Religion: Missionaries

Better known to Bantus than to most Britons, the International Missionary Council is nevertheless the biggest organization in the Protestant missionary field. Through its London and Manhattan offices the Council directs the activities of missionary groups in 28 countries. Chiefly responsible for these efforts is the Council’s secretary (Chairman John R. Mott’s title is honorary). Last week the Council elected a new British secretary—the Rev. Norman Goodall. He succeeds famed missionary Dr. William Paton, who died last August.

Secretary Goodall, a Congregationalist, was turned down for missionary work because of poor health. So he became the London Missionary Society’s secretary for India, the South Seas and Papua. He likes to putter in his garden, play the violin, go to the theater with his wife, a doctor. He reads Anthony Trollope, Charles Lamb, John Donne, can take Hemingway “in small doses.” On his office wall is a photograph of himself taken in India. It shows Mr. Goodall in shorts, squatting before a bearded Indian Christian. Says the International Missionary Council’s new secretary: “That is symbolic. It shows where an administrator should sit—at the feet of native missionaries in the field.”