Dr. McIntire Stands in Rain to Answer ‘Manifesto’
From the Philadelphia Inquirer of July 21, 1969
By Al Haas
Of The Inquirer Staff

The Rev. Dr. Carl McIntire was prevented from delivering his “Christian Manifesto” during Abington Presbyterian Church’s Sunday worship service, so he read it on the church lawn in the rain.

The fundamentalist South Jersey preacher had announced he would read the new document to the Montgomery County, Pa. congregation of the wealthy white suburban church after learning the Black Manifesto had been presented there the week before.

When the church board of elders rejected his request for “equal time” to respond to the call for black reparations, he vowed to read it anyway.

Dr. McIntire, pastor of the Bible Presbyterian Church in Collingswood, and head of the fundamentalist International Council of Christian Churches, arrived at the Abington church shortly before the start of its 10 AM service.

The preacher, who came with a revenue of 15 aides and followers, was met at the front door by church elder Lowell Reed, who told him he could come in to worship but not to preach.

Dr. McIntire then adjourned to a clump of trees affording some protection from the steady downpour and was joined by some 40 onlookers, including his entourage, newsmen and a handful of the congregation.

Under the old shade trees, while 650 worshipped inside the church, Dr. McIntire was met by applause from his following and criticism from others.

Dr. McIntire introduced a Negro missionary who denounced the Black Manifesto and a Pakistani who spoke on behalf of fundamentalism.

Then, as aides handed out newspaper-like copies of the Christian Manifesto, Dr. McIntire began reading it.

Like the Black Manifesto, which it calls “the voice of hell,” the CHristian Manifesto seeks $3 billion from churches affiliated with the relatively liberal National Council of Churches.

Half of this sum would go to the International Council of Christian Churches, which would use it for “evangelizing the nations” and erecting hospitals in which the Gospel of Christ would be presented with the healing knowledge of modern science.”

The document, which Dr. McIntire said will be read wherever the Black Manifesto is presented, also calls for money to establish theological seminaries “that will defend the Christian faith” and research centers to develop “Christian skills” and “counter the Black Manifesto.”

It also demands $300 million for use by fundamentalist Negro churches to “inform all Negroes who have been misled by false accusations of racism and the nature of Christian Brotherhood.”

It also asked that the “modernists” running places like Princeton Theological Seminary give these institutions back to the “Bible-believing (fundamental) churches.”

The manifesto, in its introduction, “repudiates the Black Manifesto, which calls for a society where the total means of production are taken from the rich and laced in the hands of the State for the so-called welfare of all people.”

“The Black Manifest,” it adds later, “is the voice of hell, not the fruit of the spirit. It is the evidence of Communist participation in the internal life of the churches in the United States of America.”

After the reading, Dr. McIntire walked slowly toward the car. He then halted for what amounted to an impromptu press conference, during which the Negro missionary, the Rev. Aaron Dumas, noted that “thousands” of Negroes reject the Black Manifesto.

“Sure, and there are some Negroes who like (apartheid) South Africa,” countered a white man on the fringe of the conference. “They’re the McIntire Negroes.”