to Ephesians 6 and listen to Paul speaking to the people in that early church, and to us today. He has just given a strong teaching as to the believer’s battle against the rulers of darkness, and spiritual wickedness in high places. He has cautioned Christians to take the whole armor of God and to stand fast, to be sure they have the shield of faith to quench the fiery darts of the wicked one. He has cautioned them to pray always, for one another, and he has asked for prayer for himself, that he might speak boldly to make known the mystery of the Gospel. Yet he tenderly finishes his letter with a compassionate promise to send Tychicus, a beloved brother, another human being who was a faithful Christian but also an understanding person. He did not say simply, “You have the Holy Spirit with you.” He said, “I am sending Tychicus to you that he might comfort your hearts.” They needed comfort, and they were going to have a person who could look into their eyes and listen and speak with comforting words.

“The bees are buzzing, the hornets are stinging! I can’t stand the pain any longer! I can’t stand the pressures another day!” What is our immediate need? And what is the need of the person whom the Lord has put next to us right now?

“Comfort ye, comfort ye my people.” “Comfort one another with these words,” that because Jesus is coming again, future history is certain. We look forward to God’s comfort for eternity in his own beautiful words of promise: “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.” The day is coming when we will be in the midst of the time described in Revelation 21, when Christ the Comforter, who is perfect, will give his perfect comfort to all his people.

Until then, we who have the Comforter living in us are to take an active part in comforting—and in accepting comfort.