Violence Justified

In 1948, long before proclamations on racial justice were commonplace, the First Assembly of the World Council of Churches declared that segregation by religious organizations is "a scandal within the Body of Christ." Over the years, the council has been an outspoken apostle of brotherhood--although its ringing declarations have also insisted that racism should be fought by nonviolent means. Last week, however, an international Consultation on Racism in London organized by the Council suggested that if all else fails, even outright warfare is morally justified to end this moral blight.

Though the statement troubled some delegates, the 25-nation meeting declared that "the church and the world are filled with blatant institutional racism." They recommended economic sanctions against "corporations and institutions" that practice discrimination, and said that "guerrilla fighters struggling against racist regimes must be given the support of the church if all else has been seen to fail." Under the chairmanship of Democratic Senator George McGovern of South Dakota, a Methodist lay delegate, the conference added: "The church must," in certain circumstances, "support resistance movements, including revolutions, which are aimed at the elimination of political or economic tyranny that makes racism possible."

Platitudinous Drivel. The mood of the delegates, white and black alike, was as militant as the resolutions. After the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Michael Ramsey, told the delegates that "there was no room for discrimination" in the house of God, the Rev. Channing Phillips, a black United Church of Christ minister from Washington, snapped: "The same old platitudinous drivel." Explaining her own dismay with such pat pleas for racial justice, a delegate from Ceylon said: "We have had enough of singing as the missionaries taught us to sing, 'Red and yellow, black and white,/All are equal in Thy sight.' What is necessary is for us to really recognize one another as equals." A tentative resolution suggested that those who felt compelled to turn to violence should first ask themselves whether all possibilities of a peaceful protest had been exhausted. This idea was quickly rejected, and one speaker explained, rather apologetically, that its author was "an out-and-out pacifist."

While pacificism seemed outdated in London, the idea of reparations for past injustices was very much in style. Despite a few questions about who would control the money, the conference supported the proposal that churches compensate those who had been "exploited" by a capitalistic system. The Christian churches, the delegates reported, had "not only tolerated but also profited from" the system. Of all the meeting's decisions, this was perhaps the one of greatest practical concern to American clergymen. Ever since he disrupted a Sunday service at Manhattan's Riverside Church with his demand for $500 million in reparations for American blacks ("$15 per nigger"), James Forman's Black Manifesto (TIME, May 16) has become one of the most hotly debated issues in U.S. churches.

Polite Rebuff. While several major denominations have acknowledged the injustices suffered by the American Negro and have stepped up their contributions to black causes, they have not besieged Forman personally with offerings of cash. The United Presbyterian Church invited him to address its General Assembly last month, but pointedly took issue with his manifesto's threat of violence to obtain compensation from the churches. Even before the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church rejected the demands, Presiding Bishop John E. Hines called Forman's manifesto "calculatedly revolutionary, Marxist, inflammatory, anti-Semitic and anti-Christian." The Forman plan, added the General Board of the Disciples of Christ, implies "an ideology we cannot accept and a methodology we cannot approve." Forman also got a polite but unequivocal rebuff from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York and Jewish organizations opposed the reparations plan but favored "massive Government aid." Even Negro church leaders expressed skepticism over Forman's demands. The Black Manifesto, said Rev. J. H. Jackson, president of the National Baptist Convention U.S.A., Inc., the nation's largest Negro religious group (reported membership: 6.2 million), carries "as firm a message for the destruction of the United States of America as has ever been given."

The firm rejection by American clergymen of the violence implicit in Forman's manifesto means that the London recommendations may not win easy acceptance at the World Council's next Central Committee meeting in August. After he returned to New York last week, General Secretary Eugene Carson Blake of the World Council wondered whimsically whether the black militants would be as eager to take over the church's debts as its assets. Even the place where it all began was not inclined to court more trouble. Although Riverside Church has promised to establish a fund for the disadvantaged and endorsed the principle of reparations, it also served a court order on Forman to keep him from breaking up more of its Sunday services.

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