Episcopal Press and News
Dean Collins Speaks on Episcopal Series
Diocesan Press Service. February 13, 1975 [75057]
ATLANTA, Ga. -- The Very Rev. David B. Collins will speak on the Episcopal Series of the Protestant Hour for 15 weeks starting March 2. This articulate, gifted, handsome Arkansas native, the son of an Episcopal priest, became Dean of Atlanta's Cathedral of St. Philip in 1966. Since then it has become the nation's largest Episcopal parish.
His love for baseball led him to the chaplaincy of the Atlanta Braves. His love for the theatre led him to Broadway where he found his bride appearing as the Salvation Army lassie in Guys and Dolls. With his flair for the dramatic and his charm as a storyteller, he probably could have become a professional actor. "There's a close relationship," he says, "between drama and acting and being a clergyman or teacher because what you are doing in all three is communicating."
Communicating is what Dean Collins will be doing with radio listeners across the nation, and he will make use of poetry, plays, movies and popular music because, he says, "They communicate with our culture and they contain the themes of the Gospel -- God reaching out to lonely, desperate people." He admits, "I stole the technique from Jesus who used it in His parables. Jesus used ordinary, earthy things in Palestine at that time -- sheep, money, corn, fish -- to communicate with people about His Father and His Father's world."
Broadcast on about 600 nationwide radio stations plus the worldwide Armed Services Network, the 15-week series is the Church's offering each year to the nation and to the world. It is a gift, with no strings attached, from those who support it to those who receive it. For almost 30 years, the Episcopal Series has been produced, distributed to radio stations and promoted by the Parish of the Air of the Episcopal Radio-TV Foundation. All expenses of the program are met from voluntary gifts to the Foundation, which relies entirely on contributions to fund its radio and TV programs. The Foundation makes an annual appeal for the $30,000 required to fund the Episcopal Series. Bishop John P. Craine, the Foundation's chairman, solicits Bishops of the Church. In 1974, 66 Bishops, or their Dioceses, contributed $21,971 in gifts ranging from $2,000 to $25. So far in 1975, 59 Dioceses have given or pledged $20,426. Bishop Craine says, "The Episcopal Series benefits the whole Church, and if all of us share in the cost, it will not be a hardship on any of us. "
As in previous years, the 15 Episcopal Series sermons will be published in The Good News. Copies of The Good News are offered at no cost upon request from the Parish of the Air, Episcopal Radio-TV Foundation, 15 Sixteenth St., N.E., Atlanta, Ga. 30309.
Radio stations should be contacted to ascertain whether the Protestant Hour, including the Episcopal Series, is scheduled and to verify the hour of broadcast on the local station. If it is not scheduled, contact the Foundation's executive director, Carolina Rakestraw, for assistance in placing it. There is no charge to parish, diocese, or radio station.