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FOUR. THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA DECEMBER 24. 1955. ©lif Sullftitt The Official Organ of the Catholic Laymen’s Association of Georgia, Incorporated JOHN MARKWALTER, Editor 416 Eighth Street, Augusta, Ga. ~ ASSOCIATION OFFICERS FOR 1955-1956 ” HOLST BEALL, Macon President E M. HEAGARTY, Waycross Honorary Vice-President MRS. L. E. MOCK, Albany Vice-President TOM GRIFFIN, Atlanta 1 Vice-President DAMON J. SWANN, Atlanta 1 V. P., Publicity GEORGE GINGELL, Columbus V. P., Activities .TOHN M. BRENNAN, Savannah 1 Secretary JOHN T. BUCKLEY, Augusta 1 Treasurer JOHN MARKWALTER, Augusta Executive Secretary MESS CECILE FERRY, Augusta Financial Secretary ALVIN M. McAULIFFE, Augusta Auditor Vol. XXXVI Saturday, December 24, 1955 No. 15 Entered as second class matter at the Post Office, Monroe, Georgia, and accepted for mailing at special rate of postage provided by para graph (e) of section 34.40, Postal Laws and Regulations. Member of N.C.W.C. News Service, the Catholic Press Association of the United States, the Georgia Press Association, and the National Editorial Association. Published fortnightly by the Catholic Laymen’s Association of Geor gia. Inc., with the Approbation of the Most Reverend Archbishop- Bishop of Savannah-Atlanta, and of the Right Reverend Abbot Ordinary of Belmont. BISHOP'S HOUSE 222 East Harris Street Savannah, Georgia December 14, 1955. My dear People: The annual collection for the support of our diocesan homes for dependent children will be taken up at all the Masses on Sunday, December 25th, the Feast of Christmas. The Feast of Christmas is eagerly anticipated by all man kind. This is true even, perhaps I should say especially, of the people in those unfortunate countries where ruthless tyrants are attempting to crush out all faith in Jesus Christ and where Christmas can be observed only interiorly in the hearts and souls of those who believe, and, because they believe, suffer and endure for the faith. It is true also of the thousands upon thousands of people in the world who are poor and homeless, even as the Son of God was on the night of His birth, and for whom Chi’istmas will be bereft of all those material joys and consolations which we associate with it. Christmas has this universal appeal because it is the feast of love and of hope —of a Divine love which knows no bounds and of a hope that Almighty God, Who so loved the world as to send His only begotten Son to earth as its Redeemer, will eventually right the wrongs which afflict mankind. As we look forward to the Feast of Christmas, we should be grateful that we, unlike so many of our fellow-Catholics in the world, enjoy the right and the freedom to practice our faith. We are able, therefore, to make Christmas a HOLY Christmas for ourselves by a sincere confession of our sins, by assisting devoutly at the Sacrifice of the Mass when Christ is born anew in our midst, and by receiving our Divine Saviour into our hearts and souls in Holy Communion. And we should be grateful also for the material things with which God has blessed us and which will enable us. by our gifts and remem brances, to make Christmas a Happy Christmas for our dear ones and especially for the children. Christmas is in a special way the feast of children. I beg to remind you, my dear people, that there are other children besides those of your own household and family to whom you must give thought and for whom you must provide at Christmastime. I refer to the dependent children of our diocese whom death or some worse tragedy has deprived of a home and of the natural and normal care of parents. In the Providence of God these children have been committed to the charity and generosity of the Catholic people of Georgia. It is in their behalf, in the name of the Infant Saviour, that I appeal to you this morning. Christ is poor and homeless again in the person of these children and there is something we can do about, it. Certainly at this season of the year, when money is lavishly spent on so many material things, we should give more than a passing thought and token offering to our dependent children. I am not unmindful of your generosity of the past and I thank you for it, but I must repeat what I have so often said before, we are not supporting our Homes for dependent children as we should. There are ever so many things we can and should do for these children and for the good Sisters who care for them. I venture, therefore, to request every adult Catholic to contribute at least $5.00 to the Christmas collection for our dependent children. Indeed, I appeal earnestly to our well-to-do Catholics to make a substantial contribution an nually to our Orphan Homes and thus relieve the diocese of all anxiety for their support. I am not appealing for luxuries for our dependent children but only for what is necessary to care adequately for them and to prepare them for an honorable career in life. I appeal only for what you would desire for yourselves and for your own children, if you or they were cast in similar circumstances. And my appeal in behalf of these children is in the name of the Divine Saviour, Who has identi fied Himself personally with everyone who is in need. Archbishop O’Hara joins me in wishing you and your dear ones a generous share of the graces and blessings of the Holy Season. Devotedly yours in Christ, FRANCIS E. HYLAND Auxiliary Bishop, Vicar General. Tension In The Middle East THIS WORLD OF OURS (By Richard Pallee) The frontier episodes and the serious clashes between Israeli and Egyptians on the Gaza strip point up, as graphically as any thing does, the profound uncer tainties in the Middle East and the enormously inflammatory jnature of the si tuation. In spite of the concern caused by the acceptance of arms from [the Soviet bloc |by Egypt and jthe ensuing pressure to per suade the Unit ed States to arm Israel, certain features of the problem ought to be stressed. First, the Czech-Egyptian arms deal is probably the consequ ence of the failure of the United States to keep a promise to Cairo to sell arms, plus the bitter dis appointment of the Egyptians that after such a formal promise they were let down and forced to deal elsewhere. The purchase of arms does not necessarily mean that Egypt has crawled in under the Soviet tent or gone “communist.” Arms are a peculiar commodity in that nations are prone to seek them where they can get them readily, and in direct proportion to the gravity of the situation as they see it. EGYPTIAN CASE While in Egypt I was pro foundly struck with the fact that the Nasser government conceives of Israel as the direct threat to the Arab world and as a nation whose aggressive tendencies are taken for granted. The Egyptian case is something like this: Israel is now a small country but a country that conceives of its mission as one of indeter minate expansion based on a constant increase of immigration and therefore of population growth. The Egyptians see an other half-mililon Jews coming from North Africa and, further more, are keenly aware that Zionism proposes that all Jews ultimately seek establishment in the homeland. If this comes to pass even in part, Palestine as it now stands is quite incap able of absorbing several more millions. Expansion into Jordan ian and Egyptian territory seems the only possible out in view of the land hunger and economic dictates of the situation. It may be that the Egyptians are making a mountain out of the thing and that Israel for a long time will remain pretty much what it is today. But the fact remains that there is a con viction in Cairo that Zionism is the threat, not the present-day Israel as now constituted. KEEPING ISRAEL ON THE ALERT Social and political forces within Egypt are totally unpre dictable. I would compare the present contingency as not un like that in the Argentine with military men running the show and reversals when least ex pected. Soldiers are dominating Egyptian political life and the •forces and currents at work be hind the scenes are extremely difficult to assess. It is conceiv able that part of the present agi tation is the fruit of internal con ditions which make this sort of thing a means of assuring the Nasser government’s stability in power. At th'e same time[ I think it is, also a form of the general Arab blockade, the aim of which is to strangle and contain Israel. The peaceful development of that country is obviously handi capped if there are constant bor der incidents and the threat of a more general war. Since the Arab governments are commit ted to a blockade on the com mercial and trade front, the added element of military ten sion cannot fail to undermine Is rael and force it to devote a dis proportionate share of its budget to defense purposes. It may well be that we are witnessing something like the , Soviet policy toward us right af ter the war, when the cold war was on more violently than now and America was jockeyed into a position of having to arm to the teeth, with no idea where the blow might fall. This added a new and very grave burden to the economic load of the United States and could not fail to be a factor in disturbing normal Amer ican recovery alter the conflict. I can scarcely imagine anything better Calculated to keep Israel on the qui vive than the menace of attack from Gaza, Sinai or the Jordanian front. » THE BACKDROP (Bv CHARLES LUCEY) WILY OLD BOYS ON THE GO (■ & n It is doubtful if 1955 has seen a more nervy, blatant example of the pot calling the kettle a fine charcoal gray than the re cent performance of Russia’s two big men, Krushchev and Bul ganin, on their visit to Asia. The Communist leaders wept bitter, bitter tears for - the suf ferings of India, Burma and oth er Far East lands under the co lonialism and imperialism of the West — but with a fine, bland disregard of the oppression and exploitation visited by Moscow for years on its ring of satellite countries. Krushchev, in a particular at tack on Britain at a state dinner in Burma, told his listeners that “the English were sitting here on your necks and were robbing your people. They say they were sitting in your colonies to bring their civilization to backward countries. We say they were sit ting in your countries to rob the piece of bread from the people.” A LOUD SILENCE But not a single word of the way Russia subjugated and crushed Latvia and Lithuania and Estonia! Nor about Poland or Czechslovakia or Bulgaria or Albania or Rumania or Hunga ry! Not a word of the police state and the purges and thought-con trol in Bucharest and Budapest and Prague! After four centuries of coloni alism the tide is reversed today. Empires are liquidated. Few de fend the exploitation of primi tive peoples all over the world for gold and commercial gain. Much of it was a filthy busi ness. Properly, in many cases native peoples demanded that colonizing exploiters get out. The pity is that in some cases west ern overseers have withdrawn with such ill grace as to help the Communist cause, CHAPTER AND VERSE Granted all of this, but how can Kruschev pass over what has happened in— Bulgaria, say, where people have suffered chronic shortages of food, clothing and fuel while the country exported first-quali ty vegetables, fruit, tobacco and other produce to the Soviet Uni on. Wher currency reforms rob bed independent farmers, shop keepers and others considered hostile to the Communist regime of vast sums. Where peasants wishing to leave collectivized farms and go it alone were not allowed to take their livestock or farm tools with them. Where hounding and liquidation was the Communist answer to dis sidents. Czechoslovakia, where in trials modeled on the Moscow purges opponents were tried for treason and sentenced to hang for being on the wrong side politically. Where the Soviets sought to up root and cut off ties with the West and destroyed Czech liter ature and imposed their own. Where elections have been the merest farce—the usual list of hand-picked candidates repre senting just one party. Poland, too, where despite the agreements of Yalta free and un fettered elections never have been held. Where independent thought has been stifled as in other satellite nations. Where op ponents of the Communist reg ime, arrested and sent to prison a decade ago, still are unheard of. THE NUMBER NOBODY KNOWS ,In every one of the satellites the Communist regimes have gone as far as they dared to stamp out religion. No one can be sure how many Catholic lead ers have been persecuted, driven from their churches, imprisoned after trials in which men’s wills were broken by torture and drugging and degradation and indignity. No one knows how many thou sands of persons in these coun tries under the Red fist have escaped into free territory —• knowing well they faced death or long imprisonment if caught —because they could stand no more of Communism’s oppres sion. Some 50,000 to 60,000 Czechoslovaks are estimated to*» have fled to Bavaria and Austria since the Communists first took that country. CONVENIENT, DISCIPLINED MEMORIES Krushchev and Bulganin would suppress all evidences of unrest in the satellites, of course, They would not tell the Inidians or the Burmese that despite the severity of repressive measures, reports persist of peasant resis tance to collectivization; of- in dustrial sabotage and slow downs; of workers riots; of the need to station troops at railroad bridges to guard against their destruction by people who never (Continued on Page Five)