Carl Spain's 1960 address to the Abilene Christian College Lectureship audience shattered the facade of complacency on race relations among Churches of Christ. It also marked the emergence of the Christian Chronicle as a leading vehicle for news and a forum for opinions ignored or abhorred in the Firm Foundation and Gospel Advocate. James Walter Nichols, Lane T. Cubstead, and, later, James Harold Batts would attempt to make the CC into a true "newspaper," pursuing the ideals of professional journalism as it was taught in Abilene by Alfred Heber Taylor and Reginald Conway Westmoreland. For a brief time the CC would report "news" about Churches of Christ, not shrinking from controversy. Such a strategy is itself controversial. At the same time the CC would be enlisted as the primary promotional voice for the many projects and church-related businesses spawned by its ambitious parent company, Fidelit Enterprises. That saga is another story for another time.

The dilemmas of house-organ journalism have not yet become fully apparent as the CC reacts to Spain's speech with a lead story and a banner headline. Quoting profusely from that part of the address concerned with race relations, the story broadcasts Spain's words to a much wider audience, and also reports some of the immediate reaction in Abilene.

Segregation against Negroes in our churches and colleges was strongly denounced by Abilene Christian College Bible professor Carl Spain in one of the main speeches of the annual ACC Bible Lectureship which closed January[sic] 25.

He asked the crowd in Sewell Auditorium, "Are we moral cowards on this issue?"

Spain cited the case of a Negro Church of Christ evangelist in Abilene who was forced to attend McMurry College (a Methodist institution) across town because Abilene Christian College would not give him credit for Bible work.

When Spain gave the lecture the next day, he said he had been challenged to a debate since the first day's remarks. He said the person issuing the challenge was a preacher and a personal friend of his, who was ready to take the Bible and show that the church had no obligation in this situation.

Spain said later that he had received several letters on the issue, most of them being favorable toward his remarks.

Abilene Christian College does not admit American Negroes for credit either to its undergraduate or graduate divisions, although it has allowed some to audit courses in the past. However, several colleges operated by members of the Church of Christ do admit Negroes.

ACC officials said that the Board of Trustees had appointed a committee to study the integration question.

Spain's speech, "Modern Challenges to Christian Morals," is printed in the Book of Lectures for 1960 distributed by ACC.

In this lecture he told the story of what happened in his hometown when some Negro brethren wanted to baptize several converts in the white church's baptistry. They were allowed to do so, but as Spain puts it, "The Blue-blooded members of the Royal Order of the Master Race, including [4] many members of the Church of Christ, the Baptists, the Methodists and Presbyterians, protested loudly. They preferred death to a fate such as this. Before the baptismal service was over, police came to put a stop to it, just like the Communists broke up services in Warsaw, Poland, last year.

"The local paper took up the fight in good old 'Democratic' style. Police patrolled the area around the church building. The Lord's church was branded as a Communist front organization where whites and Negroes socialized as brothers. The community systematically boycotted the business establishments of some of the Christians for months, nearly causing them to go bankrupt."

Spain did not advocate a revolution. He said, "We must preach righteousness and educate in a Christian way before any legislation will prove effective. Education without legislation is usually more effective than legislation without education." He said, "Brethren, we are not recommending revolutionary legislation. We are merely suggesting that we offer Christian education to all Americans without respect of persons."

We have here no literary masterpiece, but a news story written anonymously against deadline. Even with the lectureship book in front of them, the editors do not quote Spain's words exactly. But Nichols and Cubstead demonstrate excellent journalistic instincts. They alone among the editors of journals among Churches of Christ in 1960 recognize the significance of Spain's lecture. They alone are prepared to embrace its implications. The GA and FF ignore this lecture completely; they do not respond, even in opposition. Like Belshazzar's "wise men," they are either unable or unwilling to read The Handwriting on the Wall.

In this story anonymous "ACC officials" speak of an anonymous "committee" of the Board of Trustees. The story itself is attributed only to "Chronicle Staff." Even a hapless would-be debater--that least anonymous of vocations--is unnamed here. Only Carl Spain has his name on anything. Despite his rigorous condemnation in this lecture of "existentialism," he has heard the challenge of Albert Camus.

What is needed today are men
who will speak up clearly
and pay up personally.

May God have mercy.

dhaymes, his mark +