Devoted to the Propagation and Defense of New Testament Christianity
VOLUME 19
December 14, 1967
NUMBER 32, PAGE 7c

Taking A Second Look

Guthrie Dean

1900 Jenny Lind, Ft. Smith, Ark.

The Roman Catholic hierarchy in Austria has suggested that Austrians refrain from smoking on Fridays as an act of penance now that the old rule against meat on Friday has been removed. (Vienna, Austria). If smokers Austria are like smokers in the United States, they would rather eat fish seven days a week than to give up smoking for one day. I prophesy that this act of penance is doomed to failure before it gets started; or perhaps I am trying to judge other by my own brethren.

The American Cancer Society recently held its national meeting in Dallas, and reported that cigarettes were killing as many as 300,000 persons a year and called upon all "medical and health institutions to mobilize against them." To date approximately 13,000 Americans have been killed in the Vietnam war. And this is more than the combined total of deaths in four previous wars, and comparing the result with the number killed by tobacco, we solemnly report that cigarettes are still killing fifteen times more of our people in ONE YEAR than all five wars mentioned during their entirety. It seems to me that it's time to refrain from smoking seven days a week rather than just on Friday.