George Bernard Shaw, who had an opinion about everything, wrote that the subject of religion is "the only one that capable people really care for." Our readers certainly do: our mail shows consistently that they have strong, informed views on religion. This week's cover story, "The Evangelicals," concerns the fastest-growing religious movement in the U.S. today. For Religion Editor Richard N. Ostling, the assignment involved an unusual degree of personal engagement, because he is an Evan gelical. "Being religious gives you a basic interest," says Ostling. "But you have to be objective, which in my case means writing about Evangelicalism as if it were Hinduism."

The correspondents covering the movement were an ecumenical group. James Wilde, on the West Coast, marveled at the faith of the Evangelicals, but says that he remains "an un repentant papist. I prefer the pomp of Rome, the scarlet Cardinals and Gregorian Chant."

In Darien, Conn., Margaret Boeth talked to members of a thriving congregation of Evangelical Episcopalians. She remembers that, as a child in Mississippi, she once announced to her father that she no longer believed in God and would not be attending church services. "But my dear," her father replied, "we have always gone to church." Says Boeth: "I went." Now she is an active but traditional Episcopalian. She found herself envying the new Evangelicals but not really able to join them. Thirty miles and several worlds away from Darien, Correspondent Jeanne Saddler was impressed by a group of Evangelicals who minister to derelicts in Times Square. "While no one dragged me to the baptismal font," says Saddler, "mother will have an easier time getting me to church this Christmas."

The Evangelical movement is a quest for traditional faith and values, and so for our cover the editors decided on an American primitive painting, Christ's Sermon on the Mount, by an artist known only as Plattenberger. Painted in the mid-19th century, the picture now hangs in the family room of a Woodbury, Conn., doctor. It was placed there, says the owner, so that the children of the household could see Christ's admonishing gesture, and behave.

Our story on Evangelicals and their message of faith is appropriate for Christmas. We offer it with our warm good wishes for the holiday season.

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