May 4 1974
If today’s shrinking world could be said to have a motto it must surely be John Donne’s thoughtful reminder that “no man is an island”. In the midst of the monstrous crimes against flesh and blood committed in the name of abstractions and ideologies which have wracked us here in the past five years, it has not always been easy to tear away our thoughts from ourselves and give them to other people. But to lay claim to the name of Christian we have to remember that every man is our neighbour.
To the credit of the great majority, response to others’ needs has been consistent and generous. There are some circumstances, however, which lie outside the direct action of ordinary people, and yet we have to think about them and to feel involved if we are not to behave like the priest and the Levite who saw the injured man and passed by.
One of these is the matter of apartheid in South Africa. Apartheid in action is too well documented now by too many reputable witnesses to…