President & God

Scheduled to speak at the 25th anniversary meeting of the Federal Council of Churches in Washington, President Roosevelt found himself last week with two prime points to make:

"Rolphing." "This new generation, for example, is not content with preachings against that vile form of collective murder--lynch law--which has broken out in our midst anew. We know that it is murder and a deliberate and definite disobedience of the commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill.' We do not excuse those in high places or the low who condone lynch law."

Into this passage the President put full voice as if to show that Conservative Herbert Hoover, though quicker to speak out (TIME, Dec. 11) could not be more indignant than he on the subject of "rolphing."'

Profits. Suggestions from braintrusters that profits are at best a necessary evil have alarmed U. S. Business almost as much as braintrust money. Therefore Business has been waiting to hear the President use the word. He used it--but not without a thorough insulation of sociology, as follows: "We recognize the right of the individual to seek and to obtain his own fair wage, his own fair profit, in his own fair way just so long as in the doing of it he shall not push down nor hold down his neighbor. And at the same time we are at one in calling for collective effort on broad lines of social planning--a collective effort which is wholly in accord with the social teachings of Christianity."

The churchmen clapped heartily.

Christians. For the rest, the President seemed to reveal a certain Episcopal reticence in speaking too personally or effusively of the Deity. While Calvin Coolidge was never closer to his people than when expounding the verities of the God of his fathers, Franklin Roosevelt, confronted with churchmen, mostly evangelical, seemed last week to lose his neighborly touch. Soundly, however, he established the thesis that Christianity and the New Deal were at one in their goal of social justice:

"Christianity was born in and of an era notable for the great gulf that separated the privileged from the underprivileged of the world of two thousand years ago--an era of lines of demarcation between, conquerors and conquered; between caste and caste; between warring philosophies based on the theories of logicians rather than on practical humanities. The early churches were united in a social ideal. . . .

"If I were asked to state the great objective which church and State are both demanding for the sake of every man and woman and child in this country, I would say that that great objective is 'a more abundant life.'

"The early Christians challenged the pagan ethics of Greece and of Rome; we are wholly ready to challenge the pagan ethics that are represented in many phases of our boasted modern civilization. . . . Yes, the churches are the greatest influence in this world of ours to overcome the present tendency toward greed and for spreading the new philosophy of government."

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