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I Vol. 44, No. 22 10c Per Copy — $3 A Year Last Working Meeting SAVANNAH, GEORGIA, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1963 ■In Israel Court Case- Priest Protests Child’s Testimony JERUSALEM, Israel (NC) — A Catholic spokesman has pro tested against a judge’s accept ing a child’s testimony of 3 a.m. wakings and forced prayers in a case which led a court to order that four Jew ish children be taken out of a Catholic orphanage. Father M. J. Stiassny, press officer for the Israel vicariate of the Latin Rite Patriarchate of Jerusalem, said that Church authorities investigated the case and found the child’s tes timony false. The Jerusalem district court ordered that the children be taken out of the orphanage, where they were placed by their widowed mother, after testi mony by one of the four, a 12- year-old girl. The girl told the court; “They force us to bow down to a sta tue. . . They wake us up at 3 in the morning to do the cleaning. We pray from 5 to 7. The room we live in has no stove. There are about 20 children in each room. The girl also said that her mother had left the four at the orphanage three months earlier and had not visited them since. Father Stiassny said in his communique: * ‘After the wide publicity giv en by the press to the case of the Cohen children, who al legedly were mistreated in the Rosary Convent School, Jeru salem, and subsequently with drawn on the request of the Le gal Adviser to the Ministry for Social Affairs, a careful investigation has been made by the Church authorities, with the following results: “1. Mrs. Cohen placed four of her children in the above school, after all her efforts to place them in a Jewish in stitution had failed. She neither disappeared nor abandoned her children, as witnessed by the fact that she visited them reg ularly and settled each month the tuition fees to the school. 4 ‘2. The children were quite happy at the school, until their uncle started to pay them visits and create in their minds an antagonistic attitude toward the Sisters. He even tried to take them out forcibly and was prevented from doing so only by prompt police action. “3. After these unpleasant incidents, the Sisters wrote to Mrs. Cohen requesting the with drawal of the children. “4. The ‘evidence’ given by the elder daughter before the court is contrary to the truth and must be attributed either to her own imagination or to careful briefing. Our investi gation has shown that the chil dren were treated with care and love, like all the other child ren of the same school; they had nine full hours of sleep they got up at a normal time according to the season; they did not work from 3 to 5 a.m for the simple reason that they were still in bed; no other work was required of them than tidy ing up the dormitory, the same as in all boarding schools;there is not a single dormitory of 11 HNS Award For Cardinal NEW YORK (NC) -- Richard Cardinal Cushing has been nam ed to receive the Shield of Bles sed Gregory X — Crusader for his efforts in behalf of the Holy Name Society. HNS national headquarters here announced that the award given to members of the hier archy for' notably furthering Holy Name Society work in their dioceses, will be present ed to the Archbishop of Boston at his convenience. 20 beds, the largest one has the children were never taught, requested or compelled do an act of Christian wor ship, this being strictly for bidden by the ecclesiastical au thority. The spreading of horror stories about the so-called mis sion can only have one result which nobody in his right mind this country would welcome.' ’ Would Make Thanksgiving Holy Day ROME (NC)—A U.S. bishop has advocated making Thanks giving a Catholic holy day of obligation. Auxiliary Bishop Charles R. Mulrooney of Brooklyn, preach ing at the annual Thanksgiving Day Mass at Santa Susanna’s, the parish church for Ameri cans in Rome, recalled that it was President Lincoln who in augurated Thanksgiving Day as a national day for acknow ledging God’s blessings on the United States. To avoid adding an extra religious obligation on Ameri can Catholics, the Bishop pro posed that if his idea is adop ted, the present obligation to attend Mass on New Year’s Day or on Ascension Thursday be lifted. “In a foreign land,” he said, "we are even more conscious than the folks back home of the religious patrimony of the Unit ed States of America. And here in the center of Christendom, we are all the more conscious of the good that could come from bringing our American re ligious traditions into the full life of the church.’’ The Bishop said that Thanks giving, of all holidays, is among the "least exploited and least tainted with the materialism of our age.” He said it is impor tant “in our day to treasure and preserve such a religious tra dition” when traditional relig ious observances and customs are “gradually being whittled away . . . We American Catho lics, by proclaiming Thanks giving Day a holy day, will we trust, strengthen and support our brethren of other faiths in their love and devotion for our fine religious heritage.” HONORED BY POPE - Msgr. John J. Graham, (up per photo) pastor of Holy An gels Church, Philadelphia, has? been named by Pope Paul VI to be titular Bishop of Sabrata and Auxiliary to Archbishop John J. Krol of Philadelphia. A native of Philadelphia, he has been superintendent of special education in the arch diocese since 1959. Father Bernard M. Kelly, (lower photo) spiritual director of Our Lady of Providence Semi nary, Warwick Neck, R. I., since 1956, and a canon law expert, has been named titular Bishop of Tegea and Auxiliary to Bishop RussellMcVinney of Providence.—(NC Photos) First On Agenda Of Third Session By Msgr. James I. Tucek j Cardinal Bea, the last of the (NCWC NEWS SERVICE) day’s speakers, thanked theas- VATICAN CITY-The second sembly for its interest in dis- session of the council closed its last working meeting with the assurance that the chap ters of the schema on ecume nism on relations with the Jews and freedom of conscience are still live issues and will be agenda for next fall. The second session still had two days to go before its solemn cussing the schema on ecumen ism and for casting the votes which passed its first three chapters by a wide margin. Then he said: “There have remained, how ever, the two final chapters of among the first items on the the draft. We all regret that it was not permitted to us to have at least a foretaste of a dis cussion concerning these chap- closing ceremonies on Dec. 4.1 ters too. For in this way our But the assembly of Dec. 2 ! secretariat would have received greater illumination toward making a definitive edition of each chapter. However, as things have turned out, I am sincerely persuaded that even this fact offers us not a few was its last working session, a session which witnessed four important acts: ;. —It was announced that Pope Paul VI would issue on his own behalf on Dec. 3 a docu ment extending the faculties i useful things, of residential and titular I “At first sight, indeed, one bishops throughout the world. ! could ask: Could not a vote —Instructions were given for ! have been taken at least to ad- the interim period between the ■ rnit these chapters as a basis second and third sessions of the | for discussion? To this one council. ■%] might perhaps answer intheaf- — Augustin Cardinal Bea, | firmative. Nevertheless, I think president of the Secretariat for ! we should be grateful to the Promoting Christian Unity, ad-1 venerable Fathers, the mod- dressed the assmebly assuring i erators, because they wished to the council Fathers that the last j give ample opportunity for two chapters of the schema on ! speaking on the three fundamen- ecumenism are still very much alive. —The opening Mass of the as sembly honored the memory of the late President Ngo dinh Diem of Vietnam and his bro ther, Ngo dinh Nhu. j tal chapters in order to prevent I creating the danger that some- ! one might say that a hasty vote was taken on these three chap- ! ters and on the two others which j treat matters that are suffi- j ciently difficult, present some- The Mass was celebrated by - thing new, and are of the great est importance for the life and Archbishop Pierrre Ngo dinh ! Thuc of Hue for the repose of j activity of the Church in our the souls of his two brothers time, who met their death Nov. 2 in the overthrow of the Deim government. It was the “It is fitting, therefore, Cardinal Bea continued, “to meditate and ponder everything Pray For Our Deceased Priests REV. RICHARD JOHN O’BRIEN Dec. 12, 1894 Oh God, Who didst give to thy servants by their sacredotal office, a share in the priest hood of the Apostles, grant, u’e implore, that they may also be one of their company forever in heaven. Through Christ Our Lord, Amen. month’s mind” Mass of their | carefully over and over again, tragic deaths, and the council without haste and with a serene Fathers were invited to join in j and tranquil spirit, so that in praying for their eternal re 4 the next session of the council pose. Nhu’s six-year-old son, Jean Marc, was present in the council hall and received Com munion at the Mass. There was nothing in the announcement of the forth coming papal decree—a motu proprio bearing the title “Pas torale Munus” — to indicate what it would contain, but it had been long rumored that the Pope was ready to return to bishops a number of powers which in the present century have been reserved to himself or to the Vatican congregations. The secretary general, Arch bishop Pericle Felici, in the Pope’s name, outlined broadly what would be the work of the interim period between the se cond and third sessions. He said that the council commis sions will hold frequent meet ings. All the council Fathers were urged to send, before Jan. 31, their observations on the schemas still remaining to be studied. He said further that the results of the commissions’ work will be communicated to the council Fathers in due time along with instructions for the third session which is to open next Sept. 14. they (the two chapters) may be treated and judged with mature consideration. The ancient say ing applies here: 'What is put off is not put away.’ “Therefore, the questions treated in these two last chap ters remain entrusted to your study and examination, vener able Fathers, during the months to come. The discussion which it was not permitted to accom plish here will be held in the next session of the council and will be properly prepared during the coming months. “For this reason, the pre sident of the secretariat ear nestly asks all, even though there are very many tasks which will almost smother each one as he returns to his dio cese, to give attentive consid eration to these chapters and, please, to indicate their pro posals and corrections to the general secretariat of the coun cil before the middle of Feb ruary In the course of his speech although it was not contained in the written text, Cardinal Bea explained that the two chap ters had not been brought to a (Continued on Page 6) AS NATION MOURNED PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY—From high overhead, a photographer posed this symbolic picture from the Capitol Dome as the casket of the slain president was removed from the rotunda of the Capitol to the funeral Mass at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Washington. Some of the thousands who watched the horse-drawn caisson carry the remains in the procession are in the background. (NC Photos) THE FEAST OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION of the Blessed Virgin Mary will be observed on December 8, a holyday of obligation. The Gospel (Luke 1:26-28) relates the Annunciation when Mary was called “full of grace” by the Archangel Gabriel. In 1846 the American hierarchy declared Mary the patroness of the United States, under the title of her Immaculate Conception. This picture was taken at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception on the campus of the Catholic University of America, in Washing ton. The largest Catholic church in the U. S., it was dedicated in 1959.—(NC Photos) General Accord Is Council Highlight By James C. O’Neill (N.C.W.C. News Service) ROME—The overall agree ment among the great majority of the council Fathers was sin gled out here as perhaps the most significant development of the second council session. Experts on the American bi shops’ press panel were asked to give a summary of the second session of the council by Ameri can journalists Dec. 2. Mem Pope Grants 40 Faculties To Bishops VATICAN CITY (NC) - Pope Paul VI granted Bi shops forty faculties in his Motu Proprio, “Pastorale Munus,” dated November 30th and promulgated on De cember 3rd. Most of the faculties per tain to extraordinary cir cumstances in the adminis tration of Sacraments and of Diocesan goods and proper ties. Those immediately affect ing parish life concern the Mass. Bishops may permit priests to offer Mass twice on weekdays and thrice on Sundays and Holydays. They may allow priests with poor eyesight or other infirmity to offer the votive Mass of Our Lady or the Mass of the Dead daily. Bishops may al so allow confessors to ab solve from reserved sins and censures with few excep tions. Most faculties granted Bi shops were regularly inclu ded in faculties that many Bishops renewed every five years. Now they don’t have to renew them. Pope Paul also granted the Bishops a number of privileges, including that of preaching and hearing con fessions anywhere in the world. This was formerly granted only to Cardinals. bers of the panel expressed various views, but the common denominator seemed to be the question of the unanimity de monstrated during the course of the second session. Father Eugene H. Maly, scripture professor at the arch diocesan seminary of Cincin nati, pointed to the actual vot ings that had been taken during the session and said they indi cate there has been “ a loud voice” in the hall. He said the size of the majorities reached was significant, reflecting the thinking and tendencies pre dominating in this session. Father Gregory Baum, Ber lin-born Augustinian teaching in Canada, said he thought the “growing unanimity” among the bishops was the most important development of the session. He said that the council was not split between two camps, fifty- fifty, but rather that there was demonstrated a tremendous and unexpected unanimity which constantly grew, so that majo rities of 80% and larger were reached on almost all matters. Father Gustave Weigel, S. J., of Woodstock (Md.) College dis tinguished between formulation of doctrine and between the im pact that the council will have in the future of the catholic life of the Church. In terms of for mulation little was done at the second session, he noted. Most of the work on liturgy was done at the first session; there still must be written a chapter on the Blessed Virgin Mary, to be inserted in the project on the Church; the communications media project was not discuss ed but it does constitute a for mulation of teaching; the pro ject on bishops still needs work, and only three sections of the ecumenical schema have been reviewed. In terms of the effect the council will have on the future of the Church’s life, however, Father Weigel said, there have been developments of real sig nificance. “During the first session, the conservative minds were like persons holding a hill; they were the kings of the mountain. But during that ses sion the kings of the mountain found themselves in a very precarious position.” In the second session, he said, the conservative minds were “not anxious' to take to the battle field. Rather they re tired to strong, previously pre pared positions, leaving the bat tleground to others.” As a result there will be more action, more freedom in the Church in the future, ac cording to the Jesuit theologian. “This session has opened the windows wider.” What can be expected, he added, is an evo lution both greater and more rapid in its progress in the future. Both Archbishop Joseph J. McGucken of San Francisco and Bishop Albert R. Zuroweste of Belleville, Ill., who are in charge of the panel—paid tri bute to the American Bishops’ panel of experts and to the level of reporting that had been done by the American press. NEW AUXILIARY—Father Joseph T. Daley, (above) vice rector of St. Charles Broro- meo Seminary, Philadelphia, since 1960, has been named titular Bishop of Barca and Auxiliary to Bishop George L. Leech of Harrisburg. Born in Connerton, Pa., he was or dained in 1941 and served as an army chaplain from 1953 to 1956.—(NC Photos) Council Statements On Jews, Religious Freedom Deferred