Your article of July 4, on the World Council of Churches refers to my new pamphlet "Terrorism, Revolution and the WCC". As an Anglican who has watched his own Church fall under the influence of this largely bogus organisation I consider it would be a major disaster for Christianity if the Catholic Church were ever to apply for full membership. Why? Because the WCC is trying to popularise a politically-oriented version of the Faith in which salvation is equated with political liberation.
Camouflaged by the seductive use of such words as "justice", "peace" and "goodwill" the WCC supports Communist revolution in the Third World yet ignores the brutal realities of Communist power in Soviet Russia and Eastern Europe. The WCC's Vietnam policy is characteristic. Throughout the war the WCC never missed an opportunity of denigrating America, yet no criticism of the Communist North was ever made.
Back in 1968 at its Uppsala Assembly the WCC condemned the American bombing of the North hut refused to condemn the infiltration of the South by Vietcong terrorists. In 1972 the WCC denounced the US again for its bombing of Hanoi, but when the North invaded the South in deliberate violation of a Peace Treaty, creating that terrible havoc of refugees that we saw on our TV screens, did the WCC protest? Not a word. But worse than that. The WCC not only did not protest but made a gift of two million dollars to the Communist North and one million dollars to the Vietcong! And there is now evidence that during that ruthless invasion of the South the WCC was supplying the Vietcong with soya bean meal. The meal had been bought by the United Nations High Commission on Refugees and handed over to the WCC for distribution to the needy!
The WCC favoured the takeover of South Vietnam by the Communists. That it could come about only by means of a military invasion does not seem to trouble the consciences of the Marxist sociologists and radical theologians who staff the higher levels of the WCC.
They are playing the game of world politics in which nations. and Churches are mere pawns. The opening moves of another Vietnam are now being made in Korea, where the WCC is using precisely the same tactics of denigrating the South and giving tacit approval to the Communist North.
The Catholic Church is daily edging nearer full membership of the WCC. Catholics must start asking themselves now if they want to be embroiled in it. It amounts to asking again the question: What is the mission of the Church? Is it to save souls or start political revolutions? Bernard Smith Secretary, Christian Affirmation Campaign. 124 Heath Park Road, Gidea Park, Essex.