Reinhold Niebuhr in the 1960s

Christian Realism for a Secular Age

Ronald H. Stone

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781506446240
• eBook ISBN:
  9781506446257
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion, Politics & State

The Civil Rights Movement. The Cuban Missile Crisis. The assassination of a president and a senator, both from the same family. Praise turns into protest; hope into disenchantment, as democracy's new day goes up in flames. The 1960's was an era born in hope and ends in deep conflict.

During this era, Reinhold Niebuhr, once dubbed "America's theologian," retires from Union Seminary in New York. Though little has been published about him in this decade, much of Niebuhr's life and work are as much shaped and transformed by this era as his work shapes and transforms the discourse in theology, ethics, and the politics of the age.

Ronald H. Stone, a former student-turned-colleague of Niebuhr, brilliantly introduces readers to the Niebuhr of the 1960's. In his analysis of Niebuhr, he shows a theologian whose work sometimes turns less theological and becomes more secular in his writing with a view toward speaking to a less religious, more secular world around him. Stone's delightful book introduces readers to never-before seen letters between the author and Reinhold and Ursula Niebuhr, Stone points the way for theologians, ethicists, politicians, and those otherwise seeking justice and peace into the conflicted world today.

1

Index

Abrecht, Paul, 63, 178

Africa, 42, 81

African Americans, ix, 65, 67, 69, 89, 102, 119, 137, 171, 190, 193; poverty, 145, 192, 198

Alliance for Progress, 61, 82

ambiguity of history, 27, 41, 53

American character, 73, 75

American Conscience, An, 50

American dilemma, 77

Americans for Democratic Action, 85, 87, 124, 192, 198

Amos, 27, 168, 169, 190

Amsterdam conference, 63

Annals, The, 56, 58, 198

anti-Communism, 128, 159

anti-lynching, 71

apartheid, 36, 40, 147

apocalyptic, 68, 128

Aquinas, Thomas, 118

Aristotle, 52, 101, 117–19, 151; just war, 153

Asia, 158

Augustine, 47, 48, 52, 61, 117, 118, 145, 161, 188

Baldwin, James, 67, 72, 189, 192, 193

Barnard College, xi, 67, 71, 79, 99, 104, 153

Barth, Karl, 31, 36, 172

Bell, Daniel, 21

Berrigan, Daniel, 182, 190

Bennett, John C., xii, 12, 49, 56, 57, 78, 86, 87, 96, 98, 108, 109, 111, 122, 129, 150, 166, 171, 191, 196, 197

Berlin, 61–63

Bible, 21, 22, 25, 27

Bingham, June, x, 35, 99

Birmingham, 68, 69

black: churches, 189; citizens, 174; empowerment, 192; people, 115; power, 179; Black Muslim, 68, 174

Black Panthers, 179

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, 29, 71, 72

Braziller, Inc., 139, 140, 178

Brown, Charles, x, xii, 98, 169, 187

Brunner, Emil 14, 28, 193

Buber, Martin, 131

Burke, Edmund, xi

Calvin, John, 15, 18, 99

Calvinism, 107, 118, 125

Castillo, Gonzalo, xii, 195

Catholicism, 39, 111, 112

Central Intelligence Agency, 42–44, 76, 123

Children of Light and the Children of Darkness, The, 3, 7

China, 13, 58, 60, 76, 95, 97, 157

Christ, Jesus 15, 22, 28, 47, 124

Christian: ethics, 55, 118, 162; faith, 22; philosophy, 53; realism 30, 161; theology, 18, 41; tradition, 24; view, 20

Christianity, 55, 56

Christology, 22, 181

Christian Century, The, 14, 66, 172

Christianity and Crisis, ix, xi, 11–13, 42, 45, 49, 57, 59, 75, 85, 87, 96, 108, 116, 122, 132, 158, 180; interview, 158–62

church, 37, 63, 66, 111–12

Churchill, Winston, 83

civil rights, 145–47, 188

Civil Rights Act, 94, 141

Clergy and Laity Concerned about Vietnam, 130, 136

Coffin, Henry Sloane, 108, 109

Cogley, John 124, 125

Coles, Robert, 182, 190

Cold War, 5, 7–16, 36–38, 49, 52, 79, 83, 145, 196

colloquium, 110

Columbia University, ix, xi, 3, 20, 50, 116, 149, 151, 164, 171, 173, 189

Communism, x, 8, 25, 30, 41, 46, 52, 56, 76, 131, 157, 197; apocalyptic, 91, 96; changes, 158; demise, 196; myth, 127

Cone, James, x, xii, 67, 70, 71, 192

Constitution, 118; American, 146, 193

Cowan, Wayne, 94, 96, 109, 166

Cromwellian revolutionaries, 99, 118, 119

Cuba, 8, 40–45, 63, 77, 79

culture, 13, 19, 26, 53, 156

Darwinism, 107

death of God, 112–15

Declaration of Independence, 146

Delta Cooperative Farm, 59, 65, 198

democracy, xi, 4, 33, 49, 52, 58, 81; Barnard lectures on, 79, 80, 98, 123, 127, 155–71

Democratic Experience, The, 80, 153, 154, 164, 180,...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Table Of Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• Cold War Empires
• Human Nature
• Human Destiny
• Beginning the Kennedy Era, 1960
• International Politics, 1962
• The Mounting Racial Crisis and Democracy, 1963
• President Johnson, 1964
• Man’s Nature and His Communities, 1965
• Christianity and Crisis, 1966
• Social Myths and Cold War, 1967
• Faith and Politics, 1968
• Democracy, 1969
• Decline, 1970–71
• Legacy
• Index