Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

PAGE 4—THE BULLETIN, May 17, 1958 JOSEPH BREIG It’s Not That Simple Life is. never as. simple as al most any speaker on any sub ject at any convention tends to see it —- and I do not except a certain columnist who, when he gets up to talk, has an . almost pre ter natural capacity for boring' people limp. W h e n you have been Sol emnly warn ed that your t i me is 30 minutes, and you see the chairman’s watch propped against his coffee cup and sense the fidgeting of the delegates, you can hardly be blamed if you touch un only one aspect of whatever it rs you are touching on. It is with utmost sympathy, therefore, that I comment upon the address of author-editor Dr. Russell Kirk a few weeks ago before the National Catholic Ed ucation Association on the topic “A Non-Catholic Looks at Cath olic Colleges.” Only in the kind est spirit do I remark that he left something unsaid. Dr. Kirk counselled Catholic colleges, in this day when they must turn away many appli cants for sheer lack of space, to “choose quality.” This should be done, he said, “for the sake not merely of scholarship but of the effectual defense of Christian faith and learning.” Dr. Kirk went on: "The interest of all Christians and of all our civilization will be better served today by a reputa tion for intellectual power and moral worth than by mere num bers." Which is true enough as far as it goes; but it doesn’t go far enough. A great many speakers have been saying the same sort of thing of late, and 1 solicit their indulgence while I observe that to some extent they have been talking through their hats. Their first error is their as sumption that the problem fac ing us is simply that of choosing between “intellectual power and moral worth” on the one hand, and “mere numbers” on the other. This is not so. There is no such thing as “mere numbers” where human beings are concerned. Each boy and girl is of everlasting value, simply by virtue of being a boy or a girl — which is to say, an image and likeness of God, made for endless life with God. FURTHERMORE, it is impos sible to be sure that you are choosing the best, even in the relatively simple matter of in tellectual power. Intellectual power sometimes hides behind shyness, immaturi ty, indolence, lack of direction and conviction, or plain mis chievousness. Very great intellectual pow er, indeed, may be mistaken for stupidity by lesser minds, which are not utterly absent from col lege administration and facul ties. Moral worth is even more dif ficult to estimate and above all to predict. Dr. Kirk and others who hold to his thesis might be enlightened if they would take the trouble to interview, some time, a seminary rector. THE SEMINARIANS are right there all the time, day and night. Classes are small, and re lations between students and faculty are family-like. The rec tor and his advisors bring to their task of evaluating their young charges long experience, close observation and diligent prayer for guidance. Nevertheless, they make mis takes. With rueful smiles, they will tell you about young men whom they advised to leave the seminary — and who turned out in the long run to be magnifi cent priests. Perhaps even more distress ing than the mistakes are the uncertainties. Rectors go through agonies trying to decide which seminarians should be en couraged to seek ordination, and which discouraged. THE RECTORS KNOW that some youngsters mature late — but gloriously. And there are others who seem as stable as Gibraltar, but — to say the least — aren’t. Dr. Kirk might have a better case if it were easy to “choose quality.” But to “choose quali ty” out of a throng of high school boys clamoring for en trance to college is a task to turn white the hair of a Solo mon. And even if that were not so, wisdom and charity forbid that a college be turned into a club for intellectuals. Has not our American experience taught us that the common man (as he is called) has indispensable contri butions to make to the common good? We have some obligation, too, to see that he is given op portunity to develop to his full capacity. Otherwise, I shudder to think what will happen to low brows like me. Theology For The Layman By F. J. Sheed We have known all our lives that God is not an old man with a beard (rather like Karl Marx, especially when the art ist wanted to show God angry, as he often did.) We have rea lized, too, that the more com plex picture of an old man with a long beard, a young man with a short beard, and a dove, bears no resemblance to the Blessed Trinity: it is merely the artist doing his best. But getting rid of the pictures is of value only if, in their place, we develop a truer idea of God: Otherwise we have merely a blank where the picture used to hang. God is a spirit. As a first step towards forming our idea of Him, we imagine our body away and see our soul existing and functioning bodiless: it is part less, spaceless, immortal, it knows, loves, decides, acts. And all these things are true to God. But our soul is not God’s equal, it is only His image; and while there are always re semblances between an image and the original, there are greater differences. Looking at a man’s photograph you might think him very flat; looking at his statue, you might think him unnaturally rigid; in fact you don’t make either error, you make allowances for the paper on which, or the stone in which, his image is reproduced. Look ing at man’s soul we must make allowances for the nothingness in which God has reproduced His image; for our soul, like all created things, is made of no thing. How do we make al lowances for that? We are spirit: so is God. But God is infinite: so are not we. We note the meaning of the word infinite. It is from the Latin finis, meaning an end or boundary or limit; the word in says there is no such thing in God. God is without limit or boundary or end. Whatever per fection there is, God has it to tally. Apply this notion of lim it to our own soul: it knows cer- (Continued on Page Five) Jottings... (By BARBARA C. JENCKS) Question Box (By David Q. Liptak) Q: It has always been my im pression lhat there is something selfish about the kind of life led by cloistered monks and nuns, like the Trappists and Carmelites. Wouldn’t it be far better for the Church if cloister ed contemplatives were allowed to engage in certain outside apostolic work, such as teaching or nursing in' hospitals? Then they would be accomplishing something of practical value for the community. A: No Catholic could possibly . harbor the impression that a cloistered religious contemplat ive is living a selfish, impracti cal life ,without at the same time showing himself to be grossly ignorant of true piety and the nature, significance and efficacy of the contemplative life as such. FOR CONSIDERED IN IT SELF, the contemplative life (i.e., the state in which prayer and penance are emphasized al most to the exclusion of all ex ternal activities) surpasses in nobility, meritorious worth and practicality i the active life (in which outside works are engag ed in, though not without re course to some contemplation, which is necessary for all). This does not mean that the active life cannot be preferred to the contemplative life in a spe cific instance. Each soul, of course, tnust fulfill God’s will in his particular case. Subjectively, then, that state is superior to which one has been called by God. BUT TAKEN IN ITSELF, the contemplative life is by its very nature higher than its antithe sis. In the words of Pope Pius XI: "ALL THOSE WHO, accord ing to their rule, lead a secluded life remote from the din and follies of the world, and who as- (Continued on Page Five) • TEN YEARS AGO today I became a Roman Catholic. It seems much longer ago than a mere ten years. That was with out doubt the most important date in my life. I wish I could go back to that day and begin all over again. I have regrets about my first decade of spiritu al life. I have been asked would I ever go back to the easy self- styled life of a non-Catholic Where deviations from conven tion seem more important than transgressions aganist God’s commandments. Would I ever go back to the life which holds religion as something to prac tice in moderation: a sermon, a hymn, a church dinner or a strawberry festival? Would I go back to the cold, non-ritual ceremonies? Would I go back to the meat on Friday; the long Sunday morning sleeps? There’s a song that goes: “There but for you go I.” I think of this often when I see some non-Catholic struggling along alone without the help of the Sacraments, without a personal, meaningful religion. I ache to think what I might have been without a mer ciful God who bestowed on me the greatest of all gifts — the gift of my Catholic faith. I can say each day of my life: “There but for You go I,” with all the gratitude of my heart and mind and soul. • IF I COULD go back ten years ago, I think I would do things a lot differently. I do have regrets about the past dec ade. L have been disappointed. I have regrets about my own continual failures in living the faith to the letter, the opportun ities missed, the falls, the de tours, the blindness. I have dis appointments in myself never once the Church. “Remember not my sins but the faith of Thy Church.” These have been the most important years of my life — these have been the years when I have grown up emotion ally and spiritually. I never could survive without the Church. I need its strict , disci plines. I need its refreshments in the Sacrament of Penance and the Holy Eucharist. It is not easy to survive in this world and as I said I ache for those who do not have the saving arms of the Church to uphold them and refresh and renew them. I could do nothing. I would be nothing without grace. I never heard the word “grace” before I entered the Catholic Church. Everything is in naturalistic terms. God is a bank-president type, an ivy-leaguer. God is not the God who created heaven and earth; who sent His only begotten Son to walk among us as a man both divine and hu man. The humanity of Christ is stressed, not His miracles and His powers. • NON-CATHOLICS wince before our statues and our -lit anies and our rituals and our Marian devotions. The place that Our Lady holds in my church is one of the most com forting of all devotions. I first came to the Church through Our Lady. I knelt before her as a non-Catholic to pray. Fin ally like any proud mother, she brought me home to meet her Divine Son. How can non-Cath- olics refuse Our Lady a place in their hearts? Here is the model mother, the model woman. How can one know about Christ without knowing Mary. I could n't. I’d still be one of those mis directed, misguided groping souls out there . without her. Even now I must surely disap point her time upon time with my infractions. I would certain ly try to do things over much differently, much better if I could begin back 10 years ago today. Sh R A NGE BUT TRU ttle-Known Facts for Catholics E By M. J. MURRAY Cqpjrrffht 1958, N.C.W.C. N«w» Sirrioa In 'Home the color- | of a. Cardinal is robe is governed. ty liturgical changes. cr/mson on Festive occasions; V/OLCT on non Festivei c- f?OSE on Laetare Sunday (lent) and, (jaudete Sunday. Act ten ty More people visit the chapel of the Miraculous Medal - where Our LADY appeared -to ST CATHERINE LABOURS in ihe Rue duBac.fkris (last year , fr , ...... - ,, goo, ooo) than visit THE louvre U Spanish. oullftahters honor the '■"600.000). y "VlFPCEdDC LA MfiCaVENA " in i Seville Cathedral as patroness. MaNolete, "the greatest bull- |-fighter of all “gave his cloak to the statue in thanJcsgh/ing ■ £ SHARING OUR TREASURE History Research Leads Professor To The Church By REV. JOHN A. O'BRIEN, Ph. D. — —(University of Noire Dame)——— (By John A, O'Brien, Ph. D.) (The University of Noire Dame) Running as an undertone through Cardinal Newman’s famous autobiography is this thesis: “Go deep into history and you will find your way into the Catholic Ch center of Chris tian unity and the Mother Church of Christendom, ” This was the experience o f Newman him self and it has been the experience of thousands of other careful students of history. Marshall W. Baldwin, profes sor of history at New York Uni versity, and author of several scholarly works, tells in Roads lo Rome (Macmillian Co., New York) how his research in his tory led 1 him' into the Church. With degrees from Columbia and Princeton, Dr. Baldwin made a careful study of the papacy, publishing the results in a book, The Medieval Papacy in Acfion. “I had been reared an Anglo- Catholic,” began Dr. Baldwin, who for a year was a visiting professor at Notre Dame, “and my older brother is an Anglican clergyman of the Holy Cross Order. Like most Anglicans I regard the Catholic Church as my Church, at least until the sixteenth century. “After the break with Rome at the time the Reformation, I thought that the Anglican Church had preserved the essentials of Catholicism and therefore remained a ‘branch’ of the Catholic Church. As I went deeper into the matter, I discovered that England was so radically torn from the ancient faith by Henry VIII that it had no longer any organic, living connection with the historic Mother Church of Christendom, that it was now merely a national Church deriving its authority from the king. “It was a painful discovery, but there was no blinking the facts. It shattered my illusion that I was a Catholic. A Meth odist minister said to me, ‘If I wanted to be a Catholic, I cer tainly wouldn’t stop with Henry VIII.’ Blunt though his statement was, it summed up the whole story. “I realized that I was con fronted with the problem of deciding whether I was to be a member of the Church founded by Christ or a Church founded by a lustful monarch. To that question there could be but one answer. 1 told my decision to Father Quitman F. Beckley, O. P., the universally esteemed and beloved chaplain at Prince- | ton, with whom I had discussed { the matter for several months. 1 “On November 20, 1930 he | received me into the fold of Christ at the Church of St. Vin cent Ferrer in New York, and gave me my First Holy Com munion. It was a red-letter day in my life and one of the hap piest. My mother followed in my footsteps the following June, being received by Father Daniel M. Dougherty in the Cenagle of St. Regis. “My father, a professor of English at Yale and later at Columbia, reluctant to break the many contacts which a lifetime of active Anglicanism brought him, hesitated. But the deeper he went into the matter, the more clearly did he see that the Catholic Church alone was founded by Christ and alone spoke with divine authority. “He was received by Father George Ford in April 1934, with Carlton J. H. Hayes, head of the history department at Columbia, and himself a con vert, acting as sponsor. Father was confirmed by Bishop Duffy of Syracuse, who had been a graduate student of my father at Columbia. Please pray that God will give to my brother and to all sincere truth seekers the grace to find the true Church to receive the fullness of divine truth and life and love.” Readers will find his whole moving story and those of many other noted converts in Roads lo Rome. Loan that book to a sin cere truth seeker and it will help him, as it has helped many others, to find Christ’s true Church. Father O’Brien will be grate ful to readers who know of any one who has won two or more converts if they will send the names and addresses of such per sons to him at Notre Dame Uni versity, Notre Dame, Indiana. Topping 15,000 entries from Catholic high schools of 38 states, Mary Lou Hilgers, 17, of St. Catherine’s High School, Racine, Wis., receives the first prize check of $200 for her essay “How the Catholic Press Helps Me in My Studies.” Pictured presenting the award for the Catholic Press Association of the United States is Father Franklyn J. Kennedy, editor of the Catholic Herald Citizen, Milwaukee. Father Stanley Witowiak, principal, looks on approvingly.—(NC Photos). Reds Building Formidable Ecanamic Warfare Weapons THE The Soviet Union’s propagan dists are having a field day with the recession in the United States, and American officials are making no secret of their concern over the impact of the C U 111 111 U 11 1 line on the committed na tions. W h i 1 e pro duction in this . country is de- . dining; t e m porarily least tion in the Soviet Union is booming. While more than 5,000,000; American workers are jobless', every able-bodied man and hundreds of thousands of women in Russia are fully em ployed. This is a situation made to order for the communist propaganda mills, which have been gleefully predicting the quick demise of American free enterprise. Every Soviet speech, maga zine article or radio broadcast aimed at the underdeveloped nations plays up and exaggerates America’s economic difficulties. The uncommitted millions in Asia and Africa are being told that the recession in the United States proves the communist thesis that crises and unemploy ment are inevitable under capitalism. NEW NATIONS IMPRESSED Pointing to their own rapid advances in industrialization and foreign trade as proof of the superiority of communism, the Moscow propagandists are telling their have-not neighbors that their’s is the only true road BACKDROP By JOHN C. O’BRIEN to economic sufficiency and social progress. These claims appear a strong appeal for the recently liberated nations in Asia and Africa which are starting from scratch on their climb from primitive agriculture to industrialization. These new nations are in a hurry to reach their goal, and it is only natural that they should be impressed by the successes of communism in Russia which have been achieved in a relatively short time. Free enterprise has made the United States the richest country in the world but it took a long time to bring us up to our present high standard of living. For this reason free enterprise looks less attractive to the eager and inexperienced rulers of the new nations than communism. In support of their claims for the communist system, the Soviet propagandists are able to cite impressive statistics, the accuracy of which is not being challenged by American intelli gence officials. Since 1928, the Soviet Union has developed from a pre dominantly agricultural and in dustrially underdeveloped coun try to the second largest econ omy in the world. Not only that, Soviet industry is growing at a more rapid rate than our own was even before the recession set in. CATCHING UP WITH U. S. Whereas the Soviet gross national product was about one- third of our own in 1950, by 1956 it had increased about 40 percent and by 1962 it may be about 50 per cent. This means that the Soviet economy has been growing at a rate nearly twice that of the economy of the United States. In some instances, the output of specific industries in the Soviet Union has approached or exceeded that of the United States. In 1956, for example, the output of coal in the USSR was about 70 per cent of our own output, output of machine tools double our own and output of steel half of that of the United States. Hand in hand with industrial expansion, the Russians have pushed their foreign trade at a rate that is worrying American industry. For years Soviet foreign trade was confined mainly to countries within the communist orbit. But in the last two years, Soviet trade with the West has been moving far more rapidly than that with the satellites. The Soviet rulers are making aggressive efforts to expand their trade with the industrial nations of Western Europe and with our neighbors south of the Rio Grande River. A trade agreement has just been con cluded with West Germany, and trade missions are conducting negotiations in Brazil, Argentina and other South American countries. In this penetration of markets traditionally dominated by the United States, American officials see a grave danger. Once European or South American countries become substantially dependent upon Soviet indus trial raw materials, the Soviets will have available a formidable weapon of economic warfare. Babies Are Not Sins This We Believe (By FATHER LEO TRESE) It is not often that a home is faced with the problem of an unmarried pregnant daughter, but it does happen. When such an unhappy event does occur, the parents should at once seek competent guidance from the social service de partment of their local Catholic Cha rities office. In the absence of such a re source, the family’s pastor or physician will direct them to a social service agency which can provide the needed help. Meanwhile there is a basic truth involved which all of us should recognize. This is the truth that it is not a sin to have a baby, in or out of wedlock. Obviously it is a grave sin for any couple to have sexual inter course if they are not married to each other. In doing so, they wrest by force from God a priv ilege that He reserves to those who have made themselves His partners in the vocation of mar riage. However, the sin of fornica tion or adultery is equally grave whether conception follows upon the sin or not. Having a baby does not add one iota to the guilt of the action. Our warped thinking in this matter is a measure of the degree to which even we Catholics have been tainted with Puritanism. A girl may park evening after evening with her boy friend in Lovers’ Lane and still be regard ed as a respectable young wo man. Another girl may have one single moment of moral weak ness and, if a baby comes, she is the target of all the self-right eous tongues in the neighbor hood. Actually the second girl may be by far the more virtu ous of the two, but she has broken the great American com mandment, “Thou shalt not get caught.” A mortal sin is a mortal sin. Catholic parents understandably would feel grieved to know that thier daughter had missed Mass deliberately on a Sunday, but rarely would they go into hys terics over the offence. Yet if a frightened daughter confesses to her mother that she has lost her virginity, the mother’s reaction may vary from nervous collapse to screaming fury. There is of course this dif ference between the sin of de- liberatly missing Sunday Mass and the sin of fornication: the former sin hurts no one but the sinner; the latter sin can have social consequences which ser iously affect the rights of oth ers, particularly the right of a newborn child to a normal fam ily and home relationship. It is to defend itself against the so cial evils of illegitimate births that society has attached a par ticular stigma to unwed parent hood. But it is foul hypocrisy for society to condone the use of contraceptives and abortifac- ients by the unmarired, and to make the birth of a child the sole measure of moral guilt. Among the thousands of homes into which this column comes each week, there well may be at least one home this year in which an unmarried daughter will become pregnant. If other readers will bear with me, I should like to address my self to the parents of that girl. I should like to remind the par ents that if ever there was a time when their child needed sympathy and understanding, it is now. Parents must recognize that their impulse to lash out with bitterness at their preg nant daughter is basically a de fense mechanism, a defense against the sudden fear that they themselves have failed as par ents. By blaming tbe girl, they can avoid blaming themselves. Bitter words also may be a self ish reaction against the fear of the so-called “disgrace” which this daughter has brought upon the family. Instead of pity, for themselves, good parents will have com passion for their hapless child. Their girl is ridden by guilt feelings; tortured with a great sense of shame. Most of all she is frightened; frightened at the prospect of childbirth and par enthood of which she under stands so little and for which she is so ill-prepared. No doubt the sin which brought on the pregnancy long since has been confessed, long since has been forgiven by God. This girl is in the state of grace. She is not an abandoned sinner. This is the time for a mother to put her arms around her daughter and to say “Of course I’m sorry dear, that you forgot your duty to God and commit ted sin, but the sin is all in the past so let’s forget about that. Right now the important thing is to plan for the babys’ com ing. You mustn’t think that the world has come to an end for you. Above all you mustn’t think that having a baby is go ing to be a sin. You’re a good girl and you’re still our girl; your father and I will be with you all the way. Tonight we’ll go over and have a talk with Father O’Brien. Right now let’s get busy and get dinner ready.” Good parents will naturally think of their own words to say, but this is the kind of reassur ance which their daughter needs. Help with other problems which arise (To marry the boy or not? Where to go to have the baby? To keep the baby or not?) will be given by the pas tor and by the social worker who no doubt will come into the picture eventually. But right now as their girl makes her first avowal, haltingly or with pretended bravado — right now is the time for parental love to rise to its grandest heights. And may God forgive any of the rest of us who, forgetting our own sins, should dare to condemn. ©lj? Bulletin 416 8TH ST., AUGUSTA, GA. Published fortnightly by the Catholic Laymen’s Association of Georgia, Inc., with the Approbation of the Most Reverend Arch bishop-Bishop of Savannah, the Most Reverend Bishop of Atlanta, and the Right Reverend Abbot Ordinary of Belmont. Entered as second class matter at the Post Office, Monroe, Georgia, and accepted for mailing at special rate of postage provided by paragraph (e) of section 34.40, Postal Laws and Regulations. REV. FRANCIS J. DONOHUE REV. R. DONALD KIERNAN Editor Savannah Edition Editor Atlanta Edition JOHN MARKWALTER Managing Editor Vol. 38 Saturday, May 17, 1958 No. 25 ASSOCIATION OFFICERS FOR 1957-1958 GEORGE GINGELL, Columbus - - President E. M. HEAGARTY, Waycross Honorary Vice-President MRS. DAN HARRIS, Macon . _ — . - Vice-President TOM GRIFFIN, Atlanta - Vice-President NICK CAMERIO, Macon - Secretary JOHN T. BUCKLEY, Augusta Treasurer ALVIN M. McAULIFFE, Augusta Auditor JOHN MARKWALTER, Augusta Executive Secretary MISS CECILE FERRY, Augusta Financial Secretary