National Affairs: A Man & His Prayers

For Adlai Stevenson, the week before Christmas was anything but merry and bright. It began with a somewhat embarrassing discussion of his personal religious beliefs, prompted by the fact that Stevenson, a Unitarian, had quietly joined a Presbyterian church. After some Unitarians accused Stevenson of deserting his church, four pastors—two Presbyterians and two Unitarians—made public a letter to him asserting that he can belong to both churches without “inconsistency.”

“We Understand.” “While we understand that you respect theologians,” the pastors wrote, “we know that doctrinal rigidity has never limited the comfort you find in Christian faith, worship and fellowship. So, while Governor of Illinois, there being no Unitarian church in Springfield, you attended the Presbyterian church. Confronted with the same situation when you returned to your farm home [at Libertyville, Ill.], we Presbyterians urged you not only to use, as you had from time to time for many years, but to be a member of the nearby Presbyterian church of Lake Forest. Your membership was accepted with the understanding that you would maintain your lifelong affiliation with the Unitarian Church of Bloomington, your home town. Descended from active Unitarians on your mother’s side and equally active Presbyterians, including many ministers, on your father’s side, we understand perfectly that you have found a local church home without forsaking a lifelong commitment, and that you have also united your parental religious endowments.”

On the Christmas cards that Presidential Candidate Stevenson sent out during the week, acknowledging cards he received, he struck a humble note. His card bore the prayer of an unknown Confederate soldier:

I asked God for strength, that I might

achieve, I was made weak, that I might learn

humbly to obey . . . I asked for health, that I might do

greater things, I was given infirmity, that I might do

better things . . .

I asked for riches, that I might be happy, I was given poverty that I might be

wise . . . I asked for power, that I might have the

praise of men, I was given weakness, that I might feel

the need of God . . . I asked for all things, that I might enjoy

life, I was given life, that I might enjoy all

things . . . I got nothing that I asked for—but

everything I had hoped for, Almost despite myself, my unspoken

prayers were answered. I am among all men, most richly blessed.

A Sudden Need. In midweek, Adlai Stevenson found a sudden, anguished need for prayer. As he walked into his office in Chicago’s Loop one morning, he was told that his youngest son, John Fell Stevenson, 19, had been seriously injured in a highway accident. On his way home from Harvard, where he is a sophomore, John was driving his father’s 1955 Chevrolet sedan on U.S. Highway 20, just east of Goshen, Ind., with three fellow Harvard students as passengers. As he drove over a hill, a truck, passing another at 50 m.p.h., smashed head-on into the car. Two young men sitting beside young Stevenson were killed, and one in the back seat was hurt; John’s right kneecap was shattered, his lower jaw was broken, and three of his upper teeth were knocked out. When he was told of the accident, Stevenson murmured a prayer.

Within an hour, Stevenson, one of his law partners, his press secretary, a bone specialist and Mrs. John Alden Carpenter, his former wife’s mother, were on the way to Goshen in a chartered plane. The next day, the weary and worn father rode in an ambulance with his son the 115 miles to a Chicago hospital, where the boy’s mother met them. From all over the U.S. had come messages of sympathy. Wired Dwight Eisenhower: “Distressed to read on the ticker that your son John has been seriously injured. I send you my most prayerful hopes that he will soon recover.” Wired Stevenson’s rival, Estes Kefauver: “Terribly sorry to hear of your son’s accident. My prayers and thoughts are with you.”

The driver of the truck admitted that the accident was his fault; he was indicted for involuntary manslaughter and reckless driving.