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FOUR
THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
MAY 17, 1952
Hwllptin
The Official Organ of the Catholic Laymen’s
Association of Georgia, Incorporated
HUGH KINCHLEY, Editor
216-17 Southern Finance Building, Augusta, Ga.
ASSOCIATION OFFICERS FOR 1951-52
MARSHALL WELLBORN, Rome President
MARTIN a. CALLAGHAN, K. S. G., Macon...
. Honorary Vice-President
HARVEY HILL, Atlanta . . . Vice-President
CHARLES C. CHESSER, Augusta Secretary
J. P. MEYER, Columbus Treasurer
HUGH KINCHLEY, K. S. G., Augusta
Executive Secretary
MISS CECILE FERRY, Augusta, Financial Secretary
ALVIN M. McAULIFFE, Augusta Auditor
VOL. XXXIII
MAY 17, 1952
No. 5
Entered as second class matter June 15, 1921, at the
Post Office at Augusta, Georgia, under the Act of March
3> 1379, accepted for mailing at special rate of postage
provided in paragraph 4, section 538, Postal Laws and
Regulations as modified by paragraph 6
Member of N. C. W. C. News Service, Religious News
Service, the Catholic Press Association of the United
States, the Georgia Press Association, and the National
Editorial Association.
Published monthly by the Catholic Laymen’s Association
of Georgia, Inc., with the Approbation of the Most Rev
erend Archbishop-Bishop of Savannah-Atlanta, and of the
Right Reverend Abbot Ordinary of Belmont.
Commencement Time
W E ARE now approaching the season of the year
wlfen Catholic schools, from kindergarten
classes to university will be holding their clos
ing exercises or commencements. These programs,
at which graduating students are presented with
their diplomas and which mark the beginning of the
summer vacation period for the other pupils, are
annual reminders of the great educational efforts
of the Catholic Church not only in this Country
but throughout the world.
Notice was received at the office of The Bulletin
this week that the Official Catholic Directory for
1952 would be off the press sometime later this
month, so it is not possible to quote statistics from
that authority to show the latest figures on the
extent of the Catholic educational system in this
country.
However, in March of this year, The New York
Times published the results of a survey that news
paper had made of the Catholic educational system
The survey by the New York City daily disclosed
that 109,118 teachers are now teaching classes in
Catholic elementary and secondary schools in the
United States, with an enrollment that is close to
4,000,000 students..
Catholics are presently supporting more than 11,-
000 schools, while at the same time they are pay
ing their proportionate share of the taxes which are
needed to maintain the public school system
throughout the nation.
If the Catholic schools in the United States which
are closing around the first of June would remained
closed after the summer vacation season is over,
and would not open to receive pupils when the new
school year starts in September, even from a purely
material viewpoint, it would be a national calamity.
Should the millions of children and teen-agers
and young men and young women, attending Catho
lie schools, at the elementary, secondary, college
and university levels, present themselves next Fall
for entrance into public institutions of learning, in
hundreds of cities throughout the land the public
school officials would be obliged to admit their in
ability to cope with the situation.
Only a few weeks ago, speaking to the American
Association of School Administrators, in Boston
Dr. James B. Conant, president of Harvard Uni
versity, declared that the growth of private and
parochial schools was harmful to the American
educational system and that such schools were a
divisive force in our society. “The greater the pro
portion of our youth who attend independent
schools,” Dr. Conant stated, “the greater threat to
our democracy.”
Other Americans, educators like Dr. ,Conant
Protestant ministers, newspaper editors, have voiced
opposition to the opinion of the president of Har
vard. They oppose Dr. Conant’s contentions, as
The Atlanta Journal did editorially, because state
dominance of all schools threatens the freedom of
American education.
Thinking Americans not of the Catholic Faith
appreciate the magnificent and gigantic contribu
tion the Catholic Church is making toward the edu
cation of the youth of the land, in a material way,
and also in a spiritual way, because education in
Catholic schools provides religious and moral in
struction along with education in secular subjects.
The whole education of students in Catholic
schools, their entire training, has been directed
toward the upbuilding of character which will up
hold law and order, truth, justice and morality, the
basic principles upon which our government was
founded and upon which its institutions rest.
Year after year the Catholic Church, through its
educational system, has. continued to make such a
contribution to the welfare of the nation that fair-
minded Americans are becoming increasingly con
scious of the cumulative and beneficient effect of
Christian Catholic education. If atheistic and
agnostic radicalism have not made the inroads here
that they have made in more troubled parts of the
■world, the Catholic schools of the United States,
with their millions of graduates and-former students
are due a generous share of the credit.
That those schools in which religion is taught are
the greatest safeguard of the American way of life,
and of human freedom anywhere in the' world, is
impressed upon us by th© fact that the first act of
a totalitarian regime, seeking to establish itself over
a people; is to close the religious schools and sup
press the Catholic press.
In the struggle for liberty now raging in many
parts of the world, the preservation and extension
of freedom of education are an objectives of major
importance, but it seems that there are many people
in this country who do not realize the direct con
nection between freedom of education and all other
freedoms.
The foes of freedom of education, as it pertains
to religious schools are persistent. They seek to
Fifty Golden Years
1 1HERE are two kinds of anniversary celebrations.
One merely marks the passage of a certain
number of years, the other observes the com-
pletio not a certain number of years of achieve
ment.
Those who are familiar with the history of the
Knights of Columbus in Georgia will not hesitate
to place the fiftieth anniversary of the coming of the
first councils of the Order to Georgia in 1902 among
those anniversary observances Which mark the end
of a period of brilliant service.
It was twenty years after a group of Catholic
laymen in Connecticut, under the leadership and
guidance of priests like the late Father M. J. Mc-
Givney, organized the Knights of Columbus, that
the first council of the Order were established in
Georgia.
In 1902, Savannah Council, No. 631 received its
charter as the first Knights of Columbus Council in
Georgia, and later in the same year, Atlanta Coun
cil, No. 660, and Patrick Walsh Council, No. 677, in
Augusta, received their charters.
Two years later, Macon Council, No. 925, was
founded. In 1905, Bishop Gross Council, No. 1019,
was founded in Columbus, and shortly after Henry
Thomas Ross Council, No. 1939, was founded in
Brunswick. In 1919, Father Prendergast Council,
No. 2057, was founded in Albany, but some years
ago that council surrendered its character and its
members transferred to either the council in Ma
con or the council in Columbus.. There is hope that
the council in Albany may soon be revived.
In the half-century that the Knights of Columbus
have been in existence in Georgia, the members of
the Order, as individuals arid as groups, have ever
been the first to respond whenever there was an
opportunity to render service to their Church, their
community, or their fellowmen. United with other
members of the K. of C. throughout the United
States and its possessions, in Canada, Cuba and the
Philippines, they have participated in serving God
and country and mankind on a greater and grander
scale.
Members of the Knights of Columbus played an
important part in the organization of the Catholic
Laymen’s Association of Georgia, and have been
leadei-s in every phase of Catholic Action in Georgia
for fifty years. They have also rendered exemplary
patriotic service to their country and to those who
wore the uniforms of its armed forces.
In the first World War, the Knights of Co
lumbus expended more than $43,000,000 for the
welfare and educational work with members of
the Armed Forces in this country and overseas.
In the second World War 93,000 members of the
Order were in the Allied Forces’ service. The
aid the Order has given to the Catholic University
of America and its current successful advertising
campaign in nationally circulated magazines are
among its many great efforts in which the mem
hers of the K. of C. in Georgia have had a share.
Well have, the Knights of Columbus in Georgia
exemplified through the years the, cardinal princi
pies of the Order: Charity, Unity, Fraternity and
Patriotism. They have a right to, be proud of their
record in the past, a record, which as it is being re
called on this fiftieth anniversary of the founding
of the councils in Savannah, Atlanta and Augusta,
should be an inspiration to the members of the
present to render devoted service to the Church,
patriotic service to the nation, and c' aritable service
to mankind, in more abundant measure for many
more years to come.
Dixie Musings
In a sermon delivered at the
American Church of St. Susanna,
in Rome Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
declared that communists in the
United States were ordered in 1936
to infiltrate into the Catholic
priesthood. At one time, he said,
the communists were “planting
themselves in religious communi
ties to destroy them from within,
and that “a call for volunteers to
enter religious orders and make
the great sacrifices of the life of
a seminarian was made at a secret
meeting of communists in a large
American city.
Bishop Sheen also said that
man from Moscow “tried to install
himself in my office,” with the
avowed purpose of helping the
Bishop ‘to fight against commun
ism.” Upon checking with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Bishop Sheen said he discovered
that this man was one of the most
dangerous of all communists.
Bishop Sheen also mentioned
1936 as the time when the com
munists in the United States be
came a real menace because of
their success in burrowing into the
field of public opinion. "There
was hardly a single prominent
news commentator,” he said, "who
did not have a secretary who was
a communist, whether or not any
of them knew it.”
While in the Eternal City for
the annual meeting of national di
rectors and, other officials of the
Society for the Propagation of the
Faith, Bishop Sheen was received
in audience by His Holiness Pope
Pius XII before returning to this
country via France.
accomplish by indirection what they cannot do by'jpiness for all man kind.
direct action. The price of liberty in the field of
education is the same eternal vigilance that it costs
to safeguard any liberty.
This vigilance is the duty not only of Catholics
and others who support, in rapidly growing number,
schools of their own, but of all Americans. When
one freedom is hampered or destroyed, all other
freedoms face the threat of a similar fate.
The importance of Catholic education, not to
the pupils of our Catholic schools, but to the na
tion, has never been more strikingly evident than
at this commencement season when the foundations
of our American institutions are being subjected to
attacks incited by proponents of a philosophy of
life that is alien to this country.
Those noble Americans who affixed their signa
ture to the Declaration of Independence gave wit
ness to their belief in the principle which it pro
claimed, “that all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain inalien
able rights, that among these rights are life, liberty
and the pursuit of happiness.”
The existence of God, the creation of man by
God, the equality of man, which implies the im
mortality of the soul, and the derivation of rights
from man’s Creator and not from the State or any
tyrannical dictator, are fundamental American prin
ciples.
Because our freedom and the institutions which
protect that freedom rest on religious principles, it
would appear that it is not only advisable, but ab
solutely essential that this religious basis of our
freedom be deepened and strengthened in the minds
and hearts of our people..
If Catholic schools are necessary for religious
easons, they are necessary too for civic reasons.
They send out into American life young men and
young women who are permeated with American
principles which are Catholic in their essence, and
who will become a leaven in the nation as have be
come the graduates of Catholic schools for genera
tion after generation.
It is quite possible that the alumni and alumnae
of our Catholic institutions of learning who will
soon be receiving their diplomas will be dismayed
at the plight of the world into which they are gradu
ating. But they may face the future in an attitude
of hope rather than in the sadness of dispair.
They know that in spite of the unrest, and war,
and rumors of more war, it is possible for them to
attain the real purpose of life, to know, to love, and
to serve God in this world and by so doing to at
tain eternal happiness in the world to come. Catho-
lis school graduates have been taught that the more
they center their attention on the life to come, the
less they will be afflicted by the evils of this life.
If those who are seeking to secularize the educa
tional system of our nation 'could learn the lesson
that the graduates who are receiving diplomas from
Catholic schools and colleges have learned, the
world today Ayould be a better place to live in and
the future would hold a promise of peace and hap-
A charge that the Legion of
Decency ‘ is more interested in the
suppression of non-Catholic ideas
than it is with- preventing or elimi
nating obscenity” was made in
Washington, D. C., at the recent
annual conference of Protestants
and Other Americans United for
Separation of Church and State
by Mrs. Yashti McCollum, plaintiff
in the case at Champaign, Illinois,
which led to the Supreme Court
decision outlawing religious i
struction in public schools.
Mrs, McCollum said that “the
Catholic censorship policy” has
forced revisions or cuts on theo
logical grounds in such pictures as
“The Fugitive,” “Juarez,” “Black
Narcissus,” “A Street Car Named
Desire” and other films. She also
objected to motion pictures like
Bing Crosby’s showing priests as
“genial, full of sentimental charm,
indulgent.”
In filing her suit to allege that
religious education in public
schools was unlawful, Mrs. Mc
Collum said she was an atheist and
that religion was “a cronic disease
of the imagination contracted in
childhood” and that her ten-year-
old son was embarrassed because
he was the only pupil not attend
ing released time religious instruc
tion classes in the school he at
tended.
Earl L. Douglass, whose syndi
cated Sunday School lesson is a
weekly feature in many news
papers throughout the country, in
lesson for May 4, under the title
“Warning Against Profane Living,”
expressed an opinion that was in
sharp contrast to that of Mrs. Mc
Collum.
He wrote: “The movies would he
as bad as the ’legitimate’ stage to
day were it not for the Roman
Catholic Church. They cleaned
out the Augean stables of Holly
wood and the citizenry of a nation
which has always prided itself on
its wholesomeness of life owes
them a debt of gratitude.”
“Let George Do It;” latest half-
hour film produced by The Christ
ophers, which stars Danny Thomas,
Robert Young and Dennis Day,
who donated their time for the
film, will be released shortly.
Danny Thomas in the role of
‘George”-points out that the “let
George do it” attitude of so many,
including those who fail to vote,
paves the way for the Stalins, Hit
lers and Mussolinis. Robert Young
emphasizes the responsibility of the
individual citizen in the steps for
better government proposed by The
Christophers. Dennis Day con
cludes the film by singing “God
Bless America,”
The American Federation of
Musicians cleared the film for tele
vision showing because it is pre
sented as a public service. The
Christophers announced that be
cause of the urgent need to
strengthen government at this time
and to arouse people to their re
sponsibility to vote the film is be
ing made available at the actual
cost of duplicating the print, from
The Christophers, 18 East 48th
Street, New York, N. Y.
Charges that church and private
schools are undemocratic were an
swered in New York by . a 'promi
nent Presbyterian minister, who
declared that a true democracy
must have more than one school
system as it must have more than
one political party.
Addressing members of the Pres
bytery of New York, the Reverend
Dr. Paul Austin Wolfe, newly-elect
ed moderator, took sharp issue with
critics of private education and
declared that churches of the na
tion should increase their interest
in education.
“The same people who proclaim
today that democracy must have
one school system,” Dr. Wolfe said,
“will proclaim tomorrow that
democracy must have one political
party, one church, one newspaper.
When they say democracy, they
mean State regimentation,”
Dr. Wolfe charged that public
schools are “victims of highly or
ganized pressure groups,” and
would not reflect the democratic
process until they are returned to
the influence and direction of the
home.
“The children of the nation,” he
said, “should be saved from the
competing educational theories that
are exploiting them. Too many
politicians and too many associa
tions for the advancement of pro
fessional educators can ruin Amer
ican public schools.”
“We must also,” Dr. Wolfe add
ed, "affirm the democratic right of
parents to educate their children
in church or private schools of
their own choice.”
A religious ceremony, dating
back to the Middle Ages and mark
ing the completion of the newest
and biggest building in Amiens,
France, was held recently in the
presence of Bishop Rene L. M.
Stourro of Amiens, the mayor of
the city, many civic officials and
the local clergy.
The building, named Tour Per T
ret, after its architect, is said to he
the largest reinforced concrete
building in the world, a skyscrap
er 306 feet high and of 30 stories.
It towel’s over the neighboring
famed Cathedral of Amiens built in
the 13t.h century and which happily
escaped damage during the last
World War although houses sur
rounding it were leveled to, the
ground.
As soon as the building was com
pleted, at the workers’ request,
Bishop Stourm offered a Mass of
Thanksgiving on one of the floors
of the building. After Mass the
workers proceeded to the city hall
where they presented their tools,
which had been previously blessed
by the Bishop, to the city' thus re
newing the rite .of artisans who
created the famed Cathedral.
AMERICA, the National Catho
lic Weekly, in a recent issue in
cluded two items from Georgia in
the week comment on the news that
appears in the “Parade” depart
ment, edited by John A. Toomey:
“In Atlanta, Ga., police arrested
a citizen found hiding beneath a
church pew, ignoring his explana
tion that he could pray better in
an under-the-pew location . . , Re
ports came in from the field of
law enforcement . . In Macon,
Ga., a snake, bit a deputy sheriff;
then went into a coma and died.
The deputy sheriff suffered no ill
effects.”
The hell of North Presbyterian
Church in Buffalo, N. Y., rang out
in neighborly greeting when the
Most Reverend Joseph A Burke
was installed as Bishop of Buffalo.
The Presbyterian churfch, located
across the street from St. Joseph’s
Cathedral, has rung its bell tor all
consecrations and installations and
tolled the bell at funerals of Cath
olic prelates for the past twenty-
five years.
It started the bell-tolling process
when the Cathedral’s steeple, hous
ing its own bell, was torn down.
The belfry was never replaced.
A church that will be shaped like
tent and have no windows is be
ing built in Edinburgh, Scotland.
Steel girders spring from a low
brick wall and taper to an apex.
Lighting comes wholly from the
front gable, which is all glass.
The church was designed by
Peter Whiston, architect, on lines
hovel to Britain hut already known
on the continent. It is dedicated
to St. Margaret, patroness of Scot
land, and will serve Catholics iri
the Davidson’s Mains area, most of
whom are descendants of refugees
from the great famine of Ireland
during the last century. The church
will accomodate a congregation of
300 persons. H. K.