H. Shelton Smith - "Moral Crisis in a Troubled South" (April 29, 1956)

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	(organ music playing)	0:11
	(choir singing hymn)	0:21
Priest	Let us offer unto God	2:37
	our unison prayer of confession.	2:39
	Let us pray.	2:42
	Almighty God, our heavenly father, who of thy great mercy	2:44
	has promised forgiveness of sins	2:49
	to all them that with hearty repentance	2:52
	and true faith turn unto thee, have mercy upon us.	2:54
	Pardon and deliver us from all our sins.	3:00
	Confirm and strengthen us in all goodness,	3:03
	and bring us to everlasting life.	3:07
	Through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen.	3:10
	And now, as our savior Christ hath taught us,	3:14
	we pray together, saying:	3:17
	Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.	3:20
	Thy kingdom come, thy will be done,	3:25
	on earth as it is in heaven.	3:29
	Give us this day, our daily bread,	3:32
	and forgive us our trespasses,	3:35
	as we forgive those who trespass against us,	3:37
	and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,	3:41
	for thine is the kingdom,	3:46
	and the power, and the glory, forever.	3:48
	Amen.	3:52
	(church organ playing)	3:56
	(congregation singing hymn)	4:20
Choir	Amen!	6:57
Priest	"But Saul, still breathing threats and murder	7:25
	against the disciples of the Lord,	7:29
	went to the high priest and asked him	7:32
	for letters to the synagogues at Damascus,	7:36
	so that if he found any belonging to the Way,	7:41
	he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.	7:46
	Now, as he journeyed, he approached Damascus,	7:51
	and suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him,	7:56
	and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him:	8:02
	"Saul, Saul.	8:08
	Why do you persecute me?"	8:13
	And he said, "who are you, Lord?"	8:18
	And he said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,	8:23
	but rise and enter the city, and you will be told	8:31
	what you are to do."	8:37
	Saul arose from the ground, and when his eyes were opened,	8:40
	he could see nothing.	8:46
	So they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus.	8:49
	Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias.	8:57
	The Lord said to him in a vision, "Ananias,"	9:03
	and he said "here I am, Lord."	9:08
	And the lord said to him, "rise,	9:12
	and go to the street called Straight,	9:16
	and inquire into the house of Judas,	9:20
	for a man of Tarsus named Saul."	9:24
	But Ananias answered "Lord,	9:29
	I have heard from many about this man.	9:32
	How much evil he has done to thy saints at Jerusalem."	9:36
	But the Lord said to him,	9:42
	"Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine,	9:45
	to carry my name before the Gentiles,	9:50
	and kings, and the sons of Israel,	9:53
	for I will show him how much he must suffer	9:58
	for the sake of my name."	10:01
	So Ananias departed, and entered the house,	10:04
	and laying his hands on him he said,	10:09
	"Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you	10:13
	on the road by which you came,	10:18
	has sent me that you may regain your sight,	10:21
	and be filled with the Holy Spirit."	10:26
	And immediately, something like scales fell from his eyes,	10:30
	and he regained his sight.	10:35
	Then he rose, and was baptized,	10:39
	and in the synagogue, immediately he proclaimed Jesus,	10:43
	saying "He is the son of God." "	10:48
	Here endeth the lesson.	10:54
	(audio cutting)	10:58
	The Lord be with you.	10:59
Congregation	And also with you.	11:01
Priest	Let us pray.	11:03
	Oh God of peace, who through thy son, Jesus Christ,	11:12
	did send forth one faith for the salvation of mankind,	11:16
	from the confused voices of our daily life,	11:23
	help us now to draw nearer to thee,	11:27
	that with mind and heart we may worship thee.	11:30
	We bring to thee the thirst we cannot quench	11:35
	at any earthly spring,	11:37
	and the hunger which is only satisfied	11:41
	by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.	11:43
	Lift us out of our shadows, into thy light,	11:48
	out of our perplexities into thy clear truth,	11:53
	out of our burdens, into thy strength.	11:58
	Out of our troubles, into thy peace.	12:01
	Out of our foolish and disappointed purposes,	12:05
	into thy holy and blessed will.	12:10
	Take from us the tediousness,	12:14
	the anxiety and fear of selfish minds,	12:17
	the unfruitfulness of cold and narrow affections,	12:21
	and the weakness of an inconstant will.	12:26
	Send thy grace and heavenly blessing	12:31
	upon all Christian people	12:33
	who are striving to draw nearer to thee,	12:36
	and to each other, in the unity of the spirit,	12:38
	and in the bond of peace.	12:43
	Give us penitence for our divisions,	12:46
	wisdom to know thy truth, courage to do thy will,	12:49
	love that shall break down the barriers	12:54
	of pride and prejudice,	12:57
	and unswerving loyalty to thy holy name.	13:00
	Suffer us not to shrink from any endeavor	13:05
	which is in accordance with thy will,	13:08
	for the peace and unity of thy church.	13:11
	Give us boldness to seek only thy glory,	13:15
	and the advancement of thy kingdom,	13:19
	and do thou grant that we may be so molded	13:22
	by the spirit of thy son, that we may not be conformed	13:25
	to the pattern of this world,	13:30
	but may be transformed by the renewal of our minds,	13:33
	that we may know and practice what is the will of God,	13:37
	what is good, and acceptable, and perfect.	13:42
	Through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen.	13:46
	(organ plays)	13:53
	(soloist singing hymn)	15:27
	(congregation singing hymn)	16:06
	(soloist singing hymn)	16:44
	(congregation singing hymn)	17:10
	(soloist singing hymn)	17:19
	(congregation singing hymn)	17:40
	(soloist and congregation singing hymn alternately)	18:14
-	[Soloist and Congregation] Amen,	19:10
	amen.	19:19
	(organ playing)	19:29
	(congregation singing hymn)	20:05
	Amen.	20:37
Priest	Oh Lord, our God, thou king of all the earth,	20:45
	accept of thine infinite goodness	20:50
	the offerings of thy people, which,	20:52
	in obedience to thy commandment,	20:56
	and in honor of thy holy name,	20:58
	we now dedicate to thy service	21:01
	in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord.	21:03
	Amen.	21:07
	(footsteps)	21:12
	At no time in the present century	21:44
	has the South been so deeply troubled in soul	21:48
	as it is today.	21:54
	This anxiety is of course partly the result	21:58
	of pressures arising out of a far-reaching decision	22:03
	of the Supreme Court.	22:08
	But its root goes deeper.	22:12
	Unless I am seriously mistaken,	22:18
	it stems from a growing conviction	22:22
	that our legally-imposed color bar	22:26
	is in basic conflict with both the democratic ethic	22:30
	and the Christian faith.	22:38
	This conflict is involving us of the South	22:44
	in a deepening moral crisis,	22:49
	which I feel constrained	22:54
	to lay before you today.	22:58
	In meditating upon our present crisis,	23:03
	my thought has turned often to that dramatic story,	23:08
	which was read to you this morning.	23:12
	In passionate loyalty to his ancestral tradition,	23:16
	Saul of Tarsus	23:24
	earnestly tried to wipe out the early Christians.	23:28
	Where persuasion would not work,	23:35
	he did not hesitate to persecute,	23:39
	to imprison, even to murder.	23:44
	Yet at the very height of his frenzied zeal,	23:51
	while hurrying to Damascus,	23:56
	a light from heaven brighter than the sun	23:59
	flashed through his conscience,	24:03
	and he heard a voice saying "Saul, Saul,	24:06
	why do you persecute me?"	24:14
	"Who are you?" stammered Saul.	24:18
	"I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,"	24:24
	replied the heavenly visitor.	24:28
	It hurts you to kick against the goals.	24:31
	Note one thing:	24:37
	the more fiercely Saul persecuted the early Christians,	24:40
	the more brightly the moral flame	24:46
	burned within his conscience,	24:49
	until at last the scales fell from his blinded eyes,	24:53
	and he was transformed into an advocate	25:00
	of that which had formerly opposed.	25:04
	Are not we of the South experiencing an inner moral struggle	25:10
	which broadly parallels that of Saul of Tarsus?	25:17
	Is not the light from above	25:24
	disturbing our conscience in depth?	25:27
	Will the heavenly flame eventually burn through	25:33
	our clouded vision, and transform our racial perspectives?	25:37
	My considered answer,	25:46
	based finally upon faith in Almighty God,	25:48
	is a strong "yes."	25:53
	Our moral road to Damascus may be long and tortuous,	25:59
	but we are on our way.	26:07
	When I say we are on our way,	26:11
	I mean simply that thousands of White Southerners	26:15
	including, especially youth,	26:22
	no longer find it morally possible	26:26
	to justify the principle of racial segregation	26:30
	in any area of life,	26:35
	least of all in the church of Jesus Christ.	26:38
	To be sure, they are still a minority group,	26:45
	yet their numbers are steadily increasing.	26:49
	They do not, like some noisy demagogues,	26:53
	shout their views from the housetops,	26:57
	but their convictions lie deep nevertheless.	27:01
	One fact is worth emphasizing at the outset:	27:07
	This new spiritual outlook did not start on May 17, 1954,	27:11
	when the Supreme Court first ruled	27:21
	against the Plessy Doctrine of "separate but equal".	27:24
	In fact, ever since the first World War,	27:30
	the South has been the scene of the prophetic labors	27:35
	of such men as the late Will Alexander,	27:39
	and Howard Odum, men to whom the color bar was anathema.	27:44
	Through the actions of interracial councils and commissions,	27:52
	through researches and publications,	27:58
	they sowed the seeds of a nobler South,	28:02
	while they labored patiently within a bi-racial framework,	28:07
	they foresaw the day when it would be abandoned.	28:13
	Four years before the Supreme Court	28:21
	handed down its historic decision,	28:23
	the Presbyterian Synod of Alabama declared,	28:27
	"segregation is living on borrowed time."	28:33
	"Both the federal constitution	28:41
	and the Christian conscience," the Synod added,	28:43
	"have written doom upon the brow of legalized segregation."	28:47
	Southern groups in all the other major denominations	28:55
	were expressing similar convictions.	28:58
	Meanwhile, church-related colleges,	29:02
	graduate and professional schools of state universities,	29:06
	and theological seminaries were opening their doors	29:11
	to all qualified students.	29:16
	Hence, when the Supreme Court finally struck down	29:20
	the Plessy Doctrine,	29:24
	the leaders of most of the religious bodies in the South	29:26
	were already prepared to sanction its ruling.	29:30
	Episcopalians in the Southeastern Provincial Conference	29:36
	declared that decision just and right.	29:42
	A Texas Methodist conference declared it to be	29:49
	but the legal expression	29:54
	of the position of the Christian church.	29:58
	The General Assembly of Southern Presbyterians	30:04
	not only commended the decision	30:07
	but called upon all the members of the churches	30:09
	to support it wholeheartedly.	30:12
	The Southern Baptist Convention declared,	30:15
	"The decision is in harmony	30:20
	with the constitutional guarantee	30:22
	of equal freedom and justice,	30:25
	and with the Christian principle of justice	30:30
	and love to all men.	30:35
	Catholic and Jewish agencies in the South	30:39
	were equally affirmative in their actions.	30:44
	These church groups, be it noted,	30:49
	were not outside meddlers,	30:55
	but native-born Southerners.	30:59
	For a brief interval after the Supreme Court	31:06
	rendered its verdict,	31:09
	it looked as though a good many citizens in the South	31:11
	would take immediate steps to keep faith with the Court.	31:17
	Indeed, local school boards	31:22
	in some of the more progressive cities	31:25
	began taking actions toward compliance.	31:27
	But alas, alas,	31:32
	this affirmative spirit soon encountered	31:37
	another kind of spirit.	31:41
	Tough-willed resistance movements began emerging.	31:45
	Springing up first of all in the lower South,	31:50
	led by ardent segregationists whose extremer members	31:54
	openly defied the court.	31:59
	They insisted on the freedom of their respective states	32:04
	to do as they pleased, but yet,	32:08
	they did not tolerate that same freedom	32:13
	within their own borders.	32:16
	High, rigid conformity was demanded,	32:19
	even at the price of coercion, if necessary.	32:23
	Now this spirit of resistance	32:30
	later spread to the upper South as well.	32:32
	Although revealing itself in sweeter words,	32:37
	its overall effect was the same.	32:42
	Almost everywhere, the prevailing mood has been	32:46
	to prevent any local community from cracking	32:52
	the wall of segregation.	32:55
	This holds true not only for public schools,	32:59
	but largely also for many other public facilities,	33:04
	such as city halls, county courthouses,	33:09
	and recreational centers.	33:15
	Even where the color bar has been outlawed,	33:19
	as in public education,	33:23
	the negro is exhorted to volunteer to remain segregated.	33:26
	This frozen temper says "don't give an inch,	33:36
	or you will have to give a mile."	33:43
	Great dangers, my brethren, lie ahead of the South	33:49
	in this inflexible mood.	33:53
	First of all, we are in danger of jeopardizing	33:57
	our one best hope: our public schools.	34:02
	The movement to assign to local communities	34:09
	the final decision on questions of vital school policy,	34:11
	hitherto reserved to state boards of education,	34:18
	can easily scuttle the hard-won standards	34:23
	which have been a half-century in building.	34:28
	This backward trend,	34:34
	devised as a stratagem against the Court,	34:37
	threatens the South with all the evils	34:41
	of the old district school system.	34:45
	The outcome could be not a statewide system,	34:50
	but a patchwork of uneven policies, standards and programs.	34:56
	Add to this the legal option of any local community	35:05
	to abolish its public schools altogether,	35:11
	and the prospect becomes alarming.	35:17
	Some may call this power to close a local school	35:23
	a "safety bell", but it seems far more like a time bomb.	35:30
	If we in the South ever become so unbalanced	35:40
	as to wipe our public schools,	35:45
	we will surely sentence our children	35:49
	to the tyranny of ignorance and poverty.	35:53
	A second danger is,	36:00
	that the South will cut itself off	36:02
	from the main currents of the nation,	36:05
	just when it is rising.	36:09
	Industrial, political, cultural.	36:13
	Our twentieth century could be secession,	36:20
	not from the formal union as in 1860,	36:25
	but secession from the growing stream	36:31
	of democratic civilization.	36:38
	It is as true of a region as it is of an individual,	36:42
	that if it tries to live unto itself,	36:49
	it will shrivel up and die of stagnation.	36:53
	This decaying process would be hastened	37:00
	by the migration of our abler youth	37:04
	to freer sections of the nation,	37:07
	as in the wake of the Civil War.	37:10
	Meanwhile the present flow into our region	37:14
	of industrialists, scientists, skilled technicians	37:18
	and vocational specialists would slow down to a trickle.	37:24
	This two-way loss of creative leadership	37:32
	would leave the South, leave to the South,	37:39
	the inevitable ravages of political demagogues,	37:44
	cultural drones, and moral bigots.	37:50
	Yet another danger is,	37:58
	that we will so bungle our interracial relations	38:03
	in this critical moment,	38:08
	as to cripple America's moral leadership	38:10
	in the larger world community.	38:14
	Remember: two out of every three people in the world	38:18
	are colored, and our behavior is an open book to them.	38:25
	The shameful, loosest spectacle,	38:32
	and the barbaric, inutile murder were unfolded daily	38:36
	to the Chinese, the Africans, the Indonesians,	38:42
	and other colored peoples who are coming to power	38:49
	in the greatest revolution in modern history.	38:53
	They measure our morality, and our good will,	38:58
	not by our words, but by our deeds.	39:02
	When the voice of America proclaims to them	39:08
	the virtues of our Declaration of Independence	39:12
	and our Bill of Rights, they read our professed ideals	39:14
	through the lenses of our daily actions.	39:20
	When the Supreme Court first ruled	39:26
	against segregated schools, public schools,	39:28
	totalitarian governments interpreted it as a fraud,	39:33
	pawned upon the world.	39:39
	And they predicted that in any case,	39:42
	the South would not abide by it.	39:47
	Shall we in the South fulfill their cynical prophecies?	39:54
	If we do, my brethren, we will give aid and comfort	40:01
	to the mortal enemies of democracy throughout the world.	40:08
	But that which should give us the deepest concern of all	40:16
	is the tragic fact that we dare to risk all these dangers	40:20
	because of a fundamentally anti-Christian assumption	40:28
	about a group of our fellow men.	40:34
	After taking a wide-ranging poll of Southern sentiment,	40:39
	Howard Odum declared that the heart of our credo	40:44
	could be summed up in these words:	40:49
	"The negro is a negro, and nothing more."	40:53
	In other words, the negro is humanly inferior	41:03
	to the white man.	41:09
	In the final analysis, our dual-racial structure	41:13
	here in the South rests upon that belief.	41:17
	Let us then face squarely our Southern credo,	41:24
	in the light of the revelation which came to Saul	41:29
	as he paced the Damascus road.	41:33
	Without question, he did more	41:37
	than any other follower of Jesus	41:39
	to emancipate the early church from the bonds of Judaism,	41:42
	and transform it into a fellowship of all races and peoples.	41:47
	For this very reason, his fellow Jews sought to destroy him.	41:53
	Nevertheless, he was not disobedient to the heavenly vision.	42:02
	When Peter later wavered in his supra-racial views,	42:08
	Paul boldly rebuked him to his face.	42:12
	"Is God the God of the Jews only?"	42:16
	Paul asked the Christians at Rome.	42:20
	"Is he not the God of Gentiles also?"	42:23
	"Yes," he said, "of Gentiles also	42:27
	because since God is one,"	42:32
	note well those decisive words.	42:36
	"Since God is one."	42:39
	Paul here laid the very cornerstone of Christian community.	42:45
	It is faith, not race, which determines the range	42:51
	of our Christian fellowship.	42:57
	Where there is true faith in one God, there is no color bar.	43:00
	"There is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free,	43:05
	for you all are one in Christ Jesus," said Paul.	43:11
	Is it not clear then, why we White church men of the South	43:19
	are conscience-stricken?	43:25
	We do not presume to be better than our worthy forefathers,	43:30
	yet we do believe, as apparently they did not,	43:35
	that a racially segregated church is a tragic denial	43:40
	of that community which is inherent	43:45
	in one Lord, one faith, one baptism.	43:49
	Since God is one, we are members one of another,	43:57
	equally subject to God's judgment and mercy.	44:02
	Equally accountable to him, equally valuable in his sight.	44:07
	Hence, to discriminate against	44:16
	a single one of his children on the ground of race	44:19
	is to impugn the moral character of almighty God.	44:25
	Human equality is not the gift of man.	44:33
	It is the gift of God.	44:39
	Therefore human equality	44:43
	is an unalienable spiritual attribute	44:45
	of every child of God.	44:49
	When we consider the Supreme Court's decision	44:53
	from this Christian perspective,	44:56
	we are bound to admit that it is morally just and right.	45:00
	If therefore this ruling is being bitterly assailed	45:08
	in the South at this hour, it is due in no small measure	45:12
	to the moral infirmity of our Christianity.	45:19
	Many of the most rabid enemies of the Court's ruling	45:25
	are members of our Protestant churches.	45:30
	Let us ministers in particular take this fact	45:34
	seriously to heart.	45:37
	Pondering our faith, and our stewardship,	45:39
	have we been fully surrendered to the will of God?	45:44
	It is hard to believe.	45:48
	It is hard to believe	45:52
	that so many laid pillars in our churches	45:55
	would now be party to an un-Christian movement	45:59
	to obstruct the course of elemental human justice.	46:03
	How long, how long will be our road to Damascus?	46:11
	It will be as long as we persist	46:21
	in our un-Christian belief that our colored brother	46:24
	is only a negro, and nothing more.	46:30
	A fundamental change of heart may require	46:35
	a very long journey, a journey of trial and tribulation	46:39
	over a torturous road, nevertheless	46:44
	nevertheless, since the moral flame from heaven	46:50
	is already penetrating our consciences,	46:56
	the eternal light will eventually burn away the scales	47:01
	which obscure a larger vision of the kingdom of God.	47:05
	Symbolic of that new day is a generally unknown act	47:12
	which was performed by the South's greatest Civil War hero.	47:18
	Within a year after the Confederates surrendered	47:26
	the Appomattox, an unwanted negro	47:30
	entered one of Richmond's most fashionable churches	47:35
	while holy communion was being served,	47:39
	made his way down the aisle,	47:43
	and knelt at the communion altar.	47:46
	The congregation sat aghast, and emotions quickened.	47:52
	Sensing the situation,	48:00
	a great layman arose in his pew,	48:05
	stepped forward to the altar,	48:09
	and knelt beside his colored brother.	48:13
	Captured by his spirit, the congregation followed	48:18
	his magnanimous example.	48:23
	That layman was Robert E. Lee.	48:27
	On that Sunday morning,	48:36
	he won the greatest battle of his career.	48:39
	For greater is he that mastereth his spirit	48:44
	than he that taketh a city.	48:50
	By the grace of God, Robert E. Lee	48:56
	lighted the spiritual torch which will never go out	49:00
	until we of the South, Black and White,	49:06
	are transformed into a fellowship as broad and as enduring	49:12
	as the love of Christ.	49:20
	Let us pray.	49:24
	Eternal God who hast created of one blood	49:32
	the whole family of Earth,	49:35
	and hast made us members of thy kingdom	49:38
	through Jesus Christ, our Lord,	49:43
	save us, we beseech thee, from racial malice,	49:46
	and from all other sins which separate us from thee	49:53
	and from our fellow men.	49:58
	Now unto him, who is able to keep you from falling,	50:01
	and to present you without blemish	50:06
	before the presence of his glory with rejoicing,	50:08
	to the only God, our savior through Jesus Christ, our Lord,	50:12
	be glory, majesty, dominion and authority,	50:18
	today and forever.	50:24
	(organ playing)	50:28
Choir	(singing) Amen, amen, amen, amen,	50:32
	amen, amen, amen.	50:52

Item Info

Title:

H. Shelton Smith - "Moral Crisis in a Troubled South" (April 29, 1956)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4qc0068x

Date:

April 29, 1956

Speaker:

Smith, H. Shelton

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0024
ref5269_ou0
uachapelsermaud
duke:628169
dcrau002076
ark:/87924/r4qc0068x
200442f4-0f7a-4b9c-a9a3-7dddd3c0fb82

Digital Collection:

Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings

Related Resources:

See below

Language:

English

Location:

United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

Format:

Provenance:

The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

Rights:

No Re-Use

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H. Shelton Smith - "Moral Crisis in a Troubled South" (April 29, 1956)

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