Howard C. Wilkinson - "Robert Burns and the Religion - Government Controversy" (January 21, 1968)

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-	Followers, that we could pray together saying,	0:03
	"Our father who art in heaven,	0:07
	hallowed be thy name,	0:10
	thy kingdom come,	0:12
	thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.	0:14
	Give us this day our daily bread	0:18
	and forgive us our trespasses	0:21
	as we forgive those who trespass against us.	0:24
	And lead us not into temptation,	0:27
	but deliver us from evil.	0:30
	For thine is the kingdom, and the power,	0:32
	and the glory, forever.	0:36
	Amen."	0:39
	(audience coughing)	0:55
-	A few weeks ago, during the Christmas season,	1:03
	there was a fresh and fiery outburst	1:07
	in the growing national debate,	1:12
	over religious observances in tax-supported institutions.	1:15
	To an extent perhaps not witnessed before,	1:22
	verbal and printed wrath boiled over	1:27
	from both sides of the debate.	1:31
	It is becoming evident	1:36
	that reason is being replaced by emotion,	1:37
	that many on both sides are shouting louder	1:42
	and are listening less.	1:46
	Consider a few Christmas events	1:50
	of this immediate past Christmas.	1:54
	Two lawyers in Overland, Missouri,	1:58
	wrote the mayor of that city a very hostile letter,	2:02
	demanding that the nativity scene be removed	2:06
	from the lawn of city hall	2:09
	and claiming that its presence there,	2:12
	violated the first amendment of the constitution.	2:14
	The mayor with equal hostility simply ignored the letter.	2:19
	In Duluth, Minnesota,	2:26
	a father demanded that the singing of Christmas carols	2:28
	be stopped immediately in all of the city schools.	2:31
	The same demand was made in the state of Florida	2:35
	and one sheriff in that state reacted by saying	2:39
	that if he were handed a warrant to arrest a school official	2:42
	for allowing Christmas carols to be sung,	2:47
	he would refuse to make the arrest.	2:50
	In Eugene, Oregon,	2:56
	an opponent of religious observances in government,	2:58
	went so far as to obtain an injunction	3:02
	to forbid the city officials to light up a cross,	3:05
	which had been illuminated each Christmas in previous years.	3:09
	The city officials disregarded the injunction,	3:15
	refused to obey it, turned on the lights,	3:18
	and appealed to the state supreme court.	3:21
	Well, even though the emotional tone of the debate	3:25
	became disturbingly and uniquely shrill	3:30
	during these past Christmas holidays,	3:35
	there have in signs during the last several years,	3:38
	that the tension was building up.	3:42
	January the 11th, a year ago,	3:46
	Senator Everett Dirksen introduced a joint resolution	3:49
	into the 90th Congress,	3:52
	calling for an amendment to the constitution,	3:55
	which in effect would prevent any court,	3:58
	including the Supreme Court	4:02
	from prohibiting voluntary and non-denominational prayer	4:03
	in public institutions.	4:10
	The Christian Century Magazine reacted belligerently.	4:13
	It was opposed to religious observances	4:19
	in public institutions no matter how voluntary	4:22
	and had often stated its opposition.	4:26
	But when the editors learned that Senator Dirksen was going	4:29
	to introduce this proposed amendment,	4:32
	the Christian Century went beyond reasoning	4:36
	and resorted to blackmail.	4:38
	In a prominent editorial,	4:42
	Christian Century threatened that	4:44
	if Senator Dirksen's amendment passed,	4:46
	the editors would use all the influence of their command	4:50
	to disrupt the entire educational and governmental system	4:54
	of the whole United States.	4:59
	They promised that if the amendment passed,	5:03
	their program would be ready.	5:06
	And so they wrote,	5:09
	"We will push its implementation to the hilt."	5:12
	What was their plan?	5:19
	It was to go the Mormons into demanding three hours per day	5:21
	of reading from The Book of Mormon in every school	5:26
	where they are in the majority.	5:29
	The editor said they would do their best to get the Jews	5:33
	to demand a similar reading of the Torah	5:35
	in every school where they are in the majority, and so on.	5:39
	They would so they said,	5:45
	needle the Baptists into demanding	5:47
	that a Baptist open with prayer,	5:50
	every post office, every fire station,	5:52
	every Social Security office, Internal Revenue office,	5:55
	and FBI office in America every day.	5:58
	In short, the Christian Century promised	6:03
	that if the Dirksen amendment passed,	6:06
	they would do everything they could and I quote,	6:08
	"To use prayer to tie up the whole educational	6:12
	and governmental process	6:18
	until there should be a demand	6:20
	that would prevail to repeal the amendment."	6:23
	Well, it's clear from these	6:29
	and from many other indications, which could be given,	6:32
	that we are rapidly approaching a point in this controversy,	6:37
	when pushing and shoving,	6:42
	will replace dialogue and listening,	6:45
	when psychosis will replace sanity,	6:50
	when we will all talk past each other,	6:54
	when bitterness will make any peaceful solution impossible.	6:59
	Into this situation, some lines from a poem	7:08
	by Robert Burns come with intense relevance	7:12
	and hopefully with soothing balm.	7:16
	You know what they are?	7:20
	The lines by which he is best known,	7:22
	"O, wad some Power the giftie gie us	7:25
	To see oursels as others see us!	7:28
	It wad frae monie a blunder free us,	7:32
	An' foolish notion."	7:35
	Translating those lines from the charming Scottish language	7:39
	to the English language and from poetry to pros,	7:42
	we find Robert Burns wishing	7:46
	that some power would grant us the ability	7:49
	to understand how we look to others,	7:51
	so that we might avoid numerous blunders	7:56
	and be set free from many foolish notions.	8:00
	There are few blessings, my friends,	8:06
	that one can imagine,	8:08
	which would help resolve this heated controversy	8:10
	more than the one for which Burns called.	8:14
	If only we could see	8:18
	how our opponents interpret our position,	8:20
	not how we interpret it.	8:25
	We already know that.	8:26
	How they hear our arguments.	8:28
	How our posture looks to them.	8:34
	There might be enough change on both sides take place	8:38
	to make possible a resolution of the conflict.	8:42
	What we have to understand, however, is that by and large,	8:46
	up to now, we are not trying to do	8:50
	what Robert Burns called for.	8:53
	Rather, we are attempting to do the opposite.	8:56
	Some years ago in a different context,	9:01
	Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote a parody on Burns poem,	9:03
	which he more nearly described our true passions.	9:07
	Fosdick said that instead of our praying	9:12
	"O, wad some Power the giftie gie us	9:14
	To see oursels as others see us!"	9:15
	we fervently pray,	9:18
	"Owe what some power to others gie	9:20
	to see myself as I see me."	9:22
	This is precisely what both sides	9:27
	in the controversy have been praying actually.	9:29
	Each has been demanding	9:33
	that the other side see matters our way.	9:34
	The result is that,	9:38
	increasingly, we are willing to talk, but not to listen,	9:39
	quick to demand, slow to understand,	9:44
	while a beginning point would be	9:48
	to hear what the side opposite you is saying about you.	9:50
	You can do that right now during this sermon.	9:58
	Since both sides in this debate are represented	10:02
	at Duke university,	10:04
	I shall presume both are present in this congregation now.	10:06
	One side contends that it is no violation	10:10
	of the first amendment	10:13
	to have voluntary religious observances	10:14
	in public institutions.	10:17
	For convenience, let's call that side or team A.	10:21
	Now, the other side contends	10:28
	that even voluntary religious observances	10:30
	in public institutions does violate the first amendment.	10:33
	Let's call that side team B.	10:37
	Now this is what the controversy is all about.	10:41
	That's all there is to it,	10:45
	But there are many overtones and undertones,	10:47
	which are played on this simple theme	10:52
	And neither side really hears the message	10:56
	from the other side.	10:59
	For a few minutes, let us hear now.	11:02
	I've selected two points from each side.	11:06
	Will you listen?	11:09
	Team A needs to hear and ponder something	11:12
	which team B has been saying for a decade.	11:17
	They have been declaring that prayer and Bible study	11:22
	in the public school is not a proper substitute	11:26
	for religious training in the home and in the church.	11:31
	They claim that team A is insisting	11:35
	that we have have religious observances in school	11:39
	to make up for their own failure to provide it at home	11:41
	or to go with their children to church and church school.	11:44
	They wanna let George do it at the public school.	11:50
	Is there truth in this accusation?	11:55
	I think there is.	11:59
	Far too many parents have wanted their children	12:01
	to have religious training,	12:04
	but they've not wanted it badly enough	12:06
	to become involved in it themselves.	12:08
	And this has given them a very guilty conscience,	12:11
	which has emerged in the form of an insistence	12:14
	upon religious instruction in the public schools	12:18
	and other public institutions by public officials.	12:21
	Can you hear that word this morning?	12:27
	If you can, what blunder will hearing it free you from	12:33
	and what foolish notion will it dispel?	12:38
	Now, let's try one on the opposite side.	12:45
	Team A has been saying something about team B	12:48
	for several years namely,	12:54
	that they are confusing the language	12:58
	of the first amendment of the constitution	13:00
	and are insisting that the first amendment	13:02
	means something it has never meant before,	13:05
	and which the Americans who wrote it and who adopted it,	13:08
	never intended it to me.	13:13
	Specifically, they are saying,	13:16
	the first amendment prohibits religious observances	13:19
	and practices in government	13:23
	when it only was designed to prohibit a state church	13:27
	or an established denomination,	13:31
	such as the Church of England is.	13:34
	In other words, team B, they say,	13:37
	is making a religion-government controversy	13:42
	out of what under the constitution could legitimately	13:47
	only be a church-state issue.	13:50
	Is there truth in this charge?	13:58
	I think there is.	14:01
	Chief among those apparently in error on this point,	14:03
	are certain honorable justices on the US Supreme Court	14:09
	who have written that the first amendment	14:14
	forbids even voluntary and non-sectarian prayer	14:16
	in public schools.	14:20
	If by that, they mean that Thomas Jefferson	14:23
	and the members of the Congress,	14:26
	which adopted the first amendment,	14:28
	intended any such interpretation,	14:30
	they are 100% in the purest of error.	14:34
	All the writings of Jefferson	14:39
	and the records of that first Congress,	14:41
	have been carefully worked through	14:43
	and there can be no slight doubt on this point.	14:46
	This has been meticulously documented,	14:52
	and it has been fully published, and it is available.	14:56
	No one needs to be in this kind of darkness.	15:00
	The first part of the first amendment was designed	15:06
	to prohibit the establishment of a state church	15:09
	or state denomination and nothing more.	15:11
	The second portion of the first amendment,	15:16
	was designed to guarantee that nothing would be done	15:19
	to prevent the free exercise of religion.	15:22
	Therefore, to say that the first amendment was designed	15:26
	to prevent voluntary prayer and other religious observances	15:29
	in tax-supported institutions,	15:34
	is to confess that one has not read early American history.	15:36
	Can you hear that word this morning?	15:42
	Does it sink in?	15:49
	If so, what blunder will that free you from,	15:53
	and what foolish notion will it dispel?	15:58
	All right. Let's switch back to the other side.	16:03
	Team A needs to open its ears	16:07
	and hear a word which team B has been speaking	16:09
	for quite a while.	16:12
	They have been charging that the attempt	16:14
	to keep Bible in the public schools,	16:17
	to keep prayer in legislative halls,	16:19
	to keep chaplains in Congress and in the armed forces,	16:22
	to keep the motto "In God We Trust" on our national coins,	16:25
	is an attempt to make America Christian by label,	16:30
	to baptize our country by official acts,	16:35
	which are not matched by genuine piety.	16:38
	Team B has seen this as a superior's attempt	16:43
	to get God on our side	16:47
	so that when America goes to war against an enemy,	16:49
	team A can call God's attention	16:52
	to all the official religiosity we have accumulated	16:55
	in the hope that God will fight our battles for us	16:58
	and give us the victory.	17:01
	Is this charge true?	17:04
	I think it is partly true and partly false.	17:08
	This is the case for an interesting reason.	17:13
	As often happens in other areas,	17:16
	we find groups of people with entirely opposite motivations,	17:19
	apparently seeking to do the same thing.	17:25
	Some members of team A probably do try	17:30
	to keep religious observances in public institutions	17:33
	for reason assigned by team B.	17:37
	I once heard of a racially segregated veterans organization,	17:40
	which opened its meeting one night	17:44
	by singing "God bless America,"	17:46
	and then plunged into an evening of gambling,	17:48
	drunkenness and other immorality.	17:50
	However, there are many other members of team A	17:55
	who seek to maintain a Christian influence	17:58
	in governmental institutions	18:01
	for an entirely different reason.	18:02
	They realize that neutrality is both logically	18:05
	and psychologically impossible,	18:09
	that all institutions, sooner or later,	18:13
	begin to make either pro-Christian	18:16
	or anti-Christian assumptions.	18:18
	And these members of team A want our nation	18:21
	to know that we stand as a nation	18:23
	under the judgment of a righteous God.	18:26
	They therefore believe that	18:29
	if the public school is conducted	18:30
	on the assumption that if there is a God,	18:32
	the school does not need to take Him into account.	18:34
	And if the university is conducted	18:37
	on the assumption that its affairs are excluded	18:39
	from the province of God,	18:42
	and if the legislature and the Congress are led	18:44
	to believe that the nation's laws do not have to be measured	18:46
	by the plum line of God's righteousness,	18:49
	then we have surrendered	18:52
	to the central doctrine of secularism,	18:53
	which is that whether there be a God or not,	18:56
	He is at least irrelevant	19:00
	to the way we organize our life together.	19:01
	This would not be neutrality.	19:06
	This would be a flat denial of Christian faith,	19:09
	which is that God and his righteousness,	19:12
	are relevant to all of life, nothing excluded.	19:15
	These members of team A do not wish this to happen.	19:20
	So, depending on which members of team A	19:24
	you're talking about and the motivations they have,	19:29
	this charge by team B may be true or it may be false.	19:33
	But all members of team A need to hear the charge,	19:39
	because if they do,	19:46
	it may free them from blunders and false notions.	19:50
	And it is important for team A	19:56
	not to allow the charge to be true.	19:58
	Okay, let's turn our attention to a second word,	20:04
	which team A has been speaking about team B,	20:07
	and which team B assuredly needs to hear.	20:11
	Team A points out that a strong majority of American people,	20:16
	traditionally have been and are now,	20:21
	positively-oriented towards the Christian religion.	20:25
	They remind us that the last United States census,	20:30
	showed that only 3%	20:33
	of the American people identified themselves	20:35
	as being in any sense Jewish.	20:38
	And that if one added up all the adherence	20:42
	of all non-Christian religions in the United States,	20:44
	the total probably would scarcely exceed 5%	20:48
	of the population.	20:53
	And yet, charges team A,	20:55
	we are called on by team B	20:57
	to neutralize all public institutions,	20:59
	less some child of this 5% minority,	21:02
	should hear some Christian word or song,	21:05
	which might influence him in favor of the Christian religion	21:08
	and against the creed of his parents.	21:12
	Perhaps the most eloquent statement of this point of view,	21:15
	has been given by Dr. Erwin Griswold,	21:18
	who was Dean of the Harvard University Law School,	21:22
	and not too long	21:26
	before he became the Solicitor General of the United States	21:28
	at the time he wrote the article.	21:33
	Here are some sentences from the article which he wrote.	21:36
	"This is a country of religious toleration.	21:41
	That is a great consequence of our history embodied	21:46
	in the first amendment.	21:49
	But does religious toleration mean religious delelity?	21:51
	I wonder why it should be thought that it does.	21:56
	This is a Christian country in origin,	22:00
	history, tradition, and culture.	22:03
	It was out of Christian doctrine and ethics	22:07
	that it developed its notion of toleration.	22:10
	But does the fact that	22:14
	we have officially adopted toleration as our standard,	22:15
	mean that we must give up our history and our tradition.	22:18
	The Muslim who comes here may worship as he pleases	22:22
	and may hold public office without discrimination.	22:26
	This is as it should be.	22:29
	But why should it follow that he can require others	22:32
	to give up their Christian tradition	22:35
	merely because he is a welcomed member of the community?	22:37
	The child of a minority group is to be sure different	22:42
	in his beliefs.	22:45
	That is what it means to be a member of a minority.	22:47
	Is it not desirable and even educational for him to learn	22:51
	and observe this in the atmosphere of the school?	22:56
	And is it not desirable that at the same time,	23:01
	he experiences and learns the fact	23:04
	that his difference is tolerated and accepted?	23:06
	He too has the opportunity to be tolerant.	23:10
	He allows the majority of the group	23:14
	to follow their own tradition,	23:16
	perhaps coming to understand,	23:18
	and to respect what they feel is significant to them.	23:20
	In a country which has a great tradition of tolerance,	23:25
	is it not important that minorities	23:29
	who have benefited so greatly from that tolerance,	23:32
	should be tolerant too?"	23:36
	Well, the essence of team A's charge here is that,	23:41
	team B is willing to see the religious supports of morality,	23:45
	of decency, of law and order,	23:49
	disappear from all our public institutions,	23:52
	rather than see one child hear a prayer	23:55
	or a scripture reading	23:59
	from a tradition different from his own.	24:00
	Team A charges that, as a result,	24:04
	juvenile delinquency will grow,	24:06
	immorality will increase,	24:09
	crime and violence will expand in ever widening circles.	24:11
	Is this charge true?	24:16
	Perhaps only history can decide.	24:20
	But for now, the least that team B can do is really	24:23
	to open its ears and hear that charge.	24:29
	If they do,	24:34
	if they do,	24:37
	it may result in the elimination of some blunders	24:39
	and the abandonment of some foolish notions.	24:43
	And so finally, speaking for all of us,	24:48
	Robert Burns would say,	24:52
	"O, wad some Power the giftie gie us.	24:53
	To see oursels as others see us!"	24:55
	If that gift can be given to us	25:02
	and if we will accept the gift,	25:06
	we can not only hear each other,	25:10
	but perhaps we can come together	25:13
	to make some very wise decisions	25:14
	for the glory of God and the up-building of our country.	25:17
	The Prophet Ezekiel was sent by God many years ago,	25:23
	to take a message to the Israelites	25:26
	who were in exile at Tel Abib by the River Chebar.	25:28
	The message was that they were abundantly wicked	25:33
	and that if they didn't reform,	25:38
	there was bad news on the way for them.	25:40
	Well, Ezekiel went on his assignment,	25:43
	but when he got there, and as the scripture says,	25:46
	"sat where they sat for a whole week."	25:51
	He was astonished because he saw their misery	25:58
	as they saw it themselves.	26:07
	He still finally spoke the message of God,	26:10
	but it was in a new context of understanding their plight	26:13
	as they understood it themselves.	26:17
	If enough of us will practice this virtue,	26:20
	perhaps by next Christmas,	26:24
	there will not be so many nasty letters written,	26:27
	nor so many injunctions taken out,	26:30
	nor so many appeals to Supreme Courts,	26:34
	nor blackmail, nor pushing, nor shoving.	26:38
	We will be able to listen as well as to talk,	26:43
	to understand as well as to propagandize.	26:47
	And if we do,	26:52
	I'm sure it will free us from many a blunder	26:54
	and foolish notion.	26:58
	Let us pray.	26:59
	Oh, God we do not ask for the transplant of a new heart,	27:02
	but we do ask that thou will give us clean hearts	27:08
	and right spirits so that we can hear our brothers	27:13
	and love them and believe that they are as sincere as we are	27:20
	and work together for thy glory in Jesus name. Amen.	27:27
	(soft organ music)	27:41

Item Info

Title:

Howard C. Wilkinson - "Robert Burns and the Religion - Government Controversy" (January 21, 1968)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r41v5gf7w

Date:

January 21, 1968

Speaker:

Wilkinson, Howard C.

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Duke University. Chapel

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UA.17.01.0003 RR-0415
ref6033_nr0
uachapelsermaud
duke:628160
dcrau002407
ark:/87924/r41v5gf7w
5a237e6a-fcaf-448d-adde-c67bbdb4044d

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Howard C. Wilkinson - "Robert Burns and the Religion - Government Controversy" (January 21, 1968)

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1. Howard C. Wilkinson - "Robert Burns and the Religion-Government Controversy" (January 21, 1968)

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Howard C. Wilkinson - "Robert Burns and the Religion - Government Controversy" (January 21, 1968)

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