80 years ago — November 22, 1939 The 18th annual observance of Race Relations Sunday was approaching. The Federal Council of Churches shared a message drafted by Philip Jones, pastor of the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York, “challenging the churches in a time of world conflict, suffering and wreck of war, to be aware of the ‘lack of social justice in our own country,’ and ‘to purify herself of the great modern heresy of racial discrimination within her own walls.’” It called Christians to oppose “cruelty and injustice which greed, bigotry and prejudice create.” But more than this, Christians are called to action in communities to effect change. Christians are called to correct “unequal educational opportunities for minority races, inequitable administration of public benefits of social security and the like, the withholding of civic privileges and rights from citizens of color, and an unbrotherly conduct in the daily life of people of different racial groups. Concrete … [Read more...]

“The Christian college must make its appeal to our more thoughtful men and women. The things that are seen are temporal but the things that are unseen are eternal. The Christian college deals to a large extent with values, which while unseen, are more fundamental than the physical things evident to all. Such a college must depend for support upon those individuals who are concerned with the spiritual. In fact, the very existence of the Christian college is dependent upon thoughtful people. They are the ones who have built and have supported such colleges throughout the history of our nation, and, in doing this, they have labored to bring the Kingdom of God to men and have taken ‘the seats of the builders of cities and the procurers of peace.’” The occasion of such focus on Christian higher education was the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the founding of Austin College, which reaches back to the early beginnings of the state of Texas. “The moving spirit in the founding of … [Read more...]

63 years ago — November 12, 1956 By 1930, the Presbyterian Church of the U.S.A. had opened the door to ordination for women serving as elders. In 1955, the denomination approved women’s ordination to the office of pastor. On October 24, 1956, Syracuse Presbytery ordained 31-year-old, five-foot-two-inch Margaret Towner affirming her call as a minister to First Presbyterian Church in Allentown, Pennsylvania. “She wants people just to keep on calling her Margaret, as they have been doing before … she doesn’t want people to feel differently toward her now.” She “was born in Columbia, Mo., majored in art and music at Carlton College, Northfield, Minn., and then began work on pre-medical courses. Upon graduation she became a professional photographer at the Mayo Clinic, taking pictures of operations and other medical activities. In Syracuse, N.Y., she opened her own photographic studio … . Then she decided to enter church work, taking the full three-year course at Union Seminary in N.Y., … [Read more...]

50 years ago — August 11, 1969 The celebration of our national achievement of space travel and the Apollo 11 moon landing brought a brief respite from troubling domestic concerns. There were still great issues we faced as a nation and recent seminary graduates were being sent out to minister to the people. The Outlook established a forum for key seminary faculty to bear words of encouragement to the new pastors and the churches they would serve.  “The greatest problem, as I see it, for pastoral ministry in the years lying immediately ahead, is the rapidly increasing polarization of opinion, not only within congregations, but in our culture as a whole. It will not be helpful, even if it were any longer possible, to strive for a non-committal neutral posture in the face of strong cleavages of opinion on crucial questions that plague every institution and structure in our society. Pastors will have almost unprecedented pressures brought to bear on them to take a firm and visible … [Read more...]

40 years ago — August 20, 1979 The Presbyterian Church in the United States and the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America held to the understanding that all property is held in trust to the denomination — but it did not clearly state so in its documents. The U.S. Supreme Court shocked the churches with its July 2 ruling. The case involved a Presbyterian church in Georgia. The presbytery determined the minority within the congregation represented the church. The Georgia courts applied the “neutral rule.” In the absence of clearly stated local or denominational documents, the courts could determine possession based on secular criteria. Hence the majority of the congregation were awarded the property. The Supreme Court’s decision overturned the long-standing 1872 decision that “recognized the unity of the Presbyterian polity with its hierarchy of judicatories — sessions, presbyteries, synods and the General Assembly.” The federal court returned the case to the … [Read more...]

50 years ago — June 29, 1959 Southern states had strict laws segregating the races. Though the General Assemblies had spoken against such laws, the practice persisted — even in the churches. There were pastors who took bold stands from their pulpits against these laws of segregation. One pastor in Georgia declared his stance against segregation from the pulpit. The resulting turmoil in the congregation led the presbytery to remove the pastor. The example of this removal intimidated some pastors from having a prophetic voice against societal injustices. To “have the commission remove the pastor must indicate to more timid souls in pressured situations that if they stand for their deeply-held convictions in line with the assembly declarations, they will be possible candidates for membership in such an evicted company.” No charges were filed by the commission; they simply relied on a phrase from the Book of Order that allowed removal for the sake of the peace of the church. There was … [Read more...]