Background
Born in Chicago, Fifield grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, where his father was a Congregational minister.
founder president Congregational minister
Born in Chicago, Fifield grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, where his father was a Congregational minister.
After having served in the infantry during World War I, he received a Master of Arts degree from University of Chicago in 1921. In 1924, he obtained a Bachelor of Divinity degree from the Chicago Theological Seminary and was ordained a minister. The church had 1,500 members at Fifield"s arrival, but after Fifield initiated a major increase in activities membership rose to over 4,500 in the beginning of the 1940s and the debt was paid off in 1942.
The Church from 1937 to 1942 paid substantial money to The merger was approved by a clear majority of the general council of the Congregational churches in 1949, and Fifield became part of the minority movement that tried to stop the merger go through.
The merger was completed in 1957
In 1935, Fifield Junior. co-founded Mobilization for Spiritual Ideas with president of Carleton College Donald J. Cowling and William Hocking. "Freedom under God" was a much used phrase by Fifield and the organization.
Fiefield and the organization attracted the attention of philanthropist J. Howard Pew and former President Herbert Hoover whom Fifield met and with whom he corresponded. The speech, which underlined that Christian leaders and religious arguments were crucial in the effort to promote a free-market agenda, was exceptionally well received.
In 1949, started broadcasting a short radio program called the "The Freedom Story".
By late 1951 the program, which included brief remarks by Fifield, was broadcast on more than 800 radio stations. In 1951, the Anti-Defamation League demanded an apology from Fifield after he falsely stated in a program that "it was a matter of historical record that Benjamin Franklin denounced the Jews at the Constitutional Convention in 1787." On other occasions, Fifield and his organization were also accused of racism and anti-antisemitism. He successfully campaigned to remove United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization material from use in schools in Los Los Angeles
Fifield"s religious-political organization was started by Fifield in 1935 He became its president Its ideology has been described by Kevin M. Kruse and others as Christian libertarianism.
In 1940, Fifield gave a speech to the National Association of Manufacturers at the Waldorf Astoria New York where he praised capitalism and business leaders, while denouncing Franklin Doctorate. Roosevelt and the New Deal.