News Briefs
Diocesan Press Service. October 7, 1964 [XXV-3]
STATEMENT ON POVERTY URGED
Bishops of the Episcopal Church have been urged to devise "a clear statement on the immorality of poverty in a society of plenty" for action at the 61st General Convention Oct. 11-23 in St. Louis, Mo.
The request, made in "An Open Letter to the Bishops of the Episcopal Church," was endorsed by 140 Episcopalians throughout the nation who are professionals, volunteers and community leaders in a wide variety of services to troubled people.
"We seek," they said, "a doctrinal statement which calls us who are beneficiaries of an affluent society to moral indignation and repentance because our society permits one-fifth of its members to suffer degrading poverty; a statement which condemns as immoral the complacency in the face of the sufferings of the poor; a statement which unmasks the cruelty of those common stereotypes which label the poor and undeimine their human dignity."
Such a statement, the signatories claimed, "can greatly strengthen the actions of the clergy and the laity in the Church who are working to bring about needed changes."
The letter to the bishops, mailed September 16 from New York, was signed by such persons as Mrs. Sarah Patton Boyle of Charlottesville, Va., author of "The Desegregated Heart" and other books and articles on human relations; the Rev. Thomas J. Bigham, S. T. D., professor of moral theology, General Theological Seminary, New York; Prof. Gordon W. Allport of Harvard University; Michael Budzanoski of the District #5 United Mine Workers of America, Monongahela, Pa.; John A. Buggs, executive director, Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations; Mrs. Harold D. Harvey, president of the New York State Conference on Social Welfare, New York; Paul Jans, executive director of Hull House Association, Chicago, Ill.; Thomas F. Lewin, Ph.D., assistant dean, Columbia University School of Social Work, New York; Myles MacDonald, planning director of the Community Council, Houston, Texas; the Rev. Dr. William G. Pollard, executive director of the Oakridge Institute of Nuclear Studies, Oakridge, Tenn.; and William Stringfellow, New York attorney.
American society, the Episcopalians declared, "is still plagued with an age-old way of thinking about 'the poor' as personally responsible for their misfortunes, and therefore guilty, immoral and to be punished" when facts on their impoverished conditions point to a pattern of environmental factors that tend to trap the poverty-stricken.
Among the multiple facets of poverty cited in the letter as needing immediate attention were employment, discrimination, education, housing, and medical services for the sick, the disabled and the aged.
The bishops' support of a specific program to aid the national "war on poverty," the signatories said, could bring about effective mobilization of the Church's resources "to cope realistically with problems of such scope and complexity."
On this point, the letter recorded the conviction that "there are rich untapped potential resources within the Episcopal Church to give leadership in many areas to the current struggle to combat and defeat the evils of poverty."
BISHOP SELWAY CONSECRATED
The Very Rev. George Rhys Selway, D. D., was consecrated Bishop of Northern Michigan October 1.
Consecration ceremonies were held in St. Paul's Church, Marquette, Mich. Chief consecrator was the Rt. Rev. John P. Craine, Bishop of Indianapolis. Co-consecrators were the Rt. Rev. Joseph S.M. Harte, Bishop of Arizona, and the Rt. Rev. Herman R. Page, retired Bishop of Northern Michigan.
Prior to Bishop Selway's election, he was Dean of Trinity Cathedral in Phoenix, Ariz., for five years.