One Less Chaplain

The Christian Beacon, fundamentalist weekly of the Bible Presbyterian Church,* had a big story last week and spread it over four of its eight pages. The story: a U.S. Navy chaplain had resigned rather than approve liquor for sailors or give talks on venereal disease.

The Beacon's story came from the ex-chaplain himself: Dr. Norbett G. Talbott, pastor of the Methodist Church at Huntingburg, Ind. Last spring, Pastor Talbott entered the Naval Training School for Chaplains at Williamsburg, Va. He got along fine until course's end, when he was interviewed by three fellow chaplains of a survey board.

The board asked Chaplain Talbott how he would react to several situations commonly encountered by service padres. Examples: 1) On a ship returning to port after several months at sea, the captain hands the chaplain $500, tells him when they land to hire a place for a dance, get an orchestra, plenty of beer, see that the sailors have a good time. 2) On a ship returning to port after a long stretch of duty, the commanding officer tells the chaplain that when the men land some will want to see women; he orders the chaplain to give the men a talk on prophylactics.

Bowled Over. Chaplain Talbott, who never even dreamed that such things would be a part of a chaplain's work, was bowled over. He said that he could not conscientiously carry out such orders. The survey board suggested he return to parish work. Talbott agreed.

Until the Christian Beacon printed the story last week the Navy had considered the five-month-old episode a routine matter. Such scrupulous resignations from the Chaplains' Corps run about 1%.

Navy officials contend that, while the official description of a chaplain's miscellaneous duties ("recreation parties, educational activities, entertainments," etc.) does not mention liquor, they do not think it takes psychic powers to read between the lines. They also lay great stress on the requirement that chaplains "exemplify in its broadest aspects the spirit of tolerance and Christian charity."

But the Christian Beacon found the matter indicative of "a most deplorable and desperate condition" in the Navy. The Beacon's editor, the Rev. Carl Mc-Intire, took the occasion to wind up with a slap at Chief of Naval Chaplains Robert D. Workman, "who is a minister of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. and who . . . has set out to produce a chaplaincy corps in the Navy which is streamlined according to his own ideas. . . . This information is brought with the one desire of helping to correct the condition, and that we shall have a man at the head of the chaplains of the Navy who stands squarely by the Bible. . . ."

* A fundamentalist offshoot of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. Another offshoot: The Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Difference: Bible Presbyterians ban all liquor; Orthodox Presbyterians permit beer and wine.

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