Hungarian Church Press, 1968 (20. évfolyam, 2. szám)

1968-06-01 / 2. szám

HOP Vol XX Special Number

1968 No 2- 122 -(0703)

It is not enough to register the immense suffering, the tears and blood shed in our century because of racial hatred and discrimination; we must raise our voice and actl We cannot remain mute and inactive spectators! We have to go to the limit of sacrifioes.

We realize that the church has not been silent about this problem, either in her denominations or in her world org„ JLzations, but we believe that the voice of the church must be strengthened* We note a certain progress, a crescendo, in this matter if we compare the relevant resolutions of the Stockholm, Jerusalem, Oxford, Amsterdam and Evanston meetings with the voice of the New Delhi Assembly, or, still more so, if we consider the statements of the 1966 Geneva World Conference on Church and Society. It seems to us that the ecclesiastical world organizations are mutually influencing one another in the right way. And it could also be demonstrated how the Christian Peace Conference, with its resolutions concerning the problem of the races, has exerted a beneficial influence, just as the work and voice of the Yforld Council of Churches, certainly had their stimulating effect on the Second Vatican Council. The aggiomamento of Pope John XXIII, the new chord struck by the Second Vatican Coui>oil or the formulations in the encyclical PcpulOrum progressio are simply unthinkable without the influence of the "Protestant ecumenical movement". This is like a noble competition; the competitors are keenly aware of the demands of our age, watohing each other and trying to keep pace with one another. So they may inspire one another to reach out for further accomplishments, But, as a matter of course, when we ‘speak of the voice of the church, we do not only mean the declarations of the world assemblies and of the conferences of experts but also the voice of the national churches and the witness of the congregations and individual Christians. Thus the liberating message of the church on the racial problem must be proclaimed in the congregations also, and, in this matter too, we must go back to the grass roots of ecumenical action. This is how we interpret and affirm the appeal of Section III of the 1966 Geneva World Conference on Church and Society: "We call upon Christians *in each place* to urge their governments to ratify and enforce the various UN Covenants on human rights, not only as ends in themselves, but also as a stimulus to the evolution of an international moral ethos*'!9B) In proclaiming our Christian message, we must take care to avoid platitudes and generalities and gpeak in specific terms* Some of the statements cf the World Conference on Church and Society give us good examples (Among cth^s, Section III, § 66; Section IV,

§§ 22-<24)« To be concrete is one of the requirements; the other is timeliness. It is no use to speak after the events; the church must make her voice heard before it is too late. "There is growing fear that hostility between black men and white men is now reaching a point of no-retum; many whites, both in Africa and America, refuse to accept black men as brothers, ■ and as a consequence many black men fail to accept white men as brothers.

It will take deeds, and not mere words, to overcome this hostility,"99)

This is the right way of speaking; this is warning in time! The church can never retain her message for herself as the missionary command calls