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The Church In the World
By E. G. Homrighausen

THE WORLD, THE CHURCH AND THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION

Not all experimentation in theological education is being done by seminaries in the United States. From Chile, Guatemala, the Cameroon, and Taiwan come reports of fresh and relevant programs of seminary education designed to give a more effective training to the ministry and lay leadership of the church.

Chilean students will still attend the Union Seminary in Buenos Aires for some of their education, but the focus of their training will be in Chile. No great emphasis will be placed upon a building program or a sedentary seminary. The community of theological education will be committed to a flexible program and indigenous ministry. A rented house, a location that can be swiftly changed, will serve as a locus for the present. The objective is not primarily to train a paid ministry, but to prepare and inspire all the ministries of the church. Much importance will be given to work among laymen. This will call for many lay institutes. Professors will be involved in a lot of travel and a variety of duties. Some trained local pastors will be called upon to lead these institutes. The theological community is to be an intimate family group, who live together, and who share a deep worship life. The community is to be constantly in touch with the communities of the modern world, particularly the university world and the world of the working class. Some members of the university will be invited to teach courses in the theological community. And the whole project is interdenominational, with eight communions cooperating, including Anglicans and Pentecostals.

In Younde, West Africa, the only united school of theology will be preparing ministers for nine national churches and five overseas denominations in French-speaking states. The focus of theological

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education will be on African life and thought. A chair of African studies has been established to direct attention to African culture and society. After the first year, all theological studies are related to African studies. Thereby, theological education will have a sociological context and relevance, and all departments will be interrelated. Professors are under necessity to collaborate with each other. While studies are carried on in the traditional seminary community, through field projects the entire community moves out into rural, urban, industrial situations, studying a given problem from the point of view of the various disciplines, asking the right questions and seeking the answers in the practical situation. This new method of theological education has exciting possibilities in the new Africa.

The Presbyterian Seminary in Guatemala serves five social groups in which the church operates, two of which are Spanish and three of which are Indian. Churches in the capital city are self-supporting but those in rural areas are lay-oriented and lay-staffed. The percentage of illiteracy is low except in the Protestant community. The seminary conducts a three-year curriculum, and all classes are on a seminary basis with professors acting as tutors rather than lecturers. The seminary has an extension program in eight regional centers where ministerial students engaged in parish work are brought together annually for a week of orientation after which they engage in study and speak once each week at the center under the guidance of an experienced pastor. Once a month students meet with their teachers for one or two days at the center. At the end of the year there is a review and an examination. Each week students gather at the center for Bible study. In this way a theological community is generated, continuing education takes place, and students engage in church leadership.

In the Presbyterian Tainan Theological College, the Methodist and Episcopal Churches now cooperate. A Roman Catholic priest was invited to teach a course on the doctrine of the church. Formosan society has been affected by political tensions, industrialization and urbanization, the influx of mainland refugees, and a resulting denominational pluralism. The college is rethinking its role in this dynamic situation by relating theological studies more closely with the issue of culture, through its research center which focuses (1) on Biblical studies and their relation to Chinese thought; (2) on Christ and culture where the Christian tradition is brought into encounter

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with Chinese ways of thought; (3) on the relation of mission and unity; and (4) on the Church's relation to society in Southeast Asia today. The college is experimenting with new patterns of church life: industrial evangelism, internships in industry, witness in the academic world, and the ministry of a pastor who as a small shopkeeper makes his witness in that world. As the churches in Taiwan celebrate their centennial this year, and look forward to the next century, they are engaged in an island-wide survey of what the church is doing and how this relates to the social and economic situation.

It is heartening to hear of these fresh approaches to theological education in sister churches abroad. Unhampered by burdensome traditions, alert to the situations in which they find themselves, aware of the essential nature of the Gospel, these churches and their seminaries have a contribution to make to theological education in the "older" churches. Perhaps renewal will come to the "old" church by way of her children.

MEETING THE NEW BARBARISM

Members of the Peace Corps after serving in other countries are experiencing a shock at the state of immorality they find upon their return to the United States. Discerning Americans who travel abroad find the streets of Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Calcutta safer than the streets of our major cities. One distinguished theologian after a three-month trip to various countries in East and Southeast Asia regards the United States as dangerously decadent, and speaks of Americans as the new barbarians. Violence, crime, delinquency, divorce, lawlessness, drunkenness, obscenity, indecency, and many other expressions of this decadence stem from a widespread disregard for the sacredness of human life which is rooted in a sense of the holy. This moral condition is not expressed only in the sins of the flesh, but in "higher" forms: cheating in the academic world, price fixing in the economic world, deals in the political world, unscrupulous experimentation in the scientific world, promiscuity and infidelity in the sexual and domestic world. Perhaps the point at which this decadence is most evident is in the area of sex, for sex has become a dominant obsession in American life; indeed, it has been made into an idolatry.

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This condition did not happen overnight. The second world war hastened the process of liberating the modern man from inherited moral. constants. The revolt against a moral puritanism and excessive Victorianism has come full cycle. This liberation, when combined with the cult of self-expression leads to a morality that is individualistically autonomous. If people desire all the privileges of self-fulfillment from the guidance of adult responsibility, what else is there to expect? The sanctity of the older morality has suffered a terrible beating. And the new morality which eschews legal commands and bases moral attitudes and conduct upon the wishes of the self has not yet gone through the refining fires of the maturing process.

Mass media, cheap literature, and dramatic productions have disseminated an image of the "free" life, which has had a profound impact upon youth. They have helped to create a generation of permissive parents. The mobility, anonymity, and freedom of urban civilization have contributed to the breakdown of traditional codes and institutions. The cult of happiness has become for many the sanction for casual sexual relations. The rise of pluralism makes for a coexistence of indifference or tolerance, in which one opinion is as good as another and truth and conviction are surrendered for a happy togetherness. The loss of a sense of personal and national purpose coupled with a subtle, perhaps unconscious, despair regarding this problem-filled world hardly furnishes a climate of moral integrity.

The present moral deterioration, however, is not a temporary relaxation of standards; rather, it is unique, because for many people the past is dead and the objective distinction between good and evil is unclear and even questionable. Moral relativism breeds a flabby conscience. For many moralists, the root of our moral condition is the decline of a meaningful belief in God and of a reverence for the holy at the center of life.

For this reason the clamor to strengthen the law, the police force, the courts, the penal system is right as far as it goes. But this is not enough! It was Plato who said that what is cultivated in a community is that which is honored by that community. What is honored in our society is the basis of our morality.

This moral decadence cannot be dealt with only by treating its external symptoms, important as that is. Here and there communities

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have tackled the situation and through an aroused and cooperative citizenry have created a better climate of lawfulness and reduced the incidence of immorality Nor can this decadence be met with stricter legislation. Law there must be to restrain and deter the evil, but a heavy reliance upon coercion may lead to a tyranny of force which destroys freedom, legislates morality, and inspires rebelliousness. The political reformer has often done more harm than good in history.

While this period of moral decline will be with us for some time to come, and its consequences will be suffered as we reap what we have sown, the major contribution to the situation is still the high message of the church which affirms the reality of the holy at the center of life and history and the high value of life which gives it purpose and dignity. A moral revolution which would counteract the virus of moral devolution must start in the minds and hearts of men who are revolted by the indignity and unholiness of a situation that dehumanizes personality and society, and who in gratitude and obedience are firmly committed to a new way of life which issues in a new morality.

TEACHING RELIGION IN PUBLIC EDUCATION

The problem of teaching religion in public schools that are controlled and supported by all people is as difficult to solve in Sweden, where religion is a required part of the public school curriculum, as it is in the United States where the Constitution forbids the public support of one or any religion. How effective is religious instruction in Sweden? Does the separation of church from state keep religion out of public education?

The Supreme Court in the United States did not forbid the teaching of religion in the schools; rather, it reaffirmed the religious nature of the nation and urged public schools to teach all religious traditions objectively. In short, religion is regarded as a part of national culture; indeed, it is regarded as integrally related to democracy, freedom, and the dignity of man. To ignore religion in public education is to make it irrelevant and give the impression that it is not related to life or citizenship. To outlaw it is unconstitutional. To keep religion out of education is impossible, since curricular ma-

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terials deal with creation, the meaning of life, the age of the earth, the religious content of literature and history, and many other matters. To concoct an amalgam of all religion and teach a "common faith" is unacceptable to religious people of all faiths, and it would tend to establish a kind of national religion which could be innocuous and even dangerous. It is impossible to teach all religions in the public schools; this would pose a difficult administrative problem, and it would glaringly divide children into sectarian camps.

What is the solution, if any, to this knotty problem? First, private, parochial and day schools could be encouraged and even supported by the government and supervised by public agencies. But this would practically disrupt the public school system, make the various religions the organizing center of education, and put churches and synagogues into public education. Second, shared time and dismissed time could be more widely used by which children could be taught the religion of their affiliations outside school buildings either on or after school time. Third, the public schools could be urged to work with leaders of religious groups to see how the religious aspects of the curriculum could be taught in an objective and non-sectarian way. Fourth, school authorities could recognize the religious traditions, holidays, and personal heroes and heroines of all religious groups through objective explanations and demonstrations. Fifth, members of churches and synagogues who teach in the public schools or serve on boards of education could be helped to understand the ways in which they may fulfill their ministries in public education with intelligence and understanding. Sixth, church leaders and members could acknowledge that while the public schools may not ignore, deny, or attack religion, they cannot teach any specific type of religion with persuasive conviction. This is not their vocation.

It is the church, the synagogue, and the family that are the major teaching agencies of these faiths. If our appalling religious illiteracy is to be overcome, it will not be through pressure on public schools to teach religion, but through vast expenditures of funds, time, and leadership on the part of those whose major vocation is that of making disciples, maturing them in the faith, and equipping them to fulfill their ministries in the common life. While church and synagogue have a responsibility for the moral tone of the nation which is a part of the responsibility of the public schools, they should not

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for a moment think that by their occupation with the church-state problem in religious education the major task of religious education will be accomplished!

THE CITY: GOD'S GIFT OR MAN'S ENEMY?

Harvey Cox of the Andover-Newton Theological Seminary Faculty has written a book (The Secular City, Macmillan, 1964) which deals with modern man's most baffling challenge. It will be the subject of intensive and extensive discussion in councils of churches, agencies, and among church administrators and theologians for a long time to come. He presents a new interpretation of the city, the climax of the modern industrial and secular process. Cox greets the city as a gift of God, as integral to his redemptive work, as in the wave of the future.

The structures of the church, so deeply set within the rural, tribal, and town setting of the pre-city era are, in spite of their "colossal staffs, astronomical budgets, and cavernous facilities," main obstacles which keep the real church from fulfilling its function. The organizational patterns of the churches are a synthesis of Protestantism and bourgeois culture, creations of sociological patterns of the late nineteenth century. They are wholly inadequate to deal with a city-secular order however hard they try to relate to this order through "dialogues" of one kind or another. Theologically, Cox bases his thesis upon an interpretation of the biblical account of creation and the covenant relation. He believes that God early initiated the secular process in history which is now culminating in the falling away of an antiquated religious scaffolding, as modern man comes of age and finds himself in full charge of this world. Man's days of dependent infancy are finished. The city is God's creation and not man's enemy; man must respond maturely to his situation.

To fight against this secular development is to fight against God and the change he wills. Man is now emancipated from "all supernatural myths and sacred symbols." Secularization means that history is "defatalized." Man has been left with the world on his hands. "He can no longer blame fortune or the furies for what he does with it. Secularization is man turning his attention away from worlds beyond and toward this world at this time."

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About all this, Cox would have us rejoice. The secular city is here to stay, and it is willed of God. It offers a new style of life to men. Its mobility, its privacy, its interpersonal relations, its concern for pragmatic and not metaphysical meanings are not to be lamented and feared, but regarded as aspects of the promised city of man. Cox maintains that the church does not understand what is happening in the world, has no theology of revolution, and is, therefore, unable to lead this bewildered secular, urban and searching age through liberation from archaic forms into the new age. The church should be "the avant-garde of the new regime."

Cox presents a breath-taking thesis. Much of what he says is fresh and true. The issues of debate will center around several aspects of his proposal. The city is the climactic consequence of our modern industrial development. But dare it to be so uncritically related to the divine initiative and equated with "the mighty acts of God" recorded in Scripture? This enhancing of historical processes is a dangerous business, the tragic consequences of which we have seen in our time.

Further, the city is the incarnation of man's achievement, and it is an integral and irreversible part of history, but it has within it potentialities for human well being and dehumanization whether personal or corporate. This easy relation of the inbreaking of the Kingdom with this revolutionary age will have to be approached a bit more critically. More biblical and theological work will have to be done on this matter. God is certainly related to the secular world, but just what he is doing and saying in and through that world may be the critical point in Cox's thesis.

This book is filled with startling and exciting insights. It sets conversion within the context of God's revolutionary action in history; it suggests the Church's function as God's avant-garde, and as cultural exorcist; it seeks to make traditional language and insights speak in sociological and political terms. Work, play, sex, the secular university are all dealt with in a fresh way from a central thesis. Cox may seem to push his thesis too hard and to force many a reluctant or unrelated fact into his scheme of thought. To many a reader, particularly the faithful Churchman, he will be rather frustrating, since his "religionless" Christianity makes the existing Church a bit irrelevant and outdated. Whatever the criticisms of this tract, it will challenge its readers and provide opportunities for

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many stimulating discussions regarding the relation of the Church to the world.

SELMA: ACT AND SYMBOL

Selma has become like the shot that was heard around the world. It marked the place where two forces met in dramatic encounter; the one proposing to march peacefully to Montgomery to protest the denial of citizens to vote, and the other proposing to stop the march by force in the name of state and local law. In the encounter, many marchers were badly treated; one person was fatally beaten and another was shot to death.

Selma meant many things. It certainly aroused the national conscience against the injustice under which Negro-American citizens have had to live for a hundred years. The President voiced the feelings of millions when he demanded a prompt correction of old wrongs and the fulfilling of long-standing promises. For the first time, many Americans saw the plight of the Negro through the eyes of the Negro.

Selma marked a new stage in the Negro's self-confidence and determination to stand on his own feet, to speak and act boldly, and to brave brutality and death in order to be himself. And he did this in that section of the country which for years has accepted the servant image of the Negro. Selma gave an added impetus to the prompt and serious consideration and enactment of legislation of national scope and character. This could not have been effected without Selma.

Selma brought together representatives of all religious faiths, from all walks of life, and from all sections of the country. It fused them into a unity of purpose and spirit. One minister remarked that his preaching had been changed because of his participation in Selma, and that through it he had come into a fresh experience of first-century Christianity. All religious groups from Unitarians to Roman Catholics, from Pentecostals to Missouri Lutherans, from Christian Reformed to Gospel Christians, were represented at Selma. While rather late on the scene, organized religion participated in a common cause.

Selma marked the gradual isolation, and identification, of a small group of recalcitrants who will not accept the need for change, and

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who will use every form of violence to perpetuate an attitude and a passing way of life. These people are not to be confused with the sincere moderates who are burdened in conscience about the situation and who are trying to do something about it. Their position is being made difficult by the extremists; yet they will realize that while Selma is a painful event, it is also a blessed discipline which may help to bring about a due maturity in human relationships.

Selma was above all a corporate social event with judging and healing power. The senseless and brutal death of James Reeb and the shocking murder of Viola Liuzzo were more than individual matters. Many felt that these two human beings were destroyed by an evil which revealed its heinous character in the act. Further, these deaths in the struggle for justice and human dignity made Selma more than a march of people or a march of words. Here was something that made men think about the way healing comes to persons and society through bruised and broken bodies. A society which produces such suffering is one that is in need of judgment and healing. Such martyrdoms produce a revulsion against evil, a sense of involvement in the cause, a desire to do something for all victims of an unjust society, and a determination to rid the world of life-destroying evil.

To be sure, Selma was no aggregation of saints. Nor was it a clean ethical act. Nor was it participated in only by those with pure Christian motives. Its victory did not raise the standard of citizenship among Negroes in similar situations, nor did it bring to a climax and conclusion the ongoing march of Negroes in our time. Much remains to be done to realize the end of "the march" for which it began. But Selma is a milestone in the history of the human race. The issues involved in it are universal, and those issues will be with men everywhere to disturb and to judge until they are honestly recognized, realistically accepted, and responsibly handled.