Hellish Procedure

Brain Washing, The Story of Men Who Defied It, by Edward Hunter, Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, New York, 310 pp., $4.

The sobering fact that one-third of all American war prisoners in Korea who survived the ordeals of imprisonment eventually collaborated with the communists should make this book one of the most carefully read of our day. Unfortunately, it has not had wide circulation, and wherever communists have their way, it will be suppressed.

Edward Hunter is probably the free world’s outstanding authority on the meaning of, and techniques used, in brain-washing. In a previous book, Brain-Washing in Red China, Hunter gave a gruesome picture of that which had taken place. And at first this book was viewed skeptically by some because little was known with regard to this scientifically formulated process whereby the wills and even personalities of men might be warped and finally molded into a new pattern, basically abhorrent to them. However, as time went on, it was realized that Mr. Hunter knew what he was talking about, and his views were received with increasing respect.

This second book is important because it shows how brain-washing is accomplished, and also how it may he defied. The strength of his writing lies in the case-histories, the painstaking accumulation of evidence, and the clarity of presentation. The importance of the book is that we are warned against a hellish procedure which is now a stock-in-trade of world Communism.

Brain-washing has been called Menticide—murder of the mind—and this is a graphic and true description. That some have denied the existence of such a procedure makes it all the more imperative that it be understood and prepared for.

For one thing, it is obvious that to be successful, brain-washing depends primarily on the subjects’ ignorance of it. Where it is understood, effective resistance has been high as has been demonstrated by many of our own soldiers in Korea. As a matter of fact, it was Communism’s aggressive war in Korea that brought to the free world a knowledge of what brain-washing really is.

The technique of brain-washing is built on the known ability to develop conditioned reflexes by outside influence. Through this there is a deliberate program to bring about basic changes in human nature, one of which is the destruction of the individual I, replaced by the we of collectivity. Self-examination, confessions, self-accusation, and the repeated use of fixed phrases are all designed for one specific purpose—the breaking of the mind and will of the individual, and these designs have a diabolical cleverness as well as a diabolical effect.

The author states: “Brain-washing was revealed as a political strategy for expansion and control made up of two processes. One is the conditioning, or softening-up process primarily for control purposes. The other is an indoctrination or persuasion process for conversion purposes. Both can be conducted simultaneously, or either of them can precede the other. The Communists are coldly practical about it, adjusting their methods to their objective. Only the results count for them.”

One effect of the thoroughly brainwashed individual is his complete inability to stand by himself. The truly indoctrinated communist must be part of collectivity. He must be incapable of hearing opposing ideas and facts, no matter how convincing or how forcibly they bombard his senses.

In many ways brain-washing is more like a treatment than a formula. Each of the two processes that make it up are themselves composed of a number of different elements. Brain-washing is accomplished through hunger, fatigue, tenseness, threats, violence, and in some cases by the use of drugs and hypnotism. There is a period of “learning” which inevitably leads to confession. These two are interrelated and absolutely necessary to the procedure. No one is permitted to retain his own individuality as this is recognized as a deadly menace by the whole monolithic structure.

Hunter makes this arresting statement: “Brain-washing is a system of befogging the brain so a person can be seduced into acceptance of what otherwise would be abhorrent to him.” The book shows how the various elements of brain-washing are used—i.e., hunger, in which the minimum amount of food that a man can eat and still survive is kept carefully tabulated, and then cut by one-third. Fatigue is pushed to the point where even suicide is a welcome relief because of prolonged sleeplessness.

Tenseness is maintained by threats, promises, cajolery, by the holding out of hope one day, and dashing it to the ground the next. This is used to develop a sense of hopelessness and inevitable surrender. Kept in solitude and subjected to these multiplied pressures, along with threats of violence, often carried out, men break physically, mentally and spiritually.

Because it is necessary to understand the disease before there can be an effectice cure, Hunter devotes much of his book to a description of the theory and practice of brain-washing and the giving of documented cases. But the usefulness of the book is most enhanced by a study of the means whereby breakdown can be defeated.

Army medical personnel made an exhaustive study of the men who capitulated to Communism in prisoner of war camps in Korea, and they came up with the fact that these men lacked spiritual and moral convictions, an understanding and appreciation of our American heritage, discipline in the sense of a basic concept of right and wrong, and an understanding of Communism and its propaganda methods. Many of them had come from broken homes and few of them had had any church training or religious ties.

Hunter corroborates fact this to the fullest extent and shows that where men have had deep spiritual faith and moral convictions, they have largely been impervious to brain-washing. He quotes individuals who found the source of sustained strength in prayer and in reading the Bible. Where the Scriptures were not available, as was almost always the case, they spent their time bringing to mind Bible verses, and repeating them over and over. Hunter says, “The people I interviewed were mostly down-to-earth, practical men who could not be swept off their feet by emotionalism. The Shanghai lawyer, the Budapest engineer, the top-sergeant from Korea, and the automobile salesman from Detroit, were men of the world. Still, they declared that the most important elements in their survival were faith and prayer. So did the majority of those who went through Red brain-washing.”

Robert A. Vogeler, American businessman who was kept in a Red Hungary prison (and whom the reviewer has met and heard speak), said he tried, during his long days and nights of incarceration, to recall exactly what the New Testament had said. He gave himself the task of bringing back to mind the verses he had learned as a boy in Sunday School. He made a practice in prison of saying grace whenever he ate, no matter what sorry pretense of a meal was put before him. He keenly felt the lack of a Bible and kept asking for one. As a result of his experience, Vogeler came out of prison more than just a practical businessman; he became a man with a mission.

Mr. Hunter has rendered the free world a great service in writing this book. It is our hope that those in positions of responsibility, both in church and in state, will take the time to read it, ponder its message, and prepare themselves accordingly.

L. NELSON BELL

A Rationalistic Defence

The Resurrection of Theism, by Stuart Cornelius Hackett, Moody Press, 1957. 381 pp., $5.

Professor Hackett’s new book has already created a considerable amount of interest. It was a major topic of discussion at the November 1957 Philosophical Conference under the auspices of the department of Bible and philosophy at Wheaton College. Before his recent move to the philosophy department chairmanship in Louisiana College, Professor Hackett was a member of the Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary faculty in Denver. President Vernon Grounds of that institution writes an enthusiastic introduction. The conservative position of Moody Press is well-known.

Hackett’s work is a reaction against the anti-intellectual tendencies against which James Gresham Machen so vigorously warned. Even since Machen’s day there has been a movement among Bible-believing Christians to abandon the historical, factual and rational evidences of Christianity. It has been said that the use of inductive argument is worse than worthless. It is held that in dealing with unbelievers we must simply demand that they accept Christian presuppositions, or else—. Professor Hackett takes the position, maintained by a continuous line of great theologians throughout the entire history of the church, that the presentation of the Christian message should include rational, inductive, and synthetic arguments.

There are some great books like Warfield’s Revelation and Inspiration and A. A. Hodge’s Atonement about which we can say with satisfactory confidence, “That’s it. That is the book for our generation on the topic designated.” Has Professor Hackett given us such a book on the subject of Theism?

There are certain grounds for a negative answer to the above question:

The implications of Professor Hackett’s title are put into words by President Grounds as follows, “Ever since Immanuel Kant wrote his monumental Critique of Pure Reason, theistic discussion has proceeded on the postulate … that the existence of God can neither be demonstrated nor disproved by reason.… By and large … the alleged demolition of the venerable ‘proofs’ has been taken as a fait accompli by schools of all persuasions whether agnostic or liberal or neo-orthodox or even evangelical.”

Now, there is nothing new in the experience of younger scholars assuming that what is new to them is new to the world. But as a matter of fact, a long line of eminently competent philosophical theologians like Robert Flint and James Orr have masterfully answered Kant’s objections. Hackett’s title, “The Resurrection of Theism”, is a misnomer, though it is indeed a fresh approach to certain current problems.

The method of approach, called “rationalistic empiricism” is an example of an extreme form of rationalism. The laws of reason, including not only the basic axioms of logic, but also the Kantian categories, or an adapted form of them, and including a rigid totalitarian law of causality,—this rationalistic complex is binding a priori for both God and man! Hackett’s form of argument, “does not at all exempt God’s Being from the casual axiom; it certainly is legitimate and necessary to ask for the cause of God’s existence” (p. 292). Professor Hackett believes that he saves theism by saying that the cause of God’s existence is not exterior to his being, but interior. He holds that there is something in the character of God which causes God to exist. It would seem that the question of externality or internality of cause would be of no consequence, if God’s being is held to be dependent upon any cause whatever. The fallacy in Kant’s handling of the theistic arguments is found in that he thought God must be conceived as dependent upon a logical syllogism, or pure reason. On the contrary, the God of the Bible simply exists, eternally and independently. Professor Hackett is in error in thinking that it is a logical axiom that every event and every being must have a cause. In fact the simple observation that the world exists and that causality is observable in finite things requires us to believe that something must be eternal, unless something comes from nothing. The Christian answer is, God the uncaused, eternal being.

The concept of God being subject to the law of causality almost leads to Spinozistic pantheism. We read, “Spinoza will clarify the point: just as Spinoza held that substance was completely comprehended by a multiplicity of attributes, each of which was a complete embodiment from its own point of view of substance itself so we maintain that all reality is completely explicable in terms of two principles—law and purpose—each of which is a complete account, from its own point of view, of reality itself” (p. 353).

The scriptural doctrine of election is thoroughly misunderstood and rejected (pp. 172ff.).

The answer to the problem of evil is very badly mangled. “The existence of irreducible or real evil results in every case from a contingency that is necessarily involved in those determinate conditions which are themselves essential to the creation of a universe whose ultimate end is the production and progressive development of rational, moral selves” (p. 351f.).

Men with devout Christian hearts may certainly wander far in their rationalizations. There are many cases of logical non-sequiter in Dr. Hackett’s work, and also many other excellent and even brilliant insights which should be presented if there were space.

J. OLIVER BUSWELL, JR.

Theistic Idealism

Crucial Issues in Philosophy, by Daniel S. Robinson, Christopher, 1955. 285 pp., $5.

Out of his later years Dr. Robinson views crucial issues facing the West from the window of philosophical idealism, which he has long expounded. Lectures and essays roam the writings of classical and contemporary philosophers with an eye on social, political and religious concerns. Fifteen chapters deal in somewhat more practical than theoretical vein with modern problems, a dozen more with representative modern philosophers, mostly of idealistic and theistic temper.

“Since 1600 our civilization has been generating a new tension that has recently culminated in a spiritual crisis, of which the first and second world wars were merely phases,” Dr. Robinson notes. “Unless the tension … can be … overcome our civilization and culture will be dethroned” (p. 18).

To reconcile the tension between inherited Christianity, modern scientific research and political democracy—which Communism is today exploiting for revolutionary ends—Dr. Robinson turns to theistic idealism. He disowns Brightman’s finite God.

Aware of the theistic existentialist revolt against the absolutistic conception of reality espoused by Royce and Hocking, he nonetheless thinks the Christian existentialists may be retelling the Christian message so that contemporaries will believe that Jesus is the Son of God (p. 248). But the speculative thrust predominates over the theology of revelation. For while Dr. Robinson properly discerns the Pauline doctrine that “the personality of Jesus is identical with the divine Logos,” he falls into the idealistic fallacy when he extends that doctrine to mean that “the God who is incarnate in Jesus is also incarnate in every believing Christian” (p. 247).

CARL F. H. HENRY

Misunderstanding

The Reformation, by Will Durant, Simon and Shuster, New York, 1957. $7.50.

This is the fifth volume of Will Durant’s magnum opus “The Story of Civilization,” and in order to cover the period 1300–1564 it runs, like the preceding volumes, to over 1,000 pages. The earlier topics with which the author dealt naturally posed their problems; but this one, requiring careful evaluation of some of the most controversial movements in history, must have laid upon the author a particular burden.

The weight of this burden must have been especially heavy in Durant’s case since he attempts to make himself master of the whole of Western world history, and so has been obliged to limit himself largely to secondary sources which at times lead him astray. Moreover, for one who was born into the Roman Catholic communion but apparently moved over to a type of Protestant liberalism, it must have been difficult for him to develop very much sympathy for the sixteenth century Reformers.

His study of the humanistic, political and economic developments in northern Europe between 1300 and 1564 is stimulating and interesting. On the other hand, his facility for generalization and epigrammatic statement sometimes leads him or the reader astray. Despite this, however, his work in this field, if read with due care, provides a useful summary of the Northern Renaissance.

It is his efforts to deal with the Reformers which rouse the most fundamental criticisms. While he tries at times to be sympathetic and understanding, it is clear that he simply is not able to grasp the basic spirit of either Luther or Calvin. Indeed, sometimes he has even failed to understand their plain teachings, as for instance, in the case where he states that Luther kept most of the medieval church’s doctrines (p. 571), or where he refers to the Reformers’ doctrine of “justification or election by faith” (p. 465). A blow at Calvin, whom he dislikes intensely, comes at a point where he refers to that Reformer’s doctrines as the “most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honored history of nonsense” (p. 490).

Perhaps Durant would have understood the Reformation better had he read some of those who have favored it, viz., Doumergue, Bohatec, Rupp and others. But as it is, not only are there misstatements of fact, but one cannot help feeling that to the whole Reformation, the author is in fundamental opposition, and that therefore any true understanding of it is precluded.

W. S. REID

Unified Insight

A Survey of The Old and New Testaments, by Russell Bradley Jones, Baker Book House, 1957. $5.95.

In many ways this is an excellent book. It is definitely conservative in theological outlook, it is written in a clear understandable style, and indicates that the author, who is head of the Department of Bible and Religious Education at Carson-Newman College, Jefferson City, Tennessee, is a man of excellent judgment.

This last point is evident again and again throughout the book. Thus, in discussing divine sovereignty and human responsibility, the author does justice to both (p. 23). He rejects the fantastic restitution-theory with respect to the story of creation (p. 35). He does not tolerate an unfair attack on the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints (p. 329). He gives a summary-interpretation of Revelation 20 which is satisfying (p. 360).

What is perhaps the outstanding virtue of the book is the fact that the author makes us see the history of revelation as an organic whole. It is all one story, the story of God’s redeeming love. I recommend this book for those who wish to gain a unified, organic insight into the story of redemption as revealed in the Bible.

I do have a few criticisms to make. It would seem that the author has struggled with the problem of giving a survey both of the Bible story and of the Bible books within the very limited space of 372 pages. His treatment of the story is excellent. This is not always true with respect to the books. In fact, some of them receive hardly any attention: to Nahum only a few lines are devoted; to the entire Gospel according to John hardly two pages. Also, the chosen themes and divisions are often difficult to study or memorize. Frequently, too, it is not clear how the divisions are related to the theme.

It is perhaps due also to the author’s ample treatment of the story, that very little space is left for the treatment of well-known problems, e.g., less than a page is given to the Synoptic problem.

It is puzzling to understand how the author, in bestowing high praise upon a number of listed Bible translations, of which he says, “In no instance is the Word of God being deliberately changed,” and in which he characterizes the translators as “devout scholars for whose consecrated toil we should be thankful,” can include the Revised Standard Version, without offering a word of criticism (p. 20). The one redeeming feature in this connection is that the author does mention in his bibliography the work of O. T. Allis, Revised Version or Revised Bible? But these criticisms do not in any way take away the fact that Jones has written a fine book on Bible history.

WILLIAM HENDRIKSEN

Teaching Children

Beyond Neutrality, by M. V. C. Jeffreys, Pitman, London, 8s.6d.

The author is Professor of Education at the University of Birmingham, England, and one could wish that all who hold similar posts in the universities of the world were such as he. In five excellent chapters Professor Jeffreys sustains the plea that the cult of moral and religious neutrality in the teaching profession shall be brought to an end. By means of cogent arguments the author insists that unless a teacher both has and reveals convictions of a moral and religious kind he is failing in the most elementary aspects of his duty in the education of the young lives entrusted to him. The important guiding principle for a teacher is that he is not teaching “subjects”: he is teaching children. A child is a developing person and needs the stimulus not merely of factual information, but of challenging ideas. The directionless feature of so much present-day education denies to the child-person those very elements that make for a strong mind, a steadfast character, and a full personal life. The best way of indicating the healthy tone of these lectures and likewise to commend them to the serious teacher is to quote a few sentences:

“It is sometimes maintained that, in matters of belief, the teacher ought to ask questions, never to answer them; that anything more positive than a question-mark must prejudice the intellectual liberty of the pupil by putting someone else’s ideas into his head. This evasion of the educator’s responsibility, in the name of freedom, rests, however, on the false assumption that the positive presentation of a view of life is incompatible with the cultivation of the pupil’s critical judgment. The truth surely is that powers grow by exercise, and a person will never learn to withstand propaganda who has never been exposed to the force of opinion. The guarantee of freedom is not the teacher’s neutrality but his respect for the integrity of his pupil’s personality. Let the teacher preach the faith that is in him so long as he desires his pupil to exercise responsible judgment more than he desires him to accept the teacher’s opinions. The minds and souls of the young are safe with the teacher at the heart of whose faith is reverence for human personality. This is the one condition that reconciles freedom and authority. Without it, there is no escape from anarchy on the one side and tyranny on the other.”

This is a little volume that should be placed in the hands of every potential teacher and it would do experienced teachers no harm to read it.

ERNEST F. KEVAN

Neo-Orthodox Sympathies

Basic Christian Beliefs, by W. Burnet Easton, Jr., Westminster, Philadelphia, 1957. 196 pp., $3.75.

This book purports to delineate and defend biblical Christianity. Stating that Christianity is a supranatural religion, the author notes that such a faith, rather than mere obedience to the Christian ethic, is essential if one is correctly to be called Christian. In a provocative analysis of faith and reason, he shows that the “naturalist,” as well as the “supernaturalist,” is dependent on faith, and in a valid criticism of the traditional theistic proofs he points out in effect that they at best prove the existence of a God.

He holds an extremely low view of inspiration whereby he maintains that the biblical writers were storytellers who often invented details that did not or could not have happened. For him the Bible “speaks the Word of God only to those who go to it in faith and expectancy,” and here as elsewhere he shows clearly his neo-orthodox sympathies. While he does not accept the Genesis account of original sin, he does believe that all men are sinful and in need of reconciliation with God. He speaks of the Atonement as the great indispensable Christian doctrine but is all too vague as to its meaning, and he regards the Resurrection as a subjective group experience. He anticipates a final Judgment, but no eternal punishment.

The author, now a professor at Park College, Missouri, has written an interesting readable book, which is definitely theistic. But the Christianity that he depicts, based as it is on human reason and experience rather than divine revelation, is at best a badly deformed type.

CHARLES H. CRAIG

Ecclesiastical Year

Resources for Sermon Preparation, by David A. MacLennan, Westminster, Philadelphia, 1957. 239 pp., $3.75.

There are 308,647 churches in the United States, and of these 39,614 belong to denominations that adhere rather closely to the traditional Christian year, with its fixed Gospel and Epistle selections. The other 269,033 use either free texts, or else follow a modified Christian year that has become more or less recognized in recent years. The traditional Christian year devotes every Sunday to some incident relating to the earthly ministry of our Lord or to his teachings. The modified church year sets apart certain days such as Universal Bible Sunday, Brotherhood Sunday, Rural Life Sunday, Mothers’ Day, Fathers’ Day, Nature Sunday, Labor Sunday, etc. It is with this latter ecclesiastical year that Dr. MacLennan’s book is concerned.

It is not a book of sermons, but rather of suggested thoughts for sermons. For example, during the Lenten season, he includes not only such subjects as “How to Keep Lent” and “How Christ Saves Us,” but “Proud of This News,” “Sky Hooks Monday through Friday,” “What’s Life All About,” “Hearing Aids” and “How’s Your E.Q.?”

In his suggested texts, which are printed in full, the author usually uses the RSV, Moffatt, Phillips or Barclay. The homiletical thoughts range from seven pages for Easter day to six lines for “Mountains of the Bible” and three lines for “A Summer Series.”

Dr. MacLennan is pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church, Rochester, N. Y., and is a teacher of homiletics at Colgate Rochester Divinity School. He delivered the 1955 Warrack Lectures on Preaching at the Universities of Glasgow and Aberdeen.

F. R. WEBBER

Citizens of New York, Boston, Toronto, London, Glasgow, and many other cities across the earth have known a common despair. They have sought to read the “unbiased facts” of the results of a local Billy Graham evangelistic crusade. The conflicting accounts they read are not simply lined up according to competing newspapers—rather conflicts often appear in the same journals. Uneasiness with the assessments is often aroused as these seem usually to agree with predictions made by the same parties, whether pro, con, or in-between. As a result, editors are always assured of a goodly dosage of protesting letters one way or the other, and ample ammunition is thereby provided for many an ecclesiastical debate, whether in convention halls or in seminary dormitories.

Seeking to remedy this situation with regard to the recent New York Crusade is Dr. Robert O. Ferm, dean of students at Houghton College. Since the closing of that campaign last fall, he says, varied reports have been submitted. Some of these have been inadequate due to their compilation by the secular press “which lacks the spiritual prerequisite for accurate evaluation.” Other assays “have emerged from religious sources that were antagonistic from the beginning of the crusade and conducted [the surveys] without having attended a single meeting of the campaign or having access to the names of the inquirers.”

Seeking The Answer

Probably the key question in all of this—and it has been asked by thousands—is, “What happens to the converts?” Dr. Ferm sought the answer from the converts themselves as well as from ministers who had dealt with them. More than 2000 converts were questioned by personal interview, telephone, and questionnaire. Also 100 letters were selected from the 30,000 which testified of conversion through crusade telecasts.

Dr. Ferm announces: “Many gratifying facts were uncovered. Contrary to the reports that imply meager results, 95 per cent of the 60,000 who signed cards adhered to their original decision. The confused five per cent showed no reluctance to talk of their failure to grasp the full meaning of salvation through Christ. On the contrary, many of them were deeply concerned though disappointed.”

Of the 231 ministers interviewed, the majority were from the group favoring the crusade. Dr. Ferm discovered that the ministers fell into three categories: “participating, cooperating, and non-cooperating.” The “cooperating group” was that which “was in intellectual agreement but failed to take active part in preparation, in execution and in follow-up.” In the third category Dr. Ferm placed “extreme liberals” into mutually uncomfortable company with “hyper-fundamentalists.” Some pastors, states Dr. Ferm, “desire new members without effort,” while others “cannot adequately understand or cope with the person who is newly converted.”

But among ministers of the participating churches there was the “unanimous opinion” that the crusade was “entirely successful.” A Baptist pastor said, “You reached people that we local ministers could never touch with the gospel, people who are just as much in darkness as those on the foreign mission fields.” Said a Methodist minister, “People are still seeking admission who made decisions at the Garden.”

The coming of the converts into their fellowship acts as a stimulant to many churches. One Bronx minister told of the introduction of prayer meetings in his church for the first time in 70 years. Also, a Brooklyn Saturday evening social club has been transformed into a Bible study and prayer fellowship.

The question is being raised as to why the converts are not filling the local churches. Dr. Ferm says the answer lies with the churches themselves. Thus far, according to the word of those who signed “decision cards,” only 23 per cent have had a personal visit from any minister. Some have received form letters or phone calls. But he adds, “Some churches were able to bring into fellowship as many as 96 per cent of those signing the decision cards referred to them. One church which added 111 members to its roll within the first six months after termination of the meetings could account for 95 per cent of them. They had brought them, one by one, on their chartered bus. The director of a high school youth fellowship spoke of many young converts having become soul-winners.

Another Discovery

Also of importance was the discovery that more than 80 per cent of the ministers were convinced that the larger effects were to be felt in the future. An Episcopalian rector said, “Souls will be coming to Christ for many years as a result of the deepening of the spiritual lives of New York Christians.”

As for the true impact of the crusade, Dr. Graham had early warned it would not be felt for at least three years. Moreover, Dr. Ferm acknowledges that “it is only possible to measure spiritual accomplishments in a relative fashion.” The conversion of a “lad such as Spurgeon does not at once manifest the total meaning of such a decision.” And then there is the case of Billy Graham.

“Will They Last?”

The writer recalls standing in Edinburgh’s Tynecastle soccer field where he had often watched the crack “Hearts” center forward Willie Bauld deftly heading the “footba’ ” home. Now in the center of the “pitch” stood the equally familiar figure of Billy Graham, though his setting was unfamiliar. He was making a different kind of “charge.” And in response, hundreds were flocking forward. As they thronged slowly through the narrow exits to counselors waiting in neighborhood churches, the rest of the crowd stood watching them. Graham seized the dramatic moment to give voice to the question in the minds of many, “Are these converts changed for good? Will they last?” He acknowledged the division which always takes place within such a grouping, even as in the parable of the sower. But he spoke also of the many who would “last” and testified of the multitudes who he personally knew had endured. Then he recalled the evangelistic campaign of his youth in which he and his associate evangelist, Grady Wilson, were converted. “Grady lasted,” he cried. “And I lasted.”

Because Billy Graham “lasted,” there are, humanly speaking, countless others who will last. The real results of his crusades are known only to God, and God has owned them to the extent of providing in them a golden gate for the ushering of these countless ones into his kingdom.

In a coming climactic roll call a Berliner will speak his “hier” in the accents of another sphere. A Brooklynite will echo the call, while an “aye” will signify the consummation of the Tynecastle decision of a Scot. Happy will be those who remembered their coming in an Olympic stadium, across a prizefight ring site, and down a long soccer field. They sing “Worthy is the Lamb,” because of the preserving power of God, wrought in face of human, ecclesiastical, and even evangelical weakness and failure, that power being the one sure thing in this world. Far behind are the Gorgie tenements, the Bowery, and the wreckage of Berlin, now but dim memories testifying to the transforming might of God.

F.F.

Perhaps never had the issue been argued while a greater portion of the citizenry looked on. Whatever the depth of discussion, here at least were millions of Americans witnessing debate on what it would mean to have a Roman Catholic occupying the White House. The medium was television—Lawrence Spivak’s “The Big Issue” tackling the topic, “Religion and the Presidency.”

On one side were Catholic Congressman Eugene J. McCarthy, Democratic farmer-labor representative from Minnesota and former college professor, and the Very Rev. Francis B. Sayre, dean of Washington Cathedral (Episcopal), grandson of the late President Wilson.

Providing the opposition was Protestants and Other Americans United for Separation of Church and State, represented by Executive Director Glenn A. Archer, former dean of Washburn University Law School, and Vice President John A. Mackay, better known as president of Princeton Theological Seminary.

A panel of distinguished Washington news correspondents was on hand to ask questions: James Reston of the New York Times, a Protestant, Glenn Everett of Religious News Service, Protestant, and Charles L. Bartlett, of the Chattanooga Times, a Catholic.

Moderator Spivak, who is Jewish, gave a rather clear impression through questions of his own that he was sympathetic to the Roman Catholic view. In fact, the hour-long program was scarcely over when the NBC switchboard in Washington became flooded with calls reportedly sympathetic with the POAU position. Viewers protested that Spivak had dealt too harshly with Archer. Here is one of the exchanges that evoked the response:

SPIVAK: Mr. Archer, I would like to ask you this question: Aren’t you really saying, without saying boldly, that no man can be a loyal Catholic and at the same time a loyal American president? If you are not saying that, just what are you saying?

ARCHER: I think Mr. Reston posed that question in different words. I am not taking the position that a Roman Catholic can not be a good president. I am taking the position that there are areas in the political field—

SPIVAK: That wasn’t the question. Can he be a loyal Catholic and a loyal president?

ARCHER: I think he can be a loyal Roman Catholic and be a loyal president.

SPIVAK: Then what are we talking about, then?

ARCHER: Well, we are talking about whether or not he can withstand the pressures that can be exerted upon him by some 100 different organizations.

SPIVAK: Is he less human than a Protestant or a Jew? Is he less able to withstand pressures?

ARCHER: I wouldn’t say he is less able, but I would say he would have more pressures brought to bear upon him than any other Protestant or Jew.

SPIVAK: Don’t you and Dr. Mackay have confidence in the Constitution which assumes that men would seek and groups would seek undue power, and the Constitution was set up to make sure that this didn’t happen, and isn’t that protection against Jews and Protestants and Catholics?

ARCHER: The normal checks and balances in the government of the United States are inadequate when it comes to the pressure of the Roman church in this country.

There remained the possibility that viewer response on Archer’s side could be explained as having been motivated by sympathy for one appearing to be on the defensive. Archer said Spivak rushed to him after the program to say that he had butted in only because the POAU seemed to be making a one-sided impression in their favor. According to Archer, Spivak went out of his way to be cordial after they had left the air.

It was clear at the outset of the program that no one was going to oppose Roman Catholic presidents per se. The POAU position hit Vatican encroachment into politics. In matters of state, where is the Catholic politician’s ultimate loyalty? Mackay expressed serious concern over the rise of clericalism.

Dean Sayre said “mediation” rather than “suppression” is the answer to churches’ “overbearing.”

Representative McCarthy said he was not aware of any intolerances ever having become dramatic issues. The question he thus raised was whether Catholic strategy calls for relative submission only until it can exert a definite majority influence.

While the overall effect of the program may have been disappointing to some in that the issues were not joined as sharply and deeply as they could have been, this much was accomplished: The problem was recognized, ideas were planted.

Archer was only too aware of the omissions, as indicated by this remark:

“I think we are missing some of the problems,” he said. The very pressures which panel members Archer and Mackay had talked about were working against a thorough discussion of all the ramifications in having a loyal Roman Catholic as president of these United States. Archer later pointed out that the program sponsors were to be commended in having the courage to go through with the debate in the face of challenges. Participants reportedly had been admonished beforehand not to insult Catholics in whatever remarks they made. No one seemed to be worried about insulting Protestants.

Thrust Of Life

A giant question mark hung like a weather balloon over San Francisco Bay after six weeks of the greatest Christian meetings northern California has ever known. With the Billy Graham crusade having broken all Cow Palace records and focusing area-wide attention upon Jesus Christ as never before, this remained to be answered: Has the Holy Spirit moved upon the face of the water? Has genuine spiritual awakening really come to the Pacific slope?

No one was willing to be quoted as saying that “revival has come,” although hundreds of pastors with referral slips in hand were rejoicing in the knowledge of concrete evidences of God’s power at work in the lives of men. As of early June, no significantly different break-through had occurred. The San Francisco crusade was developing much as had London, Glasgow and New York. Statistics mounted impressively, attendance soared well past the half-million mark, and decisions surpassed anything previously known except New York. Yet still ignoring the crusade were dozens of powerful churches in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Piedmont, Alameda, Burlingame, Redwood City, San Mateo, Pleasant Hills, San Rafael and elsewhere. Their pastors had been careful not to engage in vocal criticism but had led their congregations to regard the events in the Cow Palace as curious phenomena theologically unrelated to their church’s worship and Christian education program.

Fifty-four years ago Bishop Warren Candler prophesied that a great revival would come to the West, aided by all the modern instruments of transportation and communication, and that it would be felt peculiarly on the Pacific Coast. It was still too early to tell whether the present crusade was to be used to fulfill that prophecy. “After all,” pointed out team member Joseph Blinco, “true revival belongs to the sovereign acts of God, not to us.” If God has not thus far brought down heavenly fire upon the Golden Gate in a manner reminiscent of Kentucky and Wales and Uganda, at least he has used the Billy Graham team to send a life-giving thrust into the bay area such as never before experienced.

For six weeks a strong voice has pierced the conscience of a people living in an atmosphere known as sophisticated if not frivolous. Young and old, rich and poor, black, yellow and white have sat transfixed as the evangelist told them to stop their sinning, to receive Jesus Christ into their hearts, and to start living for him. At some point in the service the message moved in; blood mounted as the listeners became aware that they were being addressed personally and directly. It seemed to thousands as if they were hearing the Gospel for the first time as good news—to them! The Spirit of God broke down the barriers with a rush and when the invitation came, they stepped forward. One said, “I was jet-propelled.” Another said, “I was pushed.” Thus ladies in fur stoles, young lovers, ragged little children came and were born into the Church of Jesus Christ.

Young people night after night made up over half the audience. “This has become almost a youth crusade,” said Dr. Graham after the Cow Palace had filled to overflowing for the sixth successive Thursday night. “The young people seem so open, more so than in any crusade we have held. They are the great hope for this area. I have been thrilled by the numbers of little children who have come forward.” It will take four years, he believes, before the impact of these meetings on the lives of the youth of San Francisco Bay will be fully felt in the church and in the region.

The sixth week of the crusade, which coincided with examination week at many schools, saw the attendance dropping below the 10,000 mark for the first time—on three nights—and this may have affected the team’s decision to end Cow Palace meetings on June 15. The original plan called for a four-weeks crusade ending May 25, but was later changed to six weeks. By Memorial Day a further extension to eight weeks ending June 22 was unanimously urged by the executive committee. However, at a two-hour prayer meeting on June 6 it was agreed to hold the last meeting in the Cow Palace on Sunday afternoon, June 15, and to conduct a closing rally in Seals Stadium at 3 p.m. Sunday, June 22. The stadium’s maximum capacity, including infield, is estimated at 30,000. The climactic outdoor meeting was to usher in a week-long campaign of visitation evangelism.

Spiritual revival definitely was felt in scores of churches in the bay area. Pastors’ hearts were overflowing with stories of “hopeless” church members quickened to active service, reconciliations in neighborhoods, vanished bitterness toward God on the part of widows, delinquent teenagers suddenly become radiant and leading others to Christ, amazing zeal on the part of their members serving nightly as ushers, choir singers and counselors. The leading girl member of the radical left-wing element at San Francisco State College (where Dr. Graham’s visit was protested) came to scoff and remained to pray. After going forward at the Cow Palace she told him that she had found peace and fulfillment she had never known before. A Sunday School teacher, choir member, church secretary and organist for 24 years, without victory in her life, made a public commitment in her own church after hearing Dr. Graham.

Meanwhile, the man whom Mordecai Ham (who led Dr. Graham to Christ) described as “better known than the President or the Pope” continued to hammer away at the problem of sin. “You have a moral disease that the Bible illustrates by leprosy,” he told his listeners in a sermon about Naaman entitled “Seven Ducks in Muddy Water.” “This disease is slow, steady, deliberate and deadly. In the end it will get you. Yet Jesus Christ can heal you as he healed the leper. He can make you every whit whole.”

As the evangelist prepared to bring his bay area crusade to its closing crescendo, Sacramento was eagerly looking forward to a week of meetings beginning June 29, and a tour of California cities was planned to follow. Full-page ads in eastern and southern cities urged readers to watch the Saturday night telecasts. A chain of Australian stations began to release “The Hour of Decision” broadcast. And the most powerful medicine in the world was being fed to a world suffering from what radio commentator Paul Harvey has referred to as “spiritual rigor mortis”.

S. E. W.

Canada

Note To Americans

The United Church Observer is on record against American denominations sending “well-subsidized ministers” into Canadian communities to organize congregations “where Canadian churches are already doing good work.”

“In some cases,” an editorial in the journal added, “they woo members away from established congregations where our own mission boards have insisted that the people pay their own way.”

Other Dominion developments:

—Four thousand persons met in Toronto’s Varsity Arena to honor Dr. Oswald J. Smith on the occasion of the People’s Church pastor’s 50th anniversary in the ministry.

—Canadian Girls in Training, Christian youth organization, reports that its enrollment has tripled in the past 15 years. There are now 3,000 members.

South America

Auca Explorer

Two years ago, shortly after the five American missionaries were slain by Auca Indians in Ecuador, a Canadian explorer-doctor arrived on the jungle scene. He was Dr. Robert Tremblay, formerly on the staff of a Montreal hospital, who said he wanted to reach savage Aucas for the Protestant cause. Missionaries, not convinced of his devotion, discouraged Tremblay, whereupon he turned himself over to Roman Catholics.

This spring, Protestant missionaries in Ecuador again heard from Tremblay. He charged that two Auca women who fled their savage tribe last year were being held against their will by Protestants. He accused missionaries of having taken the women captive by craft. (The Ecuadorian government has not recognized the charges.)

Tremblay then announced a jungle expedition of his own. He said he was going to meet the Aucas. He is reported to have said that if they came out peaceably, he would dope them and take them away. If they acted warlike, he allegedly vowed to kill them all. Tremblay had some threats for Protestants, too: He said he would shoot down any Missionary Aviation Fellowship plane that flew over where he happened to be.

Native burden bearers accompanied him to the beach where the five were slain. He proceeded from that point alone, with no communications equipment. A search party was organized for him some weeks later. As of early June, there had been no word as to his whereabouts or well-being.

Europe

Needed: Scholarship

“Our evangelists must be theologians and our theologians evangelists,” Dr. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones quoted Professor James Denney’s dictum of a half-century ago in an address given at the dedication of the new headquarters of the London Bible College. The address stressed the continuing need for institutions standing for great evangelical truths to train students for home and foreign ministries.

Planned in 1938 as an interdenominational college “devoted to evangelical scholarship of the highest standard possible,” London Bible College began in 1944.

Ceremonies attending the dedication of the new building included a series of lectures by Professor E. J. Young of Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia.

S. W. M.

Worth Quoting

“The Kremlin, as an outward show, does grant freedom of worship now. But the communist rulers have in progress an ingenious, diabolical plan that is killing the Christian church at its roots.”—Dr. Bob Pierce, president of World Vision, Inc., upon return from a visit to Russia.

Middle East

Turkish Trends

According to its constitution, Turkey is a secular state. But the overwhelming majority of Turks are adherents of Islam, a faith which claims authority over all society, governments included.

Until 1946, conflict between Islamic forces and those supporting secularity in government was at a minimum. Only one political party was permitted, and that one was dominated by a single leader.

In 1946, permission was granted for opposition parties. Since then, tremendous political pressure represented by millions of Muslim voters has been making itself felt increasingly. Most political leaders are trying, probably sincerely, to preserve the secular nature of the government. However, to prevent religious fanatics from gaining political power, they are obliged to grant concessions to Islam. Voters are thus satisfied.

For example, the teaching of religion is now a part of government school curriculum; there are schools for prayer leaders and preachers; Ankara University has a school of theology. All these represent developments aimed at keeping control of religious affairs by granting controlled concessions.

As religious leaders realize their potential political influence, they feel much more free to express religious convictions. Mosque attendance seems to be increasing. New religious periodicals are appearing. In the face of increasing fanaticism on the part of the general public, non-Muslim minorities are beginning to feel increasingly secure.

Two recent events, nevertheless, illustrate that the government still is trying to maintain its secular character.

The first event was the dedication, April 26, of a new house of worship for an Istanbul Christian congregation. The ceremony represented a triumph of patience and faith over seemingly insurmountable obstacles. The decision to allow construction of a Christian church could have spelled political suicide for responsible authorities. But they relented to a persevering congregation.

The building, inconspicuously located in a quiet residential district, looks much like neighboring apartment buildings. A sanctuary seating 200 is flanked by rooms for church school and young peoples’ programs.

The second event was the suppression of activities of an organization obviously reactionary Islamic. The government moved under laws forbidding secret religious orders. Apparently some of the organization’s circulated tracts advocated the overthrow of democratic reforms. Newspapers announced the curtailment.

Such open suppression of Islamic groups looks like the loss of thousands of votes for the government. However, had officials not acted, a threat to the principle of secularity in government would have gone unchecked. Apparently the government is determined to stay secular at any cost.

Hospital Fire

A spectacular fire in the south wing of Jerusalem’s Augusta Victoria Hospital failed to interrupt patient care in other sections of the building operated by the Lutheran World Federation.

The big hospital located on the Mount of Olives was only partially evacuated despite heavy smoke which poured through the roof.

The National Lutheran Council said the preliminary damage estimate was $112,000. More than 3,000 persons were said to have battled the fire for seven hours. No casualties were reported among patients or fire-fighters.

Rabbi Seat

The Seat of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel was dedicated in Jerusalem last month. More than a thousand persons, including rabbis from all over the world, witnessed the opening of the modernistic Jewish religious center, Hechal Shlomo.

A message from Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion expressed the hope “(a) that the public religious requirements of the inhabitants of Israel shall be met through the resources of the state; (b) that there shall be no coercion, either religious or anti-religious, in religious matters.”

“My greeting to you,” said the prime minister, “is that your institution may be overflowing with love for Israel, and may become a source for the consolidation of our people, the abolition of communal barriers, integration in the historic heritage of the Jewish people, and loyal devotion to the vision of Messianic redemption, for the Jewish people and for all humanity.”

Hope For Childless

The Israel Digest reports development of a method of therapeutic insemination that may enable many infertile men to become fathers. The method involves use of donors’ cell-free seminal plasma and enables the husband to become the true biological father of his child, according to the report.

Investigations of the discovering physician had been directed towards solving the problem of couples who are childless because the husband’s semen contains too few spermatozoa.

Asia

New Ministers

Korea’s Protestant seminaries topped all other Asian countries in turning out new Protestant ministers this spring. In addition to 290 graduates of major seminaries, an uncounted number of diplomas were conferred by lesser known theological schools and Bible institutes.

Here is a breakdown of graduates: Presbyterian Theological Seminary 112, Seoul Seminary (Holiness) 69, Methodist Theological Seminary 52, Hankuk Seminary (R. O. K. Presbyterian) 44, Pusan Seminary (Koryu Presbyterian) 21.

S. H. M.

Honor Statue

A new statue of its president graces the grounds of Ewha Woman’s University in Korea. The statue honors Dr. Helen Kim, Korea’s most famous woman educator and outstanding Methodist leader.

The university has 4000 students.

At a statue-unveiling ceremony, U. S. Ambassador Walter C. Dowling admired Dr. Kim’s “great leadership, based on Christian spirit, her strength, her knowledge, and her vitality.”

S. H. M.

Missionary Morale Up

Each spring, when South Indian plains begin to simmer, hundreds of missionaries head for Kodaikanal, a cool mountain-top resort 350 miles southwest of Madras. Schools are dismissed, missionaries are reunited with their children. Special conferences provide another attraction.

Five years ago, missionaries who came to Kodaikanal were optimistic about their lot. Attitudes took a strange twist, however. By 1956 many were discouraged and depressed, resolving to leave India. Last year, morale turned for the better, though a generally wholesome attitude still was lacking.

To learn missionary attitudes in the spring of 1958, CHRISTIANITY TODAY correspondent Dr. W. R. Holmes polled the Kodaikanal colony. The 140 questionnaires returned by 30 missions indicated that the slump in missionary morale is past. The demoralization of two years ago apparently has been “lived down.”

Forty per cent of the responding missionaries reported work prospects improved over last year, while more than half said the situation is no worse. Four of the 140 polled thought it has worsened. Pollster Holmes said his own talks with missionaries convinced him that doubt and despondency are virtually gone.

Those who reported a change in outlook since last year attributed the change generally to enlarged assumption of responsibility by the Indian church. The missionaries also pointed to an increase in lay interest and in the spiritual life of the church, a decline in opposition by the non-Christian community, shifts in individual work assignments, and difficulties in missionary procurement.

Still another factor in the change was the decrease in mission funds, often regarded as a powerful force for increasing local responsibility. Why then all the clamor to increase missionary giving? Holmes listed these replies: “First, it’s good for your church to keep on giving more. Second, if your mission is in an area where the local church is barely beginning, there is no place for a cutback in funds. Third, it is true that in some places in India (at least) the local church is being harmed by and drowned in mission money. You should explore this question with missionary friends and if it is true with them, encourage the heads of your mission (or whoever is not altering policy fast enough) to move on to pioneer areas and allow the local church to grow up on its own resources and not on foreign money. There are plenty of unreached areas where mission money is essential.”

An overwhelming majority of the missionaries questioned said they feel just as welcome in their work as they did a year ago. Only a few said that Indians still resent their presence or misunderstand them.

Have 10 years of Indian independence widened or narrowed the evangelistic opportunity in India? A third of the replies indicated no appreciable change, but of 90 missionaries who said that a difference can be observed, more than half reported non-Christians more open to the Gospel while a third said they were less open. Of reasons given for greater evangelical opportunity, several can be lumped together and stated thus: The social ferment and changing temper of the times have encouraged Indians to see the possibility of change, even in religion, and have given the caste system a vigorous shaking. The dissociation of government and church, moreover, apparently has helped make clearer the fact that Christianity is not a foreign religion.

Those who say that Christianity is getting as poor a reception as ever point to Indian nationalism, which has focused attention on traditional religions while reviving cultural pride. Others say opposition is more organized and that Christian witness shares the doghouse of other things Western.

The missionaries are almost evenly divided on the question of whether the rising rate of literacy makes it easier or harder to win people for Christ. A safe conclusion is that literacy is a two-edged sword and can be used either for or against a cause.

Five per cent said support of the folks back home had weakened, while 70 per cent said the backing was as keen as ever. A quarter of the responses omitted this question.

Missionaries from the United States, Great Britain, Germany, and Sweden participated in the poll.

NEWS

Christianity in the World Today

Presbyterians picked up where the press left off last month. Two unrelated mergers (coincidentally only days apart) gave the alphabetical designation UP new popular meaning. Outside the United Presbyterian strongholds of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia few persons regularly applied UP to a church. UP referred to United Press, suddenly joined with International News Service to become United Press International with the logotype UPI. Two church moderators shook hands on a rainy Pittsburgh street and the theological UP became the designation for the 3,100,000-member United Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., fourth largest Protestant denomination.

Unlike the news service merger, everyone knew the Presbyterians were getting together. The formalities, following on the heels of the 100th and last assembly of the United Presbyterian Church of North America, were part of what was labeled the 170th General Assembly of the United Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., formerly the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. The merger had been in the offing for years.

As the press service merger raised eyebrows at the American Newpaper Guild and at the Justice Department, so the latest ecumenical triumph brought measured concern. On the surface, reaction ranged from “amiable acceptance to starry-eyed enthusiasm.” Underneath, there were still some misgivings, even as officials were forgetting a small protest rally and secession requests of six churches. (Only one small congregation was allowed to leave.)

From the evangelical perspective, these would seem to be some gains realized from the merger:

—Presbyterians will pollenize the UP missionary outlook; the UPs will contribute greater conservative stability. (For the first time, this year’s assembly was preceded by an evening of prayer.) Many conservatives in larger churches apparently have been heartened to speak up on some points of doctrine. An expanded foreign interest can be expected; hitherto, UPs had been confined to small portions of Africa and Asia.

—Because there will be more churches in the same denomination, greater feeling of solidarity will result, especially among church people in isolated areas, or areas where UPs have been relatively unknown.

On the other side of the ledger, some spokesmen suggested losses from the conservative point of view:

—Anxieties are being aroused because of the accelerating trend of concentration of power. One pastor vigorously protested consolidation of unity and overseas activity functions. He successfully moved to create a special unity committee.

—The moderator of the new church, elected by acclamation, is Dr. Theophilus M. Taylor, long an enthusiastic supporter of the ecumenical movement. Is his election an indication that the united church body has already committed itself to ecumenism? Taylor is a professor at the UPs’ only seminary, Pittsburgh-Xenia.

—UPs are going to lose a family touch because of the new church’s bigness.

There were other appraisals, too.

All hinges on what course the new church takes hereout, according to Dr. Addison H. Leitch, UP seminary president. The success of the new Protestant communion will depend “on the intensity and relevance of our message of salvation,” said Leitch.

Stepping Stones

Church of Scotland presbyteries are viewing a report which could lead to merger with the Church of England. The report proposes a system of Presbyterian bishops and Episcopal elders as a means of promoting closer relations between Anglican and Presbyterian churches in Britain.

The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland voted 357 to 328 last month to pass along the proposal made by its committee on inter-church relations to constituent presbyteries for study and official comment.

In Coulterville, Illinois, the General Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in North America unanimously adopted a committee statement which formulated preliminary plans for possible union with the Bible Presbyterian Synod, Inc. Both are conservative bodies.

Or as the evangelism committee put it:

“There must be no separation of the social application of the Gospel from its more personal aspects … We must recover in the church our convictions about the uniqueness and indispensability of Jesus Christ. Forces at work in our culture have prodded us to compromise these points. The syncretism, the broad-mindedness, the incipient universalism which characterizes the current religious temper in America must not go unchallenged. All spiritual roads are not parallel … there can be only two kinds of people in the world: those who know God through Jesus Christ and those who ought to know God through Jesus Christ.”

Little change will be evident to the person in the pew, at least for the time being. Worship patterns will remain similar in both churches. Church names, too.

Upstairs, things will be different. The biggest organizational reshuffle is in the establishment of the Commission on Ecumenical Mission and Relations. Under the new “fraternal worker” policy, there is no foreign missions board.

The fate of the churches’ schools and seminaries still is undecided, although there has been talk of combining Pittsburgh-Xenia with the Presbyterians’ Western Theological Seminary and perhaps tacking on the whole institution to the University of Pittsburgh.

Plenty of ceremony attended the merger, including a pageant, complete with orchestra, choir, and choreography at Pitt Stadium. Well-wishers included President Eisenhower who sent a message via newly re-elected Stated Clerk Dr. Eugene Carson Blake expressing the hope that “we will be inspired to advance to new heights of achievement in the service of God and neighbor.” The President attends National Presbyterian Church, which shortly after the merger announced plans for a new multi-million-dollar church plant as a great representative symbol of the new Protestant body.

Long business sessions followed merger ceremonies. A multitude of reports ensued. The 9,462-church body approved a budget of $39,175,207 for 1959 and authorized loans of up to $10,000,000 for expansion programs.

One of the biggest stirs in all of the proceedings was created by a 2500-word “message” to all congregations denouncing “hypocrisy” in U. S. foreign policy and calling for peaceful co-existence with communist nations as the only alternative to “co-extinction.” The assembly approved the statement after shouting down one minister’s protest that “people will think we are pinko.”

Few press service observers predict any more immediate consolidation in their sphere. Ecumenists, however, feel they have hardly begun. The next step? A Northern-Southern Presbyterian union, quite possibly, despite the race barrier. Even while Northern Presbyterians were merging, the Texas Synod of the Presbyterian Church, U. S. was approving a plan to operate Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary jointly with its colleagues in the Reformed tradition above the Mason-Dixon line.

People: Words And Events

Deaths: Dr. John M. Ballbach, noted Baptist minister, in Wilmington, Delaware … Dr. W. Emory Hartman, 57, Methodist pastor and trustee of Ohio Wesleyan University, in Columbus, Ohio … Dr. William Walker Rockwell, 83, librarian emeritus of Union Theological Seminary, in New York … the Rev. John P. Ulrich, 42, blind Lutheran pastor, in Fort Madison, Iowa … Mrs. Willard Aldrich, wife of the president of Multnomah School of the Bible … Jesse Drinen, 32, Friends minister, in Long Beach, California.

Elections: As president of the executive committee for Billy Graham’s Australian crusade in 1959, Dr. H. W. K. Mowll, Anglican Archbishop of Sydney and Primate of Australia; as committee chairman, Bishop Coadjutor R. C. Kerle; as vice chairmen, Dr. Alan Walker and the Rev. Gordon Powell … as president of the International Union of Gospel Missions, the Rev. Clifton E. Gregory … as Free Methodist Bishop, the Rev. Walter S. Kendall of Salem, Oregon … as dean of Chicago Lutheran Theological Seminary, Dr. Donald R. Heiges … as professor of Old Testament interpretation at Southern Baptist Seminary, Dr. Clyde Francisco … as president of the National Council of Young Men’s Christian Associations, J. Clinton Hawkins, St. Louis Methodist businessman … as president of the American Jewish Congress, Dr. Joachim Prinz.

Appointments: As vice president and musical director for Word Records, Inc., Paul Mickelson, gospel musician … as acting general secretary of the International Missionary Council, Dr. George W. Carpenter … as administrative director of the American Baptist Convention Youth Fellowship, the Rev. David M. Evans … to the faculty of the Batak Protestant Christian Church’s seminary in Indonesia, Edward Nyhus … as first professor of city and church planning at Wesley Theological Seminary, the Rev. Clifford C. Ham Jr.

Awards: In recognition of “outstanding church leadership,” Central Baptist Theological Seminary Churchmanship Citations to Dr. Reuben E. Nelson, Dr. Marcus O. Clemmons, and the late W. C. Coleman … to the Rev. T. Hoffman Hurley, the “Rural Minister of the Year” citation of the Christian Churches (Disciples of Christ).

Resignation: As president of the Lutheran Free Church, Dr. T. O. Burntvedt, effective October 1 … As staff member of the Methodist General Board of Education, the Rev. Wallace Chappell.

Construction: A $400,000 office building for the Lutheran Laymen’s League is being built in St. Louis.

Dedications: A $1,800,000 building to serve as Salvation Army headquarters for 11 Midwestern states, in Chicago … A new campus for Concordia Senior College, in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Digest: A much delayed meeting between the World Council of Churches and the Russian Orthodox Church is now scheduled for August in The Netherlands … Moody Bible Institute plans an FM station in Cleveland … Voice of the Andes opened its second hospital to serve Ecuadorian jungle sections … Secretary of State John Foster Dulles saw his daughter, Mrs. Lillias Hinshaw, receive her bachelor of divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary. Dulles has a son who is a Jesuit priest …

A record registration of nearly 200 attended the Christian Reformed Ministers Institute at Calvin Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, June 3–6 … Professor Andrew W. Blackwood has given up temporary work at the School of Theology, Temple University. He will devote himself to writing, editorial work, and occasional speaking … The Assemblies of God are issuing a new monthly ministers’ magazine beginning this month called Pulpit … A fire which broke out in Wheaton College’s Old Blanchard Hall was confined to a small area … Harvard University President Dr. Nathan M. Pusey said religionist “shortcomings” aid secularism.

Assembly Roundup

Among developments at spring religious gatherings:

BOSTON—Dr. Dana McLean Greeley, who describes himself as “somewhat to the right of center” on the issue of whether ties should be broken with Christianity, was elected president of the American Unitarian Association. Greeley piled up 823 votes to 720 for Dr. Ernest W. Kuebler, reportedly the candidate of those who seek to sever the Christian link, at the group’s 133rd annual meeting. Kuebler had the support of the organization’s board of directors. Greeley was a “grass roots” candidate. It was the first contested election in 20 years for the presidency of the Unitarian assembly.

BUCK HILL FALLS, Pennsylvania—At its 152nd annual General Synod, the Reformed Church in America declared in an adopted report that “total abstinence is the preferred behavior for all people in regard to alcoholic beverages.” A resolution urged the National Council of Churches’ Broadcasting and Film Commission “to see that everything possible be done to present biblical material … authoritatively.”

COLUMBUS, Ohio—The General Association of Regular Baptists added 45 churches during its 27th annual conference. Some 850 messengers attended.

VANCOUVER—More than 400 delegates to the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada 21st biennial conference heard their missionary secretary, the Rev. G. R. Upton, list four challenges that face the church in its missionary endeavors: “A militant revival of Mohammedanism in the Near East and Africa; a resurgence of Buddhism in Asia; the subtle appeal of Communism to the under-privileged; and, at home, the highly-developed North American system of worshiping at the shrines of entertainment, sex and indulgence.”

QUITO—Nearly 200 missionaries representing 13 societies gathered for the ninth annual retreat of the Inter-Mission Fellowship of Ecuador. Dr. Theodore Epp, U. S. radio evangelist who was principal speaker, centered his messages on the conference theme: “On to Perfection.”

DUBLIN—The General Synod of the Church of Ireland rejected by overwhelming majority a suggestion that the word “Anglican” appear on notice boards.

ROME—The annual synod of the Methodist church in Italy adopted a plan of cooperation with the Waldensian church. The plan provides for integration in pastoral care and in evangelism of the ministers of one denomination into the ministry of the other.

THE FREEDMAN

Emerson Johnson is forty-three,

In the land of the brave

and the home of the free.

Slumping at ease in his Rambler coupe,

He is free on the road

with no family group.

Thousands of fins line the traffic sea

So his auto, immobile,

of motion is free.

Emerson Johnson is free of zest

Both his mind and his motor

can idle at rest.

Dreams of his youth now have lost their fire

And he sits like a buddha,

without a desire;

Sits in the jam of the highway groove,

As he waits in the heat

for the traffic to move.

Free men must mark Independence Day;

Mr. Johnson is free

in an absolute way:

Free of the cares of financial strain,

For his business is sold

and no worries remain;

Free since the day he divorced his wife,

He is loose from all ties

but the bondage of life;

Free from his tensions and morbid dread;

Psychotherapy failed

but they opened his head,

Snipped a key nerve in his noble brow

And so snapped his concern

with the here and the now.

Who in the heat of that summer sky

Is so free to relax

on the Fourth of July?

• Pastor Peterson’s latest poem probably deserves a footnote. He declares that flight from responsibility is flight from God. The only way out is the way into God. The glory of the Gospel is that when we come to terms with God’s righteousness in Christ we find the miracle of his satisfaction for sin and the freedom of new life with God and for God. Freedom, individual or national, is more than independence; and it is never independence from God.

EUTYCHUS

CAUTIONING CONSERVATIVES

I must compliment you on, and thank you for, the excellent article by Professor Zylstra and the cogent editorial “The Crisis in Education.” The May 12 issue was particularly relevant and important to me.

As a high school history teacher, I have coexisted with the Deweyites for nine years. Many of these educationists are decent people and effective teachers. Even the zealots have their good points. My own experiences lead me to the conclusion that, regardless of individual merits, Deweyism has sowed deep discord and dangers within our civilization.

I would like to caution Christian conservatives on a few items. I speak generally to people who are concerned and specifically to rural folk.

1. Be cautious and fair in your attacks on educationists. Many selfish persons are trying to exploit your concern for their own purposes. They are not really interested in educational philosophy, only in taxes and money.

2. Accept the fact that the Deweyites are entrenched in positions of power, status and influence—in the National Education Association, state teachers associations, state departments of public instruction, and professional schools. These constitute a power elite, although they do not necessarily reflect the philosophies of classroom teachers. It would be best to work with the moderate Deweyites; many of them are interested in academic standards and school discipline.

3. Secularization of our schools is pretty much of a fait accompli. Here the school only reflects the American mood. As Christians, try to reach those teachers who may not be secularists and protect those students who want to learn. Many youngsters are disgusted with the “climate” of Deweyism and anxious, believe me, for a more genuine faith.

4. Do not attack individual teachers or school officials. You will do far more harm than good. The morale and self-respect (as well as status) of teachers must be protected. If inadequate standards and poor discipline necessitate action, be very cautious of your leadership (see item one and add reactionary small-town editors to the list). Do not cater to public opinion. By and large public opinion is not Christian. Moreover, public opinion is most generally in favor of “social education,” the child-cult and teen-cult, the emerging social ethic.

5. Make deliberate efforts to offset the pushing of parental, moral and civic responsibilities onto the teacher. You must labor to have the family and community reacknowledge their basic responsibilities. It is a most difficult task.

6. Finally, keep yourself informed. The popular periodicals are not always intellectually honest. They often contain misinformation and half-truths. Harper’s and The Atlantic Monthly print articles that are both pertinent and instructive.…

I should add one more item: if you know youths who plan to go into education, encourage them to attend colleges where Christian organizations such as the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship will encourage their Christian growth, and also to take the absolute minimum of education courses. There is no substitute for subject-matter. A high school teacher, for example, needs at least 40 semester hours in his major field. Courses in philosophy and humanities will be of much greater help than “hot air” education courses.

New Brunswick, N. J.

TEACHER SHORTAGE?

Dr. Edman writes (May 12 issue) of … “the already appreciable shortage of college teachers.” … Just how much of a … shortage is there? Perhaps there is one in science and mathematics now, but surely not in the arts? Lack of reciprocity in certification procedures between the states has resulted in disqualifying some elementary and secondary school teachers. Lack of a central clearing house or teacher agency for Christian colleges has resulted in frustrating teachers who are interested in Christian education and who are vitally concerned with training young people in evangelical schools.…

St. Paul, Minn.

Hasn’t Christian education something more to say in this time of crisis?.…

St. Louis, Mo.

Dr. Edman asks whether qualified young people will be willing to undertake the long, costly preparation necessary for Christian college teaching, and states, “Much of the responsibility … rests with today’s Christian student.…” This seems to me a misplaced emphasis. Responsibility would appear to lie more centrally with college administrators and teachers to present effectively the challenge of Christian higher education to superior students. Strong appeals for youth to dedicate themselves to missions and the ministry, though eminently in place, have not often been joined by similarly earnest presentations of the need of Christian colleges for staff and faculty members. The narrow conception of the Christian call that results is reflected in the present teacher shortage. It is reflected also in the startling percentage of our college administrators and teachers who spent their early careers in ministerial training and service.

Eugene, Ore.

“JEWISH JAPANESE”

With reference to your news item concerning the 8000 “Jewish Japanese” … (March 31 issue), I wish to call your attention to the fact that there is no truth whatsoever to this fantastic story.

This fairy tale (I do not wish to be impolite by calling it an outright falsehood, which it really is) has also appeared in various other publications, doubtless copied from the Jewish publications. Why respectable and responsible men should be interested in spreading such tales all over the world, is a question for the psychiatrists to answer.

This “Jewish Japanese” tale is not a new fabrication. About two years ago the Jewish press published a similar story—only then it was 7000 proselytes. At that time, I wrote to a friend in Japan to verify it and after a careful investigation he informed me that there was no truth whatsoever in the whole story. Several years ago there were about 7000 Jewish refugees in Japan who came from Russia with tourist visas. They could not remain in Japan, neither could they go to any other country. And so they asked permission to go to Palestine.

Fantasy or propaganda transformed these Jewish refugees into Japanese, then reconverted them to Judaism and made them knock on the doors of the promised land to be admitted.

These reports, after having been widely publicized, seemed to smolder for a while only to flare up again a few weeks ago into a brighter flame. But instead of the original 7000, the figure grew to 8000 well-organized Japanese proselytes who were but the vanguard of 100,000 less-organized proselytes, who were also ready to settle in Israel within the next 10 years.

Moreover, these proselytes are now engaged in widespread propaganda among the remainder of the 80 or 90 million Japanese to “return” to the Jewish faith as they believe that the Japanese are the descendants of the tribe of Dan.

Now after this whole confab had been widely circulated among millions of Jewish and non-Jewish readers, the Jewish authorities themselves are denying all these reports as pure inventions. While on a visit to Washington recently, the Israeli Economic Minister, Mr. P. Sapir, told a representative of The Jewish Post and Opinion that these stories about the Japanese proselytes were like the report of Mark Twain’s death … slightly exaggerated.

The Jewish people were destined to fulfill a sacred mission to the world, but like Jonah of old they have been running away from God, and thus the confusion in their midst. They try to delude themselves and the whole world with fables, legends and sensational reports.

May this serve as an object lesson to Christians to help Israel return to God and live by his truth, and not by myths, and thus be prepared to fulfill their mission as did Jonah after having learned his lesson.

International Board of Jewish Missions

Atlanta, Ga.

“NEVER ALONE”

Dr. Elson’s article (Apr. 28 issue) … was wonderful.

Lawton, Okla.

Most stimulating and encouraging.…

Bethlehem Baptist Church

Taylorsville, N. C.

How very heartening it was.…

Tucson, Ariz.

CHRISTIANITY AND FREEDOM

I am grateful for Mr. David W. Baker’s generous review of my latest book, God, Gold and Government (Mar. 3 issue) but I am surprised at his statement that I left the impression “freedom, political and economic, came first and afterward, Christianity.”

I think just the opposite and fully agree with Mr. Baker that Christianity came first and out of it the possibility of freedom. Some quotations in which I sought to emphasize this very point are:

“If men do not practice the Christian virtues of honesty, truthfulness, generosity, kindness and goodwill, there is no hope that they can be free” (p. 13).

“The possibility of a free, self-governing society entered this world with the coming of Christianity” (p. 52).

“The hope of freedom for all men awaited the voluntary acceptance of the Christian religion and if Christianity should decline, this hope will most certainly disappear” (p. 52).

On page 52 I explained that righteousness could not be brought about by law and “Not until Jesus came, lifted up the ancient law, glorified it, and wrote it into the hearts of men, did it really begin to change their lives” (p. 52).

“Straight out of the teachings of Jesus, therefore, stem the vision and the possibility of free men in free association for self-government; of free institutions of all kinds, including the freedom to worship God according to one’s own conscience. The very existence of freedom depends upon this religious basis” (p. 53).

“Freedom is possible only when men accept the authority of God” (p. 54).

“The source of our freedom is God. Only as men and women are willing to live in accordance with his will as revealed to us in the Ten Commandments, the Golden Rule, the Sermon on the Mount and other words of Jesus, the writings of the Apostles and the leading of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of men—only then can we hope to achieve material well-being, abolish war and recover our freedom and self-government” (p. 55).

Of course I agree with Mr. Baker that Christianity did and can exist without freedom, but under statism we would not be free to propagate it. It could be done but not freely as in our country at present. Mr. Baker is right in calling for a study of what the relations between a Christian and his government should be and also between a Christian and his God, but that would require, at the very least, another volume.

New York City

FOURTH READING

After reading L. Nelson Bell’s “The Holy Spirit” (Apr. 14 issue) for about the fourth time, I decided to tell you how much I enjoyed it.… This article is especially significant after seeing wave after wave of people flowing forward to accept Christ at the … Cow Palace. Just as we “see” the wind only by its results, so the evidence of the Holy Spirit was clearly seen by everyone present under Billy Graham’s spirit-filled ministry.…

Berkeley, Calif.

I enjoy “A Layman and His Faith.” The battle for the faith is … to be determined, not by the seminaries … not … by the ministers but by … men and women in the pews.

Tigard, Ore.

AT THE GOLDEN GATE

In the May 12 issue, you carry a very interesting report of the Billy Graham meetings at San Francisco.… The statement is made, “The Presbytery of San Francisco voted its official approval of the crusade.” As public relations officer for the Presbytery of San Francisco I am responsible for pointing out to you, … that said action was not by any means unanimous.

United Presbyterian Church, U.S.A.

San Francisco, Calif.

Just a note to let you know that not all conservative Baptists share the views expressed by G. Archer Weniger and conservative Baptists in the Bay area who have refused to cooperate in the Billy Graham Crusade. There are many of us who deplore the actions against these crusades and regret the often unfounded and false accusations made against the Lord’s servants.

… Your … splendid articles are of great help to me personally in the work. I also appreciate the fine Christian spirit of charity toward all.

Barrington Baptist

Barrington, R. I.

NEW REPUBLIC CALLED FOR

We do not think the Republic … can be salvaged for several reasons.…

The editor’s sentimental reconstruction of the past … forgets the unChristian, the sordid, the cruel, the wasteful, the undemocratic, the unfree, the narrowly partisan, etc. aspects of our nation’s past.

The Republic (as it actually existed) was built to solve the problems of that day … Today the problems are different, and the political, cultural, etc. conditions are different.…

That Republic (as it actually existed) is not worth salvaging. It could not solve the slavery problem short of civil war … the race problem short of discrimination … the Indian problem short of a kind of extermination … the problem of the business cycle short of depression … the problem of functional distribution short of excessive income differentials … the problems of international relations short of some imperialism and the wars of 1812, 1846, 1898 and 1917. It could not solve some problems of civil liberties in a way that promoted the democratic freedoms.

Salvage the editor’s Republic? Never! Let us create something better than that Republic and something better than the present Republic …

Dept, of History and Political Science

Bethel College

St. Paul, Minn.

• Debunking of the American heritage, doubt about fixed principles of political life, and devotion to social change more than to social stability, are no cause for rejoicing, least of all in an evangelical college. “Can We Salvage the Republic” noted that the American emphasis on limited government and inalienable rights is in jeopardy, and urged Christian forces to support the changeless principles of revealed morality.—ED.

FURTHER MEDITATION

Mr. Chesterton was right.

The best way to get rid of the Eiffel Tower is to live in it.

So with the soul.

One of the best ways to get away from the love of God

Is to sit alone and meditate,

And sneer.

There is the glory of God in a Cathedral,

The chant in beauty filling the soul

With his love and love of Christ,

Who chanted in the Temple,

Loving her liturgy.

There are also other things—

The formal nothings which hurt the nostrils of the sensitive

And pietistic.

And rightly so—for these other things are not good.

They are there because a Cathedral embraces the sinner

As well as the righteous.

The wicked kneel and offer their sins

In the Communion which God ordained

Saying “Do this,” and in a Cathedral it is done,

But not everywhere.

The blood of Christ to the meditator

May seem but the whiff of eucharistic wine,

But to me—a negro—it is the heart of my life,

To me—a simple priest—it is the Scriptures

Living with the reading of them.

To me—a dowager—a warning and a trumpet call

Of the Prophet, for the rich may yet be saved.

There are also other things, unpleasing to God,

Unpleasing to the Cathedral chapter,

Who are men of God, though weak.

It is easy to sneer, for the devil is there,

Sitting at the heart.

The Dean, hearty and jolly, though not too jolly,

Gives his hand to the negro as well as the dowager,

The laugh—and later the pipe, tea, and marmalade—

Are the trimmings also of depth, not always shallow,

Though much is, to the distress of the church,

To the distress of the Cathedral chapter.

And, do not mistake, the Dean.

It’s nice to go to the church and the Cathedral,

For there you can nod to God.

There you can pray and hear his Word,

Receive his body and blood,

Make confession of sin, and

Kneel humbly.

Quebec City, Que.

SIGHTING THE FOE

I enjoyed [the Apr. 28 issue] … so much, and especially the two articles entitled “Do Humanists Exploit Our Tensions?” and “Foundations: Tilt to the Left” … because I believe you exposed some of the greatest enemies known to the Christian church today.

Bethel Baptist Church

Olanta, S. C.

You don’t seem to be abreast and reacting to the best in theology and especially in social ethics. Is this due to … a pharisaical satisfaction with one’s own limited brand of holiness and the rightness of that way?

Wardensville, W. Va.

The big profiteers continue to finance foundations tilting to the left, still ignoring and by-passing the U. S. Constitution and Bible economics.

Monmouth, Ill.

CLAIMING ENGLAND

I refer … to the letter from A. A. Cone (Apr. 28 issue).… Eric Treacy … is not a Roman Catholic but a member of the Church of England, and, knowing him, I am quite certain that his words have been lifted out of their context, and could only have been uttered in irony or as a warning against apathy. Mr. Treacy is, I am sure, the last person to wish to claim England for the Roman church.

Moxley Parish Church

Wednesbury, Staffs, England

Believing in the sovereign God of the universe, the Creator, Preserver, and Governor of his own, and that men and nations are responsible to him, their immediate and ultimate welfare being determined by their attitude to him, it therefore becomes imperative that the people of America recognize this responsibility to God and accord to him the honor and glory due his Name and the obedience to his holy will, without which men and nations decline and perish.

History records that many nations have been destroyed, not by an enemy from without, but through moral and spiritual deterioration from within.

A candid study of contemporary American life reveals the sobering fact that we have flourishing within our midst those seeds of decay which, if left unchecked, will lead inevitably to national destruction. That the incidence of immorality and crime is greater and that it is increasing at an alarming rate certainly adds to the urgency for remedial means.

We both recognize and approve of the inherent guarantee of our Constitution that all men be accorded the right of religious freedom and it would be a grave error to contemplate in any way a change in either the fact or implications in this doctrine. But freedom of religion and freedom from religion are not synonymous. While no man or government can or should dictate to any on matters of religion (each individual stands or falls before his Maker), the peoples of our nation do need again to be confronted with the claims of the sovereign God and their responsibility to him. Furthermore, we all need to be reminded of the part which faith in God has played in our national life from the very beginning of our existence as a nation.

America was founded by men and women who unashamedly worshipped God and accorded him priority in worship and in service. Many of our founding fathers came to these shores because of their determination to know and do the will of God and because of restraints which had been placed upon them in the countries of their origin. While at no time has our government undertaken to legislate on religion, there have been repeated evidences of official recognition of our duty and allegiance to Almighty God. Prayer was requested by Benjamin Franklin during the Constitutional Convention. Our currency carries the inscription, “In God We Trust.” There is a Bible in every courtroom in America on which men are expected to affirm the truthfulness of the witness they engage to make. Most of our great educational and humanitarian institutions owe their inception directly or indirectly to men and women dominated by faith in God.

With multiplied precedents it is therefore highly relevant, as well as obviously imperative, that Americans be called back to a realization of the strong faith of our fathers, the clear warnings of history, the moral and spiritual declensions of our day, and the vital need for a return to faith in, worship of and obedience to Almighty God, not only for personal redemption, but also for national preservation. For years we have been running on the momentum of a godly ancestry and this momentum is now far spent.

As convinced Christians we believe that the foundation of individual and national life is to be had in Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, as revealed in the Scriptures, and experienced through personal faith in him.

We are not so naive as to believe that all personal and national problems would be resolved should all men become Christians. But, we do believe that in him is found the immediate answer to life now and hereafter and the ultimate answer to those complicated social and political problems which are the extension of man’s estrangement from God.

It is obvious to all that in many areas of American life today those disciplines which are translated into moral and spiritual values are lacking. Right and wrong have become relative terms, no longer related to revealed religion but rather predicated on choice or expediency. No longer is there recognition of the biblical affirmation that “righteousness exalteth a nation but sin is a reproach to any people.” Grudgingly, or otherwise, we have rendered unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, but too often we have failed to render unto God the things that are God’s.

It is obvious that there is need for an unequivocal assertion of an ideology stemming from the divine concept of righteousness. We need to face the deficiencies of contemporary American thinking and life and to take steps to turn the minds of the people back to God from whom all blessings flow, and who is also a God of righteousness and judgment.

We need to be reminded anew of the spiritual heritage which is ours, of its profound effect on the development of our nation, and of the inevitable consequences of a way of life which leaves God out of perspective, or, at best, renders but lip service to him.

It is imperative that Christians exercise a rightful concern for the spiritual and moral welfare of the nation. For only as the Christian faith is reflected in the daily life of the nation does it become the preserving and illuminating influence God wills that it should be. Love of country is itself a worthy emotion; the trend away from an emphasis on patriotism has been one of the ominous developments of recent years.

We need to be reminded that those convictions which resulted in the Constitution of the United States, one of the greatest instruments for the freedom of man ever devised, and those other virtues which in the early days of our nation found expression in integrity, respect for law and concern for the rights of others, all had their roots in the laws of God and are themselves the fruits of faith and not the cause. For that reason it is imperative that we return to the divine Source of these fruits.

The inexorable laws of God can be broken, but at a cost no man or nation can afford. As recipients of divine favor, of a love displayed in prodigal provisions for our needs and comforts, and of freedoms which in large measure stem from our Judaeo-Christian heritage, we owe it to a loving Heavenly Father to return to him while there is time.

“For heathen heart that puts her trust

In reeking tube and iron shard,

“All valiant dust that builds on dust,

And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,

For frantic boast and foolish word—

Thy mercy on Thy people, Lord!”

“Lord God of hosts, be with us yet!

Lest we forget—lest we forget!”

The conception of history in the Bible can be described as linear, not cyclical. Things come to a conclusion. History does not repeat itself. Here is the difference between the conception of nature, life and history from the immanence point of view and the conception that goes forth from the belief in God and from the revelation of God. From our human point of view within history, we can never transcend our human, i.e., historical limits. No ballistic instrument can bring us beyond the borders of history and time. Therefore the human philosophy of history is always bound to history itself. It seeks the absolute in the relative, eternity in time, God in man. And only in a very modest way can it succeed. Centuries of history are only waves in the sea of eternity, human life is only an infinite little lake of foam in the breaking waves. But all is involved in the eternal motion of going and returning. Nothing seems really to hold its place, nothing comes to a definite end and goal; there is an eternal change, and the change is eternal.

The Biblical Contrast

In the Bible, the conception of history is a different one. The biblical viewpoint is not closed up in history itself but surpasses the waves of time. It sees history and the world in their relation to God. In the Bible, therefore, history has not lost its beginning, nor does it lack its end. The pattern in which the Bible describes history is not that of a circle or circumference without; it is rather that of a path of time which God has made and still is making, from the point when he created the world towards the ends and goals he is leading it.

This conception of the Bible means on the one hand an infinite relativity of world and history. There is not even a spark of the eternal light within the boundaries of nature. All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass (Isa. 40:6). It is God who alone has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light (1 Tim. 6:16).

But on the other hand, nowhere does such a brilliant perspective for man and the world and history appear as in the biblical conception of the future. This perishable nature, it is said, must put on the imperishable; this mortal nature must put on immortality (1 Cor. 15:53). It does not have this naturally. It is not the wave of eternity which moves it toward the coasts of immortality. But it will receive it as a gift from out of the hands of the eternal and immortal God. It will bear the clothes of immortality in God’s final triumph and in his eternal Kingdom, not because of its own nature, but because of the glory of his holy Name.

Let God Be God

The final triumph, the eternal Kingdom, in the biblical representation is an undeniable certainty because God is God.

When the Sadducees, who said that there is no resurrection, came to Jesus with their unbelieving questions, Jesus answered them: “You are wrong, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God … have you not read what was said to you by God, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living” (Matt. 22:29–32 RSV).

“He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” This is the biblical proof of resurrection and of God’s final triumph. It is not the conception of man and nature; it is the conception of God which forms the formation of the Christian belief in eternal life. Because God has created the world and because he has redeemed men out of the power of sin and death, the Bible displays a great and mighty light shining at the end of all God’s ways in history. Belief in the eternal Kingdom is belief in God. You cannot believe in God without believing in the final immortality of the world and man. For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living.

Therefore in his eternal Kingdom there is not only place for heavens but also for the earth; not only for angels, but also for men; not only is there eternal life for soul and spirit, but also for the body.

The Bible contains not the slightest trace of spiritualism, either in the description of the end or in that of the beginning. Therefore, the Bible can depict the glory of eternal life in the colors of the earthly. For the triumph of God in all the works of his hands fills his eternal Kingdom with glory. God does not save the heavens and leave the earth in the power of his enemy; nor does he save the soul alone from the horror of death. The new Jerusalem comes down out of heaven upon earth and the kings of the earth shall bring their glory and the honor of nations into it. And “Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall rise. O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For thy dew is a dew of light, and on the land of the shades thou wilt let it fall” (Isa. 26:19). This all-embracing glorification forms the content of the biblical conception of the kingdom of God. The Gospel of the Kingdom, as it has found provisional realization in the first coming of Christ, is the Gospel of the redemption of the earth. The Kingdom of heaven consists for the poor in spirit in the inheritance of the earth (Matt. 5:3, 5). And the signs of the Kingdom are in the blind men who receive sight, in the lame that walk, in the lepers that are cleansed, in the deaf that hear, and in the dead who are raised up (Matt. 11:5). Yea, the storms become still and the towering seas lay calm and flat and waveless before his feet, as a sign and guarantee of the new world of God. Therefore, the New Testament speaks of the reconciliation of all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by the blood of the Cross. For Christ brings the kingdom of God in its full and cosmic sense. He, the first-born of all creation, is not only the head of the body, the Church; but in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell (Col. 1:15–19). For God has put all things in subjection and he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet (1 Cor. 15:25).

In this conception of God and of the kingdom of God lies the nature and the strength of the biblical belief in immortal life and the eternal world to come. This faith is not built upon human imagination. It is no mere projection of a perfect future in an imperfect world, for the biblical belief is not under the delusion of human dignity. It does not underrate the power of sin and death, neither does it borrow its strength from spiritual dreams. It is belief in the future only because and insofar as it is belief in God and in his Kingdom.

The same holds good for the content of this belief. The picture of the future world is only a picture of the glory of God. It is not this world of sin and death, it is not this flesh and blood, that can inherit immortality. All things will be saved, but only as through fire. In this sense the holy Scripture says that heaven and earth will pass away (Matt. 5:18; 24:35); that they will perish and grow old like a garment (Ps. 102:26; Heb. 1:11); that the heavens will pass away with a loud noise and the elements will be dissolved with fire and the earth and the works that are upon it will be burned up (2 Pet. 3:10). (It is not certain that these words “burned up” express the original meaning of the text. Some manuscripts say “will be found,” or “will not be found,” or “will vanish.” The original text cannot be fixed with certainty.)

This all means the judgment of the holy God on a sinful and unholy world. But it does not mean an annihilation of the world. The apostle Paul says very clearly that the form of this world is passing away (1 Cor. 7:31). The same creation that now is subjected to futility, in the final triumph will be set free from its bondage to decay unto the liberty and glory of the children of God (Rom. 8:21). It is a passing away of the world of sin and iniquity; it is the appearance of new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Pet. 3:13). For God “will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them; and he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away” (Rev. 21:3–4). All the figures and pictures in the Bible stress in principle only one thing: the glory of God will be the salvation of men and the salvation of men will consist in the glorification of God.

That does not mean an eternal standstill. Revealed in these symbols and figures is the new and great rule of life, the order of the new world. Revelation enables us to turn our hearts to the future. Biblical apocalypse has another scope than to feed our fantasy: its scope and purpose are to strengthen our faith, and hope and love. God will be glorified in all the works of his hands; that is the final triumph. And all men, who in their waiting for the unveiled revelation of all his virtues have received the Spirit of sonship, will enter into the 12 gates of the new and imperishable city of God, to live the life of men in the light of God. That is the eternal Kingdom.

Herman N. Ridderbos has been Professor of New Testament at Kampen Seminary in The Netherlands since 1942. He received the Th.D. degree from Free University, Amsterdam, in 1936, and served as a minister of the Reformed Church before his seminary appointment. He is Editor-in-chief of Gereformeerd Weekblad and is author of numerous books.

Whatever problems the evangelical view may create, it commendably upholds the inspiration and revelation-status of Scripture. This recognition keeps faith with the witness of Scripture itself, and with the historic Christian confidence in the Bible.

A Fairer Hearing

For many years misunderstood and often misrepresented, the evangelical view today seems to be evaluated more objectively and temperately. No doubt the evangelical position is still deplored in some circles as anti-intellectual, in much the same spirit as a generation ago some groups disparaged and dismissed original sin, the atonement and other realities that now once again are lively centers of theological interest. The recent volume Fundamentalism and the Church by Gabriel Hebert reveals that the old innuendos about “bibliolatry” and “mechanical dictation” are not gone, but failure to stigmatize fundamentalism with a mechanical and naive literalist view of inspiration is increasingly evident. Fundamentalists have long been unable to recognize their own view in such attacks, since they themselves reject the formulas so frequently ascribed to them. One of their British theologians, J. I. Packer, recently commented that the “dictation theory” of the psychology of inspiration is “a complete hoax.” He insists that evangelical and Protestant theologians have never held it; that there is no evidence to think that even the Church Fathers used the “dictation” metaphor to explain the mode of inspiration (The Christian News Letter, July, 1957, p. 37). Even its larger outlines should dissolve complaints that the evangelical view narrows revelation to the Bible, that it is anti-intellectual, or that it is wholly disinterested in the bearing of the actual textual phenomena on the doctrine of Scripture.

Pivotal points of the evangelical view of revelation are:

1. The evangelical view distinguishes the personal Word of God, the Logos Theou, from the Word of God written, or the Hrema Theou. It affirms the priority of the personal or speaking Word over the spoken or written Word.

2. All revelation of God is revelation by the Logos.

3. This revelation is both general and special. God is revealed in nature, history and conscience, as well as in Scripture. The Bible witnesses to the reality of this general revelation (Ps. 19, Rom. 1:19 ff., 2:15 ff.).

4. Special revelation is itself broader than Scripture. While the Bible states all the essentials for salvation and spiritual maturity, the written record has not always existed. Abraham received special revelation but we have no reason to think he had scriptures. While our Lord’s spoken word was revelation, not all his teaching is recorded. Moreover, there is an eschatological fulfillment yet to come. For another reason special revelation must be considered broader than the Bible, which is shaped for a fallen race in need of salvation. Even by creation and before the fall, God specially revealed his will to man (Gen. 2:16). This fact indicates that even man’s creatureliness, and not his subsequent sinfulness alone, involved this special dependency on God.

5. Special revelation includes God’s redemptive events climaxed by the incarnation of the Logos, his atonement and resurrection. Without these great realities, special revelation is reduced to an inspired literature. What lifts Hebrew-Christian religion head and shoulders above the pagan religions is not simply its possession of “the oracles of God,” but the dynamic related plot these writings record. The living climax of that plot is the Logos who makes all things, illumines man in the divine image, discloses himself as the secret center of nature and history, and by his triumph over sin and death rescues a doomed race.

6. These redemptive events do not stand before us without interpretation. Scripture gives the authentic sense or meaning of the divine saving acts. While the Bible mirrors both general and special revelation, and affirms that the incarnate Logos translates God into the world of flesh, the Bible also captures that revelation in intelligible language. Revelation is dynamically broader than the Bible, but epistemologically Scripture gives us more of the revelation of the Logos than we would have without the Bible.

7. What then is the connection of the Bible and special revelation? According to the evangelical view, the Bible is a record of special revelation, and a witness to special revelation, if by the terms “record” and “witness” we do not mean the Bible is only a record and witness. Even to affirm that the Bible “contains” special revelation is quite acceptable if one intends no distinction between essence and content, but implies thereby, as does the Westminster Catechism, the unique inspiration of the whole of Scripture. For the evangelical view affirms that alongside the special divine revelation in saving acts, God’s disclosure has taken the form also of truths and words. This revelation is communicated in a restricted canon of trustworthy writings, deeding fallen man an authentic exposition of God and his purposes. Scripture itself therefore is an integral part of God’s redemptive activity, a special form of revelation, a unique mode of divine disclosure. It is, in truth, a decisive factor in God’s redemptive activity, interpreting and unifying the whole series of redemptive deeds, and exhibiting their divine meaning and significance.

Whether one appeals to Augustine or Aquinas, to Luther or Calvin, he finds the selfsame confidence in this revelatory character of the Word written as characterized the biblical writers. The Bible is for them, as for evangelical theology generally, special revelation in a normative and trustworthy form. Its difference from other sacred books of the world religions is no mere matter of degree. Rather, a special activity of divine inspiration differentiates it in kind from every other literature. This explains why the Hebrew-Christion religion has characteristically identified itself with a canon of unique writings that fulfill a divine intention of communicating special revelation. This idea of a canon did not originate suddenly in the early Christian centuries, as if by accident or by human impulse; it was a conviction already cherished by Hebrew religion, and accredited to the Christian conscience by Jesus of Nazareth. What the spirit says to the churches is, for evangelical Christianity, what is written in the inspired books. The content of this special divine revelation is to be found by historical-grammatical exegesis.

Evangelical Landmarks

While a generation ago it was customary to disparage this view as anti-intellectualistic, today it is popular to despise it as rationalistic. This remarkable change in the militant mood of apologetics reflects, of course, some important facts about recent Protestant theology. One is its basic philosophic instability that lodged first in the mires of Hegelian rationalism, and then in the muck of post-Hegelian irrationalism. Another feature is its persistent failure to rise above the fictitious disjunction that Schleiermacher first impressed upon the history of Christian thought, namely, that divine revelation consists in impartation of life, not of doctrine. The Protestant Reformers were careful to guard the Christian heritage against such errors of rationalism, irrationalism and mysticism. To prevent Christianity’s decline to mere metaphysics, they indeed stressed that the Holy Spirit alone gives life. But to prevent debasement of the Christian religion to formless mysticism or to speculative rationalism, the Reformers emphasized the Scriptures as the only trustworthy source of the knowledge of God and his purposes. These historic positions are still landmarks of the evangelical view.

Every exposition of revelation and inspiration stands in some larger context. The doctrine of Scripture necessarily implies a compatible and congenial doctrine of God; it cannot be isolated from actual dependence upon the nature and manifestation of God. Overarching the evangelical view is the cardinal fact of God’s sovereignty in his being and activity, in his goodness and truth, and especially in his supremacy in the realm of truth as God of the Covenant. Unlike the irrationalistic metaphysics that surcharges the theology of Kierkegaard, Barth and Brunner, the evangelical doctrine postulates a view of God, of his image in man, of the divine renewal of that image coherent with the biblical representations of revelation.

God And His Image

The biblical delineation of revelation and reason does not hesitate to lodge the Logos unreservedly in the Godhead. Truth and goodness are not external criteria to which the Deity is answerable. Rather, truth and goodness are God’s essence, so that his very nature itself defines rationality and morality. This concept we know to be basic in the Hebrew-Christian doctrine of God.

A rational God has ordered a rational universe in which rational creatures created in his image are to think his thoughts after him and to do them. This fact of a rational Creator maintains the unity of the general divine revelation in nature, history and man. That man bears the image of God by creation (Gen. 1:26), that he is uniquely lighted by the Logos (John 1:9), is one of Scripture’s profoundest teachings about him. It supplies the setting also for some of the most intricate controversies in contemporary theology. Barth has had at least two theories of the imago Dei thus far, and Brunner at least three. It may be fruitful, by way of contrast, to consider a view currently advocated in evangelical circles as an alternative, since it transcends the tensions tearing many of the newer theories. The image of God in man constitutes man a spiritual-rational-moral agent. It includes therefore, at very least, the forms of reason and conscience, and the idea of God. What man knows, he knows through the law of contradiction, or he does not know. The laws of logic therefore belong to the imago Dei. This propels us directly into the analysis of the form and the content of reason. Recent generations largely accepted the view of Kant or of the evolutionists. Kant said that the form of reason is innate, but that experience supplies its content; the evolutionists said that experience supplies both form and content. The scriptural view requires a reference to the imago Dei for both the form and content of reason. Moreover, the Scriptures do not separate reason, conscience and worship as if these were independent considerations.

The imago Dei does include man’s formal realization that truth and error, right and wrong, God and not-God are genuine distinctions. But the imago Dei is more than formal; it is material as well. The very forms of the imago (including the laws of logic; the essential unity of the ideas of truth and goodness and God) belong to its content. Man as sinner no doubt crowds the imago with a distorted and perverse content; he falsifies the truth and dignifies the lie; he misjudges the right and consecrates the wrong; he revolts against the one true God and worships false gods. But he is not wholly lacking, on that account, of a transcendent imago-content that confronts him throughout this perversion and judges him. Even in his rebellion, man is confronted moment-by-moment in his experience by knowledge of the one true God—disclosed in nature and history around him and in conscience within. He is unable wholly to destroy this knowledge in his very corruption of it. Therefore conscience, like a sheriff, marshals him constantly before the judgment throne of God. You will discern here the familiar outlines of the Bible doctrine of general revelation, pieced together from Psalm 19 and Romans 1 and 2.

From the outset this exposition sets human experience in the context of revelation and faith. But it does not devalue the intellect, as does contemporary theology. Nor does it exaggerate the role of reason, as does Thomistic philosophy. Before the Fall, man’s reason was subject to God and his will subject to reason; therefore, his voluntary actions were conformed to truth. After the Fall, man’s reason was in the service of a will in revolt against God. Yet man is not on that account without some knowledge of God and the truth and the right, however much he may distort them.

Redemption aims not simply at man’s restoration to obedience, but to truth as well. It seeks his return both to the service and to the knowledge of God. The immediate end of redemption is renewal of man’s knowledge of God for the ultimate end of man’s total conformity to the image of Jesus Christ. Redemptive revelation and regeneration, therefore, encompass the predicament of the whole man, who was fashioned by creation for the knowledge and service of God. Redemptive revelation and regeneration seek reinstatement of intellect, no less than of volition and emotion, to the fellowship of divine conversation. If it were not so, theologians and seminarians could proclaim the great fact of special divine revelation, and yet would be free to stuff this form with a thought-content and a word-content of their own. But God wishes man both to walk in his ways and to think his thoughts after him; hence the language of revelation, like the language of prayer, takes the form of concepts and words.

Editor Carl F. H. Henry’s address was delivered at Union Theological Seminary in New York City recently under auspices of the Student Forum Committee. An evangelical symposium on the same theme will be published later this year by Baker Book House. Dr. Henry is serving as general editor of the project, which will include chapters by distinguished evangelical scholars from many denominations in many lands.

Christianity has been the greatest influence in building the American concept of democracy. Both Christianity and democracy begin with the individual, and they stress the infinite worth of individual man.

Without Christian laymen who applied their religious philosophy to governmental decisions, there would have been no American Declaration of Independence or Constitution of the United States as we know them today. Without the application of moral and religious concepts in the laws of our land, we would be no better off than other countries of the world today.

We believe in separation of Church and State in this land, but never have we believed in separation of Church and statesmen. As Christian laymen in the early days of this country worked not only for their churches and their God, but also for application of moral and religious principles in the political and governmental decisions of the nation, so must we carry on that same important responsibility. This is especially true in this day of materialism and science when so many people are losing sight of important spiritual considerations and opportunities.

Someone has said that in our day we have learned to fly through the air like the birds of the sky and to glide through the waters like the fish of the sea, but we have not learned to live on this earth like human beings.

Detraction From The Spiritual

And now, before learning to live like brothers on this earth, we have upon us a great rush into outer space—a competitive race of science and material progress in attempt to place and control satellites in outer space.

Man’s attention is being drawn away from the spiritual essentials into the material stratosphere. Satellites are circling the earth once every 96 minutes. This is a fantastic speed for earthbound mortals to comprehend—nearly five miles per second. The Soviet Union has beaten us in the race of physical objects in outer space. There is much excitement in America for a full-scale scientific crusade to assure our country of every possible achievement for progress and adequate defense in the world in which we live.

On the other hand, when people talk about putting all the resources of their country behind a better sputnik in outer space, I cannot help but think of the need for placing more of our resources into a closer contact with the power in outer space which is greater than any man-made ball or ballistic—the power which has dominion over outer and inner space, yea over our very lives and destinies—our God in Heaven.

We are ahead of the Russian communists in that we have contact with God, and unless they are converted from their atheistic beliefs, they will never catch up with us. But this will be true only if we do not fail in our duty to emphasize and thus follow the way of Christianity.

Our destiny does not lie in our drive to be the first to set foot on the moon, or to have a space station for future conquests in our solar system. Our true destiny lies in an understanding of Him who is the power that governs outer space and the destinies of nations and men on this world.

In all this excitement over the satellites, I have heard not one speech concerning the urgent need for our people to expand and develop the philosophy and ideals which truly put us in touch with the God of the universe and assure us of his help. Our forefathers, perhaps, had a stronger grasp of this urgency than we do in this age of materialism and great technological progress. You have been reminded many times of the South American visitor who was asked to explain why the material progress of North America had so far outstripped that of South America. His reply was: “The people who settled North America came here seeking God. Those who came to South America were in search of gold.”

It will do us all good to recall the religious background of the settlers of these United States. Through all American history there runs a golden thread of deep religious conviction. The spirit of religion guided the pilgrims to the New England coast. In framing the Mayflower Compact they started with the words: “In the name of God. Amen.” The illustrious founder of Pennsylvania, William Penn, once said in an address: “If we are not ruled by God, we will be ruled by tyrants.” And the Declaration of Independence makes this statement: “We hold these truths to be self-evident—that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It is significant also that when material considerations were about to fail in the convention called at Philadelphia to write the United States Constitution, the men turned their attentions to the spiritual. Benjamin Franklin suggested humble prayer to God for assistance, and you know the result. The coins of this nation were stamped “In God We Trust.”

These examples should chart the course for us as Americans—and as children of God.

Christianity And Liberty

The Christian faith, when it is fully understood, has always promoted the liberty of the individual and the dignity of mankind. These same principles of Christianity offer us the best course toward the achievement of international understanding and peace. These Christian ideals and the reliance upon the strong hand of God give us also the answer to the spread of Communism.

We in this nation have something the communists do not have, and that is the deep, ingrown faith in a God which enables men to rise above the struggles of the materialistic world and seek the heavens in their true perspective. This is our opponents’ greatest weakness. They are professed materialists and enemies of religion. Karl Marx wrote: “Religion is the sign of the oppressed creature, the feelings of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of unspiritual conditions. It is the opium of the people.” And Lenin, Stalin and Khrushchev took up the Marxist mantle and spread the same false doctrine over the world.

The Communist Surge

Today, Communism rules by force nearly one billion people—a third of the world’s population. Ironically, this surge of Communism compares in history only with the advances of Christianity. Two thousand years ago, when Christ brought his message to earth, he gathered about him 12 men, and from the lips of those men Christianity spread like wildfire throughout the Western world.

Are we to concede that Christianity offers less than Communism, and thereby “write off” the latter’s conquests as philosophical victories which we failed to match? Christians know this is not true. They know that the atheists who preach the communist doctrine are attempting the impossible when they seek to stamp out mankind’s spiritual heritage and replace it with a new set of values based on utility and materialism.

Love of country and love of God are inseparable ingredients. Democracy, a by-product of the teachings of Christ, emphasizes that government should be a servant and not a master. It was Lenin who admitted: “When religion is strong, Communism is weak.” And that is an admission by the communist world that they can hope to succeed only by controlling the minds of men and stamping out all religious beliefs that stand in the way.

It disturbs me that the communists have been preaching to more people in recent years than have the Christians. I regret that some people in this country believe that we should become a material fortress as the best means of fighting Communism. They seem to say there is no time for God in the struggle for armed superiority. But if we yield to this temptation, someday we shall find that we have assumed the likeness of that which threatens us and which will be our own destruction.

We must arm, certainly. We cannot allow ourselves to be engulfed by the dictatorship of the Soviet Union. At the same time, we must never take our eyes away from the God of the universe. Americans believe that the true course is the course that leads to God. The hope of the world lies in men’s willingness to seek this course.

Price Daniel is the Governor of Texas. A Baptist lay leader, he delivered these remarks on November 5, 1957 at the annual State Baptist Brotherhood Convention. Governor Daniel is an alumnus of Baylor University. After a newspaper career he was elected to the Senate. He became Governor of Texas in 1957.