Religion: Protestants & the Bomb

Is it un-Christian to manufacture the hydrogen bomb? The Vatican's official newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, indicating that no other course is practicable, has endorsed President Truman's decision to develop the bomb. But the Protestants cannot agree. Last week the Executive Committee of the Federal Council of Churches wrestled with the problem, finally worked out a statement which showed the same cleavage on the subject of war as was evident at the 1948 Amsterdam conference.

"Some of us," said the statement, "feel deeply that the hydrogen bomb does not present a new and different moral issue but sheds vivid light on the wickedness of war itself. Some of us oppose the construction of hydrogen bombs, which could be used only for the mass destruction of populations. Some of us, on the other hand, believing that our people and the other free societies should not be left without the means of defense through the threat of retaliation, support the attempt to construct the new weapon. All of us unite in the prayer that it may never be used.

"The main hope of peace in this period lies in mustering the spiritual, moral and material resources latent in our world and directing them towards positive goals of human welfare, thereby helping to build bridges of understanding and fellowship among the peoples,, and serving to isolate the forces of tyranny and war. The presupposition of this strategy is faith, and not fear. The requirement of this strategy is reliance primarily on the constructive power of spiritually creative resources, rather than on the destructive power of military weapons . . .

"Whatever may befall us and our world, we affirm our unwavering faith in God's faithfulness . . . Our faith in His constancy must save us from fear and hysteria which confuse us and prevent us from doing what we ought to do."