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Science brought pressure to bear on church in '67Politically active clergymen such as Father James Groppi became so familiar that Paul Simon made reference to them in his song Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard (1972), with the line, "Now when the radical priest comes to get me released..."
WINNIPEG (Special)--The resignation of Cardinal Leger was listed as one of [the] top 10 religious news stories of 1967.
Scientific and medical developments that came later in the year topped the list.
The Lutheran Church in America's Commission on Press, Radio and Television reported their top 10 choices on a newscast carried by 300 stations in the United States, Canada and the Caribbean.
The test tube creation of chemical material that creates one form of life by Stanford University scientists "sets in motion some chain reactions in human psychology and theology to be argued for years," the summary said.
A second and equally significant news story with heavy religious over-tones occurred in South Africa with the first human heart transplant in history.
The No. 3 story was the "display of ecclesiastical courage of a Milwaukee Roman Catholic priest, Father James Groppi in leading a dozen parades of protesting Negroes in a fight for open housing in their city."
Here are the 10 selections for top religious news stories of 1967:
1. Scientists create life in test tube.
2. Human heart transplanted.
3. Father Groppi leads housing marches in Milwaukee.
4. Pope Paul, Patriarch Athenagoras exchange visits.
5. Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. adopts Confession of 1967.
6. "Modern Priest Looks at His Outdated Church."
7. Bishop Pike communicates with dead son.
8. President Johnson gets asked question in church.
9. First Synod of Bishops meets in Rome.
10. Canadian cardinal resigns to aid lepers.
The exchange of visits in Istanbul and Rome by Pope Paul the Sixth and and Patriarch Athenagoras, head of the Orthodox branch of Christendom, symbolized growing rapprochement between Christians."
The adoption of a new confession by the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S. was "the first such document in three centuries."
And the criticisms in the book by Father James Kavanaugh, "A Modern Priest Looks at His Outdated Church," added weight and momentum to the growing debate and discussion inside the institutional church of the stresses and strains on the contemporary church.
Carl McIntire, President of the International Council of Christian Churches, host of the 20th Century Reformation Hour radio broadcast, and a veteran of the battles between fundamentalists and modernists within the Presbyterian Church in the 1920s and '30s, wrote the book The Death of a Church (1967) about the Confession of 1967, and referred to the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. as "officially, judicially apostate."
James A. Pike, Episcopal Church Bishop of California from 1958-1966, was a notorious heretic and Social Justice Warrior who was a subject of frequent media coverage in his time, but is forgotten today. His son Jim committed suicide in 1966, and in September 1967, Bishop Pike appeared in a seance with medium Arthur Ford on the CTV news program W5 in an attempt to contact his son. Bishop Pike died in the Judean Desert under mysterious circumstances in September 1969 at the age of 56.
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Should churches aid homosexualsThe above article indicates that the attempt of sodomites to infiltrate and subvert churches is nothing new. The Board of Trustees of the American Psychiatric Association, under pressure from sodomite activists, voted in 1973 to remove homosexuality from the category of disorder in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual--which shows how scientific the DSM is.
No, say psychiatrists
United Press International
Homosexuals are waging a militant campaign for acceptance of their way of life as a normal condition, like being left-handed.
Their hopes for changing public attitudes would be greatly enhanced if they could get churches on their side. Recently, they seem to have made substantial progress in that direction.
A group of 90 Episcopalian priests met in New York for a symposium on the church's approach to homosexuality. The majority agreed that the church should classify homosexual relations between consenting adults as "morally neutral," and said that in some cases they may even be a good thing.
This month, thousands of congregations of the United Presbyterian Church and the United Church of Christ are receiving booklets, prepared by the social action departments of the two denominations, asserting that the church has a special responsibility for helping to change society's attitude toward homosexuality, because in the past it has been "the institution most vehement in its opposition to the homosexual."
The booklets are intended for study and discussion by local church groups.
Over the protests of several "homophile" organizations, most psychiatrists insist that homosexuality is an illness. They say it can be treated if the patient is strongly motivated, but that a majority of homosexuals appear satisfied to remain as they are.
Dr. Samuel Hadden, associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania medical school, is quoted in one of the new booklets as saying that recognition of homosexuality as "socially acceptable behavior" would be a dangerous relaxation of cultural constraints.
Dr. Hadden goes on to say that he is "most certainly opposed to harassment of homosexuals." But there is a vast difference, he points out, between humanizing essentially unenforceable laws, and accepting homosexuality as "a totally desirable state."
Canon Kenneth Sharp of Washington, D.C. expressed a similar view in a sermon:
"Let us not forget that by and large this is an acquired trait," he said.
"In the atmosphere of social acceptance, individuals were directed into the practice of homosexuality who otherwise would have led normal lives. There are strong indications that this was a factor in the deterioration of some civilizations."
Canon Sharp said the church should treat homosexuals as it has lately learned to treat alcoholics--neither condemning their plight as a moral collapse, nor condoning it as a normal way of life, but looking on them with compassion as sick people who need help and understanding.
That, however, is not what homosexuals want from the church. They want homosexuality to be on a moral and legal par with normal heterosexual relationships between males and females.
To accept this view, the church would have to make a sharp break with Jewish and Christian tradition. That tradition is reflected in such Biblical passages as Leviticus 18:22, which describes homosexual practices as "an abomination," and in Romans 1:26-27, which says that homosexual relationships are a sin "against nature."
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'Bible ethics unreliable'St. Michael's College is a Roman Catholic institution affiliated with the University of Toronto. My reaction to idiocy such as that spouted by Father Bruns is to follow the advice of Proverbs 14:7:
TORONTO (CP) -- Why is the tempter in the story of Adam and Eve a serpent?
Because it's a phallic symbol, says Rev. J. Edgar Bruns, chairman of the theology department at St. Michael's College, and it illustrates the anti-sex and anti-woman element of the Old Testament.
Father Bruns, who analyzes the Christian sexual heritage in a book entitled "The New Morality", says the Old Testament is filled with anit-sexual and anti-feminist taboos and he lists a number of "thoroughly evil women" who figure in the biblical narratives.
There was Potiphar's wife, who tried to seduce Joseph; Delilah, who was Samson's barber and his undoing; and Jezebel, who has become a synonym for the thoroughly hateful woman.
Father Bruns rejects the Bible as a reliable ethical guide because of the contrast of moral precepts--some of which are "only valid at a particular period because of the historical circumstances which created them" and others which "remain valid independently of time and place."
He suggests that the original sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was not homosexuality, but "inhospitality", which all Eastern peoples regarded as a serious offence, and was later changed by rabbis who were alarmed by the Greek propensity toward homosexuality.
Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not in him the lips of knowledge.
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Ontario merger beginningMembership in the United Church of Canada peaked in 1965, so by January 1968, the UCC was in the early stages of a decline that continues to this day.
TORONTO (CP) -- The United Church of Canada and the 10,000-member Evangelical United Brethren will merge this month.
Some local mergers have already taken place in Ontario. A London congregation of Evangelical United Brethren merged with a United church in 1958 and last June the congregation of an EUB church in Chelsey joined a United church.
In the South Cayuga area, two United churches have closed so that their congregations might worship with the Evangelical United Brethren.
The move toward union came after the American Evangelical United Brethren began negotiating union with Methodists in the U.S. The Canadian EUB then had to decide whether it should become an extension of the American Methodist Church or join with the United Church of Canada.
Union was approved by 73 per cent last May in Hamilton at a meeting of the Canadian Conference of the EUB. It was approved in 1966 by the general council of the United Church.
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The following ads from local Calgary churches pretty much speak for themselves.
First Spiritualist S.N.U.
402--7th Ave. East
7:30 Evening Service
Guest Speaker
Subject:
THERE IS NO DEATH
Clairvoyant
Mrs. C. Whitehead
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Unitarian Church of Calgary
Dr. Charles Costello
Dept. Psychology, U of C
"The Present Status of LSD and Marijuana"
10:30 a.m.
Mount Royal College
Adult Service, Church School and Nursery
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Central United Church
First Street and Seventh Avenue S.W.
....
11:00 A.M.
"1968: YEAR OF THE HAWK OR YEAR OF THE DOVE?"
7:30 P.M.
"A POSITIVE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY"
"This New Year offers an opportunity to begin restoring a positive kind of social philosophy"
Editorial, "The Calgary Herald"
....
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Knox United Church
Corner Sixth Avenue and Fourth Street West
...
11:00 a.m. COMMUNION MEDITATION -- "JUST LOOKIN' AROUND"
7:00 p.m. "CHURCH A GO-GO" (The Prophetic View)
See my posts
A secular columnist accurately assesses Canada's declining liberal churches (July 30, 2012)
United Church of Canada elects its first openly sodomite moderator (August 16, 2012)
50 years ago: United Church of Canada unveils Sunday School curriculum denying the truth of the Bible (August 1, 2014)
80 years ago: United Church of Canada ordains Canada's first female minister (November 7, 2016)
Amalgamation of congregations in Edmonton provides more evidence of the continuing decline of the United Church of Canada (January 31, 2017)
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