The Petal paper. [volume], November 30, 1961, Page 3, Image 3

About The Petal paper. [volume] (Petal, Miss.) 1953-19??

Image provided by: Mississippi Department of Archives and History

                
The Agony Of The Southern Minister
(Continued from Page 2)
without exception, ordered that
every person is welcome in the
House of God. When a Roman
Catholic layman’s organization in
New Orleans angrily and publicly
defied a local Church order
against segregation and appealed
directly to the Pope, the Vatican
took a “serious and most unsym
pathetic vidw” of the appeal. A
high Vatican source said “the
Church is unalterably opposed to
all forms of discrimination — in
New Orleans as much as in South
Africa.”
Such policy statements by na
tional and regional church organi
zations are, of course, gratifying.
They provide a necesary yardstick.
Nor is it fair to say they are with
out influence at the church or
parish level. But church congre
gations—particularly the dominant
Protestant ones of the S o u t h—
either have or assume considera
ble local authority.
Most of them harbor an ele
ment — perhaps only a minority,
but a potent one—who will never
agree that a Negro should be ad
mitted to a white church. These
all-out segregationists unhesitat
ingly put the separation of the
races ahead of Christian teaching,
law or moral principle.
With an example before them of
... public officials’ defiance of the
courts on school integration, they
find it easier to bomb churches
and schools, to defy Christian
teaching and church policies and
iU uiarvv; mv uwiv, am. hw
possible, for any minister who
seeks to follow his conscience,
secular law and church policy.
Publications by extremist states’
rights groups and White Citizens
Councils repeatedly urge that
' weak-kneed preachers" be
“whipped into line" by the with
> holding of contributions. They
sneer at the clergy of all faiths,
saying, “Money talks and they all
listen.”
Lay attacks on ministers rarely
are so open as that which at
tracted national attention in Co
lumbus, Ga. For the most part,
they take the form of relentless,
petty harassments and slow de
struction of th epastor’s program.
Some of the “big givers" reduce
their pledges and let their dislike
become known. Some move to
another church where the “re
ligion” is the “right kind.” Or
the meeting of the church board
will produce budget wrangles and
decisions which, while not so
stated, have the effect of negating
the pastor’s program.
When, for example, the congre
gation of an Atlanta church, sens
ing the intention of some hostile
members to reduce their giving,
destirred itself to extra effort and
sacrifice and turned in the full
amount of the budget anyhow, the
board suddenly found a need for
an expensive addition to the
physical equipment of the church.
By this and other devices, the
board so depleted the budget that
the pastor’s program was wrecked.
One of the largest Methodist
churches in Georgia had a strong
ly worded resolution offered at an
April meeting of the stewards
which called for the instant dis
missal of any church officials (in
cluding the pastor) or Sunday
school teachers using the facilities
of the church to practice qc ad
vocate integration. It was defeat
ed — but the chairman of the
board said the vote did not mean
the church would permit Negroes
to attend.
Thus ministers are squeezed be
tween the dictates of conscience
and church policy, on the one
hand, and the prejudices of those
who “run” the church, on the
other. Save for the so-called “Bi
ble floggers,” the Ku Klux chap
plain breed, and those who are
sure that God himself is chief
among segregationists, this is a
time of agony of spirit for the
ministers of sensitive heart and
mind.
“We are all in a long period of
Gethsemane,” said one recently.
‘And once again Judas is with us.”
Every minister with any shred
of awareness sees that, just as the
racial issue is the greatest politi
cal issue before the world today,
so it is for Christianity. If the
first great commandment of Jesus,
and the second which is “like unto
it,’ have no validity in the minds
of church members, then the
churches are finished, or eventual
ly will be.
“The thing that gets me,” said
one minister who has taken a
moderate stand, “is the silence I
encounter. I go and expose my
self to members of my congrega
tion who I know to be in oppo
sition, so that we may talk. They
won’t. The silence is worst.
“Then, too, it is uncomfortable
to see successful business and
professional men, who have been
uiu iiiciiud aim on uug iiucuitidi
props, suddenly become cold and
aloof because one voices the opin
ion that a colored person is a
child of God and has a right to
worship in any of God’s houses.
You want to kneel and pray with
these men or to put your arms
around them and say, ‘Please,
what is it in your hearts that
makes you so stubborn and
afraid?’ But today too many men
are wrapped in the armor of un
reasonable fears and anger.”
Many ministers sorrowfully note
another effect of the church’s po
sition on desegregation. It is that
many people today love their
church, but not Christ and the
faith He taught.
“It had never occurred to me,”
said one, as he talked of it, with
genuine grief in his voice, “that
for so many people the church
was the building, the meeting with
old friends, the association in the
women’s organizations, and that
Christ meant little, if anything.
But it is true. There is a great
gulf between what some mean
when they say they love the
church and what another means
for whom Christ has validity. It
saddens me to learn how many
persons do not want Christ to in
trude on them, indeed will not
permit it, if He makes them un
comfortable.”
A sense of shame and self-ac
cusation is especially noticeable
among younger ministers, encoun
tering for the first time the hard
ness of some older men whom
they had regarded as great Chris
tian lay leaders. They have
stories to tell which, while some
times wryly humorous are always
sad with disillusionment.
Many a minister today is hold
ing on in a Southern church, de
.v.ejopipg^a technique of .survival,
merely because he does not want
to desert those in the congrega
tion who depend on him and need
him. Still others Iremain, believ
ing that time and God are work
ing together in their behalf.
There are some grounds for this
optimism. Slowly but surely, if
not always clearly, one may see
at work among lay groups the in
fluence of Christian ministers
courageous enough, and with
status enough to counter some of
the fanaticism. More and more
individuals, and a slow procession
of churches, are making the de
cision that houses of worship
should be open to all seeking God.
It will be slow, in some areas,
tortuously so, but it will come.
It will come most slowly of all
in those Deep South states where
there is sure to be the closing of
public schools over the same issue.
But there are a few churches even
there which welcome Negroes to
mass and to worship.
Although bo Southern church is
integrated in the true sense of
the word, almost every Southern
city has one or two churches to
which Negroes come with some
regularity. So far the doors are
open mainly in Catholic churches,
although beginnings toward de
segregation are evident in some
others. This development is lim
ited entirely to the cities; solid
opposition to integration persists
in rural areas.
As some things cannot be meas
ured in dollars and cents, just so
the impact of all that has hap
n#>n#»d. and is in nroeress. in this
field of race, religion and church,
cannot be put down in statistics
or any sort of box score. It is
something which involves the
heart, mind and adrenal glands.
An example of what could be
i called an awakening, or impact,
I is the experience of a Methodist
Church congregation in Georgia
whose minister has recently ac
cepted a call to a large church
! in the Southwest. The board of
| deacons had harassed him for
more than a year without ever
making the harassment overt. It
had depleted his budget unneces
sarily. It had dismissed his as
sistant and otherwise frustrated
his program.
The pastor believed most of the
members were on his side, but he
did not feel he could appeal to
them over the heads of his board.
The board was, as usual, made up
largely of the major financial con
tributors.
""Some few of these had come to
him privately to protest and argue
that his policy of being willing to
admit Negroes to worship was
wrecking the church and to urge
him to renounce it. Some treated
him with contemptuous conde
scension, saying he was just trying
to attain publicity at the expense
of the church. One, who said he
wanted to talk to him “like a
father,” appealed to him not to
ruin his career by being so radical.
Still another board member, a
man of considerable wealth, asked
him to his office. “I like you,”
he said, “but you have outlived
your usefulness. I .will give you
$5,000 if you will, resign quietly
and go elsewhere. It will be a
matter between us, t No one will
know.” The minister, managed to
restrain his anger, refused, and
quietly walked out.
The pastor stayed on for about
a year. Then, to prevent a tragic,
open break, he resigned. He him
self did not know what the impact
of the affair had been on his con
gregation. But soon afterward an
excited, happy member came to
him and said, “We had a meeting
to discuss your replacement. And
you know, we found that we have
just about fifty - three die - hard
segregationists in our congregation
of more than 2,000. We are going
to engage a man with convictions
like yours.”
Other congregations are slowly
learning more about themselves.
Without question, the controversy
over desegregation is causing
soul-searching; the result in the
months and years ahead may be
to break the race barriers in most
churches.
Those ministers who have come
to grips with this problem see the
church as fulfilling its greatest
role in the years ahead—that of
binding up the spiritual wounds,
and of moving mankind another
inch or so forward toward a
brotherhood of man, under God,
so that this nation, or any nation
so dedicated, can and shall have
a new birth of freedom.
The pastor of one large Southern
church has said: “We are all in
tegrated * * * every one of our
churches is integrated. The faces
in the pews may be all white.
But the Negro is there. He is
present in the anger and guilt of
some of the congregation. He is
present in the consciences of many.
He is present in the fears of the
ushers who wait each Sunday to
see if he will come. He waits in
the wings, invisible, but present
just the same.
"God is at work. Some of the
churches may become private
clubs and establish rigid rules
against the presence of nonmem
bers. They will never be happy.
They will never know peace. We
are all integrated and there is
nothing we can do about it save
ask God’s grace to make us see
it.”—(New York Times Magazine).
| Drive Safely
The Petal Papei
THE PETAL PAPER: Printed on
Thursday of every other week by THE
SOUTHERN FARMER, INC., Mont
gomery. Ala
Published by East Publications Co.,
Box 349 Hattiesburg. Miss
Entered as second class matter at
the Post Office at Petal, Mississippi,
under Act of March ft. 1879
RE-ENTERED A1 MONTGOMERY,
ALA
Second class postage paid at Mont
gomery, Ala
RETURN FORMS 3579 TO: THE
PETAL PAPER. BOX 349. HATTIES
BURG, MISS.
P D. East_Editor A Publisher
SUBSCRIPTIONS
Six Months-$3.00
Per Year_$5.00
/Ik. jtT
,,iv ''v '"v ',v *'*v • ^ ^ ^ -”■ n
I BOOKPLATES free catalog t
? showing scores of beautiful bookplates. Ideal for j
| gifts or for your own use. Address: ANTIOCH f
I BOOKPLATE CO., Yellow Springs 6, Ohio |
Read The Ads Along With The News
. • visiting the sins of the fathers
on the children, and on the
children's children . .
Did you know that—
Geneticists estimate that tests of H-bombs already
completed may ultimately mean 13,000 more deformed i
babies born? And that each new test adds unknown
numbers to that tragic total?
The Council of Atomic Scientists in Great Britain
has warned that as many as 50,000 people may get
cancer as a result of tests already performed?
9,235 scientists from many countries, including
36 Nobel Prize winners, have called ending of nuclear
tests “imperative”!
Diplomat George F. Kennan writes—
“l have expressly refrained from speaking, in
connection with these other matters, of that aspect of
the atomic problem that now worries many of my
countrymen most of all: namely, the damage that
may be done to our human environment and to the
genetic make-up of human beings by the mere testing
of these fearful weapons, not to mention their actual
use in war ...
"Surely it is better that many of us should die
somewhat before our time, than that we should live
at the cost of prejudicing the conditions of life for our
children. So long therefore, as the scientists disagree
about the effects of all this testing, it is our duty to
be guided by our obligation to other generations—not
just our own.”
—George F. Kennan, BBC
December 1, 1957.
Write the President today to stop the .testing of nuclear weap
ons. And to find your comrades in ''‘the struggle against war
and tor peace, write - - -
The Fellowship Of Reconciliation
Box 271 Nyock. N. Y.