Program Particulars
*Times indicated refer to web version of audio

(01:19) Niebuhr's Name Invoked by Politicians

(01:50–03:53) Music Element
"The Multiples of One"
from Awakening,
performed by Joseph Curiale

Theologian Reinhold Niebuhr teaching a class at Union Theological Seminary (January 1, 1951) (Gjon Mili//Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

(02:03) Pastored a Church in Detroit
Niebuhr is quoted as saying, "I cut my eye teeth fighting Henry Ford." Read his unpublished essay entitled "Detroit," in which he talks about the social disparity and racial injustice he encountered during his time pastoring at Bethel Evangelical Church. Niebuhr's book, Leaves from the Notebook of a Tamed Cynic, is a compilation of entries from his diary as a pastor in the economic and social ferment of early 20th century Detroit.

(02:11) Invitation to Teach at Union Theological Seminary

(02:33) Citation from The Nature and Destiny of Man
Krista reads the opening sentence from Niebuhr's two-volume work The Nature and Destiny of Man: "Man has always been his own most vexing problem." View the corrected proofs of this classic text in which Niebuhr dramatically rearranges the first paragraph.

At Union Theological Seminary (January 1, 1951) are Professor Paul Tillich, theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, and Henry P. Van Dusen, president of Union. (Photo by Gjon Mili//Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Heschel was the great interpreter of the Hebrew Prophets, and Pa had always emphasized that it was the Prophets' vision of God's transcendent righteousness that gives us a standard and the dynamic for ethical action. So it is no surprise that he and Heschel hit it off from the start: there was much for them to share and explore together. "Prophecy is a sham unless it is experienced as a word of God swooping down on man and converting him into a prophet," Heschel had once written., and my mother observed, "I think others would agree with me that the word of God indeed swooped down on these two friends."

The Heschels lived at 424 Riverside Drive and we, after Reinhold retired from Union Seminary in 1960, lived at 404, so we were only a couple of blocks apart. These walks, ordered by the doctor for Reinhold's health, when in the company of Abraham, became times of exchange and refreshment. As Reinhold's own strength decreased in the latter sixties, he became rather more obviously lame on his left side, but I would watch them — Reinhold over six feet, leaning a bit like the Tower of Pisa, and Abraham, himself not too strong, and a good deal shorter — would he be able to hold Reinhold up if he tilted? One of our devoted doormen at 404 worried, as I did often, when they started, and if I came in, he would alert me and I would go down Riverside Drive looking for them. Luckily, Reinhold never did tilt or tumble, but I still have a vivid picture of those two dear figures happily talking to each other with their different architectural conformations.

Reinhold Niebuhr is known, literally, to hosts of people in this country and abroad. If one talks to a European and finds that that European knows the name of only one American Christian thinker, that name will almost invariably be the name of Reinhold Niebuhr.

(03:13) Niebuhr's Influence on Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. often spoke of the influence Niebuhr had on his own fusion of faith and social action. In a "Letter from Birmingham Jail," (listen to King reading letter) King writes:

My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

(03:20) The Serenity Prayer
In 1967, after struggling with health problems for 15 years, including depression brought on by a stroke, Niebuhr wrote a personally revealing essay, "A View of Life from the Sidelines." It was never published in his lifetime, but was printed in the Christian Century in 1984 and appears in Robert McAfee Brown's The Essential Reinhold Niebuhr. In this essay, Niebuhr reflects with humility and irony on his personal relationship to the sentiments of his prayer that became so famous:

Many friendly and inquiring correspondents asked for the original inspiration of the prayer, whether I was really its author, or whether it had been Francis of Assisi, or even an admiral who had used it in a shipboard worship service. I received about two such letters a week, and every answer to an inquiring correspondent embarrassed me because I knew that my present state of anxiety defied the petition of this prayer. I confessed my embarrassment to our family physician, who had a sense of humor touched with gentle cynicism. "Don't worry," he said, "Doctors and preachers are not expected to practice what they preach." I had to be content with this minimal consolation.

God, give us grace
to accept with serenity
the things that cannot be changed,
courage to change the things
that should be changed,
and the wisdom to distinguish
the one from the other.

(03:30) Preacehd Sober Realism
Niebuhr innovated a theology of "Christian Realism," that rejected Christian utopianism and called for active engagement in the world. At the same time, it acknowledged that human beings are imperfect and that because of their imperfections human attempts to do good would inevitably cause some harm. This is related directly to Niebuhr's understanding of human nature, and of sin.

Portrait of theologian Reinhold Niebuhr preaching at Union Theological Seminary. (Photo by Gjon Mili//Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Have you studied the history of our Puritan fathers in New England? I don't want to engage in the ordinary rather cheap strictures against our Puritan fathers because there were some very great virtues and graces in their lives. But I have become convinced as I read American history that this represents the real defect in our Puritan inheritance — the doctrine of special providence. These Puritan forefathers of ours were so sure that every rain and every drought was connected with the virtue and vice of their enterprise, that God always had his hand upon them to reward them for their goodness and to punish them for their evil.

This is unfortunate, and it's particularly unfortunate when a religious community develops in the vast possibilities of America, where inevitably the proofs of God's favor will be greater than the proof of God's wrath. This may be the reason why we are so self-righteous. This may be the reason why we still haven't come to terms, in an ultimate religious sense, with the problem of the special favors that we enjoy as a nation against the other nations of the world.

(05:02–08:03) Music Element
"Sonata III: Grave (Mulier, ecce filius tuus)"
from Haydn: The Seven Last Words,
performed by Emerson String Quartet

(06:37) Citation from Elie's Article in The Atlantic
Krista cites a passage from Elie's article published in the November 2007 issue of The Atlantic titled "A Man for All Reasons":

In 1943, with the Axis powers still strong in Europe and the Pacific, Niebuhr began to plan for the postwar situation, sketching out a peacetime alliance that would represent a mean between the extremes of anarchy and world government. As the military intervention he'd sought was becoming a fact on the ground, making American predominance in world affairs felt as never before, he was looking ahead to a time when the United States would need to "establish community with many nations."

It was at this time that he wrote the Serenity Prayer, the 33 words now uttered countless times each day in 12-step recovery programs worldwide: "God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other."

More than a prayer, this was Niebuhr's prescription for action in the new era waiting on the far side of the war. He foresaw that the American struggle in the postwar years would be a struggle with our addiction to power, and that our national story would be a story of our efforts to distinguish between the courageous and the foolish uses of that power—a story of our reluctant recognition that power can bring about necessary change, but that it can also have brutal unintended consequences. Moreover, he saw that distinguishing the one from the other would call for wisdom, a quality born of "the triumph of experience over dogma."

(08:07) Reinhold Niebuhr's Daughter
Preparing to produce this program, Krista interviewed Niebuhr's daughter, Elisabeth Sifton. She wrote a memoir tracing her relationship and memories of her father and his ideas in The Serenity Prayer. Listen to their complete conversation and Krista's interviews with other prominent Niebuhrian scholars.

(08:37) David Brooks' Article on Niebuhr
Elie cites New York Times columnist's article on Neibuhr published in the September 2002 issue of The Atlantic titled "A Man on a Gray Horse."

(09:49) Schlesinger's Call for Niebuhr's Influence

(11:58–12:48) Music Element
"Prelude and Fugue No 23 in F"
from Shostakovich: The 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87,
performed by Keith Jarrett

(12:42) Actuality of Michael Cromartie
The extended passage of the audio clip of Michael Cromartie, an evangelical political analyst, was taken from the 2004 Speaking of Faith program "Religion on the Campaign Trail":

Tippett: So is your feeling that people's concern for those kinds of issues, for matters of sexual morality, will trump maybe some discomfort that they have with the Republican economic agenda or even feelings about military action in other parts of the world?

Mr. Cromartie: Well, I can't speak for them. Let me just say that one of the definitions of a neo-conservative is a progressive with two teen-age daughters. What I mean by that — it's when you're trying to raise kids in this culture of all manner of violence and let's just say moral relativism all around, you become a little bit concerned about, "Well, what can our political process do to sort of at least abate some of these problems?"

Now, by the way, I just want to say that it is not the case that politicians can do a whole lot about all of this, except in the most symbolic ways. I know it's — I just want to say that sometimes religious conservatives have an over-inflated view of what politics can do to reshape a culture. It's what the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr said, "Politics is the art of finding approximate solutions to basically insoluble problems." Approximate solutions, not Utopian solutions, not "Everything is now fixed," but it's a steady work. Work in-between — what Augustine called "between the city of God and the city of man," — in-between the intersection of those two cities working for a certain amount of justice, a certain amount of order, but it will never be Utopian.

(13:30–14:28) Music Element
"Sonata II:Grave e Cantabile (Hodie mecum eris in Paradiso)"
from Haydn: The Seven Last Words,
performed by Emerson String Quartet

(14:00) The Dichotomies of Niebuhr's Thought
Niebuhr is often cited by conservatives and liberals in response to their stances on war and political ideologies. In Richard Wightman Fox's introduction to his biography of Niebuhr, he writes about the challenges he face in trying to make sense of these contrasting perspectives, and where Niebuhr might stand:

I first encountered Niebuhr's thought as a Stanford undergraduate in the mid-1960s. Two devoted Niebuhrians—Robert McAfee Brown and Michael Novak—introduced hundreds of students to his work. Although I never saw or heard Niebuhr, I knew at once from the devotion of Brown and Novak that he had deeply marked their generation. Those who came to political awareness between the depression of the 1930s and the Cold War of the 1950s found in Niebuhr a "crisis" theologian for troubled times. He exhorted his readers and listeners to take "responsibility" for their world, while warning them against the temptation to try to perfect it. All Niebuhrians united on the bedrock conviction that there could be no ultimate fulfillment in the political realm and yet no salvation apart from the life of political commitment. … Even in the 1960s, before Niebuhr's death, his followers were liable to dwell on different sides of his message … As the split between Brown and Novak — between a left liberal sympathetic to "liberation" and a right liberal disposed toward "democratic capitalism" — deepened in the 1970s. I was drawn back to their teacher in order to clarify the rift between my own teachers.

Reinhold Niebuhr speaking at an ADA convention. (ADA)

(15:32) Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 featured several reforms. Title I of the act barred unequal application of voter registration requirements, but did not abolish literacy tests sometimes used to disqualify African Americans and poor white voters.

Title II outlawed discrimination in public businesses participating in interstate commerce, such as hotels and restaurants, but private clubs were exempted. Title III encouraged the desegregation of public schools and authorized the U. S. Attorney General to file suits to force desegregation. Title IV authorized but did not require withdrawal of federal funds from programs which practiced discrimination. Title V outlawed discrimination in employment in any business exceeding 25 people and created.

(16:35) Quote from Elie's Article in The Atlantic
Krista quotes a line from Elie's article published in the November 2007 issue of The Atlantic titled "A Man for All Reasons":

"Our age is involved in irony because so many dreams of our nation have been so cruelly refuted by history," Niebuhr wrote in 1951. By then he had the American people as his congregation. He had given the prestigious Gifford Lectures (later published as The Nature and Destiny of Man). He had been featured in a Time cover story as America's "No. 1 Theologian," the man who had "restored to Protestantism a Christian virility." He had joined Arthur Schlesinger, Eleanor Roosevelt, Walter Reuther, and others in founding Americans for Democratic Action, which sought to claim "the vital center" by cutting ties with the "doughface" sympathizers with communism. He had advised the State Department on the cultural reconstruction of Europe and had even been touted for president. Yet This Nation Under God, as he called it, would be his last major book; retitled The Irony of American History, it went to press in early 1952, shortly before the stroke from which he never fully recovered.

The irony of American history, as Niebuhr explained it, is that our virtues and our vices are inextricably joined. From the beginning, our national purpose has been "to make a new beginning in a corrupt world." Our prosperity leads us to believe "that our society is so essentially virtuous that only malice could prompt criticism of any of our actions." Yet our counterparts abroad see us as at once naive and crudely imperialistic, and our power, ironically, has undermined our virtue, for "the same technical efficiency which provided our comforts has also placed us at the center of the tragic developments in world events," bringing about a "historic situation in which the paradise of our domestic security is suspended in a hell of global insecurity."

(19:56–21:27) Music Element
"Sarabande from Suite No. 3"
from The Cello Suites: Inspired by Bach,
performed by Yo-Yo Ma

(21:27–23:14) Music Element
"Little Fugue in G Minor"
from Saint Paul Sunday: Wish List,
performed by Lagq

(23:25–24:40) Music Element
"Trauermusik"
from Lachrymae,
performed by Kim Kashkashian

(24:26) Quote from Niebuhr's Writing
In his 1932 work, Moral Man and Immoral Society, Niebuhr applied his perspective of Christian realism to human societies and nations. He writes, "Individuals may strive to be moral, but collectively human beings are compromised and prone to immorality, even evil."

Krista reads a quote identifying Niebuhr's belief that the Christian ethic is not an adequate social ethic:

Civilization depends upon the vigorous pursuit of the highest values by people who are intelligent enough to know that their values are qualified by their interests and corrupted by their prejudices.

(24:40) Audio Clip from Sermon by Niebuhr
The audio clip of Niebuhr preaching was excerpted from a 1952 sermon entitled "Our Lord's Conception of the Providence of God." The sermon was given two weeks before his first stroke:

Where has there ever been a conflict in the human community where we have not felt, that we could not fight the battle if the Lord were not on our side? Though, as Abraham Lincoln said, we did not frequently enough ask the question of whether we were on the Lord's side. These are natural religious instincts, natural efforts to close the great structure of life's meaning prematurely.

(25:07–26:08) Music Element
"Prelude"
from Song of Hope,
performed by Bruce Stark

(30:02–30:36) Music Element
"Duet for Cello and Bass"
from Appalachia Journey,
performed by Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, and Mark O'Connor

(30:21) Actuality of Chris Hedges
In the following passage, New York Times reporter and war correspondent Chris Hedges describes how Niebuhr influenced his thought on the war in Iraq. Hedges appeared in the 2003 Speaking of Faith program "Religion in a Time of War":

Tippett: You know, you are such a Niebuhrian, aren't you? I mean, what do you think Reinhold Niebuhr would be saying about what's happening in America today?

Mr. Hedges: Well, he'd be appalled and terrified. You know, Niebuhr is often described as a Christian realist but he ardently opposed the Vietnam War. So I think, yes, I am very grounded in Niebuhr because I think Niebuhr understood human societies and he stood human nature and he understood that to make moral choice is not between moral and immoral but between immoral and more immoral. And when you don't want to be tainted, and I think some pacifists can go this route, you argue it in the same way that cynics do. You don't make choice. And somehow it's easier or cleaner for you not to make choice. But it is - you know, because we live in a fallen world, because we often don't get to pick between good and evil but between evil and more evil, you know, we in the end have to tainted. It's why Niebuhr wrote that when we make a decision, because we don't know the will of God, we often don't know the consequences of our actions, however well-intentioned, we must always ask for forgiveness and to be very frightened of hubris. And hubris, as the ancient Greeks know, can destroy us.

(31:20–31:48) Music Element
"Duet for Cello and Bass"
from Appalachia Journey,
performed by Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, and Mark O'Connor

(32:10) H. Richard Niebuhr's Book
The younger brother of Reinhold Niebuhr, H. Richard, who wrote Christ and Culture, was a revered theologian and ethical thinker who taught at Yale Divinity School during the mid-20th century. He was an advocate of theological existentialism, positing that revelation and values are relative and open to interpretation within Christianity. Read letters from H. Richard to his brother.

(34:00) Quote from Christianity and Crisis
Campaigning on the Socialist Party ticket, Niebuhr ran for a seat in the New York State Senate. He assured the president of Union Theological Seminary, Henry Sloane Coffin, that he wouldn't win. His prediction proved accurate: he receives only 1,480 votes. In an editorial for the journal Christianity and Crisis, which he founded, Niebuhr wrote "Religion is more frequently a source of confusion than of light in the political realm. The tendency to equate our political with our Christian convictions causes politics to generate idolatry."

(34:50–35:37) Music Element
"Prelude and Fugue No 23 in F"
from Shostakovich: The 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87,
performed by Keith Jarrett

(35:07) Audio Clip of Niebuhr Preaching
The third audio clip of Niebuhr preaching was excerpted from a 1952 sermon entitled "Our Lord's Conception of the Providence of God." The sermon was given two weeks before his first stroke:

Because when we say that we believe in God, we are inclined to mean by that that we have found a way to the ultimate source and end of life that gives us, against all the chances and changes of life, some special security and some special favor. And if we don't mean that — which is religion on a fairly adolescent and immature level — we at least mean that we have discovered amidst the vast confusions of life what we usually call the moral order, according to which evil is punished and good rewarded, and we could hardly feel that life had any meaning if we could not be certain of that.

I think of the words of the Psalms, "A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand, but the evil shall not come nigh unto thee" (Ps. 91.7). One thinks of the intercessory prayers that many a mother with a boy in Korea must pray, "A thousand at thy side and ten thousand at thy right hand, let no evil come to my boy." What a natural prayer that is, and how finally impossible.

. . .

The Christian faith believes that within and beyond the tragedies and the contradictions of history we have laid hold upon a loving heart, the proof of whose love on the one hand is impartiality toward all of his children, and secondly a mercy which transcends good and evil.

(37:00–37:40) Music Element
"Sonata III: Grave (Mulier, ecce filius tuus)"
from Haydn: The Seven Last Words,
performed by Emerson String Quartet

(45:26–46:14) Music Element
"Trauermusik"
from Lachrymae,
performed by Kim Kashkashian

(l to r) front row: Walter Lippmann, President James Conant, Robert Charles Wallace, Thomas Day Thacher; back row: Reinhold Niebuhr, Ralph Barton Perry, Emory Leon Chaffee, and Augustus Noble Hand (Bettmann/CORBIS )

Tippett: You know, you mentioned that some people criticize the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for, or that whole idea, for being too Christian. But I'm curious about how you felt about imposing political structure and political imperatives on these theological values.

Dr. Villa-Vicencio: This was always a tension. It was always there. How does one link, let's not even say Christian or theological concept, let's say moral aspirations. How does one operationalize these? And certainly I'd always tried to say in those days, and I think most of my colleagues were saying, that we as a government commission — and that in the end was who we were. The archbishop was our chair but he happened to be paid by the taxpayers. He was a civil servant, we used to try and remind him. As a government commission, we could not reconcile the nation, we couldn't offer forgiveness, we couldn't provide God's grace. All we could do was to try and create a space within which people listened to one another, damn it, listen to one another. I think that was our theme. "Are you hearing what your enemies are saying?" and to the extent that a greater depth of understanding, of being aware of what caused people to do things, their motives, their aspirations, what drove people to do these dreadful things. As that understanding began to emerge, so the morality began to flow in. If you like, the theology was revisited and people began to realize that amidst this political structure, there was a need to deal with deep, deep, human, theological, spiritual, ethical issues.

Tippett: So here we're talking about large theological values like forgiveness and reconciliation happening communally. And it seems to me that they're so difficult on the individual level, it's hard for me to imagine how much more complex it is communally. But have you seen this be possible?

Dr. Villa-Vicencio You know, you're a theologian. And I cut my theological teeth about a hundred years ago on Reinhold Niebuhr, who wrote a wonderful book called Moral Man and Immoral Society, that it's easier to be a moral individual than a moral community. All sorts of forces are built into those communities which make it very, very difficult to persuade communities. You know, I think one of the most amazing things that is happening in South Africa — and a very, very, very controversial thing, let me tell you — is that the African National Congress, the premier liberation movement of the past, Mr. Mandela's party, the president of whom today is President Mbeki, the ruling African National Congress in political alliance with the old National Party, who now call themselves the New National Party, by the way. But you find the oppressors of the past and the liberationists of the past sitting down and working together. Do you know what? They don't love one another. They don't even fully trust one another. But they are saying, "If we're going to get ourselves out of this mess, we've got to learn to cooperate."

(46:40–47:06) Music Element
"Trauermusik"
from Lachrymae,
performed by Kim Kashkashian

(48:49–52:54) Music Element
"First Impressions"
from Appalachia Waltz,
performed by Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, and Mark O'Connor

(49:22) Reading from The Irony of American History
Krista reads an often quoted passage from Niebuhr's 1952 work The Irony of American History:

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore, we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, could be accomplished alone; therefore, we must be saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our own standpoint; therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.