July 29, 1956

Vatican City: The machinery of the church is moving slowly to beatify Cardinal Rafael Merry del Val, who died in 1930. He was secretary of state to Pope Pius X, 1903-1914. The proceedings so far have reached the stage at which the Holy Congregation of Rites has approved the cardinal’s writings.

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Vienna: For the first time in history, an important international conclave was held on communist soil during the past week. The meeting was that of the 90-member central committee of the World Council of Churches. The committee met in a village in Red Hungary. The theme of the meeting was “Proselytizing and Religious Liberty.” Delegates from churches in all the communist countries, including Red China, were present, along with those delegates from the Western, democratic countries.

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New York: Two New York rabbis returned from a trip to Russia and satellite countries saying that Jews in Poland and Czechoslovakia are not better off than those in Russia. Rabbi Harold Gordon and Rabbi Israel Mowshowitz said in both countries there are severe limitations on Jewish cultural activities. And in Czechoslovakia where the salaries of rabbis are paid by the state, the synagogues, like the Christian churches, are more and more coming under the iron control of Red politicians.

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Frankfurt, Germany: An American minister says Russian Baptists who recently visited America were sadly disappointed because they found American women too worldly. The Rev. R.J. Smith of the Church of Christ recently returned to Frankfurt after a 10-day visit to Russia where he met the Baptist leaders who visited America. They told him they were shocked that women in America smoked, used lipstick, and had other worldly ways. In the Soviet Union, devout Baptists do not drink or smoke and the women use no cosmetics. Mr. Smith said the Soviet government gave him encouragement in his plan to get visas for ministers of the Church of Christ to visit Russia.

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New York: The Brotherhood of the United Lutheran Church in America may change its name to The Lutheran Church Men. The change will be proposed at the biennial convention at Kitchener, Ontario, September 20- 22. The idea is to get a more modern and inclusive name. For example, the women’s auxiliary of the church which once was known as the “Women’s Missionary Society” now calls itself “The United Lutheran Church Women.”

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Atlanta: Pope Pius has divided the state of Georgia into two Catholic dioceses. The Most Rev. Francis Hyland, who has been auxiliary bishop of the Atlanta-Savannah Diocese since 1949, becomes bishop of the new Diocese of Atlanta. Archbishop Gerald O’Hara continues as head of the Diocese of Savannah. The new Atlanta Diocese will comprise 70 counties.

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The first U.S. Roman Catholic priest to enter Russia as a tourist is due to arrive in Leningrad today. He is the Rev. Walter C. Jaskiewicz, director of the Institute of Contemporary Russian Studies of Fordham University, in the Bronx, New York. Father Jaskiewicz, a Jesuit, speaks and reads Russian fluently. He considers it always profitable to test the value of theoretical knowledge against reality. And he adds his 30-day visit to the Soviet Union will be in the nature of practical checks within the limits of feasibility. The Fordham educator will visit, among other Russian cities, Riga, Leningrad, Kiev, Odessa, Yalta, Tiflis, Kharkov, and Moscow. No Catholic priest has been in Moscow since March of last year. That was when the Rev. George Bissonnette was expelled as chaplain of the U.S. colony there.

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Reports of greatly improved treatment of six U.S. Catholic missionaries in Red Chinese jails leads to a church opinion that they may be released soon. The Catholic newsletter of Hong Kong says the Americans are getting special food, apparently in an effort to remove signs of prison life. The publication got the information from a British subject recently released from a Chinese Communist prison.

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A U.S. rabbi recently returned from Russia says he used Yiddish newspapers printed in the U.S. to set up contact with Jews in the Soviet Union. Rabbi George Lieberman of Rockville Centre, Long Island, adds he read the publications in the lobby of his hotel or carried them conspicuously when he attended a theater. He relates some Jews approached him openly. Others sought him surreptitiously to get information. They made appointments to meet him in subways or parks or on the steps of libraries. Then the American and the Russian would sit side by side and talk, each with his face buried in a newspaper. Rabbi Lieberman says the Russian Jews were much interested in news about Jews. But he adds they had astonishingly poor knowledge of recent developments.

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The new head of a group placing Bibles in hotels is P.J. Zondervan of Grand Rapids, Michigan. He was elected president of Gideons International at the organization’s recent annual convention in Atlanta. Mrs. Clarence Haan of Chicago has been chosen president of the Gideons Auxiliary.

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The young peoples’ organization of the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, has voted to set up a preparation program for young persons entering military life. The plan of the Walther League is based on the belief that too many church young people are spiritually and morally unprepared for what the young Missouri Lutherans term the temptations of military life. The secretary of the league, the Rev. Alfred P. Klausler of Chicago, has told the league’s convention that the problem is part of parish youth programs. He explains potential service people are in church youth ranks until they are 17. The Rev. Mr. Klausler, who is a lieutenant colonel in the Air Force, says it is the church’s responsibility to prepare the draftee for his life in the service. The delegates to the Ames, Iowa, meetings have decided, among other things, that young people at home will keep in touch with absentee members in the service.

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The North Carolina legislature has just adjourned after passing a series of administration-backed bills aimed at meeting the segregation issue in the public schools. The lawmakers were called into special session last Monday by Governor Hodges and presented with the bills embodying the recommendations of a special committee on education set up by the 1955 assembly to study ways and means of circumventing the law. These bills provide for amendments to the state constitution to (1) allow the states to pay private tuition grants to parents who object to their children attending mixed schools; and (2) authorize local school boards to close their schools by majority vote of the people when “intolerable” conditions occur. It will be interesting to see what happens.

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Some weeks ago this reporter was kidded somewhat freely for saying on this program that there was no likelihood of the school aid bill getting any action this session. Well, “I told you so’s” are fairly hollow in the face of a failure on the part of our elected representatives to face up to a moral issue and provide for the education of our growing children. But Congress has adjourned, the school aid bill died in committee, and nothing will be done on the part of the federal government at least until next session to provide aid so badly needed. In the meantime, both Democrats and Republicans will go back to their respective states and districts and each will blame the other for failure of the school bill. Just remember this, whatever those politicians say: both are to blame. It would have taken support of both to pass it, and neither can morally blame the other more than he can blame himself.

Other unfinished items on the Congressional agenda include such items as the civil rights measure. There the Democrats must take the blame, for while Republicans probably gleefully maneuvered the bill into the Senate knowing that undemocratic Democrat Sen. Eastland’s committee on the judiciary would not let it get out of that body, had the Democrats been in favor of passage, it would have taken place. It is something of a sad commentary on the term “Democrat” that one calling himself so would prohibit passage of a bill that would have simply safeguarded for all citizens, regardless of race or color, those rights which he demands for himself. There is no excuse for the behavior of the Eastlands. Their very actions make their oath to support the Constitution close to perjury, for they swear to uphold the Constitution, then proceed to subvert it by refusing to enact legislation to carry into effect the clear decisions of the Supreme Court interpreting that Constitution.

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Left unfinished also is action on the pernicious Walter-McCarran Immigration Bill, a statute that both Democrat Stevenson and Republican Eisenhower pledged themselves to revise. The statute, and if you have not read it, I urge that you do so, clearly militates against certain nationalities and religious groups. All of this is understandable if you understand its authors, both self-styled Democrats, who wrote into the law of the land discriminatory doctrines that are in spirit, if not in letter, alien to the clear implication not only for our tradition as a people but to the declared meaning of our Constitution itself.

There is more than mere comment involved in all this. We the people have a right to expect honest and forthright action by our representatives on matters on which they declared themselves at the time they asked for our confidence at the polls. It is like welshing on a bet, backing down on a promise. In essence, it is bearing false witness, and voters should take these matters into account when they are asked to support those who failed miserably to live up to what they promised two, four, and six years ago.

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Debunking is a healthy and somewhat time-honored American tradition. Americans generally take a dim view of pretension and affectation, whether it be intellectual or moral. They often correctly suspect that the high-flown phrase is without substance. As the late Will Rogers said in the early 1930s, “Maybe ‘ain’t’ ain’t so correct, but I notice that lots of folks who ain’t using ‘ain’t’ ain’t eatin.” Well, bad grammar will not make a false statement true, or a true statement false, nor is it the hallmark of character or wisdom. Why, then, do so many Americans take so much delight in ridiculing the professor? Maybe it is because we take pride in being what we call ourselves, “practical people.” We ask not, “Is it true?” but “Will it work?” But I’m convinced that the reason is deeper than this somewhat healthy skepticism. A new and sinister element has entered the American attitude toward learning, an attitude springing from a general sense of insecurity and expressing itself in a suspicion that any form of free speculation somehow is aimed at subverting our morals or our institutions. There is nothing intrinsically new about all this. We can recall the Salem witch-hunts of the 17th century; the Know Nothing movement of the 19th and the K.K.K. of a more recent day. Today the attacks come from self-appointed crusaders and vigilante groups who have set up arbitrary criteria by which to judge the loyalty or patriotism of other individuals. Books have been attacked, usually not because all the attackers have read and understand them but because someone has said they are dangerous. The importance of these attacks is that they are aimed not at a creed or a sect or a radical minority or an unpopular belief but at the very principle of tolerance itself, and at the people who have traditionally restored our emotional equilibrium after a period of hysteria – the much-abused intellectual.

A man who has lived with error and has known the difficulty – and the joy – of conquering is not likely to be dogmatic. He will not deny to others the right to seek the truth in their own way, even though he may see pitfalls into which they are bound to stumble. That is why the intellectual is both a doctor for our ills and a defender of our basic liberties. And that is why the forces of intolerance must not succeed. They must not succeed because a single shackle placed upon man’s right to knowledge is a shackle upon truth and upon that freedom that has made this nation great and, God willing, will make it greater. Nearly a hundred years ago, the army of Northern Virginia invaded the state of Maryland, and the commanding general issued a proclamation to the citizens, a few sentences which are worth our attention now:

“No constraint upon your free will is intended – no intimidation will be allowed. Within the limits of this army, at least, Marylanders shall once more enjoy their ancient freedom of thought and speech. We know no enemies among you, and will protect all of every opinion.”

The man who said that was endowed with far more than common military values. Their utterance on the field of battle, in enemy territory, was an act of supreme moral courage and could only have been inspired by a passionate devotion to the highest democratic ideals. Today freedom of thought and expression – man’s right to knowledge and the free use thereof are a part of our American heritage that must be preserved for and handed on to future generations.

 

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