The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky • Page 116

SECTION 7 THK COURIER-JOURNAL, LOUISVILLE, SUNDAY MORMNC, OCTOBER 16, 1060 10,000 Disciples Of Christ To Converge On Fairgrounds The Italian College of Georgia An Undergraduate School of Religion At the University of Georgia 220 Suth Hull Slreel Athens, Georgia Dedicated lot An Adequate Ministry For An Expanding Church afternoon the Missionary Society will hold its annual meeting and a drama, "This Burning Hour," will be presented. It was written by Kermit Hunt-' er, author of several outdoor dramas. The day will include reports on the situation in the Congo by missionaries and nationals from there. Editor To Be Honored At 8 m. Saturday, Dr.

George Walker Buckner, longtime editor of World Call, the society's publication, will be honored, and the society's president, the Rev. A. Dale Fiers, will speak. Next Sunday morning, visiting ministers will occupy pulpits in Christian churches of the Louisville area, all speaking on the subject, "Man's Spirit and His Decisions." Sunday afternoon will bring the high point in worship for the assembly when about 8,000 lation explosion, and the church in an age of science. They will not come as dcle-Cates, but all will have a vote.

The annual assembly is strictly an advisory body although its expressions are usually carried out as mandates. Any member of the 8,000 or so congregations in the United States may attend the convention and vote. But actions of the convention are not binding on locally autonomous congregations. All business coming before the convention is first submitted to the committee on recommendations, a body of 200 representatives elected by state conventions. This committee will meet Wednesday and Thursday to decide what business will be submitted to the assembly.

The convention president, Dr. Loren E. Lair, executive secretary of the Iowa Secretary of Christian Churches, will preside at all business sessions of the convention. A new convention president will be elect the Rev. James H.

Robinson, minister of the Church of The Master (Presbyterian), director of Morningside Community Center in New York City, and a noted leader in social relations, will speak. U. K. Head On Program Four college presidents, including Dr. Frank G.

Dickey, president of the University of Kentucky, will speak on "Educating for Christian Disciple-ship" Wednesday morning. A service of commission to The Decade of Decision will be held Saturday afternoon. The assembly will close Wednesday night with a music festival by massed choirs of five colleges and seminaries and a drama, "Circle Beyond Fear," by Darius Leander Swan. It will be the seventh time the International Convention of Christian Churches has met in Louisville. The last time was in 1912.

The Disciples also met here in 1869, 1872, 1875, 1880, and 1889. Denomination To Map Course For Hie 1960's Almost 10.0OO people known is Disciple of Christ will converge on the Kentucky State Fair nd Exposition Center Fridav for the 111th annual assembly of the International Convention of Christian Churches. They will spend six days here jn worship and fellowship and discussions on the theme, "Our Decision His Mission," aimed jt setting the course of their 2.000.000-strong denomination for the 1960 "The Decade of Decision." I They will deal with public matters such as racial discrimination in the churches, restrictions on voting rights, distribution of surplus food, liquor advertising, the crisis in the Belgian Congo, censorship in mass publications, the popu Convention Of Christian Churches Originated In Kentucky Pencils Used Between 3,000 and 4,000 pencils and about 600 ball-point pens are used in a year at the Christian Board of Publication. LYNCHBURG COLLEGE A CHRISTIAN COLLEGE FOR MEN AND OMEN Fully-ArTPlilpl LiiWal Ails (hirriculum Offering JJ.A. and U.S.

Degree For information write: DR. ORVILLE W. WAKE, PRESIDENT LYNCHBURG COLLEGE LYNCHBURG, VIRGINIA' from Bethany College, West Christian Theological Sem-i a Indianapolis; Culver-Stockton College, Canton, nd the College of The Bible and Transylvania College in Lexington. litre are some of the hig of the convention: Dr. Lair will give the convention president's annual address at 8 p.m.

Friday, speaking on "Our Decision His Mission," the assembly theme. Anniversary To Be Observed The 40th anniversary of the United Christian Missionary Society, which has headquarters in Indianapolis, will be observed Saturday. Dr. Roy G. Boss, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, New York, will speak in the morning on "The Mission of The Church In A New Age." A luncheon for some 5,000 persons will be served in the East Exposition Wing.

That 'among the rocks and hills of the Cumberland, where rac- -coons make their homes," in Tennessee, ninth of 15 children. When he Was 10, his family moved to Clinton County, Kentucky, and he grew up there to be, at 23, a Baptist preacher. In 1814, he moved with his wife and two children to Alabama. There tragedy befell. The cabin he had built burned and his two children died in the fire.

His wife died of the shock and Smith's theology was shaken badly. A Storied Figure He returned to Kentucky and while preaching at four Baptist churches around Mount Sterling, he came upon some of the writings of Alexander Campbell. He was deeply impressed, and in 1829 abandoned the Baptist Church to work with Campbell's Disciples of Christ. Raccoon John was a storied figure, a giant of a man. Once at Owingsville, he came upon a Methodist meeting as the preacher was about to bap-tize a child by sprinkling.

As the minister prayed, Smith slipped to the altar and drank the baptismal water. When the prayer ended, Raccoon John chortled, "Brother, I drank your' Jordan dry." Smith was on hand in 1832 for the concourse of the here- tofore diverse movement. Fol- lowers of Barton Stone and Alexander Campbell met at the Hill Street Church in Lexington. There they pounded out agreement that bound them together as soulmates in a movement that has become the Disciples of Christ. Each of these men brought something unique to the Dis ciples movement Stone the audacity of independent thinking; Smith the fire of the zealot; Thomas Campbell the profoundness of thought.

persons will participate in the celebration of the Lord's Supper in Freedom Hall. "A Look at Critical Issues" will be taken Monday morning by a panel of speakers and Monday afternoon the assembly will discuss "Responsible Parenthood and The Population Explosion." Canadian Official To Speak Miss Marion V. Royce, director of the Women's Bureau of the Canadian Department of Labor, Ontario, will speak Monday night on "Frontiers In Christian Ethics." The Missouri Association of Christian Churches will present a program Tuesday morning on "The Church at Work Within The State." Tuesday afternoon the Disciples will discuss "The Church In An Age of Science" and four ministers will present's "sermon with historical interludes." The denomination's rural minister of the year will be recognized Tuesday night, and dividual independence of the movement led by Campbell stood well against the divisive ravages of the Civil War. When other church groups were splitting the Disciples were undis- turbed. Not being a denomina tion, they took no position in the conflict.

The undenominationalism of the Disciples is their strength and their weakness. They have not had great influence on social concerns because they had no united voice. They have exercised greatest impact on the church unity movement by their contribution of leaders to the ecumenical movement. They were in the forefront of founding the Federal Council of Churches. Their leaders proportionately outnumber those of other denominations in the National Council of Churches, World Council, and other interdenominational movements.

Independence of thought can bring unity and it can bring diversity. A large group now known as the Churches of Christ broke with the Disciples in 1906, largely on disagreement over instrumental music in churches and missionary societies. Today, most Disciples churches have organs and the Churches of Christ are often called "the non-instrumental brethren." Disciples take hope, nevertheless, in the breakdown of hard sectarian lines in Protestantism, hoping that others will return to "the New Testament "church" they seek to be. WHAS Broadcasting Assembly Sessions Evening sessions of the International ntion of Christian Churches assembly will be broadcast by WHAS radio, 840 on the dial. The broadcasts will be at 8:30 p.m.

Friday and Sunday and at 8 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. fc-" MIDWAY JUNIOR COLLEGE and PINKERTON II I (ill SCHOOL CANE RIDGE meeting house near Paris, scene of great revival of 1802, looked like this before it was enclosed in limestone shelter as perpetual shrine. Midway, Devoted to the Christian education of capable, worthy young women whose homes have sustained the loss of a parent or parents through illness, disability, death or separation. Fully accredited courses in liberal arts, teacher education, business, homemaking, music, pre-nursing and religion.

Financial grants, including room, board, and tuition awarded on the basis of individual need to deserving applicants. New dormitory, 8ee Wisdom Hall, opened this tall. ed Wednesday night, October 26. A massed choir from the Christian Churches of Louisville will sing each evening at the assembly. On Monday night a verse-speaking choir and interpretative dance group from Transylvania College will present a program, "The Crier Calls." The music program of the convention will be directed by Arthur N.

Wake, professor at The College of The Bible, Lexington. Miss Florence Montz, music director at First Christian Church, Louisville, assisted in planning, and Paul Knox, minister of music at Central Christian Church, Lexington, will be convention organist. 5 Choirs To Sing i Choirs from five colleges and seminaries will combine with a brass choir to provide anthems and choral background for a special dedication service Wednesday night. They are and in 1797 arrived in Kentucky, where the Transylvania Presbytery assigned him as pastor of Cane Ridge in Bourbon County and Concord in Nicholas County. When he heard that the fa-mous preacher, James Mc-Gready, was holding a massive revival in Logan County, Stone made the long trip to hear him.

He returned to Cane Ridge, to find that the now-fainous revival there had begun. It was a monumental event, held on the grounds of Stone's church. Something like 20,000 people almost a 10th of all the people in Kentucky came to the camp meeting. They stayed for days and heard preachers of all denominations and no denomination. Emotionalism Rampant Church historians were later to peg this meeting as one of the hallmarks of the so-called Great Awakening, so influential in the spread of religion on the frontier.

But the excessive emotionalism of the revival was more than staid Presbyterians could take, and they criticized Stone for his role in it. Soon after, Stone and his followers Robert Marshall, John Dunlevy, Richard McNemar, John Thompson, and David Purvi-ance resigned from the Transylvania Presbytery and formed their own the Springfield Presbytery. But the make-up and temper of these men could not cotton to continued involvement with the Presbyterian Church. A short year later, they drew up a facetious "Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery," dissolved it, and went their own way to be known only as "Christians." By 1827, Stone's defection "au vimcvicu annual au- Tpnnps. see, and Missouri known widely as "Stoneites." By a different course then came one of the most colorful frontier preachers, "Raccoon John" Smith.

He was born Veteran niuiUlers, mls-ilonarirt or their widow on the nilnln-terlal rrlicf roll rereiv a iperlal rah gift be-rati of the Intrrna-tiontil Convention Com iminion Offering, You are invited to in litis frllowlilp Sunday, Oclolmr 2.1, 4 P.M. at Freedom Hall (Faii'tp'ouiuU), IjOiiU-Ville. insio.v ran of iiiiiiYim (in in ins (Dinrlple. of Chrint) 800 Tet Kuil.liiiK Indianapolii 4, Indiana But it was Alexander Camp bell who made the movement go and grow. By 1840, he was a frontier celebrity.

He founded Bethany College on a corner of his farm in Virginia. His magazine, "The Aiuiennial Harbinger, was widely read. He was a member of the Virginia Constitutional Convention and James Madison said he was "the ablest and most original expounder of Scripture I ever heard." Campbell was invited to address Congress in a joint, adjourned session. Wherever he went, crowds gathered to hear him discourse, endlessly sometimes. At one Louisville meeting, people sat on hard wooden benches in a schoolhouse to hear him.

He stood behind a tall desk with a long, tallow candle at each side. He preached until the candles burned down. They were replaced, burned down again, and still the crowd remained. He was a tall, gaunt man with a hawklike nose and a grand manner. He delighted in theological debate and often challenged local preachers.

He once engaged the Roman Catholic archbishop of Cincinnati, John B. Purcell, in five debates that drew national attention and made the archbishop and Campbell fast friends. When he spoke on the Corin- thians text of "faith, hope, and charity," he allotted an hour to each of the three. Held Long Debates His greatest debate was with a Presbyterian preacher, N. Rice, of Paris, with Henry Clay as moderator.

They dis- puted the subject of baptism for 16 days. Each made 64 speeches and a transcript of the debate that ran to 912 pages was sold all over the world. The local autonomy and in- at (Dltc'pUt of Chrit!) ECUMENICAL Ifs 7th Largest Protestant Groups In U. S. By OR A SPAII) The International Convention pf Christian Churches is a denomination that, has tried hard not to be denomination.

The last thing its founders wanted to do was to start another church. But today the group known as Disciples of numbers more than 1,808,000 in 7,127 congregations in the United States and Can-ada and another 320,000 in 17 other countries. 'It is the seventh largest Protestant communion in the Protestant communion in the JJnited States, but the largest to originate on American soil. And it is not improper to say that it originated right here in Its origin reaches back, however, to the green of Northern Ireland, where at the turn of the 19th Century lived a Scot Thomas Campbell by name a schoolmaster and preacher. His grandfather was a Roman Catholic, his father an Anglican, and he a Seceder Presbyterian.

He had seven mouths to feed and his fortunes were not good. In 1807, seeking greater opportunity for his not inconsiderable talents, he migrated to America, at the age of 44. He began preaching on a Presbyterian circuit in Western Pennsylvania, but almost immediately got into trouble. There were not enough established churches of all denominations in those days and he invited people with no church to worship with him. Orthodox Challenged Offering Communion to any and all, inviting the people to come without accepting any creed, he caused conflict with his Presbyterian brethren.

His orthodoxy was challenged and hf was hailed before his presbytery for trial. He was censored by his presbytery, but he appealed to the higher court, the Associate Synod of North America. There the censure was removed, but his ffectiveness as a Presbyterian minister was ended. -Thomas Campbell set out on his own. He organized a Chris- tran Association of Washing- a discussion group of lenow intellectuals, And he cOmpleled his "Declaration and Address," a statement of his religious belief which has become the Magna Carta of the Disciple movement, Campbell's eldest son, Alexander, was at this time back irj Scotland attending the Uni versity of Glasgow.

Unbe- known to his father, Alexander was taking a similar course of itefiance to the limitations of Presbyterian faith. Followed His Father On being questioned by the church elders, Alexander answered all questions. Then, hen given a small metal token entitling him to partake of Communion, he flung the token indignantly into an offering plate and stalked away. Alexander followed his father to America, where both expected to be admonished by the other for breaking with Jhe faith. When they found themselves on common ground, arrived at separately, they re- joiced and vowed to preach the cause of nondenomination-alism.

The Campbell idea might be ummed up in four slogans that have become watchwords ths Disciples: No creed but Christ, no book hut the Bible, no name but the "Divine, Lewis A-Tipcr President Read The Classified Ads, Kentucky David Cleveland Director of Public Rlritiont M. Louis PVvmMS HMHHHMMI WWWgJiSlgP'! '-k ft I iff li i i Am, Lmmm, immw You are cordially invited to visit the Christian Board of Publication exhibit at the International Convention ton, liberty; in all things, charity. We are not the only Christians, but Christians only. Alexander began to preach this doctrine and soon gathered a following in what is now West Virginia that became Brush Run Church. Young Campbell married about this time and it was a significant matrimony.

His bride was the daughter of a wealthy farmer who four years later gave him a prosperous farm. Freed from the need to earn a living, Alexander could devote great time to preaching. Baptism By Immersion When Alexander's first child was born in 1812, he and his father decided that infant baptism was not scriptural and that baptism by immersion was the mandate of the Bible. Alexander and his entire family were immersed in a creek by a Baptist preacher, establishing a hard tenet of his the-ology baptism by immersion. Soon after, the, Campbells' church was taken into the Redstone Baptist Association.

They continued there until 1830, known always as "reformers." Thomas Campbell was the vkmnarv. the idealist, the in stigator, the intellectual. His son had many of these powers but to them he brought also )ri( attributes of builder, ex- hortor, organizer, writer. Both men traveled widely, preaching their new gospel. But Alexander began to emerge as leader of the movement.

The movement grew and wherever they appeared, con-firenations sprang up in their wake. Meetings were held in the open or in a or barn. Because schoolhouse there were i few permanent preachers, lay- men conducted services ana administered the Lord's Supper. There were no organs, because instrumental music was considered unscriptural. Cause Spreads Other itinerent, horseback-ing preachers took up- the cause men like William Hay-den and Waller Scott.

Farmers left their farms in winter to preach. They were welcomed on the stul-frontier reaches of mid-America as something new ana something rare. A second prong In the fork of the Disciple movement began in the person of Barton Warren Stone, born in 1772 in Port Tobacco, reared by his widowed mother in Virginia. He was schooled in a Presbyterian academy in North Carolina and set out to be a Presbyterian preacher. But Stone was longer on re- GREAT LEADERS of Christian Churches were Thomas Campbell, left, Barton W.

Stone, center, and Thomas' son, Alexander. All began as Presbyterians. CHRISTIAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY Indianapolis, Indiana Affiliated with' tht CHRISTIAN. CHURCHES History records that in the year 1910 the first Board of Directors of the Christian Hoard of Publication directed that application be made to the Slate of Missouri for a charter to do business in the City of St. Louis, as a non-profit religious publishing house.

It was created to serve the churches of the Disciples of Christ, (Christian Churches) by providing periodicals, Bibles, curriculum materials, books and other supplies for an ongoing program of Christian teaching, evangelism and stewardship in the local church. Beginning with a total investment of 10 1, 307. 95, donated by R. A. Long, the gross assets, before- depreciation, have increased, to over $1,000,000.

Jn addition, it lias, through the years, contributed over $1,275,000 to Christian education, missionary and benevolent institutions of the Disciples of Christ. From a small beginning this publishing house lias grown to great service institution, catering to the religious needs of Christian Churches and their membership. yf -i Slnf J855 Actrditd by tht America Aitotiafien-of Theological Schaolj Offering courses leading to the: Bachelor of Divinity degrtt Maittr of Theology degrtt Master of Religioul Education degrlt Matter af Sacred Muic degrot C.tS. IS INTERDENOMINATIONAL INTERNATIONAL INTERRACIAL publishing house when in Where the Scriptures speak, vival zeal than he was on the-we speak; where the Scriptures ology and he smarted under the are silent; we are silent. strictures of church doctrine, In essentials, unity; in opin- He preached on the frontier or visit the 4.

Eureka College Providing flrttduate professional study for men and women preparing for service In the fattert ministry Teaching Chriition education Mittiafll Var'eui chaplaind Other Christian vocations Dt, Beauford A. North, President WE SALUTE Oar titter Semirtarlee and Divinity Mouses Our tlnivtniiiei end Colleges Ovtr Board of Hightr Education Our Brotherhood and all Co-operating agencies Our congregations throughout tht world Out hf city, Uuiivtllt, nd all who join to molt tht Convention possible Our fellow believe in Christ among all denomination irt Kentucky and around tht World lur.ka, III. Ira W. langtron, Pittidtnt Invites You to Its One Hundredth Commencement Festival 2, 4, 191 Ar('hilfM'l' Mveldi of I lie new LuildingH and remodeled old buildings. Theme: "Tht Learned Live With Tragedy" Presented in Drama, Interpretation, Sermon, Address, and Music.