Newspaper Page Text
f
Vol. 44, No. 32
10c Per Copy — $5 A Year
WEEKLY NEWSPAPER
OF THE DIOCESE OF
SAVANNAH
Benedictine Military School
SAVANNAH, GEORGIA, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1964
FATHER JOHN CUDDY, Diocesan Superintendent of Schools was the fourth Speaker in
a series entitled "Second Vatican Council - Reform and Reunion.” He is shown above at
rostrum. At left in photo is Bishop McDonough. At right is Father William V. Coleman,
program moderator.
Prophecies Must Be Fulfilled”
School Superintendent
Views Unity Prospects
SAVANNAH — The Rev. John
Cuddy, Diocesan Superintendent
of Schools was the speaker for
the fourth in a series of six
lectures entitled "Second Vati
can Council — Reform and
/Reunion,” delivered at Cathe
dral Day School Auditorium
Thursday evening, Feb. 13.
Topic of his talk was "The
Prospect of Reunion.”
Father Cuddy emphasized
that Christ prophesied ' ‘other
Sheep I have who are not of
this fold. Them also I must
bring and there shall be one
flock and one shepherd,” and
prayed the night before He died,
"That they all may be one, Fa
ther. As Thou in me and I in
Thee, that they also may be one
r in us.”
"Jesus is God,” he said, "His
prophecies must be fulfilled;
His prayers must be an
swered.”
He noted that althought there
are 900,000,000 Christians in
' the world, "they are not all
in one flock.”
The differences which sepa
rate the various Christian bod
ies are immense, he said, and if
they were "just minor dis
agreements, disunity would be
blasphemy.”
Declaring that there is hope
that "our Church and the other
Churches will . . . reconcile
our differences,” the Savannah
educator said, "The day has
ended when Christians took
a their divisions for granted. We
now view them as an unbearable
disgrace, a heavy cross.
But we love Our Lord too
much to pretend to believe
something we do not believe
simply to acquire a sur
face unity. We love Our Lord
Lecture By
Msgr.McDonald
February 27
SAVANNAH — Right Rev
erend Monsignor Andrew J.
McDonald, Chancellor of the
Diocese of Savannah and pas
tor of the church of the Most
Blessed Sacrament, will de
liver the last in the series
of lectures on "Reform and
Reunion Among Christians.”
The lecture, sponsored by
the Diocese of Savannah, will
be held Thursday evening,
February 27th, at 8 p.m. in
the Cathedral School Au
ditorium.
Monsignor McDonald’s
subject will be "The Church
and Matrimony.”
too much to pretend that it
doesn’t matter what we be
lieve simply to acquire the ap
pearance of unity. Such unity
would be a farce harder to
bear than our present dis
unity.
"We really have no choice
but to leave the entire matter
in Our Lord’s wounded hands.
He can do for us what we
cannot do for ourselves. He
can help us see what we cannot
now see. . . He can use our
love for Him and, in Him for
one another, to make all of us
so much like Him that we shall
begin to think as He would
think, to do as He would do,
to love as He would love.
"When that day arrives, and
only then, will full unity among
Christians be a reality, no long
er a dream.”
Father Cuddy said there is
almost no end to what indivi
duals can do, personally, to fur
ther Christian unity.
"To begin with, we must ad
mit to ourselves that those
who disagree with us are not
our enemies, but our brothers
in Christ. . . In our love for
one another we learn not mere
ly to show our friends what we
believe; but since friendship
invites an exchange, we develop
a deep desire to understand what
our friends believe. To sit down
together as friends to probe,
ever more deeply, into the Word
of God—this is our privilege
today.”
Christians must really know
what they beleive before they
can share ideas, he said, de
ploring the "superficial know
ledge” of many Catholics whose
inability to distinguish between
essentials and non-essentials in
their religion, leads them to
"misrepresent their Faith both
by word and action.”
(Continued on Page 2)
AS LENTEN SEASON BEGAN—In the Pope’s private chapel, Luigi Cardinal Traglia,
(left) Pro-Vicar General of Rome, proceeds to place the mark of ashes upon the fore
head of Pope Paul VI on Ash Wednesday. On that day the Holy Father spoke to thousands
in a general audience at the Vatican’s Hall of Benedictions. He also visited the Church of
Santa Sabina, the first of a series of processions to the Roman churches during Lent.—
(NC Photos)
Apostolic Delegate To
Officiate At Dedication
SAVANNAH—His Excellency, The Most Reverend EgidioVag-
nozzi, Ph.D., S.T.D., J.C.D., Apostolic Delegate to the United
States will officiate at the formal dedication of the new Sacred
Heart Priory and Benedictine Military School, Thursday, April
30th.
The announcement was made
in a joint statement by His Ex
cellency, Bishop Thomas J. Mc
Donough and the Very Rev. Bede
Lightner, O.S.B., Prior of the
Savannah Benedictine Com
munity, issued at the Savannah
Chancery last Monday.
Dedication exercises will be
gin at 10:30 a.m. and will be
followed by an outdoor Solemn
Pontifical Mass at the school
plaza. Archbishop Vagnozzi will
be the celebrant. Music for both
the dedication ceremonies and
the Mass will be provided by a
city-wide choir under the di
rection of Mr. J. Harry Persse.
A reception for Archbishop
Vagnozzi, planned for 8:00 p.m.,
will feature a musical program
by the Choral Group of St. Vin
cent’s Academy, under the
direction of Mrs. Joseph C.
Schreck.
Dignitaries in attendance will
include Bishops from the Pro
vince of Atlanta, which em
braces the States of North and
South Carolina, Georgia and
Florida, and Abbots of the
MOST REVEREND
EGIDIO VAGNOZZI
APOSTOLIC DELEGATE
tion. Detailed arrangements for
the reception of the Apostolic
Delegate and visiting dignatar-
ies, and for the dedication pro
gram have not yet been com
pleted and will be made public
at a later date.
The new Benedictine fa
cilities are located at Seawright
Drive and Cornell Avenue, on a
111 acre tract, formerly part of
Chatham County’s old ‘‘Brown
Farm.”
Ground for the $1,500,000
complex of buildings was brok
en Feb. 11, 1963 and classes
began Sept. 20th. Buildings in
clude a Priory and Chapel for
the Benedictine Community,
Academic building, Cafetorium,
and Gymnasium. School facili
ties can accommodate 600 stu
dents.
Architects for the new Pri
ory and School were the Savan
nah firm of Thomas, Driscoll
and Hutton. Whaley and Minter
Construction Company of
Brunswick, were the contrac
tors.
Although Benedictine Mili
tary School dates only from
1902, Priests of the Order of St.
Benedict have labored in Geor
gia since 1871 when a group of
French Benedictines, led by
Father Gabriel Bergier O.S.B.
came to Savannah, where they
built the chapel at Isle of Hope,
which still serves as a Mission
of St. James Parish.
In 1885 they affiliated with
the monks of Belmont Abbey,
N. C. and opened Benedictine
College (now Benedictine Mili
tary School) Sept. 29, 1902. The
first school was located on the
southside of 32nd Street between
Lincoln and Habersham.
On June 16, 1905, the late
Bishop Benjamin J. Keiley offi
ciated at the dedication of the
building at 34th and Bull Streets,
which served as Benedictine
Military School until last Sep
tember.
A decree from the Holy See
established the Savannah Com
munity as an independent Pri
ory in June of 1961 and The Very
Rev. Bede Lightner was elected
its first Prior in September of
the same year.
Priests presently residing at
Sacred Heart Priory and teach
ing at the new school are: Very
Rev. Bede Lightner, O.S.B.,
Prior; Rev Aloysium Wacht-
er O.S.B.; Rev. Andrew Doris,
O. S.B.; Rev. Brendan Dooley,
O.S.B.; Rev. Christopher Jo
hann, O.S.B., School Principal;
Rev. Damian Muldowney,
O.S.B.; Rev. Luke Bain,O.S.B.;
Rev. Peter Trizzino, O.S.B.;
Rev. Stephen Dowd, O.S.B.; Rev.
Terrence Kernan O.S.B., pas
tor of Sacred Heart Church;
and Rev. Timothy Flaherty
O.S.B.
Also residing at the Priory
are Frater Paschal Morlino,
O.S.B.; Bro. Charles Leonard,
Oblate Novice.
Lent Recalls Shortness
Of Life, Pope Reminds
VATICAN CITY (NC)—Pope
Paul VI told the thousands at
his general audience on Ash
Wednesday (Feb. 12) that the
significance of the ceremony
of the ashes—a reminder of the
shortness of a man’s life—is
unwelcome to many because it
is * ‘very striking, almost terri
fying.”
Speaking in the Vatican’s Hall
of Benedictions, the Pope said
that the Ash Wednesday cere
monies recall * ‘the most seri
ous aspect of our religion. . .
the penitential aspect, the sad,
severe and pessimistic as
pect.”
Pope Paul noted that this in
sistence on man’s mortality
‘‘drive many souls away from
the Faith and from the Church,
especially the young and the
children of our time who want
joy, beauty and the enjoyment
of life.”
He said that instead ‘‘Chris
tianity is the religion of the
Cross, the Church is the teach
er of mortification. All this
does not conform to the modern
spirit which seeks happiness.”
But he went on, it is this in
sistence on the frailty of life
that is ‘‘frankly realistic.” He
said that * ‘when the Church
speaks to us about the brief
ness of our earthly existence
it deals with the most common
and most obvious experience of
our present condition and it
deals with it flatly and bluntly,
with the undeniable language of
the pessimistic philosophers.
What is time if not a race to
death? What are the goods of
this world if not the vanity of
vanities?”
The Church’s doctrine, the
Pope said, ‘‘does not hide,does
not minimize the misery of poor
human clay. It recognizes, it
teaches and it recalls it to our
blindness and our vanity.”
Through its teaching, he con
cluded, the Church leads man
beyond his own weakness and
through mortification it over
comes the misery of life with
the result that there is achiev
ed ‘ ‘a victory of good over evil,
of happiness over sorrow, of
holiness over sin and of life
over death.”
Dispensation
In view of the fact that
Washington’s birthday, Feb
ruary 22nd, is a National
Holiday, His Excellency, The
Most Reverend Thomas J.
McDonough, D.D.J.C.D., has
granted a dispensation from
the law of fast and absti
nence.
ACADEMIC BUILDING
GYMNASIUM
Haiti Ousts All Jesuits;
Close Only Seminary
Pray For Our
Deceased Priests
VERY REV. MICHAEL
CULLINAN
Feb. 23, 1877
Oh God, Who didst give to
thy servants by their sacredotnl
office, a share in the priest
hood of the Apostles, grant,
ti'e implore, that they may
also be one of their company
forever in heaven. Through
• Christ Our Lord, Amen.
(N.C.W.C. News Service)
The Haitian government of
President Francois Duvalier |
expelled the entire Jesuit com
munity from the country and au
tomatically forced the closing of
the nation’s only major semin
ary.
The 18 priests and Brothers
of the Society of Jesus in Hai
ti, all members of the Jesuit
province of lower Canada, were
forced to fly out of Port-au-
Prince, the capital, on Ash Wed
nesday ( Feb. 12 ). Two of the
Jesuits had been held in prison
incommunicado for 12 days pri
or to their ouster.
The Canadian Jesuits under
took the Haitian mission in 1953,
after the Holy See requested
them to provide the faculty and
administration of the Port-au-
Prince seminary. With their ex
pulsion, the seminary was clos
ed. The approximately 60 sem
inarians were sent home. The
100-room Jesuit retreat house,
which had provided spiritual re
treats for some 2,000 persons
in the little more than four years
since its opening was siezed by
the government.
The day of the ouster, Cana
dian Minister of External Af
fairs Paul Martin issued a
statement in Ottawa declaring
that the Canadian government
was "very displeased by the de
cision of the Haitian govern
ment to expell a mission which
has brought so much good to the
Haitian people.” Martin said
also that "Canada could not be
satisfied by the vague allega
tions about the activities of the
Jesuit mission, which, to our
point of view, have in no way
been improper.”
The foreign minister further
noted that he had ordered the
charge de’affaires of the Cana
dian embassy in Haiti, Charles
Bedard, to lodge an official pro
test with the Duvalier regime
for refusing to allow any Can
adian official to see the two Je
suits who were held in prison.
The two were Father Paul La-
ramee, S. J., and Brother Fran -
cois-Xavier Ross, S. J., who
were arrested at the Port-au-
Prince airport Jan. 31 on their
return from a trip to Canada.
Arrested with them was Father
Paul Hamel, S. J., who had gone
to the airport to meet them. All
were imprisoned in the
notorious Fort Diamanche jail.
While Father Hamel was
released several days later,
following a protest by the Can
adian charge d’affaires, Father
Laramee and Brother Ross
were held in jail until they were
nustled off to the airport Feb.
12 and ejected from Haiti.
According to Father Jean d’-
JESUITS OUSTED FROM
HAITI BY GOVERNMENT —
The Haitian Government of
President Duvalier has expel
led the entire Jesuit commun
ity and closed that nation’s only
major seminary. Among the 18
priests and Brothers, all mem
bers of the Jesuit province of
lower Canada, flown to Mon
treal are, from the top, father
Paul Hamel, Brother F.X. Ross
and Father Paul Laramee.—
(NC Photo)
Auteuil Richard, S.J., Provin
cial of the Jesuits’ lower Can
ada province, who went to the
Montreal airport to welcome the
ousted missionaries home, nei
ther Father Laramee nor Bro
ther Ross apparently suffered
any ill-treatment. The pro
vincial said however that the
conditions at the Fort Dimanche
prison were obviously "de
plorable.”
The Jesuit community flew
out of Port-au-Prince in three
different planes. One group of
eight flew to Kingston, Jamai
ca, then toMiami, NewYorkand
Montreal. Another eight flew to
San Juan, Puerto Rico, New
York and Montreal. Two priests
flew to Santo Dominigo, capital
of the Dominican Republic,
which shares the island of His
paniola with Haiti. The two—
Fathers Paul Chartiez, S. J.,
and Paul Lachance, S.J.—
planned to go by ship to New
York and then on to Montreal by
train, because 64-year-old fa
ther Chartiez has a heart ail
ment and prefers not to fly.
The superior of the Jesuit
community in Haiti, Father Ge
rard Goulet, S. J., who was also
rector of the seminary, said on
arriving in Montreal that the
Haitian government is engaged
in "deliberate programs of re
ligious suppression.” “We
were supposed to have been in
volved in some political activi
ty,” he said. "But that was
false, of course—complete non
sense.”
Among the Jesuits returning
here was Father Roy Fenelon,
S.J., who had opened the mis
sion in Port-au-Prince in 1953.
Father Richard, the Pro
vincial, said that the 16 Jesuits
who had arrived back in
Montreal seemed to be in good
health. He said however, that
they had been "under very
severe strain for the past two
weeks” and that the "psychol
ogical climate prior to that
was bad.” The former members
of the mission in Haiti will be
reassigned after they get an ad
equate period of rest, he said.
Father Richard noted that
meanwhile eight Haitians who
are Jesuit scholastics and have
been studying in Montreal will
continue their studies there.
The expulsion of the Jesuits
was the latest episode in the
long war of attrition the Du
valier regime has waged against
the Catholic Church in pre
dominantly Catholic Haiti.
The first major incident was
the expulsion of the French-
continued on Page 2)