The English speaking churches in South Africa were the focus of a strong opposition to Apartheid during the 1960s and 1970s, though they did not move from protest to resistance as a whole. In the 1960s, there was a movement to create groups within the Christian church which would stand up for the rights of those oppressed. Groups which would be focal points of Christian resistance. There was opposition within the Christian community in South Africa, wherein the Dutch Reformed Churches attacked this new approach as though it were a new denomination. The Dutch Reformed Church had traditionally been closely connected to the government in power, the National Party. Burnett, at that time the General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches, said at a synod meeting in Grahamstown that because of his position he could not lead such a movement but if nobody else tried to get it going he might consider doing so.