The church mosaic, side 1.

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Gathered together in common vulnerability, we discover how much
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we have to give each other. The Christian community is the
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opposite of a highly uniform group of people whose behavior has been
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toned down to a common denominator and whose originality has
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dulled. On the contrary the Christian community
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gathered in common discipleship is a place where individual gifts can
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be called forth and put into service for the benefit of all
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That belongs to the essence of this new togetherness
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that our unique talents are no longer objects of competition, but
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elements of community. No longer qualities that divide,
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but gifts that unite. In community the particular talents
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of the individual members become like the little stones that form
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a great mosaic. The fact that a little gold, blue or
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red piece is part of a splendid mosaic makes it not
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less, but more valuable because it contributes to an
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image much greater than itself.
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These words, I believe, echo our purpose, which you have before you
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in the adaptable model which we hope you will take home and feel led to
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use. I would like to read that purpose, and you might like to read along with me.
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We seek to picture the church as a mosaic,
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identifying the pieces by recognizing the gifts each person
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brings, hearing their concerns, feeling each
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other's pain, that together we might discover new ways of responding
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to each other as we the church try to live and walk in
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faithfulness to God's call. Then by God's grace we will no
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longer be isolated pieces, but a picture of wholeness.
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We're most fortunate and privileged to have Miss Jane Whitney
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from Philadelphia as our moderator and facilitator here today.
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Jane is the host of the Jane Whitney show WCAU-T V
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Philadelphia, a public affairs talk show. She has been
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with Channel ten since nineteen eighty, and prior to that time she was co-host
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of PM Magazine for K.X. T.V. in Sacramento California.
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She has had a great deal of experience and expertise in communication
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and is keenly aware and knowledgeable about the any many issues facing society
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and the church today. Jane is also a Presbyterian woman
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and so familiar somewhat with the idiosyncrasies of our denomination.
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Her warm and open personality make you really feel right at
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home. Jane, we welcome you to with us today. [Whitney, Jane speaking] Thank you very much.
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Right now I think we should meet the panelists. And, I think, so we all have
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an idea of what your lives are like. Describe your life in three sentences, George.
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We are going to ask each of them to just tell us briefly about who they are. I must start with George
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Morgan.[Morgan, George Pidcock]
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[Morgan speaking] I live in Columbus Ohio. I'm Synod Executive in the
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Senate of the Covenant, which is
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most of Ohio, Michigan, and Kentucky.
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I've
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had three careers, all of them in the church and all quite
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different. I've been a parish pastor. I have been a university pastor
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and a church administrator. I've lived in a lot of places
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Starting in West Virginia, in New Jersey, in New York State, in
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Scotland, in California, now in Ohio.
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So that I've seen a lot of the church. I have
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A background theologically which I would identify as
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historically evangelical, and I'm a member of the Witherspoon Society.
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I have two daughters and two sons-in-law and two grandsons, whose pictures
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I would be glad to show you.
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OK. Mary Yamamoto.
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[Yamamoto speaking] OK I'm from Davis California and I'm a deacon in the Davis Community Church.
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And and I have five girls and two boys. And my husband
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is a professor in the medical school at U.C.D. And I would like
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to mention that during the War, I was interned in camp.
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And, that was an experience I will
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not forget. And, I know there will be some questions coming from the audience
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about this past. And I hope I will be able to
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answer some of the questions for you. OK. Thelma
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Adair.
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[Adiar speaking] Veteran Presbyterian
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I am Thelma Adair [Adair, Thelma C. Davidson] . I live in New York City
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in the center of the black community, where my husband [Adair, Arthur Eugene]
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pastored a church [Mount Morris Ascension Presbyterian Church] that we organized in the early nineteen forties for more than
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thirty-eight years until his death.
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By profession I teach. I am a full-time thirty-
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six hour a day volunteer. And, I have served as Moderator of
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your church. And, I am presently the national
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president of Church Women United.
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Martha Campbell. I'm from Highbridge, New Jersey, having also
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lived in the Chicago area, Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio, due to
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corporate transfers. A few years ago I was pretty secure in the knowledge
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that, as a suburban wife and mother and
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volunteer, that I was the typical United Presbyterian Women, woman.
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I now find that that is not true, and that I am one of the new minority
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of
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full time mothers, who is also a volunteer.
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I'm grateful that I am just another piece in the mosaic.
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Kent Pipes [Pipes, Kenton R.].
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[Pipes speaking] I'm Kent Pipes. I'm living right now in Willingboro, New Jersey. I was
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raised in California in a very fundamentalist home, non
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Presbyterian. I went to seminary and converted to Presbyterian.
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I then finished at McCormick Seminary, entered the ministry kicking and screaming, didn't feel
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that God really was directing me there.
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Except for the fact that that's where the church was. I had friends who had left
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the organized church and started a community, one of which
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became Sojourners Fellowship, now in Washington D.C. I
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felt very much on the outside of the organized church and still sometimes feel that
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way because of my political and social views, though I find myself theologically
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to be the perspective of the evangelical andconservative side. So, I
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tend to have friends and enemies in all camps of the church.
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Right now I'm pastoring during half time and supporting myself and my family
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selling real estate and insurance. My wife and I and my wife was also selling insurance to and
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also an organist in the congregation where we are. So I
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think that little bit of background. shows you how diverse we are
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today.
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OK Right now we're going to have to try to do the same thing with the reactors, who are down in the audience for
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the reason that maybe you can distance yourself a little bit despite the fact you are on the front row.
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and Allan I'll start with you. Boesak right? Allan Boesak? My name is Allan Boesak.
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I come from Cape Town South Africa. I am
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a campus minister and live and work in a
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situation, which is sometimes difficult.
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And one cannot live comfotably except if you want to live with the Lord. And, I am very happy to be here.
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I am Jill Martinez. I'm a third year student at San Francisco Theological Seminary.
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And, I'm currently doing my internship in Guadalupe, California, which is a
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small migrant farm community and which is also my home. I'm Don Black. [Black, Donald F.]
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I'm Associate Director of the Program Agency
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and the husband of Fran Black, who works for the Thelma Adair in
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Church Women United and tries to keep subscription lists straight and so forth and
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to top George Morgan, which is my only chance to do that, we have seven
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grandchildren. You have more time. Two of
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our sons are in the pastorate, one as a chaplain in the
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hospital in Cincinnati, the other pastor in a church in New York State. The third
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is a banker and that's appropriate with two brothers and a father in the ministry
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to be sort of the work.
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OK we've met the principals. I would just like to say when I was invited to do this.
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I don't remember when it was, but it was quite some time ago to be here at Purdue. I
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think I was asked to do so because I do have a show in Philadelphia where we cover issues of local,
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national or international concern, everything ranging from the Human Life Amendment to Agent
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Orange to the threat of nuclear war. And, I don't think they knew when they
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asked me that I was Presbyterian, or I am Presbyterian.
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I must admit, though, the folks at the national office were kind enough to send
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me the Church and Society publication dating back to nineteen seventy-three. I've been
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reading ever since. It's a lot of reading. It was very
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interesting. I must say. I must confess
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that I didn't know. My Presbyterianism really doesn't extend far beyond the
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"Doxology" and the Apostle's Creed. I have to be very honest with you.
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A couple of people cringed involuntarily. What I found, though, in reading through those
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bulletins on whether or not you agree with a sensitive or
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controversial subject the way the church policy or the General Assembly has blocked it
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out on those bulletins, I was very proud and delighted to
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see that the whole range of human issues, in my opinion,
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were covered in that publication and are being addressed in the church. And, I think,
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that's very exciting. So, for that reason, I'm even gladder to be here today. OK
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what I want to find out, show of hands, How many of you feel that
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being involved in social issues and human issues is a vital
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part of your Christian ministry? Hands up. Maybe I should ask how
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many feel that it's not a part?
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OK. Oh, wait a second! All right. You don't?
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I do,
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but our church is very evangelical and
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it bothers me, because I think that we should be involved with social issues, each of
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the circles have projects, but the church
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as a whole, we just don't. We want to be. We don't have, we don't want to have
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the big controversies and we're growing by leaps and bounds.
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Yes we've built on and we are bulging at the seams again but you
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need you feel you have to express yourself as an individual when it's not done. You don't do it as a church trial
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right.
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I ask you what kinds of issues do you really care about. Certainly peace in the
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world and hunger.
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What about some of you some of you other folks in the audience? What are some of your real pressing concerns right now?
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I just went through a thirteen-week study of peace in the Sunday School
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class. And then the session voted not to vote.
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Very depressing. What do you do then? What is your next option? That's why I'm here.
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OK OK You also have problems of ecology
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all over the globe.
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Yes I'm primarily ours, I suppose. I saw another hand
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to speak. And is peace in church or union?
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Church reunion came up earlier than we thought it might, didn't it?
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Running about five minutes.
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OK. Why don't we save church reunion for a few minutes and get some other concerns before we go on because I think we're going to
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talk about that. Will you stand up?
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I'm Betty Dodson. I'm from Charleston, Illinois. I'm concerned about the thing that the
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first woman mentioned.
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I'm concerned about the splits and the rifts in our church fellowship and the unity of the
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church because basically a theological stance and theological
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differences between conservatives and liberals between
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evangelicals.
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I have a concern. I worry. I'm from New Mexico and I work
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with the undocumented. And I am concerned about the immigration laws.
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OK. Among many concerns I have is how in the local church, we
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can minister to the community around us.
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I live in a county that presently has twenty-four percent unemployment rate
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with all the implications of this. I am concerned in how we as a
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congregation can reach out and minister to these people where they are.
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I'm aware that as a church we do much on a larger scale, but I'd like to see it
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on both ends.
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OK.
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I'm concerned about losing some of the friendship of our Latin American
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people. They are wonderful folks. And, we should have them as friends and not
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having, losing some of that.
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And I'd also like to hear something of the good things that the multi
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corporations do in those countries, not just the bad.
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OK.
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Yes.
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I'm from Philadelphia. I am concerned about juvenile justice.
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How about agism? How about agism? How about older women who aren't
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supposed to get old gracefully, but somehow as women we get to be old hags, right? Do men age gracefully?
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Double standard. Yet a couple back there.
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And I'm concerned about land use and soil conservation. I'm from New Jersey,
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and I'm very concerned about teenage alcoholism.
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I'm from Virginia, and I'm very concerned about child abuse and battered women.
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OK maybe we should turn to our panel of just for a minute and find out. Start with you
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Martha, some of the things that were just mentioned. You identify with any of the issues, or do you have your own that you
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really are especially worried about?
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My and my most involvement has been with the hunger issue so that I
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really identify with that. But, what I've discovered over a period of
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time in dealing with the hunger issue is the interrelatedness of all the
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issues. And I hope I'm not begging the question, but what what
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strikes me about this is that if we don't take a holistic
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view we we cannot get far with artificial
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separation.
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OK. Thelma? It struck me. Peace.
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That's the top burner for me since in the last
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few months we have been on three
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different continents. The groundswell interest
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around the world for nuclear freeze, the
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banning of the bomb. I'm speaking now of an Australian
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experience of being present at the world conference on peace
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in Moscow. You heard very little about it, mostly about Billy Graham
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speaking in the Rose Bowl on Peace Sunday.
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The voices are there. And, how can
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the church help those voices become translated into
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pressure points for government. And, the other was unemployment,
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twenty-four percent for a community. But, if I put on my racial
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ethnic cap, I'd have to
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begin to say to all of us that we are
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building slow-fused time bomb for people. What
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are fifty-three percent black youth, males
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that have never had a job? It goes with one
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half of the population has no work ethic. Now fifty-
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three percent of black teenagers, those
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kind of people.
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OK Mary? [Yamamoto speaking] Right now, the thing that is bothering me
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are the so-called middle class people that I have been saying,
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who are now losing their jobs, losing their homes,
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and that children that are involved. They used to
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have security. They no longer have that. They used to have plenty of food.
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They no longer have that. So, in our community of Davis, we're trying to.
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Well. What is bad. is that all we are doing is committees committees
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and we aren't going forward.
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OK. George? [Morgan, George Pidcock speaking] This is an
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interesting discipline for me to try to narrow down what the issues were that
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concern me the most. And, all the panel decided that they would
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do that so I tried to do it too.
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I guess
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as far as social issues are concerned, peacemaking is the is the one that is
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highest on my agenda.
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My I would give it the highest priority,
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and not just being against war but trying to
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cultivate and develop the art of peace in an aggressive,
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in an aggressive way.
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Another one that's very close and very inter-related is the
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impact of of economic policy on people.
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It's not just that I have, within the region I work
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in, the city with the highest unemployment rate in the
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United States, Flint, Michigan. But
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and it's not just government economic policy, but it's the economic
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policy, the international economic policy of most multi-national corporations and giant
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organ companies that operate all over over the world and
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have their own foreign policies and economic policies,
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which operate quite independently of governments, but have tremendous
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impact worldwide on the people of the world.
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That's a social issue that's bigger than all of us, but has to absorb some
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attention from us. Within the church, I
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have a very high level concern about Reunion.
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I have wanted it to happen.
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I hope it does, but I would hope for the next five ten years, we do not
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become so bogged down organizationally in making it happen
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that we don't do anything else.
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I'm concerned too about something else, that is sort of elusive to try to put into words.
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It's it's a kind of separatism that can happen so
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easily in our church when individual congregations can feel
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separated out. The positive
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word for it I guess would be self-sufficiency. But self-sufficiency can
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be demonic. And, presbyteries can have that same kind of
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separate feeling of we don't need anything beyond this or synods
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can or the denomination can. And, that kind of Christian separatism is a
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very
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demonic thing, I think. Just out of curiosity how many of you have felt that?
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Or have some sort of identity with what George just said about the separatism?
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OK OK. Quite a few. Kent, we'll hear from you. [Pipes, Kenton R. speaking] What
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troubles me most is that I see the church basically functioning as
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a religious organization and not willing to be the church
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as I hear it being described and charted as the New Testament body.
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People are so ready to accept the savingness of Christ and the power that can
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come to in a sense assure our future. But then they turn right
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around and protect themselves without becoming fully under the Lordship of
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Christ, which then would allow them to address these issues with abandon: the
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peace issue when we're not concerned about our own future, but the future of the world Christ
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died for. Our own economic interest, I mean you can't drive by a Presbyterian church
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parking lot on Sunday morning and believe that they really are reading the same scripture
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that you read. If you hear the thing saying to you get rid of your
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material wealth. Give your extra coat to the poor person doesn't have one.
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Live simply so that others may simply live. I mean if you get at the core of your faith,
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and if you're committed really to being a Christian and following the Lordship of Christ,
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then these other issues are not issues anymore.
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The church can work in unison to solve them, but I think we really haven't gotten together
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theologically to really define what it is that God is calling us to be. And, that's
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the ultimate underlying problem for the church, not the other issues that keep arising.
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But what it means to be the church. That's where I think we need to address some of the basic
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concerns.
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One thing.
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I would agree with that. It brings me to something that concerns me very much and which
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might speak to the woman who wants to know, where do we go next? And, why isn't my church involved?
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And, it has to do with our being, I think, very afraid of
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conflict in our church. And, that's not to say that we haven't had many
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controversial issues over the past several years,
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but we are in a hurry to rush on to
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the, the reconciliation. And, I would just like to point out to
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you that the theme statement for our national meeting
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can be read. And, I'm afraid it's too often read, like this:
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Compelled by gratitude for God's gift of grace to seek a vision for our time,
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we struggle with questions, experience a tension, that would compromise us over the choices.
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So we can get to the "Never the less." And, I'm suggesting now that
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we're going to have to pause at each step along the way. And, until we
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are able to do that, to struggle with the questions,
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to experience that tension.
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You cannot experience something in a hurry, it takes time. To
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live with the compromises. In that church, you're going to
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have to compromise somewhere along the line. Can you live with that?
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And then to wrestle with the choices that we have to make.
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You talk about longevity. and I
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think I would feel at times we have been content
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to wrestle, but not to seek for closure.
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and I agree that we will
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never be without tension, but I want to let
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let go some as we've solved this. We
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have affirmed the fact that we are church of diversity. And we want you
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there
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as peers. And, let's just move on as peers to tackle
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local and regional global issues.
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I think it's peers that we cannot be afraid to disagree.
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too often, we
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Seem to think that there is no such thing as an angry Christian.
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We're very uncomfortable. Just let me out! When I was going to say, we need to
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stop right there because. How many people feel? When I was reading, I
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mentioned the Church and Society Bulletin. And, I guess, I was a little surprised that their
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policy per se stated on abortion,
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on on alcoholism, policy on violence and sex in the
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media. There was policy on our El Salvador, on Cuba.
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I mean just everything was covered. Now what is that mean to you? I mean the church,
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should the church be in the, not the business, but go about setting
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policy?
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What does that mean to you?
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Not everybody in this room, I'm sure, agrees about about equal rights for women. Do
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they? I mean, you know, the Church and Society
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publication or the General Assembly endorsed equal rights amendment back in nineteen seventy-
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five. And yet, there is not. Oh, way! OK I want to ask you.
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But there's a lot of,
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you know, there's pluralism within this very room. And, I hear talk about unity and going on to
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bigger issues.
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Well, how do you do that? Does anybody have an answer to that?
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Actually, I should have pointed out that we're not probably going to get many answers here today. We're just trying to really
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listen to each other. I think you do. Could you get? I can't fly over there.
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I don't have an answer, but if we take our Christianity seriously, we cannot ignore
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the people around us in the world. We have to be concerned about what is
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happening to them and concerned about their needs.
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One of the ways that we can do that is start by asking people,
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What does Jesus Christ mean to you? And, when they answer that question, the
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second result is then. What difference does it make in your life as you live in the world?
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What is God saying to you to do about that thing
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which you believe Christ has done for you and in you and to you.
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If you believe it's directed at God then you can affirm somebody who's struggling to
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protect children who are being abused. The question is, Is it God-
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directed or is my socially chosen way to work out my
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faith. I mean it's an option for me to choose which
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social issue with mine
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or does God somehow direct the Christian community to
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meet the needs of the people of the world. And, if we get back to a spirit-
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directed church, then we could affirm each other. It is a matter of discerning the work of
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the Spirit in our midst, not whether or not you're doing the right thing or not.
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But, I think the church does have a responsibility corporately to say, "Hey! I think
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you are wrong!" And, the church has said there are such things as heresies in the past.
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Now, that's where we come to do issue when the church talks about certain
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policy kinds of matters. I happen to believe that the church has made misjudgment in
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the area of freedom of choice and right to life issue. And, I disagree with
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the church's posture on that. I sit silently, not so quietly,
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but I have an inner burning inside of me that the church continues to support
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peace issues and justice issues on all kinds of life-related matters except
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for the fetuses that are having to struggle right now in our society for their protection.
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And, that's a frustration. How do you live in a church and be a part of a church when you agree with
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so much of what it's doing except for this thing which constantly
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burns and festers? Could you answer that question? How do you live with it?
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Not very easily. I think if we look at the six Great Ends of the
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Church, it's impossible for us to separate our
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theology and the spiritual from our social action. They have
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to meld together. It could be or to be a whole church.
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Can you have? I mean do you have disparity of opinion within a whole church?
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I think that is where creative conflict comes. We don't want to be a
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pattern, all cut from the same pattern. I think we
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have to have. When the Lord chose his twelve disciples, each one of them
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brought different gifts to that.
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I'm hearing a lot of murmurs of agreement. Yes? OK. Chris, do you
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have a comment down here?
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Yeah. I just wanted to respond to what I was
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hearing Kent say. And I think it brings us to a point of putting our life on
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the line and being willing to risk and be vulnerable. And, I think sometimes that
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that's a hard thing to do. There's a there's a lot of fear that goes with that. What what does that really
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mean to to risk and be vulnerable for others? And, I think this is, as someone
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said to me the other day, this is like a third conversion in your life. And,
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I would be interested in knowing Allan Boesak's response
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to that because I I sense in his life that he has had that
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third conversion.
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Allan. Talk about, that is another tough act to follow. Have you had a third conversion? Or
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a total one? Why don't you stand up. I'm not so sure about
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that third conversion experience, in the sense, whether I have gone through
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that voluntarily. about for a long time or lose the idea that I was pushed into
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something that I never really wanted to do and that God was
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doing something to me that I was not really ready to
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argue with him about but I didn't want to do it and I find
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myself in a situation where when
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a friend sometimes because I have to do certain things I believe
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are right, I have to challenge the government that is in that country right
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now. I have to speak out against injustice.
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I have to I have to stand up and and say
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loudly and clearly what I believe is right and and
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then your life is in danger.
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There is a choice between I think being
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afraid of God. I'm more afraid of God than I am of the South African government so to
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speak.
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And it's, but in a sense
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But you know, in a sense, I would simply just like to to live my life with my wife
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and my children and and be a pastor and do whatever I would
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want to do. I don't want to be on this line every day
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worrying about what will happen and how will this day end and not being
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sure at all.
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But I'm listening to what you are saying, both from the people here on the panel
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and I want to raise one or two issues here.
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We can come back to this thing that I have just been talking about if you want to, but
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this peace issue thing? I wonder first of all whether we have
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though about it that there is a definite link between the peace issue that the
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church is fighting for and the whole question of abortion. And, I look
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at it this way: Why is it that we have always been so many Christians been
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so worried about protecting life as long as it is
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unborn? Once that life is born, we don't care anymore. Then babies can die.
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People can die.
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Those, those same children that we wanted to save, we send off to war
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and they die there senselessly. So that's the one thing or the
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other thing about this issue is we, as a church,
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I think one has to learn that we have to be
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just a little bit more humble than we are in this issue. I'm not saying we should
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not fight for peace. I want. I want peace. People in
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my country, I know, we are going into a war
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situation. We will die, as people are dying now in Namibia. As people are
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dying in the Middle East and there is this nuclear thing. But the problem
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is we, as a church, have developed the theory called just war theory.
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We in the church have developed a theory called theory
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of tyrannicide when you can kill someone who oppresses. We
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have gone on. And, we have blessed wars ever since we have left
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the gospel on this issue. We have
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mixed our faith in Jesus Christ and our obedience to God with
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some kind of patriotism.
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Abby, I'm going to ask yourself why in your church is the American flag is in one corner in the church?
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The church flag is in the other. What's it doing there? It has no business there as far as I'm concerned.
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But it's the right thing to do.
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It's this patriotic thing that we have, and it's full of near religiosity
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that has got nothing to do with our being used to the Gospel. And now that we have manuevered
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ourselves into this corner. We see what violence is doing to our world. Now
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we don't know what to do about it. So I think not only should we
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be very involved in the peace making issue, we should also
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ask ourselves, How do we rectify
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this past that we have got all of the entanglement of theological issues
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that we don't know what to do? There are some other things I want to say, but I think I'd better keep quiet.
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keep going.
speaker
OK. So from our audience. You had your hand up.
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I have several thoughts that are on my mind. First of all I think what Kent says is very true that all of
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these issues come grow out of what we see the church
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to be. And, if we dealt with what,what it means to be the church, then these other issues would take their proper
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perspective. I'd like to back up and say you asked
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if we agreed with the church policies. And my understanding is that when the General
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Assembly speaks a policy, they are not
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speaking for us, they are speaking for themselves. That's up to us and a local congregation
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then to discuss them and deal with them. A lot of people get mad. They say the General
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Assembly has no right to think that for us. They don't. and and I. But,
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I think, a lot of people don't understand that. And some of the feeling bad feelings
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against the larger church is because they don't understand who's speaking for
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whom. But I have one more thing.
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I'm very frustrated with all of these issues because I come from a
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large suburban affluent church in Pittsburgh.
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We. There's resistance. They don't want to deal with any of these issues. Because, you know, they want to be more
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spiritual, or you make people mad. The women
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want to deal with peace making. The pastor says, Oh, there are only a couple people who want to deal with that.
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There was another problem, oh the hunger problem. I suggested that our circle, which I'm a
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circle leader. When we were hosts for the luncheon in May that it we have a sacrificial
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meal, because the hunger fund is ongoing. We're always asking for hunger hunger
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funds. The need, the unemployment in Pittsburgh is growing and growing. We need to be aware of this.
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I thought one small thing to do would be to have a sacrificial meal. We don't need all this
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food when we gather for a church meeting. And, we could have.
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I didn't suggest we go about anything. But we could have something very simple and give to pay the same money.
speaker
No way! You know would they buy into that. We can't
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have a sacrifical meal. No one will come.
speaker
You know, this isn't the time. Another time might be
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OK but not this time. And it's that kind of resistance of, you know, why not have a
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nice club in a church and do nice things and not do things that are going to keep people away from
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the church in our quote nice fellowship.
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I'm from a church in an isolated area of Arkansas. And, I can agree
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with everything she said. And, I wonder is it just
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the large churches in Pittsburgh, medium-size churches in little country
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towns in Arkansas or is it churchwide?
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OK. Another hand. Get your hand up,
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I'm also from the Pittsburgh area. And, there are some
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positives and negatives during. I'm a
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seminarian. And, during the course of my seminary studies, I've been preaching
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where the preaching association. So, I've had a chance to travel to a
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great many churches, some in the suburbs,
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affluent white churches, some in the rural areas, very
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small congregations, farming people.
speaker
The whole problem is. I'm sorry I can't remember the first gentleman's name.
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Kent? is that there are different concepts
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of the nature of Jesus Christ does seem to be at the bottom of it.
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If we perceive God. If we
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perceive God as a provider primarily,
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then we have one way of looking at things. If we perceive God
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as a great warrior of the earth, then we are militarists in our
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minds and hearts. And, a lot of this goes right back to the same
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thing. At the root of the evil are two-pronged problem and that
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is racism and sexism. And, a lot of times we don't want
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to call it that. We don't want to deal with that evil
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as being at the root of most of our problems.
speaker
How many of you agree that it is at the root of most problems? We've heard a lot of basis for problems or bases for
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problems. Yes Ma'am? No, I was thinking.
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Oh, you agree. OK.
speaker
Some of these issues it seems that we've made some progress.
speaker
I think about the million or a half a million plus people who came
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to New York City in support of the peace
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issue. And I read a little blurb on the bulletin board over
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in the University Church yesterday that said the Secretary
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General made the statement that at the disarmament conference, practically nothing was
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accomplished. And, he was concerned about the fact that there was such a
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great disparity between what the people of the world want and
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need and what their governments are willing to do. And, I
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wonder, we, as U.P.W. women, have been on this peace issue for a number of years. The
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church has picked it up.
speaker
It's a grassroots swelling across the country, but the government isn't
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listening.
speaker
What do we do next?
speaker
I guess we have to become more political. We have to seek out people who express
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our point of view. And, say these are the people that we want to elect. Unless you have
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a better option.
speaker
Does anybody have a better option?
speaker
Well. Trying to elect. I don't know what any other options are. And, I think, what we need to
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do is we need to get together as concerned Christian people. And, we need some
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people who will take the leadership to do that to say OK this is what we can do. Let us
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band together and get with people who have similar feelings to ours
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and elect them. And that takes that takes
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courage. It takes a risk on one's part. And, I think
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sometimes we get to that point we're not willing to risk. We're, we're happy to talk about
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these issues, and we clap and say "Hurray!" Yes, we must be concerned. But, when it comes to
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implementing an action. we're falling down. And, I think, we need some kind of
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leadership to gather us together and say we have to do
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specific kinds of things. We have to move.
speaker
And let's get about moving.
speaker
OK You also need education and information. I mean, a lot of people are incredibly
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ignorant about a lot of subjects.
speaker
I'm from Columbus Ohio, And, I'd like to know how many people have written to their congresspeople and
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representatives in the last six months?
speaker
OK. That's good to see. I attended a conference this spring where they told us that the flood of
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letters that was causing so much devastation to children and families
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bills and legislation was the figure. It was devastating
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to me.
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Fifteen thousand letters. Now that's not that many letters to make them much of a
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difference. and I know personally touched me and got my pen out. And, I encourage
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each of you to do that because that and the pocketbook is the only way that we're ever going to make those
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people feel the way we believe. Getting together and discussing it is not enough.
speaker
There's another hand up over there, if you can get her. I just wondered
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if we'd ever tried prayer?
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Yes. Yes, I was going to say all the time.
speaker
Let me suggest a response to that. I wanted say it
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graciously.
speaker
The church that I grew up in prayed all the time. And, the world continued to go to hell.
speaker
And, I can say that with conviction because I still
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believe in prayer. I shared with other members of the panel that
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it was about seven years ago that I became convinced that Christians need to
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change their lifestyle. It's been hard to do that.
speaker
Then I saw a bumper sticker that said, "Why pray for peace and pay for war?"
speaker
My wife and I talked about the
speaker
implications of our April fifteenth decision every year, in which we pledge our
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allegiance to the state. I quit saying the Pledge of Allegiance ten years ago.
speaker
I stand respectfully, but I don't pledge allegiance to a flag because my allegiance is to
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the Jesus Christ. So I quit paying my taxes five years ago on the portion of my
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money that goes to fuel the war machine. And, it's a very popular thing in some
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radical leftist circles to do, but it's not very popular in the Presbyterian Church among ministers.
speaker
And just Wednesday, I was audited finally for my nineteen eighty tax return.
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The next step is tax court and then the next step is I don't know,
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but I think, you know, if you really wanted to make a difference in small communities of Christians
speaker
around the country, it wouldn't take more than ten thousand Presbyterian families not to pay their war
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taxes. And, the government would have to come to a grinding halt.
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The Mennonites are doing it. The Quakers are doing it.
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People of faith in the Presbyterian Church can doing it. And that is not very popular. My ministry in
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my last parish ended because of this kind of political activism on my part. So
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there are some small prices that some people pay. And, I have paid nothing with my life like
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Christians around the world are doing. And, I don't mean to put myself in that category.
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I don't boast about that. I am saying that there is an alternative to simply voicing paper
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tigers like our church has done for the past ten years. And actually physically changing the course
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of the government. And I, that is a realistic alternative.
speaker
How do you feel that you have to go outside the church in order to express your views or take any kind of
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action? That you don't have that channel through the church?
speaker
Do you have to go outside the church? In respect to going outside of the church
speaker
to making comments about your views, I feel this is
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very true. It may not be necessary if, within our churches, we had responsible
speaker
sessions that would back the people and help them in following through on
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things. Well, you could take a stronger stand. One other
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point I wanted to make was that prayng about these issues that
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we're concerned with is fine, ut
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I cannot down government officials quite as much as maybe
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some others do because I am scared to death in seeing them deal
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with countries that do not respond to Christian love
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and regardless of how we may try to cut down on
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the number of nuclear weapons that we produce, I feel
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very sure that they never will and I don't I don't
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necessarily feel safe by us backing down. You know, not being
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able to be in a position to defend ourselves. I,
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I am not for war any more than anyone else, but it just scares me to death to
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to see what we might have to face.

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Title: The church mosaic, side 1.
Description: Moderated by Jane Whitney. Panellists: George Morgan, Mary Yamamoto, Thelma Adair, Martha Campbell, Kenton Pipes. Reactors: Allan Boesak, Jill Martinez, Don Black.
Creator: Whitney, Jane. (moderator)
Morgan, George Pidock, 1923- (speaker)
Yamamoto, Mary. (speaker)
Adair, Thelma. (speaker)
Campbell, Martha. (speaker)
Pipes, Kenton Robert, 1946- (speaker)
Boesak, Allan, 1945- (speaker)
Martinez, Jill. (speaker)
Black, Donald, 1920- (speaker)
Date: 1982
July 14-19, 1982
Type of resource: sound recording-nonmusical
Genre: sound recordings
Form: audiocassettes
Extent: 1 sound cassette : 1 7/8 ips., mono.
Language: English
Topics: Church and the world.
Geographic subjects: West Lafayette (Ind.)
North and Central America--United States--Indiana--Tippecanoe--West Lafayette
Rights status: Contact repository for more information
Note: Recorded at the United Presbyterian Women's National Meeting, Purdue University, July 14-19, 1982.
Physical location: CASSETTE 774; Presbyterian Historical Society, Philadelphia, PA
Related item: The church mosaic [sound recording] / Jane Whitney, moderating.--https://catalog.history.pcusa.org/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumb...
Identifier (local): cassette774_church_mosaic_side1
PID (Persistent Identifier): islandora:116455

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The church mosaic, side 1.

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