By Bobby Ross Jr. | Religion Unplugged
DALLAS — Less than a year before the U.S. presidential election, pastors took to their pulpits to decry a culture of hate, extremism and vile politics.
“Much of the hate and discord that has been poisoning our nation has been preached in the name of Christ and the church,” the Rev. Charles V. Denman declared.
In a different sanctuary, the Rev. William Dickinson proclaimed, “Hate knows no political loyalty and is as deadly and as vicious in the heart and mind of liberals and those to the far right as to the far left alike.”
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Those sermons were delivered not during the current race for the White House — but in the aftermath of the Nov. 22, 1963, assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
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“One overarching theme emerges again and again: A call for civility, a call for condemnation of extremism and a call to end the divisions and polarizations … that they think provided the climate in which this assassination could occur,” said Matthew Wilson, director of Southern Methodist University’s Center for Faith and Learning. “That is really striking because so much of what they say seems to apply to our current moment.”
Library archives at SMU’s Perkins School of Theology include sermons preached to overflowing crowds on Nov. 24, 1963 — the Sunday after the shooting.
This column appears in the online magazine Religion Unplugged. Christianity Today republished this story.
Photo by Walt Cisco, Dallas Morning News, via Wikimedia Commons
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