Episcopal Press and News
NCCC Governing Board Meets in New York City
Diocesan Press Service. October 20, 1975 [75361]
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nostalgia and a sense of expectation marked the Governing Board of the National Council of Churches of Christ as it celebrated its 25th anniversary and elected new officers to lead it through the next three years.
Old photographs, films, the presence of former council presidents, a formal banquet, liturgies and hymns recalled the early decades when the council's focuses of unity and social action spurred years of remarkable Christian witness.
Looking ahead, the board elected William Phelps Thompson, stated clerk of the United Presbyterian Church, USA, as its next president. The choice pointed to a renewed quest for unity which the new president called "of first importance." But while he suggested that in the months ahead it was time to "make much more explicit the invitation to non-member churches to consider now whether their own need to show forth unity in the Spirit might bring them at this time to become full members," he also pointed to the need for the existing member churches to " engage in dialogue with each other in order to share their historic and contemporary understanding of the gospel and the church."
Thompson noted that in the past decade there had been a "willingness " on the part of some churches to "encourage the council" to undertake " marginal, even bizarre " projects that the churches themselves would not conduct, and stated "this must be avoided." The council "should be seen as integral and essential to the mission of each member church " so that as years go on, a deeper unity will evolve. "
Looking outward, he spoke of the need to work on world hunger, and of violence "which has now reached epidemic proportions...not only in the acts of individuals and small groups that take the law in their own hands, but also in the use of force by officials of governments in violation of basic human rights."
In a moving final service, he and the other new officers committed themselves to be faithful to their new task, and they, in turn, asked for a re-commitment of staff to their tasks, while board members promised their support for the work ahead.
Through the various services, songs and liturgies that the entire board enjoyed, it became evident that there was a deeper rooting in the Scriptural and specifically Christian heritage shared by these diverse churches, and that the rapid change suffered by the nation as well as its drift from fundamental Judeo-Christian values had brought the nation's largest ecumenical organization to a more cohesive point in recent years and a deeper reflection upon its corporate and individual faith.
But while that which could be called specifically "religious " predominated in a new way at this session, there was not only no lack, but in fact a greater number of policy statements, resolutions and actions which define the NCCC's "prophetic" witness on social issues both to church members and to the nation and world at large.
Outgoing president W. Sterling Cary reminded the board early in its session that faithfulness means the Church can never surrender...and that "we need to deal with reality...with the demonic ideology which refuses to treat blacks as fully human unless they are in an integrated situation...and that in the light of the world's conflicts, private tranquility is blasphemy."
Three major policy statements came before the board: two for a first reading and one for final action.
Receiving first reading was the policy based upon a report of a panel of top scientists dealing with the use of nuclear power as an alternate source of energy.
Bucking corporate (and other scientific) plans, the statement declares that the use of plutonium (as nuclear fuel) is "morally indefensible and technically objectionable " because of its danger to the biosphere.
Speaking to the statement was anthropologist Margaret Mead, an Episcopal churchwoman, who with Professor Emeritus Rene Dubos of The Rockefeller University had called a panel of scientists together to study the issue at the request of the NCCC's Division of Church and Society.
Dr. Mead termed plutonium "a man-made artificial substance that nature cannot absorb" and warned that the unintentional or mistaken release of " only one ounce was enough to destroy millions of people." The kind of security system needed to protect plutonium would force the nation to adopt a security system which could only violate basic American freedoms, would encourage espionage, and other unprecedented dangers to the earth. "There is still time to turn back, and all who believe that technology should serve human values should join in opposition to these developments," she said.
The board agreed to have printed 2,000 copies of the plutonium statement signed already by 16 Nobel prize winners, distributed widely among member churches for study, and to set up a mechanism to report back to DCS on results. Final action on it will come at the next (March 1976) meeting.
The policy statement that was passed at this session concerned world hunger. A comprehensive study of some 20 pages, it claimed that the food crisis itself is of such magnitude as to "challenge all previous policies and practices of the Church" which from its beginnings has cared for the hungry.
The hunger policy was the result of hundreds of denominational and staff people working across unit lines and begins with the premise that "because God is the Creator of all, and loves all he has made...every person has a basic human right to food." Thus Christians can set "no lesser goal than the abolition of hunger from the earth."
It goes on to recommend a variety of ways in which individuals can work towards this and, both in terms of their own life-style and citizen action.
The seriousness with which churches, corporately, and Christians, as individuals, have been taking the hunger crisis was detailed by James Cogswell of the Presbyterian Church, U.S., who chairs the Inter-unit Task Force on Hunger, and who listed an impressive variety of actions taken only since last December by the NCCC and made possible by the strong financial contributions of individuals and local churches to end hunger.
The third major policy statement, which here received its "first reading" concerned evangelism, perhaps the most basic task of churches and one that has received less attention in the council in recent years than many board members wished. It points out that "growth in church membership and calling people to Christian discipleship are not necessarily the same." The failure of new church members to be "enlisted in a pilgrimage toward fuller Christian discipleship called into question the effectiveness of methods then used."
Thus it pointed to causes of many church member's disaffection with serious personal and corporate Christian behavior, and stated that while evangelism is "primarily a congregational function, challenging the most creative capabilities,...and depends on the Holy Spirit to be the real evangelist, " it needs and deserves denominational and ecumenical emphasis, support and resources.
This policy also will receive final action at the March 1976 board, and is available for study from the Division of Church and Society.
As is usual in Governing Board meetings, many specific resolutions rose from members concerning as wide a variety of issues as are reflected in the pluralistic nature of the board. After much " re-wording," all were supported by the membership and they directed the General Secretary, or appropriate staff units, to:
o appeal to President Ford and the UN on behalf of two Russians now imprisoned (the Rev. George Vins, a Baptist pastor, and Vladimir Osipov, the 31-year-old editor of "Veche") to seek their release, due to a denial of their human rights by the Soviet courts;
o request President Ford to meet with members of the Oglala Dakota Treaty Council, now seeking such a meeting, to talk over with them the increasing incidents of violence and murder taking place not only on Pine Ridge reservation but also spreading now to other native American reservations. The Indians explained that the Bureau of Indian Affairs, as constituted, and state governments were not helping but were part of their problem;
o urge South Africa to withdraw from Namibia, and the U.S. and the United Nations to insist upon free elections under international supervision;
o call for defeat of the proposed Criminal Justice Reform Act of 1975 (S. 1) on the basis that it would "undo much of the recent progress in criminal justice and civil liberty, to the extent that it would violate First Amendment rights of U.S. citizens, and encourage, instead, passage of legislation recommended by the National Commission on Reform of Criminal Laws;
o encourage the government to recognize the sovereign rights of the Republic of Panama over its territory, including the Canal Zone, and negotiate a new relationship based on this principle between the two countries;
o express concern about the "tragic situation" in Lebanon, stating that it was caused by political, economic and social rather than religious reasons -- and call for respect for national unity in Lebanon, a settlement of the Middle East crisis respecting rights and justice on all sides;
o protest to General Augusto Pinochet, president of Chile, the refusal of his government to allow Evangelical Lutheran Bishop Helmut Frenz to re-enter that country to continue his ministry there;
o urge Secretary of State Kissinger to develop a "humanitarian and realistic" African policy that will give non-military support to Black Africans' struggle for freedom, assist African nations in self-development, resolving also to continue, in the NCCC, a Southern Africa program emphasis with appropriate relationships to church leaders there;
o establish within the NCCC an inter-unit committee to review policy statements on the United Nations with an eye toward adopting a more comprehensive and timely way to relate to It;
o engage, with other concerned organizations, in an effort against the practice of torture and police brutality, encouraging the UN to launch a world campaign to eliminate torture and designate a unit of the NCCC to assess this issue and U.S. compliance with it;
o call on the Senate NOT to ratify the June 17 referendum held on the northern Mariana islands which made it a U.S. territory, but rather to honor the UN policies seeking to help bring about full independence for the entire Trust Territory of Micronesia.
The Board also heard reports on the ending of one council unit dealing with Emergency Ministries to Vietnam era veterans, agreed to co-sponsor meetings with the U.S. Conference for the World Council of Churches regionally, to explain the upcoming Nairobi meeting, and heard a report on Church World Service's work resettling Vietnamese refugees here.
This report presented by CWS chairman David Taylor (Presbyterian Church, US) and Paul McCleary, CWS director, not only described the difficulties CWS has had with the government but also brought to the floor the difficulties that some board members had with the interpretive materials the agency used.
The next meeting of the Governing Board will be held in Atlanta, Georgia in early March 1976.
Episcopal Church members elected to the Governing Board, with terms beginning at the next meeting, were (Diocese and Province number in parentheses): The Rt. Rev. John M. Allin, Presiding Bishop, New York; the Rt. Rev. Milton L. Wood, New York; the Rt. Rev. Matthew P. Bigliardi (Oregon, VIII), Lake Oswego, Ore.; the Rt. Rev. John H. Burt (Ohio, V), Cleveland, Ohio; the Very Rev. Elton O. Smith (Western New York, II), Buffalo, N. Y.; the Rev. Charles M. Vogt (Minnesota, VI), Edina, Minn.; the Rev. Paul Washington (Pennsylvania, III), Philadelphia, Pa.; Mrs. Maurice J. Allain (Maryland, III), Glen Burnie, Md.; Miss Polly Cooper (Western Massachusetts, I), Springfield, Mass.; Mr. George McGonigle (Texas, VII), Houston, Tex.; Dr. Howard Meredith (Oklahoma, VII), Norman, Okla.; Mr. Thomas Tisdale (South Carolina, IV), Charleston, S.C.; Mrs. Margaret Bush Wilson (Missouri, VII), St. Louis, Mo.; and staff representatives, Dr. Peter Day, Ecumenical Officer, and Mrs. Ruth G. Cheney, Executive for Program.