St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1959-02-13

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challenge that confronts religious
leaders. All the pretensions of
American democracy and Of the
Jewish and Christian heritage to a
concern with brotherhood and the
sanctity of the individual are test
ed in our response to this problem.
The voice of religion should be
heard proclaiming most persua-
sively and firmly those insights of
American faith that brand pre-
JUDGE and inhumanity as sinful.
It should affirm in specific re-
lationships and actual test situa-
tions those ethical values which
will afford to America the moral
leadership she so sorely needs.
Church-going and synagogue-at-
tendance without a clearly express
sed and specifically served dedica-
ton to the fulfillment, without res
ervation, of the ideal of human
brotherhood is empty mockery of
the fundamental concept of man
which is the inescapable conse-
quence of Jewish tradition and
Christian belief.
Measured against this ideal, the
effectiveness of religious forces on
this issue has been disappointingly
inadequate on the national level.
The testimony of individual clergy
men and congregations who by
announcement and action have
made clear the sincerity of their
protestations has, however, been
heartening. Where the three faith
groups have spoken and acted in
concert the results have been real
and rewarding.
The hunger of the American
community for an unequivocal and
authoritative moral voice was dem
onstrated in its response to the
unrationalized and uncomplcated
statement of a little girl. a high
school student in Van Buren,, Ar
kansas, who had boldly and naively
stated her belief that segregation
is un-Christian.
We can and must with equal
simplicity and clarity declare that
any action which humiliates an
other human being or diminishes
his opportunity to develop his full
human potential, is un-Jewish. The
question of human equality before
God is one on which Judaism sheds
clear and direct light. Our tradi-
ton and its value in this area of
concern have been moulded by the
story of the common origin of man.
kind recorded in the opening chap
tiers of Genesis with its inspiring
and provocative thought that the
image of God is present in Man
not black man, or white man or
yellow man-but generic Man and
the children of Man.
This view of man is of one piece
with the prophetic insistence that
the Philippians and the Aramaeans
can claim Gods protection and
Gods loving concern equally with
the Israelites, and it receives its
clearest delineation in the epochal
injunction of the nineteenth chap
ter of Leviticus: The stranger
that sojourneth with you shall be
unto you as the home-born among
you, and thou shalt love him as
myself; for we were strangers in
the land of Egypt"
Having known the evils of dis
elimination as it's victims, we are
hidden to reverse the normal mech
anism of projection and to con-
Germ ourselves lovingly with all
those against whom discrimina-
ton may be practiced, to assure
equal treatment and the respect
due Gods image to all men wheth-
er stranger or homeborn, members
Of the tribe or outsiders, Jew or
nOn-Jew, Israelite or Ethiopian.
Hence, any Jew who discrimin-
ates against his colored brother
or who harbors prejudice against
the Negro in his heart is unfaith-
full to his tradition.
If we are to love our neighbors
as ourselves we must take affirm
alive action to secure for them
the rights we ourselves cherish
Paramount among those rights is
the right to learn, the right of all
men to have access, in accordance
with ability and on no other test