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About Bulletin (Monroe, Ga.) 1958-1962 | View Entire Issue (March 3, 1962)
PAGE 4—THE BULLETIN, March 3, 1962 Keep a Bay of Peace A Cause for Pride and Prayers The past one hundred and twelve years have witnessed a truly remark able growth in the Catholic Church in the Southeastern States of our Nation. In only two of the six Dioceses comprising the new Province of At lanta does the number of Catholics exceed two percent of the total popu lation. And the total Catholic popula tion of the five Dioceses of Savannah, St. Augustine, Charleston, Raleigh, and Miami, and the Archdiocese of Atlanta does not exceed six hundred forty thousand. Yet, since the establishment of the Diocese of Savanhah in 1850, the vi brant, vigorous and resolute Faith of the Catholic people of the South, often laboring against great odds and some times violent opposition, has brought into being four additional Dioceses and now, an Archdiocese and a new Province. The labors and sacrifices of our forbears were certainly no less than our own, and perhaps they wondered, from time to time, if the day would ever come when Catholics would not have to travel hundreds of miles be tween churches—if 'the day would ever come when their children would be able to receive a Catholic educa tion in their own schools. Today, from Heaven they can look with us, on the recognition of the Holy See, itself, that that day certainly has come. For if Catholic churches do not yet “dot the landscape” as they do m so many other places in the Nation, there is hardly a place in the South where the Catholic Church is not known and respected—there is hardly a village or town more than a few miles from the nearest Catholic church —and if all parishes do not have their own schools, it can be safely said that very many do. Catholics of the new Province of Atlanta rejoice in Pope John XXIII’S recognition of their achievements, and in tne signal honor conferred on a Diocese not yet six years old, by rais- ing it to the rank of a Metropolitan See. Together with the Bishops of all the Suffragan Sees they pledge to Archbishop-elect Paul Hallinan, their Metropolitan, their loyalty and devo tion, and their renewed determination to bring the blessings of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Sacra ments to every corner of our great Southeast United States. Love Thy Neighbor Communists have never disguised their intention to conquer the world. In their attempts to carry out that intention they have used military ag gression, internal subversion, and a world-wide propaganda campaign de signed to capture the minds and the allegiance of men struggling to be free from economic oppression, and from the arbitrary suppression of their God- given human rights and legitimate aspirations. The combined military strength of the Free World and the deterrent effect of a thermo-nuclear arsenal have halted large-scale Communist military adventures. A greater awareness on the part of the non-Communist nations that they, too, are on the Red “Schedule of Conquest” has led to measures which have lessened, if not obviated, the danger of conquest by internal sub version. But the Kremlin propaganda cam paign continues to make serious in roads throughout the world, by ex ploiting the social and economic evils which make the minds of men recep- - tive to the Communist promise of “Heaven on Earth.” It is the threat of this means of Communist conquest which underlies America’s vast program of foreign economic and technical assistance to the underdeveloped and newly emerg ing nations of the world. The manner in which this aid is extended and the efficiency and fiscal soundness of the various programs em ployed have always been the subject, and properly so, of intelligent discus sion and debate. But, of late, a growing and dis turbing voice is being heard through out the land criticizing the very con cept of foreign aid, itself. There are those who say we have no real obligation to alleviate needs which we did not create; that in send ing food, clothing, and medicine to the poverty-stricken and diseased of Communist nations we strengthen the hand of tyranny; that foreign aid pro grams have not “bought” us any friends. It is only natural that Americans should be resentful in the face of seeming ingratitude on the part of some of the very nations-which have benefited most from American lar gesse—that they should feel frustrated when their many sacrifices seem to have purchased only a stalemate in the war between Freedom and Slavery —that they should chafe under the heavy financial burden they bear for the sake of others all around the world. But to yield to such natural feel ings would be to aid and abet the very cause against which we struggle. For the only remedy for the eco nomic and social ills which make na tions easy prey for Communist propa ganda is the establishment of a truly Christian Social Order THROUGH OUT THE WORLD. Such a Social Order cannot be established by condemning to con tinued slavery millions of souls be hind the Iron and Bamboo Curtains, and in those pitifully poor areas where men are only beginning to awake to the idea of national identity. It can only become a reality if the peoples and nations of the world, including our own people and nation, have the faith and courage to prac tice the Corporal Works of Mercy in 1 accordance with their ability and the needs of men EVERYWHERE, know ing they can expect God’s own re ward for doing so. This means that the principles of Christian Social Action must be trans lated from the realm of mere aca demic consideration into concrete reality. These principles have been enun ciated by every Sovereign Pontiff from Leo XIII to John XXIII and the great Encyclicals in which they are embodied have become household words—“Rerum Novarum,” “Quadra- gesimo Anno,” and the recent “Mater et Magistra.” We strongly urge that the Ameri can people be guided by the social doctrine of these great documents rather than by the self-interest of demagogues, either of the “Left” or the “Right” who would consign the sick, homeless, and poor of the world to their fate. And we urge them to have the mind of Christ, not of man, when they ponder the dire and pressing needs of men and their own responsibility to “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” 'Yoke' Reaches 20 Million By J. J. Gilbert WASHINGTON — Communists are spending six times the annual cost of the “Voice of America” program to keep its broadcasts from being heard in their areas. Although they are using “several thou sand stations at hundreds of locations” to jam the American programs, they are not entirely successful. Officials here estimate, judging by letters and words from diplo mats, visitors, travelers and defectors from Red-dominated lands, that VO A direct broadcasts have a daily audience of 20 mil lion persons. VOA, radio arm of the United States Information Agency, started broadcasting officially on February 24, 1942, employing the English, French, German, Spanish and Italian languages. Now, 20 years later, it is broadcasting 716 hours a week and using 36 languages regularly. VOA has 87 transmitters and is adding two more powerful facilities. In addition, programs prepared by VOA and the U. S. Information Service are sent to 2,600 other stations abroad which broadcast a total of 5,462 hours weekly. Including special broadcasts, the program uses more than 60 different languages. The “Voice of America” broadcasts were originally under the control of the Office of the Coordinator of Information, established shortly before the Pearl Harbor attack in December, 1941, to provide infor mation about the U. S. In the beginning, international broadcasts of private U. S. companies were beamed abroad. On Febru ary 24, 1942, a staff of Government em ployees had been assembled, and the broad casts became the official voice of the U. St This anniversary is being observed, and President Kennedy marked the occasion by using the VOA facilities to make ‘ a worldwide broadcast on February 26. Religious programs have long been a part of the VOA schedules. Parts of mid night Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, New York, and messages from religious leaders have, been beamed abroad in 30 different languages at Christmas time. Statements by U. S. Catholic Bishops, particularly those expressing sympathy with the “suffering millions” behind the Iron Curtain, have been widely disseminat ed. References to the trials and imprison ment of Catholic prelates behind the Iron Curtain have been broadcast to areas not likely to be told about them otherwise. In marking 20 years on the air, VOA has made known some interesting facts about the English language. It says English is the mother tongue of 75 million persons outside the United States and Canada; be tween eight and ten million persons speak it as a second language; it is an official language for an additional 631 million per sons; it is the international language of. business and commerce; it is becoming the language of international diplomacy. DORIS REVERE PETERS rndwerA YOUTH GIRL IN HIGH SCHOOL ASKS ADVICE ABOUT CAREERS **** \ *Ve//- WILL MAN MAKE LIFE? It Seems to Me “In the next 25 years,” said the caption on an article in Look magazine by senior edi tor J. Robert Moskin, “man will master the secret of Crea tion.” The article is an exam ple of the kind of loose use of words which often causes con fusion about religion and science. Religious truth and scientif ic truth cannot clash. Truth cannot conflict with truth. But disputing arises when truth is misstated, or inadequately and inexactly worded. Life, wrote Moskin, will be created in a test tube. Man, therefore, will “perform an act of God.” THAT IS NOT SO — not as stated. Moskin neglected to de fine his terms. Thus he left the door open for mistaken con clusions in the minds of read ers. Creation, in the root sense, is possible to God only. Why? Because Creation means that something is brought into being where there was nothingness—where there was utter non-existence, the total absence of anything. If we are to grasp this cor rectly, some thinking is called for. We must leave imagination to one side. b . WE CANNOT PICTURE no thingness. We must rely, then, on the intellect. We cannot envision nothingness, but we can con ceive it intellectually. To repeat — Creation is not making something out of something. It is making some thing in nothingness. When God creates, He does not make something out of Himself. He simply wills that nothingness shall cease, and something begin to be. That’s Creation — and God alone can do it. MOSKIN WAS WRITING about something different. But he didn’t explain that that was what he was doing. He said life will be “created” in a test tube, and man will “perform an act of God.” Man will do nothing of the kind. What Moskin means is that he believes man will trig ger, in a test tube, the poten tiality for life that God has placed in matter. If man does that (and he may) he will not be perform ing an act of God. Not at all. He will be performing an act of man. He will be using the intellect that God gave him to unlock the secret which is there because God put it there —created it. SCIENTISTS, said Moskin, “have put together nonliving chemicals to form complicated units just like the units that make up living things. When scientists completely master the' techniques of making the complex building blocks of life and when they go on to fit to- JOSEPH BREIG gether the blocks themselves, they will have created living matter.” The final three words con tradict the rest of the sentence. Scientists will not “create” anything, not in the sense we mean when we talk about Cre ation as an act of God. The scientists will simply do what Moskin, in the first part of his statement, correctly de scribes them as doing. They will “put together non living chemicals.” They will “fit blocks together.” But they will get the chemicals and the blocks from God’s Creation; they will not. create them. NEITHER WILL THEY cre ate life. They will merely du- (Continued on Page 5) THE IDEAL PLACE By BARBARA C. JENCKS © THEY CALL this quest for a perfect land as old as civilization. Every man with soul afire has dreamed to live in a land far from the daily strivings of man, a land where there are no wars, no diseases, no evils of any name. Tho mas Moore wrote his “Utopia” and Plato wrote “The Re public” about their ideal states and civilization. Thoreau wrote his “Walden” and founded what he thought an ideal community. More recently Ann Morrow Lindberg wrote of her island retreat. Before the fire on cold winter evenings when we think long thoughts and hope great things our minds are prone to imagine the kind of place we would go to if we could escape in this age of nuclear fears and the dins and drumming of the traffic of life. © RECENTLY a Boston newspaper told of a young British couple who were seeking out a “subtropical island far from the hubbub of contemporary diplomacy and the perils of nuclear war.” They proposed to create a tiny inde pendent state of their own and sought other young couples to join them in their enterprise. As children we dreamed of being a Robinson Crusoe and we grow old but not wiser perhaps for our dreams are still to escape from the hard realities of a world of getting and spending where there is far too little time to stop and wonder. When we look up at the stars, there are jets in the skies and when we stop to listen to the sounds of nature or even to a recorded opera,/ the noises of our world crash over our ears. No wonder the ! tearing yearning to escape grows in the heart of all of us/ Shakespeare wrote of his magic Forest of Arden: “Tongues in trees, books in running brooks, sermons in stones and good in everything.” / • FOR THREE MONTHS I have lived in what I' would call a near perfect civilization. It took me some time to turn down the controls of an American-geared mind and nervous system to the gentle, nonchalant, easy-going manner of the Irish people. If one bus is missed, another will be along in another half hour and isn't it a grand day# thank the good Lord. What, does it all matter in a thousand years whether you have accomplished what you set out to do today? By American standards my three months in this near-idyllic nation have been a complete loss. I have done no serious writing. I have not earned any money. But as a young man asked me the other day, "have you found happiness?" I have found more peace and contentment in three months in Ireland than I have known for many a year. I have stopped to stroll when I used to rush in high gear. I have leaned over the bridge on the Liffey and look ed out on a sunset for almost an hour and I have squan dered hours strolling through St. Stephen's Green or pass ing the time with a stranger in a teashop. Ah, it is the land for those who can enjoy life and my answer to those who seek an island retreat. Anything that man touches becomes less perfect. No nation is perfect, no civilization without flaw. But in the heart of all of us beats the hope that somewhere somehow we might come upon a place on this earth which approximates perfection. I have. * * * 9 IT IS TIME for me to look back and say farewell to Ireland. I say it sadly but I have lived a little while when I have been in her care. Because we are human, all things are never perfect. No matter where God sends us, we should be able to find peace and happiness despite the fears of the day. Our little island retreats, our Waldens and our Dub- lins are all within us. I remember the last line of the play “Look Homeward Angel,” the Thomas Wolfe classic when the boy asks his brother “where is the world and the answer to it all?” The big brother spoke and said: “you little idiot, look inside yourself, there is your world.” That As sane ad vice for all of us who would escape and dream—me world is within us, we carry our worlds with us. Dear Doris: I am a 15-year-old, grade 10, Ukranian Catholic girl. I often think of my future career but have not come to a conclusion. Usually girls my age have their careers planned and take courses to prepare, which I have not. I would like to meet people, as a clerk; supervise, as a teacher; serve people as a lib rarian or hairdresser. I think I have the ability to do any of the preceeding well, but I cannot decide which career to prepare for nor do I know if there is a job that could fulfill some of my desires. I do not plan to go to the university or take any course longer than two years. Could you help me with a solution? Floating Some girls know early what they want to be when they grow up. Others don’t know until years later. You are not unusual, but lucky that you have begun to think about fu ture plans now. Use the re maining two years of high school to investigate system atically various careers. First, pray. We all have our place of work in God’s plan. The particular job He wants you to do may not be clear now. If you pray and ask for guidance He will make it clearer as you go along. Read books and pamphlets on careers. The public library has many. The school library has some also. Talk to adults about different jobs. Friends of your parents are happy to answer questions. Discover how they got started, how they like it, and why. By reading and talking you learn the qua lifications and education nec essary and what the job is all about; its duties, salary, etc. Discuss this with your teach er, principal or guidance coun- celor. They are fajniliar with your qualifications and talents and can give you sound advice. The jobs you/' mentioned with the exception of clerk, require additional training. While you may teach in a few private or country schools without a college degree you are expected to work towards one by attending summer and evening classes. * * * BOY IS YOUNGER, SHORTER Dear Doris: Would you please give me your opinion about a girl going out with a boy a few months younger and a couple of inches shorter? He is very nice and lots of fun. My girl friends kid about his being shorter 5 and I keep telling them that it does n’t matter. I know I should ignore their catty remarks but sometimes they hurt my feel ings. Kathy Looks are never as import ant as we think. We discover this when we take time to get acquainted. There are lots of nice boys who do not fall into the “tall, dark and handsome” category. Generally it takes quite a while to find out. Some girls never do. Since you have already discovered it at 16 you’re lucky. You said he is a nice boy and fun to be with. What more could you want in a compan ion? Could it be that your girl friends are a wee bit jealous? * * *. i TIME TO COME HOME? Dear Doris: I am a freshman in high school. Many of the fellows have been discussing the time a 14-year-old boy should be home at night. We would greatly appreciate a definite answer. The Boys Wish I could give a definite answer. But the time varies. It depends on where you are go ing, with whom and the cus toms of the community in which you live. A Friday night movie may be later than the CYO dance; and a birthday party later than a school ball game. Generally parents agree to the time according to the occasion and you go along with their decision. * * * CURED RUDE HABIT Dear Doris: Within the last week my boy friend has hung up on the phone about six times. lie has also lied to me. I like him a lot so please don’t tell me to drop him. I’d like to stpp him in his nasty habits, but how? A Listener I don’t need to tell you to drop him. It sounds as if he might be trying to drop you and hasn’t the courage to come right out and say it. So he hedges, lies and acts rude. Who phones whom? If you are doing the phoning, stop. If he is, have an excuse to be busy the next time. This won’t give him the chance to either lie or hang up. D oris Revere Peters answers letters through her column, not by mail. Please do not ask for a personal reply. Young readers are invited to write to her in care of The Bulletin. thing intrinsically wrong in such an election. Rather, the morality will depend upon the circumstances in each particu- la case. FIRST AND FOREMOST, a right, intention is requisite. For example, it would be un lawful for a criminal to under go cosmetic surgery in order to continue a life of crime and evade justice. Such surgery would also be wrong, as Pope Pius warned, merely for rea sons of vanity or caprice. ANOTHER REQUISITE con dition is that at least a reason ably proportionate cause for such surgery exists.. This cause certainly can be psychological or even economic as well as physical. In the words of Dr. Thomas J. O’Donnell in his Morals in Medicine: “Anomalies or malforma- (Continued on Page 5) © ®lf* IBuUrtin 411 STH ST., AUGUSTA. GA. f 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. Subscription included in membership in Catholic Laymen’s Association. Second class mail privileges authorized 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 REV. LAWRENCE LUCREE, REV. JOHN FITZPATRICK, Associate Editors, Savannah Edition. By David Q. Liptak Q. What is the Church's position as regards plastic surgery for beautification? What about the morality of nasal reconstruction, for in stance? A. A recourse to plastic or cosmetic surgery is not wrong in itself, for, as Pope Pius XII pointed out to a group of plas tic surgeons in October, 1958, physical beauty is a gift to be / esteemed and cared for. It does not rank high on the ladder of Christian values but it is nonetheless not to be despised in itself. And certainly there is no moral law enjoining any one to take extraordinary means to acquire or to pre serve it. Yet even when a per son of normal appearance elects to undergo cosmetic sur gery to have his or her fea tures improved, there is no- Vol. 42 Saturday, March 3, 1962 No. 20 ASSOCIATION OFFICERS GEORGE GINGELL, Columbus President MRS. DAN HARRIS, Macon Vice-President NICK CAMERIO, Macon Secretary JOHN T. BUCKLEY, Augusta Treasurer ALVIN M. McAULIFFE, Augusta Auditor JOHN MARKWALTER, Augusta Executive Secretary MISS CECILS FERRY, Augusta Financial Secretary
