Religion: God & One

A Negro couple and their two children sat proudly among their white neighbors at regular Sunday services in Houston's Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church last week. The family of Laundryman Carl Williams were the first Negroes accepted as members of the congregation, and the pioneers in a revolution under way at Augustana Church.

The revolution began so quietly that the church's 400 members were hardly aware of it. "It is quite conceivable," said the Rev. Paul T. Seastrand in a report to the congregation two years ago, "that some of our Negro friends may politely ask if they may come into our church on Sunday morning to worship. Certainly Christian love has no answer but to kindly grant the request." There were a few frowns and compressed lips, but the congregation showed no rancor. In Houston, no Negro had ever asked to join Augustana Church, even though it is perched on the edge of an expanding Negro district. Few parishioners seemed to feel that the pastor's words boded any real change.

Though he had been their pastor for six years, the congregation had a lot to learn about Massachusetts-born Pastor Seastrand, 40. Many a Southern pastor who thinks church segregation un-Christian is afraid to buck his all-white flock to abolish it. Not so Paul Seastrand. "God and one," he said, "is always a majority." Amid some ominous grumblings, he began a persistent campaign to persuade his congregation to "meet the challenge of integration." He preached the Christian view of equality. "It is not my purpose to force on you my own convictions," he said, "but to endeavor to lead you into the word of God." Then he passed the word to a parish worker to invite two Negro women to Sunday services.

Pastor Seastrand was bitterly criticized for his attitude, and some angry talk broke out at church meetings. There were dark rumors—half the congregation would leave; the church would not get financial support. To every protest, Pastor Seastrand gave a gentle but firm rejoinder. When his congregation talked of moving the church, he warned: "We can't move ourselves away from moral and spiritual responsibilities." Meanwhile, more Negroes came to church each Sunday, and several Negro children enrolled in the Sunday school. By last summer half of the 70 children in the church's vacation Bible school were Negroes.

Eighteen members left the church in protest against Pastor Seastrand's stand, but his methods have won over many of the congregation, and 26 additional whites have joined the church since the inter-racial policy became known. Said a Texas-born deacon at a church meeting: "No one has had a more difficult job battling this problem than I. But I thank God that I now not only recognize what is the right thing to do but am willing to accept it."