The only workable answer we can offer to those who wish to enlist the churches in efforts to eradicate social evils is predicated on dealing with the churches as they really are, not with some hoped for vision of the future. Efforts must be concentrated on the silent majority. It is difficult to maintain a realistic view of the religious situation if one often attends conferences, and symposiums on problems of peace, race, and the like in which religious spokesmen participate. The majority of such clerical participants are filled with moral fervor and compassion and seek an active Christian witness on such matters. One is easily misled into thinking of them as representative of moral ferment in the churches and as certain evidence that the churches are a potentially powerful force in such matters. This is always the danger in preach-ing to the converted; as many important evangelists have recognized, it prevents you from reaching the heathen. Thus, in our judgment it is vital now to turn away from the comforts of dialogues with the New Breed and seek conversations with the main body of the clergy.

"So long as efforts to arouse the average parish clergy men on such human issues as peace, poverty, prejudice, and justice are not more successful than they have been so far, Sunday will remain the same: the American silent majority sitting righteously in the pews listening to silent sermons."