Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-07-18
CHURCH FOES HIT
BY YOUNG STRATON
Sonsof Fundamentals Lead
er. Ready for Ministry,
Defies Baptist Body.
BY BRADLEY W. TRENT.

ls
Special Dispatch TO The star.
NEW YORK. July 1T.-Any bright
young college man who thinks the
modernists gain all the recruits. al
graduation time, and that he knows
the last word on the Bibles conflict
with evolution, can get regular
catch'as-catch-can argument any day
from New York's youngest exponent
of Bryanesque characterization.
Hillyer Hawthorne Straton, FL, cid.
est son of Rev, John Roach Straton.
well known Baptist pastor who has
taken up the banner dropped by the
late William Jennings Bryan in the
war on modernists, is a fighting
fundamentalist. He has fight ON his
hands even before he has entered the
ministry, and he has flung q ringing
def to the modernists to try to make
him wear their collar.
Young Starton has just been gradu-
ated from Mercer University at Ma,
con, Ga. and will receive his M. Al.
degree n August. The coming week
he will go before the council OF Calvary
Baptist Church here. of which his
father is pastor, to be ordained as a
minister. He will do so in direct de-
fiance of the Southern New York Bap-
fist Association, for he denies its au-
thority to take over to itself exclusive
charge of the examination of candi-
dates for the ministry.
This action of the Baptist associa-
ton is termed by young Straton as
simply another move Of the modernist
wing of the church under the leader
ship of Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick
and John d. Rockefeller, jr. Straton
contends that the local church is SUI
preme and that the associations rul-
ing violates a timerhonored principle
of individual autonomy in the church.
Has Punch i'm Words.
Young Straton is a. tall, bronzed
youth with flashing dark eyes and a
punch in his words which makes them
crackle in spite of his Southern drawL
The writer asked him for q fuller
exposition of his views on religion and
the educational system, after hearing
him give sermon in Calvary Baptist
Church the past week in which he
made public his def to the n1odernist
forces.
Young Straton thinks there are
plenty of things wrong with the col
leges, although he doesn't quite share
going straight to hell" The youth
is not convinced that some Of the
worlds sins cannot be corrected.
What the American youth needs in
this "jazz age" young Straton be-
lieves, is q more frequent and vigor-
Gus application of the good old hick-
DRY stick and more home training.
"The educational system today is
wrong because it places emphasis in
the wrong places" he declared. 1t
fails to strengthen character at the
most important point-that of faith.
We are substituting lopsided theories
for living truths. Facts are poured
into the student, but little faith"
Shuns the Theater.
Young Straton said he doubted
whether God would have called me
to preach If had been raised on card
parties, Mencken and Athe pitiful trash
that fills most of our modern novels"
He does not dance, smoke. play cards
or attend the theater. Incidentally
his father is an inveterate foe Of the
theater. having written a book with
the title Church VS.. Stage" and look
ing upon the theater as one of the
agencies corrupting, the morals Of the
young. So
Young Straton would rank the BIZ
BILE alongside of Shakespeare in the
public schools. The Old Testament,
at least, could be placed on the cur
riculum, he believes, and the whole
b1Ul6 sSlOu1u DC StuUlSQ. III Colleges
for its literary and, ethical values.
He interpretS the Bible literally and
cannot reconcile evolution with it, but
admits that students should be per-
mitted to accept or reject whatever
portions they choose.
People laugh when you mention
the story of Jonah and the whale; :"
he said, "but it shows they fail to
appreciate the true lesson of the
story-that of obedience. If there
We're more obedience taught in the
home. there would be less maynard
ness among youth and less crime"
Scores Church Body.
Regarding the ukase of the South.
ern New York Baptist Association on
ordination, young Straton said that
1T appears to be the first step inn the
definite plan of a few men to gain
control of the Baptist denomination
by controlling the preachers
do not propose to bow my knee
to this modern Baal,'' he declared. IT
refuse to be stamped with the wrap
ping stamp of the man-n1ade machine
system adopted by the association"
Straton has a younger brother who
is studying law. The elder brother
is named after his mother, who was
Miss Georgia Hillyer of Atlanta. Rev.
John Roach Straton was born in
Evansville, Ind. He was graduated
from Mercer University in 1898 and
later taught there and at Baylor Uni.
Rersity. Tenn. He held pastorates In
chicago, Baltimore and Norfolk be.
Tore coming to New York in 1918.
Copyright. 1926.l