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PASTORAL "PSYCHOLOGY

June

ted with the rise of men's hopes and PSYCHOLOGY from the beginning, I the elevation of men's ideals and have followed with gratitude and instandards of conduct ? terest the service it is rendering. For The siguificant thing is this: Jesus, that reason I was disturbed by and his early disciple Paul, recognized Howard L. Parsons' article in the the presence of evil in man, but in February issue, "Rooted and GroundJesus Christ the offer of God was ed in Love." Granted that t h e docmade of a new life which was rooted trine of Original Sin has often been and grounded in the love of God. It crassly held, I am not at all sure that was because Jesus was a supernatural- we must now throw it overboard in ist that he was so far removed from the name of, "science," particularly pessimism. That is true of every Cal- the kind of historical study representvinist preacher today who recognizes ed in such a book as Overstreet's, a force which is greater than evil, the The Mature Mind. Those who take power of God to change human lives. what Dr. Parsons calls the optimistic If I were to devel0p the Biblical view are entitled to their opinions, but teaching about man's nature, and his they are not entitled to pass such a potentialities for evil, and his poten- sweeping judgment on those who may tialities for good through the power disagree without at least reading of God, this would be the result: a what they have to say. For example it very good case could be made out, is completely false to imply that Nieshowing that the Biblical recognition buhr holds that man is depraved withof sin and its destructive, disintegra- out serious reservations tf you have ting effects, plus the supernatural read Chapter ten of the Nature of optimism of the Biblical teaching of Man. redemption, combine to make a solid This protest is not at all meant to foundation upon which psychology belittle the overall excellence of can proceed. PASTORAL PSYCI-IOLOGYor the effecIt seems a little unfair to quote the tiveness of its help. In fact, the same words of the Apostle Paul about issue has what I believe to be outbeing rooted and grounded in love as standing proof that ministers have an argument ~or a r/aturalistic ap- much to. learn from their co-workers. proach to man. I believe his voice was I seem to feel in the answers to the raised on the other side of the fence. question in the Consultation Clinic Again, it was the supernatural outlook that the ministers come off very badof this man that enabled him to make ly; The D.D.s all seem more organithe statements he did, including those zation-centered, more concerned with quoted by Mr. Parsons. Let me the proper functioning of th e parish hasten to add that there is nothing in than with this poor soul who is in super-naturalism that precludes the real need of the Church, more so than study of man from every scientific most perhaps. It was the M.D.'s who standpoint. were person-centered and concerned C. JOHN WESTHOF with "pastoral care.,' Very revealing. First Presbyterian Church I t shows how we do need help. Our Whitesboro, Texas greatest need, perhaps, is dealt with Another minister writes: in "The ,Element of Hostility in Having subscribed to PASTOItAL Parish Work." The greatest asset of

1951

READERS' FORUM

any parish parson is the fellowship in which h e works, a very dynamic thing that we understand very little. You may help us even more by getting hold of more articles in the field of group dynamics and group therapy. Continue the fine work. RICHARD R. BAKER, I I I Warsaw, Virginia Dean Willard L. Sperry replies: Professor Parson's paper, "Rooted and Grounded in Love," was bound to start a discussion. Perhaps he intended just that. It 'is, a t the moment, the theological fashion to think badly of human nature, o n e must admit that there is, in the history of these last years, much warrant for thinking thus. An Engli.sht essayist has recently said that the religious question is no longer whether we can believe in God, but whether and to what degree we can continue to belie;ce in man. Professor Parsons cites Kropotkin's Mutual Aid as a warrant for his t.hesis that it is the nature of living creatures to cooperate wittl one another. He then goes on to say that evidence is now pouring in from biologists and sociologists to confirm this fact. He is still somewhat in advance of the facts if he assumes that the case for cooperation vs. competition has been universally decided in favor of the former. It should be pointed out that this mutual aid in the animal kingdom seems to operate for the " i n - g r o u p " of a single species. I t does not extend to the "out-group" of other species. Homo sapiens is presumably a single species, b u t for practical purposes he is divided into. in-groups on political, racial, social, economic, and religious bases. Parsons is quite right in adding that the Quakers trust the '(seed" of

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the spirit in every man. The mystics have always rested their case upon confidence in the Fiinklein--the divine spark in our humanity. John 1:5, according to the King James' translation, says' that the darkness has not comprehended this spark of light. A more accurate translation should read, "the darkness has not been able to put it out." Classical Christian mysticism is, therefore, on Dr. Parsons' sid e , and most of us think that the mystics were m o r e nearly right t h a n w r o n g . B u t it must be added at once that this mysticism is not to be identified with modern naturalism. In general Professor Parsons identifies himself with the n o w rather outmoded and unfashionable liberalism which was the order of the day~ from the mid-eighteenth century' until the onset of the First World War. In view of the events whicl~ have intervened in these later years, that liberalism seems, in retrospect, a little t o o good to be true. Lord Bryce, the greatest of the champions of modern democracy, said in lectures delivered at Yale in 1909 that after one hundred and fifty years of experimental de' mocracy there was "a painful contrast between that which the theory of democracy requires and that which the practice of democracy reveals." Man had not measured up to the vote of cpnfidence which the founding fathers of our democracy had vested in him, he had not turned out as good a person as the dogma presupposed. There is n o doubt that our conventional liberalism, whether in politics or in theology, had overbid its hand. Even those of us who cqntinue to call ourselves liberal, because we feel that this position has permanent values which cannot be destroyed by tragic happenings.,' in history,, and that the position