In drupal 5 parlance (not really sure how drupal 6 does it yet) :

$vars = $node;

array_walk($vars, "drupal_render");

return _phptemplate_callback("node", array("node" => $node) + $vars);

I am 100% against you needing to use an interface to assign variable names, because it makes

node template un-distributable, without distributing the additional configuration too.

Also, I don't think a drupal_render call over and above the already existing print call is too much to ask,

because quite frankly we are already going to be requiring it for localisation (ie: print t("Some text") ).

Also. there's a difference between themers , and end users. Requiring an interface to be able to assign

variables is going to help the latter, but not the former. It's going to make their life more complicated.

What I really think we should do, if we want to make an interface for the latter, is make a proper version of the contemplate

module, using the token replacement code (ie: use %my_field) in the text editor to place field, with a list of possible

tokens. 

That then translates to <? print drupal_render($node['my_field']);?> in the final template file it uses.