CRISIS IN MORALITY / by Al Sanders
M ecently I was riding on a bus in Los Angeles, and heard two men talking about a mutual friend who, it seems, is a salesman. Their comments, summed up, were that his trouble is due to the fact that he is too honest. One of them said, “You can’t get ahead today unless you are willing to bend the truth a little, here or there.” Their conversation fits perfectly into the content of a paper which I have before me from the Federal Trade Commission. It is published weekly and lists hundreds of frauds which have recently been uncovered in various parts of our nation. These frauds range from perfumes and cosmetics to electric water heaters. Virtually every area of business has some shysters in it. Thank God for the men who believe in and practice honesty. This is the exhortation which we find the Holy Spirit imparting to our hearts in the Christian citizenship chapter of the Bible—Romans 13. The 13th verse of this chapter opens with these, words, “Let us walk honestly . . . ” The greatest struggle which we Christians face to day is not between armies, navies, mis siles, and all such products of war ef fort — but it is a spiritual struggle between Christianity and the satanic
force of corruption in all its forms. Lenin said, “Religion is a kind of spiritual gin in which the slaves of a capital drown their human shape and their claims to any decent human life. It is the opiate of the people.” But let us see what these thoughts of Romans 13:13 mean when translated into our modem way of life. In 1952, Senator Charles Tobey wrote, “Poli tics is being played as if there were no uncertainty in the nation. Dishon esty and intrigue are rife in the capi tal. We have revelations of corruption all about us. Benedict Arnold rides again across the land.” J. Edgar Hoover reports, “Our record of law violation has become a national disgrace. One of every 16 people in the United States has been arrested and fingerprinted . . . the enormity of the crime problem is reflected by the fact that for every dol lar spent on education, one dollar and eighty-two cents is diverted to the cost of crime. For every dollar given to the churches of the nation, crime costs us ten dollars.” Do we know what hon esty is in our land? Describing crime in New York City, a recent Newsweek Magazine stated, “Much of the city is a jungle, where no one is safe after dark. Even in some 32
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