Reinhold Niebuhr

In a series of articles in the fall of 1946, Christianity and Crisis contributors offered reports based upon their travels, including from Reinhold Niebuhr and John Baillie in Germany.

The Bible is still right and that the contest of greatest significance is not between good and bad nations, but between all nations or men and God. We do want peace, but we would like it to be our peace.

“We are in danger of inflation because we do not have sufficient goods to meet the demands of the people despite the fact that we are producing more goods than any other nation on earth.”

“It is time to take the full measure of certain arguments widely cherished by churchmen to excuse Soviet practice and minimize the Soviet threat” – Henry P. Van Dusen in 1946, responding to Christians who thought the West’s actions caused tensions with the USSR.

Toward the end of World War II, Americans contemplated the possibility of “world government” to prevent another catastrophe, especially after the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japan.

In 1946, Reinhold Niebuhr visited an evangelical church for an Easter worship service in a movie theater. He did not entirely enjoy the experience. Here are his reflections.

In this article originally published by Christianity and Crisis on March 18, 1946, Charles W. Gilkey warns Americans not to worry that helping people abroad will make them “suckers.”

“A Christian knows, or ought to know, that an adequate Christian political ethic is not established merely by conceiving the most ideal possible solution for a political problem. He must, in all humility, deal with the realities of human nature, as well as the ideal possibilities.”

Christian Realism is our theme at Providence, and Christian Realism was the theme of George Washington’s life that America celebrates with today’s federal holiday.