Battle of Columbus

Population centre of the homely, zealous, intensely personal religion founded by John Wesley is, according to Methodist statistics, Columbus, Ohio. Last week in the Columbus Public Auditorium gathered 616 delegates to the 32nd Quadrennial Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. These bishops, ministers and laymen were to be in session for at least three weeks, threshing the accumulated problems of four years. Aware of the deep eco nomic differences among Methodists, the church press had been anxiously predicting a "Battle of Columbus." Battle was joined last week with a few popping squibs.

Purge? Methodism of the extreme Right in a number of U. S. localities is represented by Laymen's Conferences patterned after the one formed last summer in Chicago's Union League Club (TIME, Sept. 23). On the extreme Left is the Methodist Federation for Social Service, whose guiding spirits are its big, shrewd, sarcastic president, Bishop Francis John McConnell of New York, and its wiry lit tle British-born secretary, Professor Harry Frederick Ward of Manhattan's Union Theological Seminary. For 29 years the Federation has sniped at Capitalism with out attracting much attention. Last week, however, Hearstpapers were headlining PURGE OF PULPIT REDS DEMANDED as 75 members of the Federation sat down to a preConference meeting in Columbus. Conscious of suc cess in the past in getting Methodist conferences to give at least lip service to liberalism, the Federation presented to the Columbus gathering a memorial denouncing "profit-seeking economy." In turn Methodist laymen presented the Conference with resolutions to compel the Federation to delete "Methodist" from its name; to bar any bishop or Conference officer from serving as a Federation official; to lodge in a Conference-appointed commission the sole right to speak the Church's social views.

Keynote-- Neatly neutral were the balanced social observations in the Episcopal Address or keynote speech representing the mind of the Church's 30 active bishops.

This speech was read to the Conference by Senior Bishop Edwin Holt Hughes, 69, of Washington, a suave, well-dressed cleric who has a rich wife and gets good fees for lectures and sermons. Declared Keynoter Hughes: "Property, whether among ministers or merchants, is not proof of iniquity. In many individual cases the profit motive has been joined by the benevolent motive, as multiplied evidences would show. . . .

We must seek everywhere for a balance in our teaching and our work. . . . Often we defeat ourselves not by saying a thing, but by saying it too much! Ere long we create a feverish audience that is utterly wearied of the sounding of one string upon the harp of God! . . ." At this plea for moderation, the Methodist delegates laughed and applauded. They also applauded a resounding denunciation of "the forces of inebriety" and a reference to the projected reunion of North- ern, Southern and Protestant Methodist churches (TIME, Aug. 26). This the Columbus Conference made its first order of business. Despite objections from liberals against segregating Negroes in a separate Methodist conference, the unification plan was ratified, 470-10-83. Hailed by some Methodists as nothing less than "dramatic," this merger now awaits the approval of Southerners and Methodist Protestants during the next two years.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.