Baptists in St. Louis

In St. Louis' big Municipal Auditorium Convention Hall during the fortnight gathered the Southern Baptist Convention, the Northern Baptist Convention and, for the second time since 1845, joint "Fellowship Meetings" of the two.

Southern Baptists occupied themselves mainly with reports and resolutions. They were pleased to learn that, claiming 4,389,417 enrolled members last year, they were still ahead of the Methodists as the nation's largest non-Catholic body. Contributions to all Southern Baptist work aggregated $26,888,567, an increase of 10% over the year before. Baptist ministerial training was not in such good shape. Last available statistics showed that 64% of Southern Baptist ministers had neither college nor seminary training; only 14% had both. In two nations Baptist mission aries had had their troubles: 1) in Italy where the state had all but expropriated 15 acres of Baptist land; 2) in Rumania where the Government had detained one missionary 48 hours in a "vile dungeon." To Secretary of State Hull in Washington went Baptist protests against both "injustices." The Southern Baptist Convention passed a broad social service report but with stubborn conservatism tabled a recommendation to "investigate moral and social conditions as they affect Southern Baptist life." Said a "messenger" (delegate) : "We don't want any of that Communistic business in this convention." Fellowship Meetings. An odd liaison between the Northern and Southern conventions appeared in St. Louis in the loud-voiced, bumptious person of Rev. John Franklyn ("J. Frank") Norris, famed Texas evangelist who is nominal pastor of 12,000 Baptists in Fort Worth, actual shepherd of a flock of 5,000 in Detroit (TIME, Jan. 14, 1935). Baptist Norris got his Fort Worth church to pay the necessary $250 fee, armed himself with a badge reading "Messenger" and for the first time in years was an active member of a Southern Baptist Convention. Full of talk about Socialism and Communism, Messenger Norris was loudest in announcing that he was going to spike plans to have a Fellowship Meeting addressed by Dr. Toyohiko Kagawa, No. 1 Japanese Christian (TIME, Dec. 30 et seq.) whom Dr. Norris attempted to bait in Rochester, N. Y. last month. The Southern Baptists easily squelched the Texan. As a demonstration of Baptist solidarity -- though neither convention discussed merging during their sessions -- the Fellowship Meeting was presided over alternately by President James Henry Franklin of the Northern Baptists and President John Richard Sampey of the Southern. In oratory the meeting was a draw. Professor Emeritus Frederick Lincoln Anderson of Andover-Newton Theological Seminary led off: "The tyrants who sit in Rome, Moscow and Berlin. . . ." Dr. George W. Truett of Dallas, president of the World Baptist Alliance, countered with a thundering speech on missions : "If we Baptists sit smugly aside and prate about our orthodoxy while this mission work goes unheeded, then I say orthodoxy is a grinning, chattering skeleton!" Of Dr. Kagawa, after that mild little man had shouted one of his high-pitched, unintelligible addresses into a microphone, onetime President Monroe Elmon Dodd of the Southern Baptist Convention exclaimed: "I can only say I wish we were as good Christians as this man." Finally Northern President Franklin's voice broke with emotion when from James Grover McDonald, onetime League of Nations High Commissioner for German Refugees, he accepted a challenge for U. S. Baptists to carry on the work of Roger Williams, founder 300 years ago of Rhode Island, the anniversary of which Baptists are currently celebrating in the conviction that this pioneer in religious freedom was their spiritual ancestor. Northern Baptists. During the widespread U. S. religious ferment of a century ago, the Church of Disciples of Christ (Campbellites) was formed by a onetime Baptist named Alexander Campbell, who rejected most Baptist tenets except baptism by immersion. Last week another Campbell -- Rev. George A. of St. Louis' Union Avenue Christian Church -- appeared before the Northern Baptist Convention with a plea for merger on the ground that theological differences between the two churches were now slight. The Baptists applauded, indicated they would name a committee on reunion. But the 1,500 delegates adjourned this week without doing anything about the matter. Other work not done : The convention shelved a Social Action report whose economic implications scared many a conservative Baptist. Also put over for revision was a 15-point "Code of Professional Ethics" for Baptist ministers which contained the following observations: "It is unethical to accept the pastorate of a church and then by word or act seek to deflect that church from its cooperating affiliations. . . . It is considered unethical for one minister to make professional calls on members of other churches. . . . One must not malign another minister or besmirch his reputation. If all the truth must be spoken, let it be spoken in ministerial affection." To succeed President Franklin the Northern Baptists elected Herbert B. Clark, banker, of North Adams, Mass.

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