(Editors Note: We can learn from history and how fad movements rise and fall in reaction to religious conditions. This is a great overview of this tendency in every generation. This article was written in 1942.)

"I thank heaven for a man like Adolph Hitler." So spoke the founder of Buchmanism to a New York reporter in 1937. And these words have had no little part in proving the undoing of the movement started in the 1920s by Dr. Frank Buchman, baldish, plump, Pennsylvania-born Lutheran. The sect has been known under many names, among, them being "Buchmanism," "First Century Christian Fellowship," "Oxford Groups," and "Moral Rearmament."

There have been persistent rumors that Vidkun Quisling, the Norwegian traitor, as well as Rudolph Hess, who lately 'sailed against England,' and certain others high in the Nazi party were either members of, or sympathetic to, the Oxford Groups. This was partly brought out in a recent debate in the British House of Commons, when the Hon. A. P. Herbert remarked that Buchman had never publicly condemned Hitler. "He loves Hitler as well as he loves us," said the Britisher, "and there is in all his preaching a strange tendency toward flabbiness and fascism." The issue of the debate was whether the Buchmanite "lay preachers" would be granted military exemption. They weren't.

With practically the whole world regarding Hitler as the arch-enemy of all civilized values, and all decency and honor in both individual and national relationships, it is understandable that Dr. Buchman's impetuous admiration for Der Fuehrer should come back to haunt him. His movement, which spread like a house afire through the Protestant world about a decade ago, has gone into an eclipse which promises to be even more spectacular than its rise. In New York City on November 8th, Dr. Samuel M. Shoemaker, rector of Calvary Episcopal Church, and leading American exponent of Buchmanism, wrote a letter to his parishioners explaining his withdrawal from the movement, and denying the Buchmanites any further use of his parish house which had been their headquarters. His action was typical of that being taken by prominent Buchmanites all over the nation. And now the retreat from "Moral Re-Armament" threatens to become a debacle.

Swing of the Pendulum

Buchmanism, like, nearly every false doctrine that has cursed the earth since the day of the apostles, represented a "swing of the pendulum" movement. One has but to look into church history to discover what a large proportion of heretical movements have had their genesis in the same sort of situation that brought the "Groupers" into existence. It has been the practical neglect of some phase or section of Christian doctrine, followed by a long felt need for the thing being stressed, then the emergency of someone to emphasize that particular thing, with a consequent over-emphasis which amounts to heresy.

For example, can there be any doubt that the reformation started by Martin Luther, with its heretical overemphasis on "faith" (salvation by faith only) was a swing of the pendulum away from the Catholic church's neglect of that doctrine? Because Catholicism had virtually eliminated personal faith, and had made salvation dependent almost entirely on doing the "works" of the church, Luther found a fertile soil for his emphatic preaching on the importance of faith.

Then there was Calvinism with its heretical overemphasis on the sovereignty of God. In rebellion against the accepted idea that mankind could work out his own scheme of redemption, and that careful observance of the decrees of "the church" would bring salvation, Calvin declared the whole thing was in the hands of God. Not only could man not save himself, he couldn't even help to save himself. Before time began, God had settled everything by his divine decree. All was predestinated and foreordained according to his will.

Later on, Wesley came with his enthusiastic emotionalized version of "whop-'em-up" religion. Which was a clear case of the "swing of the pendulum" away from the cold formalism of the Anglican church. His movement resulted in a heretical over-emphasis on the "feeling" side of religion.

In our own country Mary Baker Eddy secured a tremendous following by putting great emphasis on a phase of Christian doctrine that was very generally over looked and neglected--meditation and prayer. By staking her so-called "Christian Science" on these two points, and building her whole cult around them, she was able to snare a large number of people who had felt there was something lacking in their denominational teaching, without knowing exactly what it was that was absent. This writer has yet to meet a Christian Scientist who was not a member of some other denomination before he fell under the wiles of Mrs. Eddy.

Cardinal Points of Buchmanism

In much the same way, Dr. Buchman in the '20s and '30s pounced upon certain phases of Christian doctrine which were largely being neglected, and with these as a frame work, built up an impressive following among religious people in nearly all the larger denominations. A study of the cardinal points of his teaching will show them to have been nothing more nor less than an over-emphasis on parts of the Christian religion which had been long ignored and abused:

1. The "quiet time." This is the name the Buchmanites gave to a period of meditation and earnest devotion which they pledged themselves to observe each day. Usually it is early in the morning. This time may be spent partly in prayer, and partly in an inner searching of the soul. Devout men have long since recognized that our modern high pressure living has practically eliminated this sort of experience from the life of the average Christian. And successful Christian living simply isn't possible without it. Every soul must have some method of retreat and withdrawal from the noisy clatter and swift rush of daily living. Because our generation has virtually lost this technique of Christian living, the Buchmanites were able to capitalize on it. The result was an over-emphasis that made of the "quiet time" a sort of mystical, unearthly, experience in which the "Grouper" thought he would receive a direct message (guidance) from the Holy Spirit.

2. "Sharing" was the word the Buchmanite used to describe his attitude toward others in the movement. In "sharing" he purged his soul by a confession of sins. Nothing was kept back. Everything from the most trivial peccadilloes of behavior to the most revolting of crimes was laid bare. Again, thoughtful men have long recognized the actual, psychological, prophylactic value of a full and free - confession. Modern Christianity has seemed much more willing to confess the faults of others than its own guilt. But Christ and the apostles taught, "Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another," (Jas. 5:16) and "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us, our sins," (I Jno.1:9). Dr. Buchman was quick to sense the weakness in the modern attitude, and to emphasize this neglected portion of the gospel. But, as is usual with such "swing of the pendulum" movements, he over-emphasized the idea to the point of heresy.

3. Individual evangelism. Because modern denominationalism is frozen in its stiff formality of "called" and "ordained" clergymen, the Buchmanites saw a golden opportunity to return to the primitive conception of every member being an evangelist for the movement. In this attitude and conception Dr. Buchman gave a tremendous emphasis to a long neglected teaching of the scripture that--it is the solemn duty of every disciple to teach and influence all he meets to accept the new doctrine. But here, once more, the pious doctor went beyond the truth in his over-emphasis of this neglected principle. He has tried to make all his movement dependent on the work of the "lay preachers"--giving no place at all to evangelists or teachers whose sole duty would be to spread the teaching.

How the Church can Profit

Although Buchmanism is clearly a heretical movement, it has none-the-less certain points well worth the Christian's sober consideration. Can anyone deny that the church of Christ would profit immeasurably if all the members would give greater emphasis to the cardinal points of the "Groupers"--periods of meditation and prayer, honest confession of faults, and intense, flaming, individual evangelism? Not because Dr. B. taught them, but because Jesus Christ himself taught them.

The chief value of Dr. Buchman to us moderns has been to show us that the plan of Christ works. Even handicapped as it was by all the errors and wrong ideas of denominational teachings, it was undoubtedly the zealous individual evangelism of Buchman's followers that made hundreds of thousands of converts to his movement within a short decade. And if the church of Christ in our day could develop the same intensity of enthusiasm on the part of every member that characterized the Buchmanites, who can say how rapid would be her growth throughout the world?

Dr. Buchman's admiration for the goose-stepping Nazis and his lack of any solid doctrinal framework has doubtless doomed his movement to an early extinction. But the incredible speed with which his "Moral Rearmament" swept the world has been one of the outstanding religious phenomena of our day. It shocked and astonished our easy-going religionists into stupefied wonder. Two things were clearly demonstrated: first, our sophisticated twentieth century is certainly not hardened and immune to all religious influence; second, if people, are won to a new religious life it must be by a return to the flaming, passionate intensity or individual evangelism which characterized the church in the first century. The way of Christ and the apostles the way of the early disciples--is the way that get results. Let the church of Christ take notice!

Only to the extent that the church is kept militant (not in the persons of her preachers and leaders, but in the rank and file of her membership) can we hope for the church to become triumphant.

Bible Banner Jan - 1942