Religion: Act of Belief

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In trying to bring integration to Albany, Ga., the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and his Negro followers have had plenty of armchair support from Northern whites. Last week came more impressive backing—an act of belief. Asked by Dr. King to join in a prayer vigil in Albany, 75 Protestant, Jewish and Catholic laymen and clerics submitted to arrest and jail for praying on behalf of the cause of desegregation.

Shortly after 2, one muggy afternoon last week, a convoy of cars drove up Pine Street in downtown Albany. "This looks like the Yankee preachers," murmured one bystander. Led by the Rev.

Ralph Lord Roy, pastor of Manhattan's Grace Methodist Church, the group lined up in single file outside the city hall. The Northerners included 54 Protestant ministers, nine rabbis, six Roman Catholic laymen, four Protestant and two Catholic women active in church affairs; all but 19 of them were white.

"All Right, Reverends." A Negro minister from Newark began to read from St. Paul's Letter to the Galatians: "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." Up stepped Laurie Pritchett. Albany's coolheaded, hard-as-nails police chief. "All right, reverends," he said. "I want to know what your purpose is." Answered the Rev. Norman Eddy, of Manhattan's interracial East Harlem Protestant parish: "Our purpose is to offer our prayers to God." "You have come to aid and abet the law violators of this city," the chief shot back. "Go back to your homes. Clear your own cities of sin and violence. Disperse—in the name of decency." Rabbi Richard Israel of Yale University's Hillel Foundation began to read from the Old Testament. Once more the chief asked them to disperse. Then he turned to his police officers, gave a sharp order. "All right, take them to jail." The crowd cheered.

The 75 leaders, charged with disorderly conduct and creating a disturbance, were locked up in four of the Albany area jails. Some fasted—perhaps after glancing at the prison fare of cornbread, beans, greens and fat back. By week's end, all but 19 ministers were released on $200 bond and went home.

"To Bear Witness." For most of the prisoners, the prayer crusade fulfilled a desire, as one of them put it, "to bear witness to a belief in morality and justice." Emily McLees of the United Presbyterian Church's Board of National Missions pointed out that on a recent trip abroad, people kept asking her if Dr.King was still in jail (he isn't). "This made me realize," she said, "how concerned other colored peoples are about our racial problems." Added Lutheran Pastor L. W. Halverson of Chicago: "We didn't come here to be holier than thou.

We have a serious problem of our own up North. But we were answering the call of a group of churchmen for help." Pastor Roy, who promises to drum up recruits for another crusade if King wants one, found the affair "an opportunity to stand up for what we feel is right."