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PAGE 4—THE BULLETIN, December 10, 1960 DECLINE IN READING THE BACKDROP In the Sunday edition of a daily newspaper there appear ed recently three articles, all critical of the failure of the schools to teach Junior to spell and to read. The com plaints were not new. For some years deans of col leges have been report ing that a large per- c e n t age of their fresh man failed in their first year because they did not know how to read. Some colleges have introduced remedial read ing courses which they re quire freshmen to take along with their first year subjects. In the business world the “howlers” in spelling by stenographers and secretaries are notorious. EXPERTS GIVE UP The most alarming fact in the newspaper articles was not, as one reported, that 99 out of every 100 high school students cannot write a five- minute theme without making some kind of mistake, but that many of the education experts appear to have thrown up their hands. The experts’ defense seems to be that education for the modern student must be made easy, pleasant and painless. You simply cannot, the educa tors say (not all, but many), put this generation of students through the boring drill in phonetics, spelling, parts of By JOHN C. O’BRIEN speech and rules of composi tion that their fathers and their grandfathers were sub jected to. You cannot even ask a child of this generation to read any of the English classics from cover to cover. He doesn’t have the time, too many other interests compete for his at tention. So now we have, one of the articles reports, capsule sized condensations of such books as “David Copperfield,” “A Tale of Two Cities” and “Swiss Family Robinson.” Un abridged, it seems, these class ics would be too long for to day’s high school freshman. in their effort to make the classics painless, some educa tors have gone further. They have eliminated words in lit erary classics that might have sent Junior to the dictionary. To spare him such boring drudgery, an edition of “Ben Hur” has been published which screens out all words not on the approved Thorn dike vocabulary list for the sixth grade. If you wonder why a high school freshman must not be asked to read Dickens un abridged, the preface to the aforementioned collection of abridged classics gives the reason: “The American youth of to day in a quandary twirls the dial of the radio to learn the movie progra ms available calls his girl by telephone and makes a date, bprrows his dad's car for the evening and an hour later the boy and girl are watching their favorite screen stars.” TELEVENGLISH? There you have it. Junior just has too many other im portant things to do to find time to wade through the great books which have form ed the literary taste of his forefathers. The chances are that sooner or later a filmed version of many of the classics will turn up at the neighbor hood movie and he and his girl can get the story without straining their eyes on print in a book. Not all educators, of course, have thrown in the sponge to radio, television, dates and movies, but the amazing thing is that so many of them scoff at the idea of going back to the old-fashioned drills in the basic elements of the Eng lish language. So, unless parents demand a change in instructional meth ods, we may expect to con tinue to have high school graduates who can’t distin guish between a preposition and an adverb, who cannot spell, who do not know the most elementary rules of Eng lish grammar, who have never read all the way through a single classic of English liter ature. We may even see the fulfill ment of the prophecy of Clif ton Fadiman, the critic, who recently wrote: “It is likely that in 50 years the Televenglish professor will be examining an obsolescent minority idiom known as Eng lish, just as today the aca demic linguist studies the ar got of thieves or the slang of the hashhouse counterman.” Boy's Prayer Leads to Father's Conversion SHARING OUR TREASURE Reverend J. A. O'Brien, University of Notre Dame Conversion is due to the grace of God, and this is com monly channeled through a person. We can all become channels of that grace if we live upright and devout Chris tian lives and strive | zealously to Wtf ' N share the [, f ^ source of | JbPW our spiritual happin ess with others Many Jewish j people have become es tranged from their ancient faith and are eager to learn about Jesus Christ and the re ligion which He founded. This is illustrated in the conversion of Solomon Ross of Providence. “I was born of Jewish parents,” related Mr. Ross, “and observed the He brew holydays, especially the Passover and the Day of Atonement. I became a travel ing salesman and my work brought me from Michigan to Providence. “There I met a lovely girl of Italian extraction, and soon we were very much in love. As she was under the legal age, we got her parents’ per mission to marry in a civil ceremony. Neither of us was especially religious, but I would keep the high holydays and she would go once in a while to the Catholic Church, in which she had been bap tized. “About seven years ago we decided it would be best for our three children to be brought up Catholics. They were enrolled at St. Edward’s School, instructed by a Sister of Mercy, and baptized by Father Frederick Halloran. I heard a rumor that, if a Cath olic marries outside the Church, he can’t be buried in a Catholic cemetery. I was worried about my wife. “I talked it over with Father Halloran and found the mat ter could be remedied by the validation of our marriage in the Church. This we had done, so my wife could receive Communion again. My oldest son Ted had graduated from La Salle Academy, my wife and children were all Cath olics, but none had ever in vited me to join their Faith. “Ted was suddenly stricken with cystic fibrosis, an incur able disease, and was at the point of death. ‘Dad,’ he said, ‘I know I’m dying. Promise that you’ll not cry, but pray for me.’ God spoke to me through my son. I wanted desperately to help my son jn the way he desired, but I didn't really know how to pray. I determined to learn at once. “I went to St. Edward’s rec tory and told Father Sweeney that I wanted to become a Catholic so I could pray and receive Holy Communion for my son, and help him most effectively. Father brought me over to the convent where Sister Mary Raphael, R.S.M., gave me a splendid course of instructions. When I told Ted what I was doing, he said, ‘Dad, I’ve prayed for seven years that you would become a Catholic.’ “How my heart was stirred as I learned about Jesus and the love that prompted Him to die on Calvary’s cross for our redemption. The noblest figure in the Jewish race and the Son of God, Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of the Old Tes tament and proved Himself to be the long expected Messias. Catholicism is the flowering of Judaism and in becoming a Catholic I simply entered into the fullness of my Jewish in heritance. “With Bishop MeVinney’s permission I was baptized by Father Sweeney at home, so Ted could be present. Then with my wife and Jennie car ing for Ted, I went to the Sis ters’ convent where I received my first Holy Communion. Tears were in my eyes as I offered our Eucharistic Lord for the boy whose prayers had brought me into my full in heritance.” 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 persons to him at Notre Dame University, Notre Dame, In diana. JOTTINGS CLOSE EVEN IN DEATH Good News... for Hint JOSEPH BREIG IS THE LAW SICK? nnp IMH ^sjr[/ THAT GUY ENNUI Pfi| | i [from flie jail) 6 Hectory fe iHl By Tha Rav. Hobart H. Wharton m "I called at your new house loday To hear the words you do not say To watch the eyes I cannot see The hands you do not give to me And found a home austere and new That has enshrined and hallowed you I love this house where you are dead Your new grave leave me comforted." —Sister Madelva • IT HAS BEEN just a year now since Mother Bribe began the final stage of her journey to God. At this time last year, she knew that soon she would be Home. How many associates, acquaintances, com panions we find along the way to heaven but how few qualify for the sacred title of “friend.” Mother Bride was one of the few such persons who has blessed my life. The scriptures remind that a friend is to be preferred to riches and I know the truth of this well. Where as wealth, health, fame, have passed me by, I have known something far greater in the blessing of a few tried and trusted friends. Mother Bride has known the beauty of God’s house and the By BARBARA C. JENCKS dwelling place of His glory for almost a year. I thought of her, as I do every day at Mass, particularly as I read the Mass for the first Sunday of Advent. It read: “Behold the day of salvation is nearer than when we came to believe . . . the day is at hand!” Mother Bride read these words last year and knew indeed that it was true for her. Certainly there must have been joy for this soul who had loved God “from her youth to her gray hairs.” “The night is advanced, the day is at hand” for all of us the bell tolls sometime. Advent is a preparation for this day whe ther it is now, tomorrow, next year or 20 years away. I thought what a great blessing it was that Mother Bride an ticipated the last Advent, knowing the secret that death to this world was with her and soon she would be an exile no longer to the everlasting hills of heaven. * MOTHER BRIDE has re mained close to me even in death. At the convent where she served as superior and where she died, the nuns re port that “all speaks of her . . . an evergreen she planted, the St. Francis placque she put on the wall, the dogwood in bloom, the violets, and the lil ies of the valley.” Only once since her after-Advent death did I experience the sting of earthly separation. That was the day I visited her grave for the first time. Unlike the poem quoted above, her grave did not leave me comforted. I could not find her there. Only silence met me as I visited her in her new home, strange with its simple white-washed cross and the little mound of earth. This was what remained of the person of Mother Bride! No warm greeting, handclasp, no wonderful accent, joking re mark, dancing blue eyes greet ed me. All was still. The dia logue was one of silence and sobs. I was grieving for my self and her strange reception instead of realizing that Mother Bride was experienc ing the joys of “In Paradisim.” She was home. I was the exile. I do not find my dead friend in that quiet convent grave yard which holds its own kind of dignity ana beauty. I find her in the chapel at daily Mass, I find her in the lines of Irish poetry, in the authors she loved best, Ronald Knox, Padraic Pearse. I find her in the beautiful things where her spirit still lives. Now again to day, I find her in the Advent Mass which she read as it toll- (Continued on Page 5) A man goes into a bank. He hands a note to a teller. The teller reads, and pales. Not wishing to be shot, he hands the man the money de manded. The intru der departs quickly. He jumps into a car and speeds away. The, teller touches a button. Bells clang frantically. Warnings go to police head quarters. Sirens scream. From every direction, police cars converge on the crime scene. Roadblocks are set up. DETECTIVES go into action. The mayor and the police commissioner demand results. Newspapers roll off the presses, with big black head lines. Editorials are written. Radio and television broad cast bulletins. Photographers set up their cameras. The teller is inter viewed. So is the bank man ager- So is the chief of police. Authorities all around the area—perhaps across a state, or several states—are alerted. EVERY RESOURCE of law enforcement is thrown into the effort to capture the holdup man. The hand of society is turn ed against him. He is like a hunted animal. He has no apologists. Nobody says that after all, Marilyn Monroe’s marriage to Arthur Miller has now bro ken up after four highly pub licized years of heart-throb bing headlines. It was a sur prise that it lasted so long. For the aver age Holly wood mar riage is well on the way to the rocks after the first year. Why do Holly wood marriai ges break up so to be generally assumed that film idols are a dissolute group and that promiscuity and lech ary are the very climate of the film Capital. I think how ever that the answer to the question is more comp!ex than this. It is probably nearer the truth to say that broken Holly wood marriages are caused by a combination of factors, of which s e x u a 1 imrqorhlity is perhaps only one of the minor factors. MAIN REASONS Some of the most-married actors and actresses have been rather decent and normal hu man beings. Take for instance, Clark Gable. As a rough-and- tumbie roughneck he was a all he did was to steal some money. Nobody argues that bank robbery can’t be defined. Nobody says that laws for bidding holdups are uncon stitutional. Psychiatrists do not rush into the public prints with statements that there is some thing to be said for theft—that maybe people need a bit of stealing for the good of their psyches, or something. When the man is caught, he is brought to trial. He has an attorney to de fend him, but the prosecuting attorney presses the case re lentlessly. SOCIETY must be protected. .Property rights must be in sured. Citizens must not have guns pointed at them; their lives must not be ruthlessly threat ened. The evidence is heard. Guilt is established. The prisoner is ordered to stand up for sen tencing. The judge is severe. The court brooks no doubletalk. There is no hesitancy about punishing the offender. The jurist has public opinion on his side, solidly and unani mously, and he knows it. The offender is ordered to prison. Swift retribution— that’s the ticket. That’s what we must have if we are to pre serve civilization. It is so with durg-peddling. With burglary. With drunken driving. With any number of things. By Rev. John B. Sheerin, C.S.P. pleasant change from Rudolf Valentino. He was well liked by friends and acquaintances and had a distinguished record in the Air Force. Yet the fact is that this manly and whole some movie idol was married five times. There seem to be two main reasons for the early crackup of film idol marriages: broken homes and self-centeredness. According to. the New York Herald-Tribune Hollywood columnist Joe Hyams (Novem ber 15th) a recent study of one hundred random biographies of film stars revealed that 86 out of these Hollywood stars came from broken homes. The second factor, self- centeredness, seems to grow almost inevitably out of the very nature of a box-office idol’s role. As Hyams says, movie idols “are doomed to live in a private world sur rounded by mirrors in which they are compelled to stare at their image until like Narcis sus, the boy in the fable, they fall into the river and drown while trying to embrace their own image.” So the film star must con centrate on self to keep up his box-office appeal. It is this self-centeredness which gives him the drive and dynamism not a bank robber, or a dope peddler, or a drunken driver. Suppose what he is attack ing is not property, or health, or life and limb, but the very humanity of human beings— the thing that distinguishes them from beasts and worse than beasts. Suppose the man is a pornographer. Suppose his business is making degenerates and lech ers out of decent people—es pecially young people. Suppose he is making mon ey by preying, like a jackal, like a hyena, like an obscene vulture, on his fellowmen. Suppose he is stirring fiend ish passions that emerge in weird lusts, in cruelties, in prowling viciousness. SUPPOSE HE IS doing what he can to make it unsafe for a woman to walk from a neigh borhood store to her home. Suppose he is something crawling out of a filthy swamp; a shameless, drooling being. Oh, well, then that’s differ ent. Then the police say, what’s the use in bringing him in; he’ll get off. Then the prosecuting attor ney says, what’s the sense in bothering; the courts will go around and around in circles, saying, who can define ob scenity. The judge won’t sen tence him—or if he does, a higher court will reverse him. And so this vile enemy of man and society plies his low business—and not a siren is heard, not one black headline is seen in the newspapers. that enables him to succeed in a business that demands that he project his ego. Like wise it demands that the sexy actress project her ego, the re sult is that the more they fall in love with themselves, the more they unfit themselves for loving other human beings. Instead of being great lov ers, the role they play on the screen, they are actually fail ures in love. They may be box-office successes but they are also tragic human failures. They are incapable of loving in real life. WEAR MASKS Coming from broken homes, the film idols are often un happy individuals who are only too ready to play a part in the world of make-believe. So the sexy star, afraid of showing the world her real personality, puts on a mask. The more unhappy she is, the more' she becomes devoted to the mask. But her problem arises when in the close in timacies of married life, she tries to shed the mask and be herself. There is very little left of her real self. Wearing a mask continually has consumed all her spon taneity and she finds it al most impossible to develop a (Continued on Page 5). A lady was taking her grandson on a cross-country trip and before they went, they decided to keep a diary. Every night before he went to bed, the boy wrote about what he had seen during the day. When they came to the Grand Canyon, he seemed to be extremely i m p r e ssed. A f t e r he went to sleep, Grandma decid ed to peep into the dairy and find out what he thought about this wonder of nature. Scrawled in his boyish handwriting was: “Today 1 spit more than a mile.” That’s the eternal spring time of youth. Excitement in a trip to the zoo, a holiday from school, the first train ride—and a record spit. Some persons manage to keep their youthful zest for life even as the middle spreads and the hair recedes. Hopes, dreams, ambitions are not qualities which youth may hoard along with its strange lingo and zany actions. Youth ful interests and youthful thoughts are taken away by age, but abandoned by ennui When I was a little shaver and big people mentioned en nui, I thought it was a person. I was even more convinced that it was a he when I read the following: “Ennui has made more gamblers than avarice, more drunkards than thirst, and perhaps as many suicides as despair.” That guy is dangerous, I thought. Then Webster opened my eyes to the fact that it was an it. He says that ennui is pro nounced an-we, and that it means “a feeling of weariness and dissatisfaction; tedium; boredom.” So ennui- is a thing, not a person. But it’s still danger ous. I’m inclined to agree that plain old boredom is respon sible for more avarice, alcohol ism and suicide than all the difficulties of life rolled up into a ball and hitting a per son on the head. It’s amazing, when you think about it, that someone could really become bored with life. Just the excitement of keeping ahead of the in come tax and the grocer’s bill is enough. But there’s also the thrill qf wondering if Mr. Khrushchev is going to push that button some day, of dodg ing a million maniacs behind the wheels of cars these days. Unpleasant things all—but not dull. No one will ever be over come by Webster’s “feeling of weariness and dissatisfaction,” however, as long as he is in terested in God. Maintaining a healthy spiritual life is enough to dispel boredom. If it’s excitement you want, think about the story of our first parents and their tragic fall from grace. Consider the long history of man yearning for a redeemer, and the “full ness of time” when God Him self became one of us to snatch uS from the pain of separation from Him. The whole plan of redemption through the sacra mental life of the Church is not only a tale of beauty, but one that has furnished rich food for thought for devout souls throughout the centuries. It’s true that not everyone can enjoy the full fruits of contemplation. But everyone surely can find some zest in the struggle of the spiritual life. How can a person be bored when he’s waging a war on three fronts? It’s the never-ending battle against the world, the flesh and the devil. This battle, too, is some- timefe unpleasant—but not dull. .On the natural level, life should I be; rewarding enough. Very few - of us enjoy fame, wealth, or power. But there is pleasure in so many things if we would but open our eyes and ears, to the best things in life-, which are free. Just. -, gs . .the contemplative finds, a, fylh life in communion with God, the cultured person can find unlimited joy-in the beauty of nature, the laughter of happy children, the rich ness of music and the wealth of good literature. Ennui comes only when we withdraw from the two worlds in which we live—God’s na tural life and His supernatural life. Both worlds are full of wonder, but their excitement is lost when we retire to the small world of self. A novelist once described one of her characters thus: “Edith was a small country, bounded on the east, west, north and south by Edith.” When we become Edith-like we became bored, having no new interests and having nothing to take us out of our selves. The cure for selfishness, and its companion ennui, is to be come interested in the excit ing world around us, the spiritual world within us and the interesting characters mov ing about in both worlds. Question Box By David Q. Liptak Q. Last week I chanced upon a television program during which a Protestant minister was answering questions apparently tele phoned in to him while he was on camera. What dis turbed me particularly was the lack of accuracy with which he represented cer tain Catholic teachings. In response to a query on birth control, for instance, he launched into an emotional apology as if to give the im pression that birth control is the same as contraception, Commenting on a question concerning divorce, he seem ed to imply that a decree of nullity granted by the Cath olic Church is comparable to ihe Protestant concept of di vorce. Shouldn't responsible commentators, whether on radio, TV or in newspapers, be careful to check their use of terms before making as sertions? A. Inaccuracy of expression in theological matters is, un fortunately, much too common an occurrence in the commu nications media. Perphas ordi nary newspaper reporters or newscasters, can frequently be excused for such lack of pre ciseness. But it unquestionably jars one’s sense of fairness to see or hear responsible indi viduals representing theologi cal concepts in a cloudy, ill- defined manner.! Unfortunate ly, too, many Catholic “popu- larizers” are not blameless in this same regard.) TO IMPLY, at any rate, that the Catholic Church condemns “birth control” as such is a meaningless assertion, because in reality birth control can be either moral or immoral. What the Church proscribes, specif ically,. is immoral birth pre vention by means contrary to the natural or divine positive laws; that is, (1) any deliberate frustration of the marital act such as contraception;, (2) di rect Sterilization and (3) direct abortion. Hence, unless the meaning of “birth control” is clear from the context in (Continued on Page 5) 0% 416 8TH ST., AUGUSTA, GA. Published fortnightly by the Catholic Laymen’s Association of Georgia, Inc., with the Approbation of the Most Reverend Bishop of Savannah; and the Most Reverend Bishop of Atlanta. .Subscription price $3.00 per year. Second class mail privileges auihor.zeri at Monroe, Ga. Send notice of change of address to P. O. Box 320, Monroe, Ga. REV. FRANCIS J. DONOHUE REV. R. DONALD KIERNAN Editor Savannah Edition Editor Atlanta Edition JOHN MARKWALTER Managing Editor Vol. 41 Saturday, December 10, 1960 No. 14 ASSOCIATION OFFICERS GEORGE GINGELL, Columbus . President MRS. DAN HARRIS, Macon Vice-President POM GRIFFIN, Atlanta Vice-President NICK CAMERIO, Macon Secretary JOHN T. BUCKLEY, Augusta Treasure! ALVIN M. McAULIFFE, Augusta Auditor JOHN MARKW ALTER, Augusta Executive Secretary MISS CECI.LE FERRY, Augusta — Financial Secretary BUT SUPPOSE the man is FILM IDOLS CAN'T STAY MARRIED SUM AND SUBSTANCE quickly?. 11 seems