Changing Standards

The speakers gave graphic descriptions of the world today. Mlle. Barot spoke on "Confronting Moral Chaos." After this second world war, there has been a complete reversal of the entire conception of Western ethics. Children in France were taught, for seven years, to lie about the Jew in the cellar. Now they are taught that lying, black marketing, or forging of papers is wrong. Who are they to believe and where is their sense of security? The loss of respect for death [unclear: du-g] the war [unclear: has] led to the loss of respect for life.

Pastor Niemoller of concentration camp fame, said that after two wars, the optimism of the people has swung to nihilism and in Reinhald Niebuhr's words, the world now has fallen either into "the sleep of complacency" or into "the drunkenness of despair."

So we left Norway, each returning to our own respective countries, taking with us innumerable International friendships and hoping that through our Christian fellowship, we may achieve some unity which is not evident in the present world.