Since we last met in this house of God, many
sudden and shocking things have happened. As our
President said, “December the seventh is a date
which will live in infamy.”
A dastardly and unprovoked attack has plunged
this country into war. Already we can feel the
changes. Nothing seems quite the same. There is
a sense of unreality about many things, a certain
grimness about other things, and in the atmosphere
a quiet purpose that has sobered us all. The base
treachery of the enemy has filled us all with a cold
anger and resentment, and we are united in indigna-
tion and a strong determination to defend ourselves
and the liberties we hold dear.
Our freedom is at stake! Freedom !—not a very
big word, but my how much it embraces! What is
freedom?
‘There recently came into my hands a definition:
“Freedom is a man lifting a gate latch at dusk and
sitting for a while on the porch, smoking his pipe
before he goes to bed. It is the violence of an argu-
ment outside an election pole; it is the righteous
anger of the pulpits, It is the warm laughter of a girl
on a park bench. It is the rush of a train over the con-
tinent and the unafraid faces of people looking out
the windows. It is all the howdys in the world and
all the helloes, It is Westbrook Pegler telling Roose-
velt how to raise his children; it is Roosevelt letting
them raise themselves. It is Dorothy Thompson ask-
ing for war; it is General Hugh S. Johnson asking
her to keep quiet, It is you trying to remember the
words of the Star Spangled Banner. It is the sea
breaking on wide sands somewhere and the shoulders
of a mountain supporting the sky. It is the air you
fill your lungs with and the dirt that is your garden,
It is a man cursing all cops. It is the absence of
apprehension at the sound of approaching footsteps
outside your closed door. It is your hot resentment.
of intrigue, the tilt of your chin and the tightening
of your lips sometimes. It is all the things you do
and want to keep on doing. It is all the things you
feel and cannot help feeling. Freedom—it is you.”
It is quite fitting therefore, that the Church should
remember the 150th Anniversary of the adoption of
the Bill of Rights. Ratification was completed on
December 15, 1791. ‘Thus for a century and a half
it has been established that “Congress shall make
no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
‘This anniversary deserves to be remembered, for
after all, it is the things guaranteed in the Bill of
Rights that we are fighting to preserve.
Before the Bill of Rights was ratified, ever since
the first settlers came to these shores seeking that
liberty, they braved all kinds of danger, they gave
up all the things that other men hold dear in order to
find and enjoy this most essential of our freedoms,
namely, religious liberty. I cannot understand why !
It is not always given its rightful place at the head
of the list of freedoms, The others follow it and
depend upon it, and were it not for religious freedom
the others would not exist. Religious freedom is the
most essential because it is basic, it is man’s attempt
to set up his fundamental relationships with the
universe.
In the Declaration of Independence, the thirteen
states together held as self-evident that all men are
“endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable
rights.” It is the recognition of the endowment by
God that is the basis of the further guarantees in the
Bill of Rights.
‘The founding fathers sought freedom, not from
law but freedom in law; not freedom from govern-
ment but freedom in government; not freedom from
speech but freedom in speech; not freedom from the
press but freedom in the press; not freedom from
religion but freedom in religion.
The State may by due process of Jaw curtail the
freedom of a citizen at several points. It may direct
how he shall buy and sell, and for what prices. It
may define the limits of his movements and decree
whether or not he shall travel abroad. It may under
some circumstances use his property or even take
it away. It may even take his life if he destroys the
life of another. But it may not tell him how he
must worship or that he shall not worship as he
chooses. It may not bring force to bear upon him
to repeat a dictated prayer, to clasp his hands in
ordered petitions. It may not compel him to read
the Bible, It must not prohibit him from so doing.
It may not by secret, police or storm troopers make
him adopt any particular form of worship nor pre-
vent him from following the form he chooses for
himself. In the realm of religion, he is free!
‘The Constitution and the Bill of Rights would
seem to infer that he will worship God in some way,
and it guarantees to him liberty to do so in his own
way.
Now this was not a generous concession on the
part of a group of patriots indifferent to religion,
to the interests of a small religious minority. People
who had fought for independence, men and women
who had crossed the hazardous ocean had come for
the most part for the very things the Rill of Rights
guarantees, and they had come prepared to pay the
price of any hardship, even the price of life itself
to be able to live at peace and to worship God as
their consciences dictated.
These are days in which we have become more
thoughtful and more appreciative of our heritage
since we have seen these things denied one by one
to other peoples and the lamps of the human free-
doms going out, But we best defend those privileges
which are ours in the Bill of Rights by exercising
them, for it is true spiritually as it is true physically
and intellectually that that which is not used, that
which is neglected will be taken away. ‘There is a
terrible atrophy which operates in every realm of
life and liberty. A neglected Bible, unsaid prayers,
a holy day made into a holiday, empty pews and ne-
glected churches are a strange commentary upon a
people who claim to cherish religious freedom.
It may be that we in America have interpreted
religious freedom to mean freedom from religion.
That is how it would seem to be interpreted in many
of our schools.
In June there appeared in “The Ladies Home
Journal” a letter which was written by an under-
graduate to the president of one of our eastern uni-
versities. I do not think I am betraying any confi-
dence when I say that the author of this letter is
the son of a distinguished surgeon in Washington.
The letter presents the dilemma in which our young
people find themselves today.
“You, sir, were brought up from earliest
childhood’ in an atmosphere of traditional
Christianity and democracy. You read,
learned and inwardly digested the Bible.
Nearly every Sunday you went to church,
and there you heard and believed sermons
which postulated the divinity of Christ,
eternal principles of right and wrong, the
existence of the human soul, a personal God
and a life after death. Thanks to your early
training, your life as you have led it derives
its meaning largely from the teachings of
Jesus.“During your youth you also were edu-
cated to think that man is superior to ani-
mals, that he is a free agent capable of
choosing between good and evil. Loyalty to
country was an ideal you came to cherish,
and your schooling never caused you to
doubt that man possesses certain inalienable
rights. Your position is typical of your
generation.“But what about us, the youth of
America? What have we been taught to
revere in the university you direct, and in
other similar institutions throughout the
land?“In the modern college it is probably fair
to say that Christianity has progressively
lost its grip on young minds, You may have
noticed that, unlike you, most of us have
scarcely ever glanced at the Bible. When
our elders refer to eternal verities, abso-
lutist ethics, we are likely to recall the lesson
your instructors in sociology have driven
home that morals are relative to time and
place, that what is good in one society is bad.
in another. Such teaching is separated only
by a hair’s breadth from the view that there
can be not such thing as sin. Have we not,
gleaned from your very own professors of
natural science, philosophy and ancient his-
tory that religions are the product of myth
and superstition and that men create gods
in their own image; that if there is such a
thing as the soul, no scientist has ever iso-
lated it in the laboratory? …“Thanks principally to you and to your
fellow educators, little of the learning we
absorb includes value judgments. Ifa lec-
ture seems to clash with traditional belief,
discussion of the fact is generally omitted.
Our instructors the country over are accus-
tomed to present an aloof and objective in-
terpretation of their material, leaving us
alone and unguided to draw our own conclu-
sions and integrate our own philosophies.
Therefore, as one spokesman for a flounder-
ing generation, may I ask your help in an-
swering some questions—questions so des-
perately important to us that the whole
course of our lives hangs in the balance?“What reason is there, in light of present
knowledge, for continuing to accept any
form of Christianity? If the implications
of modern education are what they appear
to be, was not Jesus of Nazareth an ordinary
human whose naive outpourings reveal a
sad ignorance of polities and economies,
whose precepts constitute a fanatical repudi-
ation of human nature as your subordinates
have taught us to view it? If it is correct
to infer from sociology that sin is nonexist-
ent, why should we cultivate any restraints
or tolerate any inhibitions? If the teach-
ings in American halls of learning are valid,
will you kindly point out the fallacy in
“The good old rule . . . the simple plan,
That they should take who have the power
And they should keep who can.“If men are but animals, why not treat
them as such? An animal has no rights.
‘The law among animals is the law of the
strong. If man is a slave to determinism,
incapable of a free choice, what is the value
of the ballot, trial by jury and civil liberties
in general? If there is no natural law in
the universe, how do you justify those in-
alienable rights which the Declaration of In-
dependence asserts men to possess? If pa-
triotic fervor is just a manifestation of an
‘enlarged tribalism,’ why do you think
America is worth defending?“Personally, I fail to understand how you,
or any other college president, can expect us
to become ardent Christians and democrats,
when the vital postulates on which these
faiths are supposed to rest are daily under-
mined in the classroom. . .“Some of our elders have wondered why
we are not more excited over totalitarian ag-
gression and ruthlessness. But for most of
us the international situation is ultimately
a case of one group of animals without rights
or free will torturing another group of the
same breed. No Promethean fires of faith
and sacrificial zeal burn in our hearts. Our
wishy-washy adherence to Christianity and
democracy pales into nothingness alongside
the incredible devotion of German youths to
the Nazi creed. You may as well face the
brute fact that our education has made the
difference between us and you far more deep-
striking and revolutionary than any normal
variation in generations,“Our situation has indeed grown more
serious than you think, Your generation
must soon pass on to our hands the torch of
democracy and Christianity. Our hearts im-
pel us to be faithful to that trust, but our
heads that you have helped condition may
decree otherwise. As men think, as men
view the cosmos and human nature, so they
must act. And when the time comes for us
to act, we may embitter your declining years.
We may destroy the liberal values toward
which man has struggled down through the
ages.“If we are to be saved, our elders must
assist us to harmonize our education with
the old faith. Perhaps you will say that
every individual should grapple coura-
geously with the facts by himself, that no
one can do our thinking for us. Quite so.
Yet surely with all the richness of your ex-
perience, with all your achievements, you
and others like you can at least comment,
helpfully on the demoralizing naturalism and
relativism that render us impotent to face
the present world crisis. It would seem that
America has grave need for a brand-new
humanitarian philosophy based upon modern
developments in the arts and sciences.
Callow youth cannot conjure up such a phi-
Iosophy without guidance,
“If our outlook is ever to rise above a
selfish materialism, somehow, somewhere,
we must find an answer to our questions.”
I am quite sure that what this student has written
to the president of his university applies to a great
many schools and colleges throughout our country.
Many students are positively precocious when dis-
cussing Hemingway, Steinbeck, and Huxley, but are
woefully ignorant of Matthew, Mark and Luke.
‘They can air political and economic convictions both
radical and conservative with enthusiasm, skill, and
an amazing familiarity with the facts, but in debat-
ing religion, they reveal themselves to be spiritually
illiterate, and as far as things of the spirit are con-
cerned to have the grade of morons,
This is because, as everybody knows, religion has
been crowded out of the college curriculum. In our
large state universities one can find courses on
everything from philosophy to cheese-making, from
girls studying advanced economics to football heroes
studying domestic science, but there are very few
courses on religion. Even in our church schools,
courses on religion have usually sunk to an inferior
and unenviable academic status.
It must not be assumed, however, that religion
has been entirely banished from the campus. Pro-
fessors of literature, psychology, anthropology, phi-
losophy and history could not ignore religion if they
wanted to, And even geologists, physicists and
biologists, as every college student can testify, do
not succeed in excluding it from their lectures. It
is amazing how they manage to devise opportunities
of dragging in religion in order to air their own
opinions, sometimes the brilliance of their sarcasm,
sometimes their flippant sneers, but in far too many
cases the straw man which such professors delight
in tearing to pieces bears no resemblance whatever
to the faith, the ideals, and the convictions which
are cherished by the people who know God.
It has been all too painfully obvious again and
again that school-men whose thrusts have been the
sharpest and most witty, know least about religion.
Although the selected textbook does not necessarily
reflect the beliefs of the professor, nor indicate the
content of his course, nevertheless, it is a rather
good indication of what the sociologists throughout
the country are teaching. And since sociology seems
to attract a greater number of students, we can get
some idea of the sort of ideas that are being planted
in the minds of our young people.
Some of the textbooks display a bias against re-
ligion. Reuter and Hart, for instance, in their “In-
troduction to Sociology,” define religion as “an emo-
tional attitude toward the unknown and uncon-
trolled,” and insist that the attitude is generally one
of fear, Sutherland and Woodward in their “Intro-
ductory Sociology” describe the conflict between
science and religion and conclude: “But the super-
natural realm is not banished completely . . . Science
cannot penetrate all the mysteries of life and mind,
ard the unknown will still continue to thrill man,
pique his curiosity, and lead him to postulate power
in the supernatural.” Ogburn and Nimkoff, whose
textbook is familiar to many of our young people,
devote several pages to a section entitled “Fact and
Fancy”, the implication being that religious beliefs
and experiences belong, not to the world of fact, but
to that suspicious realm of the imagination.
We thus have the amazing spectacle of authors
who know nothing of religion, authors to whom it
is all either fancy, imagination, myth, superstition
and unreality attempting to dismiss with a joke and
a shrug of sophisticated shoulders that which history
clearly teaches is indispensable to democracy.
In the United States there are 240,319 churches
with 64,501,594 members, Last year one percent of
the national income was contributed to the churches.
Yet somehow we are not providing for the religious
instruction of our youth, nor are we succeeding in
exercising the privileges guaranteed to us by the
Bill of Rights.
Surely the time has come to break the taboo
against religious instruction in the public schools.
Religion ought to be taught to our children by
teachers who are specially prepared for this work.
The teachers’ college could project a course in the
teaching of religion where the subject matter could
he defined and the technique developed. Our children
are souls, made in the image of God, and unless the
Bible is a lie from beginning to end, unless Jesus
Christ was a liar or a fool, unless the Church for
untold centuries has been a fake and a farce, these
souls are immortal, and will live forever. Unless all
that has been revealed to man is falsehood and de-
ception, the human body is but a house in which the
soul is living, and the human brain but a tool and
an instrument which the human soul shall use.
In the name of God, in the name of truth, in the
name of a true representation of human civilization,
teaching about religion must be demanded and must
be provided for the children of today. Certainly
not in the name of this denomination or of that,
certainly not in the name of bigotry and intolerance,
but in the name of God, and in the name of truth,
the lamp of the teaching of religion must be lit
again.
Dr. Peter Marshall, December 14, 1941