Beneath the rain trees the shade was cool. Brown-skinned girls in neat blue middy blouses strolled among the bougainvillea, and in the glittering, pinnacled temples near by, yellow-robed Buddhist priests went about their ritual. In this peaceful setting, on the campus of a Presbyterian girls’ school in Bangkok, Siam, 98 churchmen from 15 countries assembled last week to talk over a situation almost as dangerous and difficult as the Christians faced in the days of the catacombs.
The Void. The week-long meeting, the first of its kind, was called jointly by the World Council of Churches and the International Missionary Council, to discuss the position of the Protestant churches in Southern and Eastern Asia. In addition to General Secretary W. A. Visser ‘t Hooft of the World Council and the International Missionary Council’s Chairman John A. Mackay, the meeting included five bishops (from the Philippines, India and Japan), and delegates from almost every country in Asia.
The conferees found nothing to feel smug about. “The imprint of Christian culture in Asia is lighter than the West assumes,” said Visser ‘t Hooft. Said Dr. Mackay, president of Princeton Theological Seminary,’ who has spent the past two months in the Far East: “There’s a tremendous void in the heart of East Asia. The ancient religions are unable to explain the revolutionary changes that are taking place, or have no adequate ideas or attitudes with which to meet them.”
The question of how Christians would meet the revolutionary changes was at the top of the agenda. Notably absent from the conference were six delegates from China, who had been unable to leave Communist-occupied territory because of “visa trouble.” South Korean delegates explained that for Christians in Russian-dominated North Korea, the situation is increasingly serious. Numerous pastors, they said, have been forced to flee south, while others have disappeared altogether.
The Challenge. Executive secretary of the conference, Dr. Siu C. Leung, longtime general secretary of China’s Y.M.C.A., made it clear that Christians could not hope to put off decisions until things blow over. “The present regime has come to stay in China,” he warned. “All Christians must . . . meet the challenge for a more vital faith. And we must preach the complete gospel . . .
“We must seek to win to the Christian faith . . . even Communists themselves. We must outthink, out-live—and, if necessary, out-die the Communists.”
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