Religion: Colony’s Oath

Judging by the pranks of its pastors, Philadelphia is the most exhilarating vineyard in which a U. S. man of God may labor. There, Rev. Zed Copp, Presbyterian, crusades hotly against Santa Claus, Easter bunnies and the Stork, while spending his spare time transcribing the New

Testament into journalese. There the peppery, dogmatic rector of old Christ Church, 77-year-old Rev. Louis Cope Washburn, preached his retiring sermon last January with a bandage about his head, result of an encounter in which he bested a footpad with his umbrella.Episcopal Rev. Dr. David McConnell Steele believes that Lent is a bore (TIME, March 30, 1936), Rev. “Jack” Hart this summer founded the Episcopal Anti-Mothball Society (TIME, July 12), “Rev.” MaryHubbert Ellis scuttles about looking for nude statues to cover up, and Rev. Dr. George Chalmers Richmond broods in a Philadelphia suburb over the many lawsuits he has brought against Episcopal dignitaries, including one pending for libel against Presiding Bishop James De Wolf Perry. Lutheran Rev. Reginald Beasil Naugle specializes in fighting labor unions, and last week he cried, “We’re in Russia now!” after persons unknown smashed a door glass and window of his house by hurling milk bottles. And Philadelphia is also the home of Episcopal Rev. David Carl Colony, who last week performed the latest of the exploits which make conservative members of his church shake their heads.

Dark, stocky David Colony was born 37 years ago in Lithuania, went to Chicago at 15 to enter school, got through eight grades in a year. He joined the Canadian Royal Fusiliers, saw service in the Near East, returned to the U. S. to study at the University of Pennsylvania, become an Episcopal minister. A radical, David Colony was assigned to teach Latin at swank Episcopal Academy and assist in a church at Rosemont, both on the Main Line and both cool to his notions.Transferred to more congenial, lower-class parishes in Philadelphia suburbs. Rector Colony established a barter system for the unemployed, a “school of the poor for the poor” which was to be supported by penny contributions. In 1934 and 1935 he wrote articles for Harper’s and Scribner’s, respectively, comparing the U. S. Episcopal clergy with that of pre-War Russia and accusing U. S. mission boards of “building battleships for Japan.” David Colony also made his way to Harrisburg for a hearing on a Sunday cinema bill, cried: “I am willing to stand in my pulpit and compete with Mae West, and if the Word I preach isn’t more attractive than the swaying of hips I am ready to go back to the coal mines.”

Last week in Minister Colony’s present church in suburban Kensington, a choir boy named Willard Noble, just turning 21, stood before his rector and recited a lengthy oath, core of which was: “I believe that every Communist and Fascist in America is a traitor to the United States of America. This is my pledge as an American and a Christian: to fight Communism and Fascism wherever I find them; to enlist others in the fight. . . .” Explained David Colony, who said he had thought up the oath after attending a Nazi meeting: “I wish to see every boy passing into manhood take this serious oath. . . . He may come here to my church and he will be welcome. … I want Christian young men and young women on the march again, with the Cross and Old Glory leading.” At week’s end Minister Colony said 300 young men had joined his newest movement.