By June Goodwin and Ben Schiff

Scribner

413 pp.; $27.50

On November 5, 1994, the Reverend Johan Heyns was seated in the living room of his Pretoria home with his wife and grandchildren when an assassin, standing only six yards away, fired a high-powered rifle through an open window. The bullet, modified to wreak maximum havoc, blew off Heyns’s head.

So begins this timely, informative, and often painful account of the postapartheid mentality of the largest white “tribe” in the new South Africa. Heyns’s assassination is a particularly graphic symbol of contemporary divisions within Afrikanerdom, for in the years before the release of Nelson Mandela from prison, Heyns had been a foot-dragging spokesman for the main Dutch Reformed church and the once-secret Broederbund who offered endless, theologically grounded reasons for maintaining the white-dominated status quo. Finally, however, he had given in to the tide of events and accepted an all-race political nation. For that malfeasance, and despite his earlier positions, he was condemned to grisly death by a radically reactionary fringe group of Afrikaners.

It is indeed gratifying that most of the individuals profiled by Goodwin and Schiff–capable reporters who carried out their interviews in 1992–do not evidence the extremism that led to Heyns’s assassination. Rather, Afrikaners now seem spread out along a broad spectrum, with a few “liberals” joyfully welcoming the recent changes in South Africa, a few “extremists” fighting them to the bitter end, but most (including large numbers of what can only be called “moderate traditionalists” and “moderate progressives”) making the best of the new situation. As always, the Afrikaners’ gritty Calvinism bulks large in any assessment of their attitudes, actions, and expectations. Sadly, there are all too many examples here of the prostitution of the faith to tribal absolutes. Happily, there are many examples of the reverse, where (often under real duress) Afrikaners testify that the values of the kingdom are more important than the values of the tribe. For readers in North America, it is pertinent to note that the freshest and most solidly grounded theological voice in the book belongs to Elaine Botha, for many years a Calvinist philosopher at Potchefstroom University, who has recently become the provost of Redeemer College in Ancaster, Ontario, Canada.

–Mark Noll

“Religion in Public Life: A Dilemma for Democracy”

By Ronald F. Thiemann

Georgetown University Press

186 pp.; $55, hardcover; $17.95, paper

Thiemann, dean of Harvard Divinity School, reviews the Supreme Court’s widely critiqued recent jurisprudence to show that the dilemma of religion’s role in American public life is unresolved. He refutes the “myth of neutrality” propounded by those political philosophers who–raising the specter of unbridgeable civil conflict, as in Bosnia–would banish religion from public affairs. Without the presence of morally based (including religious) arguments, he notes, our polity can only degenerate into power battles among competing interests.

Thiemann discusses at length the question of “publicity”–whether religiously based arguments can be sufficiently accessible to public scrutiny and suitable for civic discourse. He concludes that religious arguments are permissible, because religious groups as advocates do not differ in kind from political parties, interest groups, and other voluntary organizations, and because religious belief systems are no less rational than nonreligious ones. The desirability of such arguments, however, depends on whether an argument “is compatible with the basic values of our constitutional democracy”; religiously rooted convictions cannot claim “general applicability in a society that includes a sizable minority of non-Christians.” As a result, Thiemann’s position reduces to the weaker claim that persons of religious conviction can speak up, but only to fellow believers or if they say things nonbelievers have already accepted anyhow.

While Thiemann calls for discarding both the phrase “separation of church and state” and the three-part Lemon test for whether a government action violates the Establishment Clause, he acknowledges that his own proposed framework would not change the results of Establishment cases. Thiemann would further restrain government from infringing on the freedoms of religious minorities, but how he would rehabilitate religion’s positive role in public life is left unclear.

Thiemann leaves several key questions unaddressed. If religiously based arguments in public affairs have no claim except upon believers, why bother to construct them at all? How can believers translate their convictions into public discourse in a pluralistic society? What happens when religious conviction and “democratic values” collide–for example, when evangelicals opposed to gay legitimacy are charged with denying human equality?

Proponents of religion’s role in public life will feel at times that Thiemann argues laboriously for points already persuasively made by Richard John Neuhaus or the Williamsburg Charter Project. But Thiemann’s rigorous critique of more exclusionary positions is the book’s greatest strength. His discussion will stimulate any reader and will especially aid those seeking sophisticated, nonreligious ways to dismantle the prevailing “wall of separation.”

–Bruce Barron

BIOGRAPHY

“Dictionary of Evangelical Biography 1730-1860”

Edited by Donald M. Lewis

Blackwell

2 vols., 1,059 pp.; $195

The scope of this superbly produced biographical dictionary is set out with admirable clarity by its editor, Donald M. Lewis: “This volume seeks to provide biographical treatment and to indicate the sources of study of figures of historical, literary, and religious significance who flourished at any time between 1730 and 1860 and were associated with the evangelical movement in the English-speaking world.” The dictionary was the brainchild of missionary and historian Andrew Walls. Work on it began in earnest in the early 1970s but was halted by 1976. The project was revived in 1985 under the direction of Lewis (at Regent College in Vancouver, B.C.), who carried it through to completion: a massive undertaking requiring almost ten years.

All the effort was well spent. In the future, those who ask, “But what is evangelicalism?” should simply be directed to read through these two volumes. If, after that, they don’t know the answer, they never will. From these “brief lives” (more than 3,500 altogether) many strong recurring patterns emerge. This man “experienced a dramatic conversion” while in college; that woman “was converted as a child.” Conversion led to action. These entries give an almost overwhelming impression of faith enacted–above all, through evangelism, but also through an enormous variety of other ministries, ranging from schools for servants to homes for indigent sailors. Study was not neglected–indeed, these evangelicals include a number of scholars as well as popular writers. Also striking is the social range of the figures included here, from the biblical scholar John Kitto, the son of “a drunken Cornish stonemason,” to the Scottish philanthropist Lady Darcy Maxwell. And the endless schisms, the proliferation of splinter groups within splinter groups–these too are abundantly in evidence.

One does not consult these volumes merely to note such patterns, revealing as they are, nor–though clearly this will be their primary use–to find reliable biographical data. Here, as in no orderly textbook account, you will catch the tone of another time. Indeed, some of the best entries are those that, like Arthur Pollard’s on John Berridge (“one of the few and earliest of Anglican peregrinating preachers”), draw generously on the the very words of the subject and his contemporaries. And here you will find, again and again, the mysterious idiosyncratic shape of a life, like a face seen fleetingly from a bus. If your library doesn’t already have this set on order, agitate.

–JW

“Twentieth-Century Dictionary of Christian Biography”

Edited by J. D. Douglas

Baker Book House

439 pp.; $24.99

When you use a reference work, you need to have a sense of its boundaries. If I want to know how many errors shortstop Jose Offerman committed in 1993, I won’t waste time looking in the “Encyclopaedia Britannica.” The biggest problem with this dictionary of Christian biography is its failure to draw any but the roughest of boundaries. Editor J. D. Douglas seems to anticipate this objection in his preface, but his response is simply to throw up his hands: “Here is a modestly sized book that gives some eight hundred brief entries on a cross-section of Christians who lived during, or whose lives extended into, the present century.” When the field suggested is potentially so large–twentieth-century Christians, and not a few from the previous century besides!–and no criteria for inclusion are specified, the reader is left in uncertainty, and will be disinclined to consult the volume.

Thus, for example, there is an entry on the American historian Robert Linder, but no entry for Jaroslav Pelikan. Charles Colson receives an excellent entry (contributed by Carl Henry), but there is no entry for Richard John Neuhaus. And so it goes, seemingly without rhyme or reason. Moreover, while year of birth and death is given, the entries do not specify date of birth and death. In a biographical dictionary, this is a serious lack. One wants to be able to say, “He married at the age of ___,” or “She lived to the age of ___,” but this volume does not provide the information needed to construct such a chronology. In general, the entries are brief (many are 200 words or fewer) and tend toward flatness, though some (including many of those supplied by the editor) are livelier. Sometimes misinformation is passed on in the guise of summarizing the range of current opinion; the conclusion of the entry on Solzhenitsyn–“Many have been offended by his harsh criticism of life in democratic society and his penchant for monarchy and autocratic orthodox faith”–gives credence to canards that have been decisively exposed as such.

The volume includes a generous selection of figures from Africa, India, Korea, Latin America–wherever the gospel has penetrated. While this exacerbates the shapelessness of the dictionary, it is a welcome testament to the global transmission of Christianity. It is good to turn the page from an entry on the French novelist Francois Mauriac to one on the African theologian John Mbiti, and to find the Korean theologian and missionary statesman Bong-Rin Ro in the Rs with Karl Rahner, Bernard Ramm, Oral Roberts, Pat Robertson, Archbishop Oscar Romero, Helen Roseveare, Hans Rookmaaker, and Charles Ryrie, among others. There is poetry in these alphabetical collocations.

–JW

“Auden”

By Richard Davenport-Hines

Pantheon Books

406 pp.; $30

Since it is briefer and less detailed than the current standard biography, Humphrey Carpenter’s 1981 “W. H. Auden,” Davenport-Hines’s book needs to justify itself by offering new interpretations of the poet’s life and work. Early on it bids fair to do so: Davenport-Hines makes a convincing case that the attention previous biographers have lavished on Auden’s relationship with his mother has tended to obscure Auden’s father. George Auden emerges from this book as a vivid figure:

a committed, progressive physician, and a man of wide-ranging intellectual gifts. (In so vividly portraying George Auden, Davenport-Hines creates a new mystery: Why did Wystan Auden in adult life have virtually nothing to say about his father, while he made frequent reference to his mother and her influence upon him?)

After the early chapters Davenport-Hines settles into a pretty straightforward narrative. He differs from Carpenter largely in his apparent belief that Auden’s entire character can be explained with reference to his homosexuality. The complex history of Auden’s Christian faith is scarcely touched upon here, while not just his poems but also his essays and even his book reviews are treated as coded symbolic messages about homosexual experience and culture. Unfortunately, Davenport-Hines seems little interested in Auden’s work in any other respect: his focus is on events rather than ideas. One may contend that such an emphasis is proper in a biography, as opposed to a critical study, but surely the chief reason people read biographies of artists is that they are interested in the artists’ art. A really useful biography of Auden will focus much more attention on the development of his ideas. This is what Edward Mendelson did in the best book yet written about Auden, “Early Auden,” which covers the development of the poet’s mind from his earliest poems to his and Christopher Isherwood’s abandonment of England for America in 1939. My counsel is to save the 30 dollars the Davenport-Hines book costs and put it aside until Mendelson’s “Later Aude”n appears.

–Alan Jacobs

“Golden Mouth: The Story of John Chrysostom–Ascetic, Preacher, Bishop”

By J. N. D. Kelly

Cornell University Press

320 pp.; $47.50

Few biographies in English have appeared on the life and times of John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople in the late fourth century C.E. In fact, the last significant English work on Chrysostom’s life was W. R. W. Stephen’s “Saint John Chrysostom, His Life and Times,” first published in 1880. For the last 35 years, readers have largely depended upon the two-volume work on Chrysostom by C. Baur, published in German in 1929-30 and issued in English translation in 1959. Hence, the interest and excitement no doubt to be generated by the publication of a new Chrysostom biography by J. N. D. Kelly, highly respected patristic scholar and author of the well-received Early Christian Doctrines and Jerome.

Kelly does not disappoint. His biography of Chrysostom is largely based on an intimate knowledge of primary source materials. For example, Kelly’s discussion of Chrysostom’s final exile in Cucusus includes a brief analysis of a relatively unknown work of Chrysostom on divine providence and human suffering written in the closing years of his life and only recently available in English translation (“On the Providence of God”).

The Chrysostom that emerges from Kelly’s study is a complex, uncompromising individual on fire with the love of God, a man Kelly characterizes as passionately committed to orthodoxy, unable to compromise with perceived or genuine falsehood or error, and fearsomely outspoken. John’s zeal and occasional harshness was finally to result in a disastrous break with the Roman emperor Arcadius and his wife Eudoxia, the frequent target of Chrysostom’s exhortation and critique.

And yet, simultaneously, there was a gentleness and compassion in Chrysostom’s character that Kelly also observes, demonstrated in a variety of surprising contexts. Chrysostom’s love and concern for the poor is well known. Perhaps more intriguing and enlightening is John’s willingness to hold out hope for those who struggled to break free from ingrained patterns of sin. As John put it, “You are a sinner? Don’t give up. I keep on applying these ointments to you. . . . Even if you sin every day, every day repent.” For the Church of Chrysostom’s time, these were bold, if not revolutionary, words, guaranteed to upset, as Kelly puts it, not a few “puritan-minded people” unsure of the efficacy of postbaptismal repentance.

Kelly has written a detailed, judicious study. Chrysostom scholars will welcome his contribution. Those encountering Chrysostom for the first time will find Kelly to be a reliable guide.

–Christopher A. Hall

“God’s Chinese Son: The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom of Hong Xiuquan”

By Jonathan D. Spence

Norton

400 pp.; $27.50

Jonathan Spence, in my opinion our foremost historian of early modern and modern China, has in this, his latest book, given us a well-crafted and compellingly told account of the massive mid-nineteenth century Taiping Rebellion, which wracked the empire and almost toppled the Qing (Manchu) Dynasty. The story of the Taiping Rebellion (1850-64), which culminated in perhaps the largest and bloodiest civil war the world has ever known, and its quixotic founder and leader, Hong Xiuquan, is not an unfamiliar one to historians of modern China. All the elements stressed in other accounts (including Spence’s own in the fine general history, “The Search for Modern China”)–the increasingly volatile social, economic, and ethnic tinderbox of South China in the 1840s, aggravated by Qing government defeat at the hands of the British in the Opium War (1839-42), all ignited by the pseudo-Christian doctrines of Hong, derived both from early Christian tracts and from a powerful vision in which he visited heaven and was commissioned by God as the (literal) younger brother of Jesus–are visible around the edges of this work. But to get a full account of the Taipings and their times, including their government foes, the reader must look elsewhere.

The unique contribution of this book rather is to highlight elements often neglected by other scholars; in particular, the religious dynamism and power of the movement, from the context of Chinese popular religion to the painstaking manner in which the “priest-king” Hong emended and excised sections of the Chinese Bible to suit his own theology. Anyone who needs confirmation of the potential of the millenarian aspects of Christianity to fire rebellion in a receptive climate, or the chilling tendency of fanatical messianic leaders to bring tragedy upon the heads of many may look to Spence’s story of Hong, who, claiming to be sent by God to seize “the killing power in Heaven and earth,” did just that, and set a precedent followed in some ways a century later by Chairman Mao.

–Daniel H. Bays

Copyright (c) 1996 Christianity Today, Inc./BOOKS & CULTURE

July/August 1996, Vol. 2, No. 4, Page 30

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The post In Brief: July 01, 1996 appeared first on Christianity Today.

The decline, only two-tenths of one per cent, came as no surprise, however, inasmuch as the post-war church membership boom has been leveling off in recent years.

Total church and synagogue membership for 1961 was reported as 116,109,929, or 63.4 per cent of the total population, as compared to the 1960 percentage of 63.6.

Two of the top ten U. S. Protestant denominations showed net losses for 1961. United Presbyterians reported 3,242,479 members compared with 3,259,011 the previous year, and the Protestant Episcopal Church was down from 3,444,265 to 3,269,325.

Records of church membership since 1850 show that a percentage decrease occurred only once before, in 1870, when the drop (in a 10-year period) was from 23 to 18 per cent.

Another factor which indicates a leveling off is that for the first time since World War II percentage gains in membership have fallen below the estimated population increase. The 1961 membership increase of 1,660,712 amounted to a 1.4 per cent rise as compared to an estimated population gain of 1.6 per cent.

Although both Protestants and Roman Catholics reported an increase in membership, their percentages of the total population showed a decline. Both were reduced by two-tenths of one per cent.

Of the 258 religious bodies supplying membership figures, 228 were Protestant with a total membership of 64,434,966. This was a gain of 766,131 or 1.2 per cent over 1960.

Protestant churches also reported a loss of 3.1 per cent of the total Sunday school enrollment.

Compilers of the yearbook (members of the NCC’s Bureau of Research and Survey) stress that church statistics must be examined with the foreknowledge that not all churches reporting employ the same recording system. Some include infants and all family members while others record only those received into membership by baptism. The new yearbook carries statistics furnished by 258 religious bodies of all faiths, one less than reported in 1960 and three more than in 1959.

NEWS / A fornightly report of developments in religion

PROTESTANT DENOMINATIONAL TOTALS

Catholic membership was given as 42,876,665, an increase of 771,765 or 1.9 per cent over last year’s total.

Membership in Jewish congregations showed a decline for the second time in two years. The 1961 total was 5,365,000 compared with 5,367,000 in 1960, and 5,500,000 in 1959.

Eastern Orthodox Churches reported 2,800,401 members, an increase of 101,738. The Old Catholic Church, Polish National Catholic Church, and the Armenian Church of North America had a combined membership of 572,897, almost 17,000 less than in 1960.

The 31 member communions of the National Council of Churches reported a total membership of 40,318,430, a slight increase over last year’s figure of 40,185,813.

The yearbook listed the total number of ordained persons in 236 reporting bodies as 381,252. The total number of pastors having charges was given as 247,009.

The total number of local churches reported was 319,670, compared with 318,697 for the previous year.

Some 228 religious bodies reported 286,661 Sunday or Sabbath schools in 1961, with 3,715,221 teachers and officers and a total enrollment of 44,434,291.

Meanwhile, figures contained in the newly-released 1962 World Mission Map of the Catholic Students’ Mission Crusade show that Catholics throughout the world total some 558,221,000; about 18.2 per cent of the global population.

The total is a numerical increase of nearly eight million over the previous year, but represents a percentage decline of about one-tenth of one per cent.

The students’ map statistics are widely recognized as the most authoritative source of Roman Catholic population figures.

Already somewhat lean statistics covering large areas of Christendom are beginning to prompt concern. At a meeting of denominational leaders in Nashville last month Executive Secretary James L. Sullivan of the Southern Baptist Convention Sunday School Board posed the question:

“We have been emphasizing the functions and planning projects, but where are the people?”

Preliminary statistical reports indicated that Southern Baptists, leaders in Sunday school enrollment totals in the United States, increased only 54,000 in membership during the 1961–62 associational year. This apparently was the lowest numerical increase since the mid-1940s.

Preliminary data was said to indicate that Southern Baptist Training Union enrollment increased during 1961–62, but that it too failed to make an annual increase similar to previous years.

Methodists outnumber members of any other religious affiliation in the 88th Congress, which convenes January 9. A total of 102 lawmakers—78 in the House and 24 in the Senate—list themselves as Methodists.

Roman Catholics, who were the most numerous in the 87th Congress, are second this year with 88 in the House and 11 in the Senate for a total of 99.

Here is the current makeup of Congress according to religious affiliation (Senators are italicized):

Methodist

Abele (R.-Ohio)

Abernethy (D.-Miss.)

Adair (R.-Ind.)

Albert (D.-Okla.)

Arends (R.-Ill.)

Aspinall (D.-Colo.)

Avery (R.-Kan.)

Ayres (R.-Ohio)

Bass (D.-Tenn.)

Bayh (D.-Ind.)

Belcher (R.-Okla.)

Bible (D.-Nev.)

Boggs(R.-Del.)

Brademas (D.-Ind.)

Brooks (D.-Tex.)

Broomfield (R.-Mich.)

Brotzman (R.-Colo.)

Brown (R.-Ohio)

Burkhalter (D.-Calif.)

Cameron (D.-Calif.)

Collier (R.-Ill.)

Colmer (D.-Miss.)

Corman (D.-Calif.)

Cramer (R.-Fla.)

Denton (D.-Ind.)

Devine (R.-Ohio)

Dole (R.-Kan.)

Dowdy (D.-Tex.)

Eastland (D.-Miss.)

Elliott (D.-Ala.)

Engle (D.-Calif.)

Flynt (D.-Ga.)

Foreman (R.-Tex.)

Fulton (D.-Tenn.)

Grant (D.-Ala.)

Haley (D.-Fla.)

Halleck (R.-Ind.)

Hardy (D.-Va.)

Hawkins (D.-Calif.)

Herlong (D.-Fla.)

Hickenlooper (R.-Iowa)

Hill (D.-Ala.)

Holland (D.-Fla.)

Inouye (D.-Hawaii)

Jennings (D.-Va.)

Jonas (R.-N.C.)

Jones (D.-Ala.)

Jordan, B. E. (D.-N.C.)

Jordan, L. B. (R.-Idaho)

Kilburn (R.-N.Y.)

Kilgore (D.-Tex.)

Kornegay (D.-N.C.)

Long (D.-La.)

Mahon (D.-Tex.)

McGovern (D.-S.D.)

McLoskey (R.-Il)

Meader (R.-Mic.)

Mechem (R.-N.M.)

Metcalf (D.-Mont.)

Mills (D.-Ark.)

Moore (R.-W. Va.)

Morgan (D.-i a.)

Mundt (R.-S.D.)

Murray (D.-Tenn.)

Nelson (D.-Wisc.)

Olsen (D.-Mont.)

Pilcher (D.-Ga.)

Pool (D.-Tex.)

Quillen (R.-Tenn.)

Randall (D.-Mo.)

Rhodes (R.-Ariz.)

Rich (R.-Ohio)

Roberts (D.-Tex.)

Robison (R.-N.Y.)

Rogers (D.-Fla.)

Russell (D.-Ga.)

Schenck (R.-Ohio)

Shriver (R.-Kan.)

Sheppard (D.-Calif.)

Sikes (D.-Fla.)

Skubitz (R.-Kan.)

Smathers (D.-Fla.)

Mrs. Smith (R.-Maine)

Smith, H. A. (R.-Calif.)

Smith, N. (D.-Iowa)

Sparkman (D.-Ala.)

Staggers (D.-W. Va.)

Steed (D.-Okla.)

Stubblefield (D.-Ky.)

Talcott (R.-Calif.)

Thomas (D.-Tex.)

Thornberry (D.-Tex.)

Tower (R.-Tex.)

Trimble (D.-Ark.)

Tupper (R.-Maine)

Vinson (D.-Ga.)

Waggonner (D.-La.)

Wallhauser (R.-N.J.)

Wharton (R.-N.Y.)

Whitener (D.-N.C.)

Williams (R.-Del.)

Young (D.-Ohio)

Roman Catholic

Addabbo (D.-N.Y.)

Barrett (D.-Pa.)

Bates (R.-Mass.)

Becker (R.-N.Y.)

Bennett (R.-Mich.)

Blatnik (D.-Minn.)

Boggs (D.-La.)

Boland (D.-Mass.)

Buckley (D.-N.Y.)

Burke (D.-Mass.)

Byrne (D.-Pa.)

Byrnes (R.-Wis.)

Cahill (R.-N.J.)

Carey (D.-N.Y.)

Clancy (R.-Ohio)

Conte (R.-Mass.)

Daddario (D.-Conn.)

Daniels (D.-N.J.)

Delaney (D.-N.Y.)

Dent (D.-Pa.)

Derwinski (R.-Ill.)

Dingell (D.-Mich.)

Dodd (D.-Conn.)

Donohue (D.-Mass.)

Dulski (D.-N.Y.)

Fallon (D.-Md.)

Feighan (D.-Ohio)

Finnegan (D.-Ill.)

Fino (R.-N.Y.)

Flood (D.-Pa.)

Fogarty (D.-R.I.)

Gallagher (D.-N.J.)

Giaimo (D.-Conn.)

Gonzalez (D.-Tex.)

Grabowski (D.-Conn.)

Green (D.-Pa.)

Grover (R.-N.Y.)

Hart (D.-Mich.)

Healey (D.-N.Y.)

Hebert (D.-La.)

Hoffman (R.-Ill.)

Holland (D.-Pa.)

Mrs. Kelly (D.-N.Y.)

Kennedy (D.-Mass.)

Keogh (D.-N.Y.)

King (R.-N.Y.)

Kirwan (D.-Ohio)

Kluczynski (D.-Ill.)

Lausche (D.-Ohio)

Leggett (D.-Calif.)

Lesinski (D.-Mich.)

Libonati (D.-Ill.)

Macdonald (D.-Mass.)

Madden (D.-Ind.)

Mansfield (D.-Mont.)

McCarthy (D.-Minn.)

McCormack (D.-Mass.)

McDade (R.-Pa.)

McIntyre (D.-N.H.)

McNamara (D.-Mich.)

Miller (R.-Iowa)

Miller, G. P. (D.-Calif.)

Miller, W. E. (R.-N.Y.)

Minish (D.-N.J.)

Monagan (D.-Conn.)

Montoya (D.-N.M.)

Murphy, J. M. (D.-N.Y.)

Murphy, W. T. (D.-Ill.)

Muskie (D.-Maine)

Nedzi (D.-Mich.)

O’Brien, L. W. (D.-N.Y.)

O’Brien, T. J. (D.-Ill.)

O’Hara, B. (D.-Ill.)

O’Hara, J.G. (D.-Mich.)

O’Konski (R.-Wis.)

Onge (D.-Conn.)

O’Neill (D.-Mass.)

Pastore (D.-R.I.)

Patten (D.-N.J.)

Philbin (D.-Mass.)

Price (D.-Ill.)

Pucinski (D.-Ill.)

Rodino (D.-N.J.)

Rooney (D.-N.Y.)

Rostenkowski (D.-Ill.)

Roybal (D.-Calif.)

Ryan, H. M. (D.-Mich.)

Ryan, W. F. (D.-N.Y.)

Shelley (D.-Calif.)

Sickles (D.-Md.)

St. Germain (D.-R.I.)

Mrs. Sullivan (D.-Mo.)

Thompson, F. (D.-N.J.)

Thompson, T.A. (D.-La.)

Vanik (D.-Ohio)

White (D.-Idaho)

Willis (D.-La.)

Young (D.-Tex.)

Zablocki (D.-Wis.)

Presbyterian

Anderson (D.-N.M.)

Auchincloss (R.-N.J.)

Baker (R.-Tenn.)

Baldwin (R.-Calif.)

Barry (R.-N.Y.)

Bell (R.-Calif.)

Bolton (R.-Ohio)

Bow (R.-Ohio)

Brock (R.-Tenn.)

Bromwell (R.-Iowa)

Case (R.-N.J.)

Chelf (D.-Ky.)

Church (D.-Idaho)

Clark (D.-Pa.)

Corbett (R.-Pa.)

Curtis (R.-Neb.)

Dague (R.-Pa.)

Davis (D.-Ga.)

Derounian (R.-N.Y.)

Edmondson (D.-Okla.)

Ellender (D.-La.)

Ervin (D.-N.C.)

Fountain (D.-N.C.)

Fulton (R.-Pa.)

Fuqua (D.-Fla.)

Gibbons (D.-Fla.)

Glenn (R.-N.J.)

Gross (R.-Iowa)

Gubser (R.-Calif.)

Harsha (R.-Ohio)

Harvey (R.-Mich.)

Hays (D.-Ohio)

Hemphill (D.-S.C.)

Henderson (D.-N.C.)

Hoeven (R.-Iowa)

Horan (R.-Wash.)

Horton (R.-N.Y.)

Jackson (D.-Wash.)

Jarman (D.-Okla.)

Johnson (D.-Calif.)

Karth (D.-Minn.)

Keating (R.-N.Y.)

Knox (R.-Mich.)

Kyl (R.-Iowa)

Laird (R.-Wis.)

Lindsay (R.-N.Y.)

Long (D.-Md.)

MacGregor (R.-Minn.)

Marsh (D.-Va.)

Martin (R.-Neb.)

Matthews (D.-Fla.)

McCulloch (R.-Ohio)

McDowell (D.-Del.)

McGee (R.-Wyo.)

Milliken (R.-Pa.)

Morris (D.-N.M.)

Norblad (R.-Ore.)

Pearson (R.-Kan.)

Pillion (R.-N.Y.)

Poff (R.-Va.)

Purcell (D.-Tex.)

Reid, O. (R.-N.Y.)

Mrs. Reid, C. (R.-Ill.)

Rumsfeld (R.-Ill.)

Scott (D.-N.C.)

Secrest (D.-Ohio)

Slack (D.-W.Va.)

Springer (R.-Ill.)

Stennis (D.-Miss.)

Stephens (D.-Ga.)

Stinson (R.-Wash.)

Stratton (D.-N.Y.)

Thomson (R.-Wis.)

Ullman (D.-Ore.)

Utt (R.-Calif.)

Weaver (R.-Pa.)

Weltner (D.-Ga.)

Westland (R.-Wash.)

Whalley (R.-Pa.)

Whitten (D.-Miss.)

Wright (D.-Tex.)

Baptist

Abbitt (D.-Va.)

Andrews (D.-Ala.)

Ashbrook (R.-Ohio)

Ashmore (D.-S.C.)

Beckworth (D.-Tex.)

Broyhill (R.-N.C.)

Byrd (D.-W. Va.)

Cannon (D.-Mo.)

Carlson (R.-Kan.)

Chenoweth (R.-Colo.)

Cooley (D.-N.C.)

Cooper (R.-Ky.)

Davis (D.-Tenn.)

Diggs (D.-Mich.)

Dorn (D.-S.C.)

Forrester (D.-Ga.)

Gary (D.-Va.)

Gathings (D.-Ark.)

Gore (D.-Tenn.)

Gray (D.-Ill.)

Hagan (D.-Ga.)

Hall (R.-Mo.)

Harris (D.-Ark.)

Ichord (D.-Mo.)

Johnston (D.-S.C.)

Kefauver (D.-Tenn.)

Kerr (D.-Okla.)

Landrum (D.-Ga.)

Lennon (D.-N.C.)

Lipscomb (R.-Calif.)

Long (D.-La.)

Long (D.-Mo.)

McClellan (D.-Ark.)

McIntire (R.-Maine)

McMillan (D.-S.C.)

Natcher (D.-Ky.)

Nix (D.-Pa.)

Passman (D.-La.)

Patman (D.-Tex.)

Pepper (D.-Fla.)

Perkins (D.-Ky.)

Powell (D.-N.Y.)

Rains (D.-Ala.)

Randolph (D.-W. Va.)

Riehlman (R.-N.Y.)

Roberts (D.-Ala.)

Robertson (D.-Va.)

Rogers (D.-Colo.)

Schwengel (R.-Iowa)

Shipley (D.-Ill.)

Siler (R.-Ky.)

Talmadge (D.-Ga.)

Taylor (D.-N.C.)

Teague, C. M. (R.-Calif.)

Teague, O. E. (D.-Tex.)

Thurmond (D.-S.C.)

Tuck (D.-Va.)

Tuten (D.-Ga.)

Williams (D.-Miss.)

Wilson, B. (R.-Calif.)

Wilson, C. (D.-Calif.)

Wilson, E. (R.-Ind.)

Winstead (D.-Miss.)

Yarborough (D.-Tex.)

Episcopal

Allott (R.-Colo.)

Ashley (D.-Ohio)

Beall (R.-Md.)

Betts (R.-Ohio)

Bolling (D.-Mo.)

Bolton (R.-Ohio)

Bonner (D.-N.C.)

Brewster (D.-Md.)

Brown (D.-Calif.)

Byrd (D.-Va.)

Cohelan (D.-Calif.)

Cunningham (R.-Nebr.)

Curtin (R.-Pa.)

Deerlin (D.-Calif.)

Dominick (R.-Colo.)

Downing (D.-Va.)

Ellsworth (R.-Kan.)

Frelinghuysen (R.-N.J.)

Ford (R.-Mich.)

Gavin (R.-Pa.)

Goldwater (R.-Ariz.)

Goodell (R.-N.Y.)

Hayden (D.-Ariz.)

Karsten (D.-Mo.)

Mrs. Kee (D.-W. Va.)

Hanna (D.-Calif.)

Hechler (D.-W. Va.)

Hosmer (R.-Calif.)

Huddleston (D.-Ala.)

King (D.-Calif.)

Kuchel (R.-Calif.)

Kunkel (R.-Pa.)

Lankford (D.-Md.)

Mailliard (R.-Calif.)

Mathias (R.-Md.)

Matsunaga (D.-Hawaii)

Mrs. May (R.-Wash.)

McFall (D.-Calif.)

Monroney (D.-Okla.)

Moorhead (D.-Pa.)

Morrison (D.-La.)

Morton (R.-Ky.)

Morton (R.-Md.)

Pell (D.-R.I.)

Pelly (R.-Wash.)

Proxmire (D.-Wis.)

Reifel (R.-S.D.)

Reuss (D.-Wis.)

Rivers, L. M. (D.-S.C.)

Rivers, R.J. (D.-Alaska)

Rogers (D.-Tex.)

Roosevelt (D.-Calif.)

Schneebeli (R.-Pa.)

Scott (R.-Pa.)

Selden (D.-Ala.)

Short (R.-N.D.)

Simpson (R.-Wyo.)

Smith (D.-Va.)

Mrs. St. George (R.-N.Y.)

Symington (D.-Mo.)

Thompson, (D.-Tex.)

Widnall (R.-N.J.)

Watson (D.-S.C.)

Wydler (R.-N.Y.)

Congregational Christian

Battin (R.-Mont.)

Berry (R.-S.D.)

Burdick (D.-N.D.)

Cotton (R.-N.H.)

Doyle (D.-Calif.)

Findley (R.-Ill.)

Fong (R.-Hawaii)

Fraser (D.-Minn.)

Griffin (R.-Mich.)

Gurney (R.-Fla.)

Humphrey (D.-Minn.)

Johansen (R.-Mich.)

Keith (R.-Mass.)

Morse (D.-Ore.)

Morse (R.-Mass.)

Mosher (R.-Ohio)

Osmers (R.-N.J.)

Pike (D.-N.Y.)

Prouty (R.-Vt.)

Schadeberg (R.-Wis.)

Sibal (R.-Conn.)

Stafford (R.-Vt.)

Wyman (R.-N.H.)

Younger (R.-Calif.)

‘Protestant’

Aiken (R.-Vt.)

Baring (D.-Nev.)

Bartlett (D.-Alaska)

Casey (D.-Tex.)

Chamberlain (R.-Mich.)

Cleveland (R.-N.H.)

Duncan (D.-Ore.)

Mrs. Dwyer (R.-N.J.)

Fascell (D.-Fla.)

Gill (D.-Hawaii)

Mrs. Griffiths (D.-Mich.)

Hagen (D.-Calif.)

McClory (R.-Ill.)

Minshall (R.-Ohio)

Moss (D.-Calif.)

Ostertag (R.-N.Y.)

Pirnie (R.-N.Y.)

Snyder (R.-Ky.)

Taft (R.-Ohio)

Van Pelt (R.-Wis.)

Lutheran

Beermann (R.-Nebr.)

Broyhill (R.-Va.)

Bruce (R.-Ind.)

Hartke (D.-Ind.)

Jensen (R.-Iowa)

Johnson (D.-Wis.)

Langen (R.-Minn.)

Magnuson (D.-Wash.)

Martin (R.-Calif.)

Nelsen (R.-Minn.)

Nygaard (R.-N.D.)

Olson (D.-Minn.)

Quie (R.-Minn.)

Rhodes (D.-Pa.)

Senner (D.-Ariz.)

Tollefson (R.-Wash.)

Walter (D.-Pa.)

Disciples Of Christ

Alger (R.-Tex.)

Bennett (D.-Fla.)

Fulbright (D.-Ark.)

Mrs. Green (D.-Ore.)

Harvey (R.-Ind.)

Holifield (D.-Calif.)

Hull (D.-Mo.)

Jones (D.-Mo.)

Latta (R.-Ohio)

Roudebush (R.-Ind.)

Watts (D.-Ky.)

Wickersham (D.-Okla.)

Jewish

Celler (D.-N.Y.)

Farbstein (D.-N.Y.);

Firedel (D.-Md.)

Gilbert (D.-N.Y.)

Halpern (R.-N.Y.)

Javits (R.-N.Y.)

Joelson (D.-N.J.)

Multer (D.-N.Y.)

Ribicoff (D.-Conn.)

Rosenthal (D.-N.Y.)

Toll (D.-Pa.)

Unitarian

Clark (D.-Pa.)

Curtis (R.-Mo.)

Edwards (D.-Calif.)

Gruening (D.-Alaska)

Harrison (R.-Wyo.)

Hruska (R.-Neb.)

Neuberger (D.-Ore.)

Saltonstall (R.-Mass.)

Staebler (D.-Mich.)

Williams (D.-N.J.)

Latter Day Saints

Bennett (R.-Utah)

Burton (R.-Utah)

Cannon (D.-Nev.)

Harding (D.-Idaho)

Lloyd (R.-Utah)

Moss (D.-Utah)

Udall (D.-Ariz.)

Young (R.-N.D.)

Others

APOSTOLIC CHRISTIAN: Michel (R.-Ill.); BRETHREN IN CHRIST: Roush (D.-Ind.); CHRISTIAN SCIENTIST: Dawson (D.-Ill.), Mrs. Hansen (D.-Wash.), Hutchinson (R.-Mich.); CHURCHES OF CHRIST: Burleson (D.-Tex.), Evins (D.-Tenn.), Fisher (D.-Tex.), Sisk (D.-Calif.); CUMBERLAND PRESBYTERIAN: Everett (D.-Tenn.); EVANGELICAL AND RE-FORMED: Garmatz (D.-Md.), Saylor (R.-Pa.); EVANGELICAL FREE: Anderson (R.-Ill.), Cederberg (R.-Mich.); EVANGELICAL UNITED BRETHREN: Goodling (R.-Pa.); REFORMED CHURCH IN AMERICA: Dirksen (R.-Ill.); SCHWENKFELDER: Schweiker (R.-Pa.); SOCIETY OF FRIENDS: Bray (R.-Ind.), Douglas (D.-Ill.); UNIVERSALIST: Poage (D.-Tex.); NOT LISTED: Kastenmeier (D.-Wis.); Martin (R.-Mass.).

Governors’ Lineup

Eleven U. S. state governors list a Methodist affiliation or preference as of the beginning of 1963. Nine governors are Roman Catholics, eight are Baptists, seven are Presbyterians, and another seven are Episcopalians. Here is a complete breakdown:

Methodist: Anderson (R.-Kan.), Bryant (D.-Fla.), Clement (D.-Tenn.), Connally (D.-Tex.), Fannin (R.-Ariz.), Hughes (D.-Iowa), Russell (D.-S.C.), Sanford (D.-N.C.), Smylie (R.-Idaho), Tawes (D.-Md.), Wallace (D-Ala.).

Catholics: Brown (D.-Calif.), Burns (D. Hawaii), Campbell (D.-N. M.), Dempsey (D.-Conn.), Egan (D.-Alaska), Hughes (D.-N.J.), King (D.-N.FL), Reynolds (D.-Wis.), Rossellini (D.-Wash.).

Baptist: Barnett (D.-Miss.), Combs (D.-Ky.), Davis (D.-La.), Faubus (D.-Ark.), Hatfield (R.-Ore.), Rockefeller (R.-N.Y.), Sanders (D.-Ga.), Sawyer (D.-Nev.).

Presbyterians: Babcock (D.-Mont.), Barron (D.-W. Va.), Bellmon (R.-Okla.), Dalton (D.-Mo.), Guy (D. N.D.), Rhodes (R.-Ohio), Scranton (R.-Pa.).

Episcopalians: Carvel (D.-Del.), Chafee (R.-R. I.), Hansen (R.-Wyo.), Harrison (D.-Va.), Hoff (D.-Vt.), Morrison (D.-Neb.), Peabody (D.-Mass.).

Congregational Christian: Kerner (D.-Ill.), Reed (R.-Maine).

Latter Day Saints: Clyde (D.-Utah.), Romney (R.-Mich.).

Lutheran: Anderson (R.-Minn.), Gubbrud (R.-S. D.).

Disciples of Christ: Welsh (D.-Ind.).

United Church of Christ: Love (R.-Colo.).

The Battle Begins

With the convening of the 88th Congress, controversy over possible federal aid to religious schools promises to flare up again.

A general aid-to-education bill was defeated in 1961, and a college aid bill was rejected in 1962. In each case, a religious issue was involved.

The Kennedy administration, nonetheless, is still determined to see a bill enacted for aid to education. The strategy is not yet certain, but first reports suggested that one approach being considered would give federal planning grants to states to enable them to determine their own elementary and secondary school needs. In this way the states would have to wrestle with the problems of separation of church and state and would keep the major responsibility for decisions out of Washington.

The Court Rests

The U. S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Kentucky’s Sunday closing law last month. A one-sentence order dismissing the appeal of three store owners cited want of a substantial federal question. Justice William O. Douglas, who takes the most extreme view of church-state separation of any member of the court, filed a dissenting opinion.

In another ruling, the court agreed to hear a South Carolina court opinion that a Seventh-day Adventist properly was denied unemployment benefits for refusing to work on Saturdays.

Still being weighed by the highest court in the land were several all-important cases on the constitutionality of Bible reading and prayers in public schools.

Surplus Favoritism?

Chester B. Lund, supervisor of the federal government’s surplus disposal program, was quoted last month as saying that the transfer of U. S. acreage and buildings to church bodies has not resulted, as charged by some, in favoritism to the Roman Catholic Church.

Lund’s contention was promptly disputed by Protestants and Other Americans United for Separation of Church and State. A POAU statement referred to the “downright dishonesty of Mr. Lund’s information.”

Lund, in an interview in New York, said disposal of surplus properties to church groups over the past 18 years is tabulated this way:

Roman Catholic: Receipt of real estate with an original value of $11,775,274. The property was appraised at a “fair present value” of $8,849,632. Discounts of up to 100 per cent, Lund said, brought total payments up to $133,227.

Protestant: Receipt of real estate and buildings with an original value of $25,211,632. The property was appraised

at a “fair present value” of $8,375,192. The sum actually paid after discounts were applied amounted to $398,662.

Lund gave the figures to the New York Herald-Tribune. In discussing the amount of property released to church bodies, he said that the Catholics are ahead, with Baptists and Methodists not far behind.

Methodists, it was reported, received the largest single property transfer in the 18-year history of the federal program when the government turned over a General Electric defense plant having an original value of $8,088,143. Actual payment was $11,561.

POAU said the General Electric plant went to Syracuse University, which is Methodist-related somewhat peripherally. “On such a basis,” POAU added, “many of the so-called Protestant donations turn out to be donations to private, nonsectarian colleges which have only a nominal church tie.”

Since 1944, when U. S. surplus disposal began, 527 transactions involving sale or grant of property to religious bodies have been recorded. Lund, a Lutheran and one-time deacon, said Catholics were involved in 209. Seventh-day Adventists were second with 125.

Ncc Housekeeping

Encouraging frigid temperatures in Louisville, Kentucky, last month, the policy-making General Board of the National Council of Churches seemed quite content to remain indoors for housekeeping chores. Lack of a big issue for the two-day meeting doubtless accounted in part for absence of out-of-town secular-press reporters (though regular coverage given these thrice-yearly meetings is generally slight compared to that accorded major denominational conventions), but the sessions highlighted the fact that through the year the Second Vatican Council has siphoned funds from newspaper travel-expense money which ordinarily would have gone to covering Protestant meetings. In the rivalry for the travel dollar, the Protestants should do better in 1963.

Some General Board difference of opinion was sparked by presentation of a preliminary report of a special committee which is restudying the National Council’s structure and function, to which end the Rockefeller Brothers Fund has provided $100,000. One NCC official indicated that greater centralization is envisaged, with more General Board control over the various council units. The hope is that the denominations will thus send the best-equipped sort of delegates to the General Board. A Methodist layman objected to what he termed “this strong move” toward centralization and warned that the NCC could lose members over it, with a consequent “weakening of the ecumenical movement.”

General Board deliberation on this subject is planned for its next meeting, to take place in February at Denver.

NCC General Secretary Roy G. Ross reported that council staff members, at the request of the General Constituent Membership Committee, “have developed personal ties with leaders of a number of those denominations which are not members of the Council but whose boards are members of some of the Council’s divisions. These ties are resulting in a growing interest in full Council membership.”

Dr. Ross also noted embarrassment among leaders of NCC member churches over “wide differences of conviction” on church-state relations as dramatized by the Supreme Court decision on the New York State Regents’ prayer. He pointed to the irony in NCC inability “to be definitive in stating any common position on behalf of our member churches” even though special study has been carried on since 1953. He said the NCC will be poorly prepared to face questions arising from new Supreme Court decisions until the NCC conference on church-state relations to be held in 1964.

Louisville actions of the General Board included:

• Approval of a net budget of $15,329,270 in 1963.

• Allocation of $33,000 toward the development of a Protestant center at the New York World’s Fair of 1964 and 1965.

• Election as head of the Washington, D. C., office of the Council, Dr. Vernon L. Ferwerda, now director of U.N.-U.S. interpretation in NCC’s Department of International Affairs.

Board members also heard plans for a three-week visit to this country in February by some 20 church leaders from the Soviet Union. This will return a visit to Russia last summer by 11 NCC representatives. Plans call for the Russian churchmen to visit the February General Board meeting in Denver. F. F.

Presbyterian Precedent?

When the Gunton-Temple Memorial Presbyterian Church leaves Washington, D. C., for a suburban Maryland location, it will leave behind $50,000 somewhat reluctantly.

The bequest was ordered by the Presbytery of Washington as a condition of its approval of relocation plans. Members of the church argued that the sum of $90,000 originally attached to relocation approval would hamper establishment of the church elsewhere. Others argued that the church had an obligation to its old locale.

The 80-year-old congregation, which currently has a total membership of 291, reportedly will receive $360,000 for its old property, which is being sold to a Negro Baptist group.

There was no debate over the advisability of the move itself. The $50,000 will go toward helping other Presbyterian churches in the area as well as toward interdenominational projects deemed worthy.

Belated Review

Not even a work of “dignified mediocrity,” says writer T. S. Eliot, referring to the language of the New English Bible (New Testament), whose world sales are pushing the five million mark. Eliot declares that from a panel representing the most distinguished modern scholars has come “something which astonishes in its combination of the vulgar, the trivial and the pedantic,” causing us to ask in alarm, “What is happening to the English language?”

The 74-year-old Nobel prizewinner, writing in London’s Sunday Telegraph, went on to give examples. He was especially critical of “Do not feed your pearls to pigs,” which he concluded was not only undignified and gauche, but also made the figure of speech ludicrous. “There is all the difference in the world,” he suggests, “between saying that pigs do not appreciate the value of pearls, and saying, what the youngest and most illiterate among us know, that they cannot be nourished on pearls.” Some passages of the new version he finds lack clarity: it is, for example, small comfort to be told, “How blest are those who know that they are poor.” He deals with a number of other infelicities, and recommends for further reading a leaflet published by the Trinitarian Bible Society which gives “a useful list of specimens of bad taste.”

Turning to the translators’ introduction, Eliot points out that “no attempt is made to substantiate the assertion that the rate of change of English usage has accelerated, or to inform us in what respects English usage is changing.” The writers evidently had not considered that change could sometimes be for the worse, and “it is as much our business to attempt to arrest deterioration and combat corruption of our language, as to accept change.” After discussing the difference between public and private use of the NEB, he suggests that when read in church it will be just as difficult to grasp as, and will not have the verbal beauty of, the King James Version. The conclusion of his article will make the fur and hair fly. While approving the stress on classical scholarship, he nevertheless adds: “It would also be good if those who have authority to translate a dead language could show understanding and appreciation of their own.”

Bells And Smells

Parliament’s relationship with the Church of England came up in the House of Commons last month. A motion introduced by an Irish farmer, John Maginnis, was believed to be pointed toward a recent letter to Parliament dispatched by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, who called for revision of Canon Law and the Prayer Book (see “Uneasiness in the Camp,” CHRISTIANITY TODAY News, November 23, 1962).

The motion read: “That this House is mindful of the fact that the majority of the people of this country adhere to the Christian religion and that the Church of England is by law established; and is concerned that the relationship between Parliament and Church shall, in the interests of both, be effectively maintained.”

There was, of course, more in this than met the eye. Maginnis himself made it clearer: because of the Established Church’s many privileges in England, he thought it right that the supremacy of Parliament should be effectively maintained. “We must get back to the Bible and the teachings of the Holy Scriptures,” he added. “We must get back to the teaching of justification by faith and everything embodied in our great, historic Church of England.”

The Commons debate touched upon widespread deviations from the Book of Common Prayer, and Maginnis suggested that such irregularities have produced serious tensions in the church. Cited was a list of 48 churches in the diocese of London alone where masses were advertised as part of the service. Maginnis also noted that the Bishop of Southwark, Dr. Mervyn Stockwood, had celebrated a “Solemn Pontifical High Mass.” Maginnis charged that the Church of England was in a state of anarchy, and proposed the establishment of a royal commission to investigate.

Mr. Chuter Ede, a former Home Secretary, said he saw no sign that the majority of the people of Britain adhered to the Christian religion, and deplored a system which tied a church for expressions of doctrine to decisions of the House of Commons. Mr. Iain Macleod, Leader of the House, stating that charges of illegality in Church of England services were completely valid, agreed that it was wise to postpone discussion of details until the House discussed an Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measure early in 1963. Mr. John Cordle, a prominent evangelical, pointed out that many laymen disliked the way in which the Communion service was “monkeyed around” by some clergy. Parishioners were subjected to “bells and smells”—and there were times when it was impossible to follow the service from the Prayer Book.

This can be regarded as a dry run in anticipation of the future full-scale debate on kindred topics. Although the participants handled a provocative subject in a surprisingly quiet and reasonable manner, the fact that the motion passed unopposed might well set episcopal hearts beating faster at the thought of things to come.

J. D. D.

Word From Rome

How serious was the recent illness of Pope John XXIII?

“Alarmist news” reports in certain journals are “completely unfounded,” Professor Antonio Gasbarrini, the pontiff’s personal physician, declared in a Vatican City interview.

Later, an official of Osservatore Romano, Vatican City newspaper, was quoted as saying that “there is every reason to hope that the Pope does not have cancer, but rather a weakening of the blood vessels of the stomach.”

Meanwhile, Osservatore Romano also disclosed two weeks after the close of the first session of the Second Vatican Council that the council fathers had voted to allow certain changes in the Mass. Bishops with the approval of the Holy See may now change many parts of the Mass from Latin into the language spoken by the people. The council voted to let such bodies as national and regional bishops conferences decide whether the change should be made. Also provided by the action of the council fathers on December 7, the day before they recessed, is adaptation of the Mass to the culture and traditions of some areas.

Anti-Christian Law

Seventeen United Presbyterian and Reformed missionaries from the United States have been ordered by the Sudanese government to leave that Moslem country under its new anti-Christian missionary law. Six already have left the country and the remaining 11 must quit their posts by January 19.

The Sudan law requires that every missionary society or missionary be licensed annually to carry on any activity. Under this law, church schools have been confiscated, resident missionaries expelled or arrested, and contact restricted between Christian clergymen and the people.

Other provisions of the law state that Christian children may not be baptized without permission of police or village chiefs.

The post Losses Dot Latest Church Membership Tally appeared first on Christianity Today.

With these words Kenneth Hagin moved down the healing line that formed after each evening service during his Pittsburgh Faith Crusade earlier this year. Now in his fifty-third year of preaching, Hagin remains active as a traveling preacher, writer, and teacher (at his 1,500-student Rhema Bible Training Center in Tulsa, Okla.). He is generally regarded as the dean of the increasingly popular “faith movement.”

Hagin proclaims a message of health and prosperity through positive faith. His homespun humor, gentle demeanor, and strong emphasis on Christian unity give no hint of the controversy that has surrounded the faith movement. Neither do they tell of the crossroads the movement is approaching, as Christians—especially charismatics—assess whether to accept it or oppose it.

Healing For All?

Hagin and his colleagues in the movement—including Kenneth Copeland and Jerry Savelle in Fort Worth, and Fred Price in Los Angeles—have long faced criticism for teaching that physical healing is available to anyone who has enough faith. Though the faith teachers allow for the use of medicine, they consider divine healing and perfect health both preferable and attainable.

But critics accuse faith teachers of unbiblical dogmatism and a lack of compassion for the sick. Author and artist Joni Eareckson Tada, a quadriplegic, cited in a recent fund-raising letter for her ministry “the insensitive nature of health-wealth theology,” which leaves disabled persons “nearly shipwrecked.”

Charles Farah, theology professor at Oral Roberts University and a critic of the faith movement, is optimistic about its future. “The movement is buying into Oral’s contention that prayer and medicine must go together,” he said. “That’s a good sign, because it will save the lives of a lot of babies and adults who will get to the hospital on time.”

In an interview with CHRISTIANITY TODAY, Hagin allowed that “there’s always an element of mystery” in the area of healing. Recalling one instance when he wondered why a relative had to die, Hagin said the Lord directed him to Deuteronomy 29:29 (“The secret things belong to the Lord our God”) and told him, “If I’d wanted you to know why, I would have told you.”

Asked about his message’s potentially harmful effect on those not healed, Hagin replied, “We don’t ever want to put a guilt trip on anyone.” However, he stressed that his main purpose is to take the message of the availability of healing to as many people as possible.

Indications Of A Truce

One sign of a truce between the faith movement and other charismatics is Copeland’s selection as one of the plenary speakers at the giant North American Congress on the Holy Spirit and World Evangelization to be held in New Orleans this month. Vinson Synan, director of the conference, said no one on the planning committee objected to inviting Copeland.

Like Farah, Synan feels the controversy over the faith teachers is beginning to subside. He noted with approval Copeland’s vigorous support of world missions.

Farah said he sees the same focus emerging from Hagin’s ministry, although Farah blames prosperity preaching for the charismatic movement’s inability to produce long-term missionaries: “If [people are] concerned about upward mobility, missions isn’t a good field to choose.”

During his Pittsburgh crusade, Hagin described the work of his school’s graduates on six continents. One such graduate has built in just eight years a church of 8,000 members—5,000 of them white, and 3,000 black—in South Africa.

In North America, the faith movement appears to be institutionalizing, as signified by its participation in structures such as Oral Roberts’s Charismatic Bible Ministries organization. Sociologist Margaret Poloma of the University of Akron, author of a book on the charismatic movement, views this as a positive sign, observing, “There’s nothing like institutionalization to balance things out.”

New Battles

But even as some of the old battles are resolved, a new one has arisen over the faith teachers’ doctrine that Jesus underwent “spiritual death” along with physical death, that he suffered in hell for three days before being “born again” in the Resurrection.

Author Judith Matta of Fullerton, California, charges that some faith teachers use this doctrine heretically, to put redeemed humanity on a level with Jesus. “If Jesus is a born-again man and is now exalted at the right hand of God, then you and I who are also born-again are equal with this God,” Matta writes in the forthcoming second edition of her book, The Born-Again Jesus of the Word-Faith Teaching. According to Matta, the foundation of the movement’s teaching is “to make themselves equal with God and be in control of their circumstances and lives.”

Theologian Farah and Rob Bowman of the Christian Research Institute (CRI) in San Juan Capistrano, California, share this concern. Bowman said CRI classifies the faith movement as “aberrational,” a term the institute uses for groups that “affirm the basic essentials of the faith, then make statements that seriously compromise this position.”

Among the leading faith teachers, Bowman said, Copeland is in the most serious error. “He seems to regard God as finite,” Bowman asserted, quoting Copeland’s reference Bible, which at one point states that Adam’s body and God’s were “exactly the same size.”

Bowman is critical also of the unwillingness of some faith teachers to enter dialogue with other Christians. “They say they don’t want to come into controversy, but they are the controversy,” he said. “They are teaching false doctrine, and the church needs to hold them accountable for it.” Bowman praised faith teacher Fred Price, who, after meeting with CRI, agreed to stop saying humans are “gods.”

Hagin said he has never been asked to enter any dialogue. He said he would be open to the idea, though arrangements would have to be made a year in advance because of his full schedule.

In the meantime, this mild-mannered father of the faith movement pursues his own course, imparting the key truths for which he is known—confident faith, victorious living, and continual dependence on the Word of God—while seeking to avoid dissension. He quips, “You can disagree without being disagreeable.”

By Bruce Barron.

The post Faith Healers: Moving toward the Mainstream? appeared first on Christianity Today.

Christian Research Institute president Hank Hanegraaff and evangelist James Robison have taken televangelist Benny Hinn to task for his teaching of the word-of-faith doctrine, telling Hinn that if he does not change his ministry, it eventually will fail due to false teachings.

After meeting with both leaders, Hinn has apologized to his congregation, eschewing the faith message he has been preaching for almost a decade.

In interviews with CHRISTIANITY TODAY, both Hanegraaff and Robison detailed their roles in bringing Hinn to a change of heart. Hanegraaff, author of Christianity in Crisis, says Robison phoned him to say he had “called Benny Hinn and told him that if he didn’t change now, his ministry would go down the tubes.”

Robison confirms, “I told Benny that every time I prayed for him, the Lord showed me his displeasure over what he was doing. I didn’t want to see Benny continue in his slaughter of the innocent sheep.” Robison says he brought the same message to Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, and Larry Lea, but none of them heeded the warning. Hinn, says Robison, reacted differently.

“Benny went to pieces and was very contrite,” Robison says. “I told him God didn’t anoint him to preach erroneous teachings and perform extravagant theatrics like knocking people down, waving his coat around, and blowing on people, and, if he continued, his ministry would be destroyed within three years.”

You gotta have faith

Hinn, pastor of the 7,000-member Orlando (Fla.) Christian Center, greeted his stunned congregation in June with his renunciation of the faith message, which includes positive confession, the prosperity gospel, and the divine right-to-be-healed concept. Under such teachings, followers are told God wants them to be “healthy and wealthy.” The right amount of faith will secure anything, from a cure of cancer to a new, expensive automobile. To be in debt or to be sick shows a lack of faith.

In front of a jolted and teary-eyed congregation, Hinn censured the “word-of-faith” movement. “It’s faith, faith, faith and no Jesus anywhere. We have to have faith in Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. So, where do I stand on faith? Stop seeking faith and start seeking the Lord! The word-of-faith message is New Age and it doesn’t work. I’m going to stop preaching healing and start preaching Jesus.”

In a July interview with CT, Hinn delineated the way faith teaching has harmed him. “I was heavily swayed by Kenneth Hagin and Kenneth Copeland. And, none of them talked about salvation. It’s all faith. The faith message is a message of lack, without the Spirit anywhere.”

In his June sermon, Hinn, seemingly resolved to “right the wrong I’ve been teaching and doing,” continued his strong denunciation of word-of-faith teaching. On “prosperity,” Hinn asserts: “The very word itself has been twisted around and has become a major business in the ministry. Money, money, money. It’s almost like going gambling!” And Hinn lambastes both healing, his ministry’s cornerstone, and positive confession.

“I once said if my daddy knew what I know, he wouldn’t have died of cancer. [But] it was God’s will to take my father home. I became so convinced I was right. God had to shake it out of me.”

Bruce Barron, a Pittsburgh scholar who has followed the faith movement for a decade, says, “The health and wealth gospels are, in their extreme, a symptom of a deeper problem, that being an ongoing tendency to elevate redeemed humanity at the expense of God’s transcendence and sovereignty. This inclination can take its form by placing humanity and human powers at the center of the universe, and placing God at man’s disposal.”

Robison is convinced of Hinn’s turnaround. “I told Benny that what I hear God saying is that he anointed him to lead people into his presence with abandonment to [God’s] will. I think Benny will do that this time.”

“There has been a hunger inside me for the past few weeks,” Hinn says softly. “I really want Billy Graham to pray for me.”

Still skeptical

Hanegraaff, though encouraged by Hinn’s changes, says he still has concerns. “I told James [Robison] that at the risk of sounding cynical or skeptical, I have seen Benny [repent] before, so I’m not sure if he’s sincere.”

Hinn has recanted the faith message before (CT, Oct. 28, 1991, p. 44; CT, Oct. 5, 1992, p. 53), and Hanegraaff has reason to be wary. Hinn has publicly threatened his critics, including Hanegraaff, in the past, once saying he wished God would give him “a Holy Ghost machine gun” to destroy them.

According to both Hanegraaff and Robison, there is only one way for Hinn to demonstrate his rectitude. “The real test,” says Hanegraaff, “is whether Benny will pull his books. In other words, will he continue to sell books that promote the very thing he says he is turning away from?”

“Benny must demonstrate repentance and a turning away from what he has been teaching and doing, including pulling his books,” Robison says.

At Thomas Nelson, Bruce Barbour, head of the company’s book division, says pulling books from store shelves is not a decision made by a publishing house alone. “We don’t publish Thomas Nelson books, we publish authors’ books. If one of our authors has a problem, we want to react clearly.”

Hinn, later, said he and Thomas Nelson came to an agreement. Lord, I Need A Miracle is being extensively revised, Hinn said, deleting all references to word-of-faith teaching. Good Morning, Holy Spirit has no faith teaching in it, and only one editing change is needed in The Anointing, according to Hinn.

Hinn says that on future books, he’s enlisting sound counsel. “I’m having Dudley Hall [a Robison associate] work on my books with me,” he says, “not only on what I’ve already done, but on future ones.” Hall is working on Hinn’s new book, The Blood, published by Creation House and distributed by Word, which is owned by Thomas Nelson.

This latest Hinn confession has coincided with a new round of media scrutiny. In the summer 1993 issue of Cornerstone magazine, William Watkins, a former managing editor of Thomas Nelson’s book division, recounts his unsuccessful attempts to correct Hinn’s unorthodox theology in his first two books. And the July issue of The Quarterly Journal published by Personal Freedom Outreach says Hinn has shown a “propensity for exaggeration” and details further his “personal mythmaking” about everything from circumstances of his childhood to details of healings. Earlier this year, “Inside Edition,” the tabloid TV show, planted a woman who faked a healing on one of Hinn’s broadcasts. In the August issue of Charisma magazine, Hinn says he has instituted new procedures in which physicians will closely question those individuals who claim healings so as to verify their claims. In addition, Hinn reports he has stopped wearing his Rolex watch and now drives a Lincoln instead of a Mercedes.

Recently, some Christian retailers have begun to react harshly to word-of-faith books. Steve Adams, president of Evangel, Inc., says his recent decision to get rid of books by faith teachers was a matter of knowing what God’s Word says. “Our industry needs to police itself against unscriptural and heretical teaching. That’s why I took Copeland’s, Hagin’s, and Hinn’s books off my shelves. It’s aberrant teaching.”

Bookstore owner and Christian Bookseller’s Association (CBA) chairman Jim Reimann says, “We can carry any book that has a correct view of who Jesus Christ is, from the biblical standpoint.

“We [as an industry] need to search the Scriptures and determine what is biblical, then compare what we’re offered to sell in our stores and not sell what is unbiblical.” Reimann does not sell books by Hinn, Copeland, or Hagin.

CBA board member Winston Maddox, of Evangelical Books and Bibles, also recently stopped carrying books by Hinn, Hagin, and Copeland. “We need to examine all our teachers and we must ask ourselves: Does any teaching utilize only a small part of the Bible and neglect the whole … and are the practices meant to glorify God or the teacher?”

By Perucci Ferraiuolo.

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