wfn.org | Bailey Recalls Seven NCC General Secretaries

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National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA
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	50th Anniversary Newsroom - Nov. 8-12, 1999 call 216-696-8490

NCC11/11/99					FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SEVEN NCC GENERAL SECRETARIES I HAVE KNOWN
By J. Martin Bailey

	Nov. 11, 1999, CLEVELAND, Ohio - No one person or group of persons can 
adequately represent any institution-especially an ecumenical organization 
like the National Council of Churches (NCC).
	
Yet, because the God of the Incarnation acts through individuals, 
particular persons have shaped and embodied the Council.  Take the seven 
men and women who have been our general secretaries.  I have been blessed 
by knowing all seven. And I was privileged to serve under the leadership of 
four, beginning with Roy Ross and ending with Joan Campbell.
	
Each of the seven brought different styles and emphases.  All were 
passionate ecumenists.  Fifty years ago this month, the train to Cleveland 
on which Roy Ross was traveling from Chicago was stopped in a 
blizzard.  The short-legged, well-rounded Roy Ross believed earnestly in 
what was to happen the next day; he wanted to get off the train and 
struggle through the drifting snow.

Representing what was then the International Council of Religious 
Education, Roy Ross did not want to be late for a meeting with the Federal 
Council of Churches' Samuel McCrae Cavert.  Those two shaped conciliar 
ecumenism in America; both were convinced that Christian witness would be 
inadequate without concern for a just and peaceful society and for future 
leadership of the churches.
	
Ed Espy led the Council during the turbulent 1960s; it was a gift that a 
layman with an inclusive worldview was the third general secretary.   There 
were plenty of voices ready to blame the nation's clergy for being 
unrealistic and soft when confrontation was experienced in the streets, on 
campuses and across the so-called Iron Curtain.  Ed was experienced, 
strong, daring.

Ed was succeeded by Claire Randall who had headed a vast and influential 
women's organization.  She encouraged America's churches to extend hands of 
friendship and welcome to the faithful in what was then called the Soviet 
Union.  She introduced thousands of Americans to Baptist, Orthodox and 
other religious leaders from Eastern Europe.
	
That search for peace with a human face also was a passion of Arie Brouwer, 
who struggled (perhaps too hard and certainly too quickly) to cure the 
organizational and financial dilemmas that the Council had inherited from 
its very diverse member churches who could not prioritize their goals 
together.  He was tough and visionary-and was too far ahead of his staff 
and constituents.
	
Jim Hamilton, a careful lawyer by training, brought a measure of stability 
to the Council.  He enjoyed the confidence of both constituents and 
staff.  Jim knew the Council from the inside as perhaps no one else: he had 
headed the NCC's Washington office and worked long into many nights to 
balance budgets and constituency participation.  A real gentleman.
	
Then came Joan Campbell.  Indefatigable.  Eloquent.  She has been a gifted 
interpreter of the Council's commitment to justice for all people and to 
the goal of Christian unity.  The door to her office was seldom closed, 
generally because she was away from her desk working with the staff and 
speaking with the constituents.  At the end of my work with the Council as 
at its beginning, the publication and utilization of the Bible in 
contemporary English were parts of the legacy of two general secretaries, 
Roy Ross and Joan Campbell.
	
As I look back across the 50 years that I have observed the leaders of the 
National Council of Churches, I see how each general secretary challenged 
me personally.  There were moments of high exhilaration and joy.  There 
were times of organizational tedium.  There were hours of great tension and 
pain.  There was education in every experience.

For half a century the Council has struggled to express a unity in Christ 
that often was at odds with the culture of the American religious 
community.   Every general secretary learned to duck.  They also learned to 
absorb much of the conflict that surged around them.  All sought peace and 
justice as an expression of their commitment to the Gospel.  Some were, by 
nature, more graceful than others in the ecclesiastical dance.  But (to 
follow that metaphor) there was not a wallflower among them.  Each knew the 
cost and the joy of leadership.  I remember them all with fondness and 
awesome respect.

              -end-

[The Rev. J. Martin Bailey began his work with the Council on the staff of 
the International Journal of Religious Education.  When he retired in 1994 
he was Associate General Secretary for Education, Communication and 
Discipleship.]