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DIOCESE OF SAVANNAH NEWSPAPER
Vol. 38, No. 40
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SAVANNAH, GEORGIA, THURSDAY, APRIL 18, 1968
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POPE iN HUMBLE HOLY WEEK RITE-Pope Paul VI washes feet of Peter Thiet of North
Vietnam, a seminarian studying in Rome, during Holy Thursday rites. The Pope washed and kissed
the feet of 12 young men from around the world who are studying in Rome for the priesthood.
Besides the North Vietnamese refugee, also taking part in the Vatican ceremony were four other
Asians, four Black Africans, an Australian, a Colombian an*! * Snnt? Sen islander from Torj'v
(RNS Photo)
EASTER MESSAGE
Pope Urges End Of War,
Racism And Class Hate
VATICAN CITY (RNS) -
Pope Paul VI, in his
traditional Easter message to
the world, made a dual appeal
for an end to the war in
Vietnam and for the
replacement of racism,
nationalism and class hatred
by universal love.
Without mentioning Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., by
name, he spoke of the
“inauspicious and warning
episode of the murder which
stirred the whole world.”
He said “it would be most
admirable if those great
collective egoisms. . .racism,
nationalism, class hatred and
the dominion of privileged
peoples over the weaker
ones. . .were made to open
themselves up to the
courageous and generous
adventure of universal love.”
In making what was
regarded by many as his
strongest appeal for peace in
Vietnam, the Pope spoke
before more than 100,000
tourists and pilgrims who
braved downpours of rain to
attend an open-air Easter
Mass celebrated in front of
St. Peter’s Basilica.
He said the thoughts of
the whole civilized world
“turn. . .toward peace,
toward the difficult peace of
that distant region of Asia,
where, it seems, the war can
never end, where the collision
of the greatest powers keeps
the world in suspense, with
the anguished fear of a
gigantic conflict which would
overwhelm all in frightful
ruin.”
At the same time, the
Pope exhorted mankind to
“turn away from this
nightmare of persistent
menace” and to “implore all
the interested parties to think
resolutely in terms of military
truce and honorable and fair
negotiations.”
“Eagerly,” he said, “do we
look, as all of you do also,
upon the promising
symptoms of a forthcoming
understanding between the
peoples in conflict, and we
express the wish, made
acceptable by our absolute
neutrality and our heartfelt
affection for the nations
involved, and, above all, for
the suffering peoples, that
these first steps may soon
lead to a happy ending.”
Going on to voice hope
that “the show of strength”
might be “transformed into a
competition of generosity,”
the pontiff added:
“May victory go, not to a
presumptive justice of arms,
but to a justice which
recognizes the reciprocal
rights to freedom, and the
common needs of work and
of peace; may the feeling of
envy and hate be turned into
resolutions of pardon and
brotherhood.”
Turning also to the Middle
East and Africa, Pope Paul
spoke of the “fearful shock”
experienced by the world
because of recent conflicts in
these areas.
“May there now arise
again,” he said, “the great
ideals of the orderly and
peaceful organization of the
world; may skepticism
regarding the constitutional
inability of mankind to
advance its freedom never
triumph; but may hope be
confirmed and with hope the
necessary action to resolve
present conflicts and prevent
others in the future.”
The Pope concluded his
1,000-word message,
delivered in a firm, ringing
voice, by expressing “another
wish which the good of
mankind suggests and which
we would like to vivify with
the charism of Easter.”
was for “a
authoritative
effective
the rights of
the civilized
INSIDE STORY
Anglican-Methodist Union
Mercy Team Mourned
Our Readers Reply
Convention Speakers
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This wish
clearer, more
and more
affirmation of
man, which
world is celebrating this year
in a special and solemn
manner,” the Pope explained.
In the opening part of his
message, Pope Paul spoke of
“the interior world of the
heart, where it may seem a
vain labor to introduce truly
active and renovating
elements, those innovations,
namely, which can conquer
man’s natural tendency
toward his inborn
weaknesses, toward his
recurring and reviving
wickedness, toward his
primitive and also modern
deformation of the true
concept of life and of his
higher destiny.”
MASSIVE SPENDING PROGRAM
Nation’s Churchmen Urge
‘Economic Bill Of Rights’
NEW YORK (RNS) - Four major religious organizations,
representing Protestants, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox and Jews,
have asked Congress to pass a multi-billion-dollar Economic Bill
of Rights for the Disadvantaged.
In a joint statement leaders of he organizations urged the
“extraordinary action” as a “first step” in implementation of
the recommendations of the National Advisory Commission on
Civil Disorders (Kerner Report).
They noted that the
massive anti-poverty
campaign had been
recommended by the late Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., when
he said he hoped his
non-violent demonstrations
would lead to a measure
“requiring about 10 or 12
billion dollars.”
Signing the statement on
behalf of their organizations
were Archbishop John F.
Dearden, head of the
National Conference of
Catholic Bishops and of the
U.S. Catholic Conference; Dr.
Arthur S. Flemming,
president of the National
C n u r> o.\ i o f Obu es:
Archbishop Iakovos,
chairman of the Standing
Conference of Orthodox
Bishops in the Americas; and
Rabbi Jacob P. Rudin,
president of the Synagogue
Council of America, the
national coordinating body
for Conservative, Orthodox
and Reform Judaism.
It was issued on April 14 --
the day when Christians
observed Easter and one of
the days of Passover,
memorial of Jewish freedom
from Egyptian bondage.
“Only through massive
contributions by the
American people,” the
statement declared, “can this
nation duly honor the
life-offering of Martin Luther
King, Jr., and responsibly lift
up the burden of the poor
and oppressed in our land.”
The religious leaders asked
that citizens back the effort
to the extent of accepting
additional taxes, that private
and public sectors accelerate
their programs of help to the
disadvantaged, and declared
their intention “to take
immediate steps to develop a
coordinated sacrificial effort
on the part of the American
religious community to help
the disadvantaged implement
local programs.”
The interreligious
declaration commended the
Congress for passing the 1968
Civil Rights Act, but urged
the legislators to “approve
immediately the balance of
the $ 1,980,000,000
authorized by the Economic
Opportunity Act for fiscal
year 1968.”
The four groups, the
statement declared, “bow
together in grief before the
shameful murder” of Dr.
King, and “affirm that no
service of remembrance or
local memorial is equal to the
greatness of his labor or the
vastness of our national
need.”
HEADLINE
HOPSCOTCH
DIOCESE
Senate Of Religious
The Senate of Religious of the Diocese of Savannah will meet
on May 4 at the Holiday Inn in Dublin, Georgia. The meeting is
scheduled for 12:30 p.m.
Benedictine High
Father Paschal Kneip, O.S.B., assistant pastor, Sacred Heart
Church, Jeannette, and member of the faculty of Greensburg
Central Catholic High School, has been assigned to the
Benedictine Priory and Benedictine High School in Savannah,
for teaching and administrative duties, it was announced by
Archabbot Egbert Donovan, O.S.B. last week. Father Paschal, a
native of Pittsburgh, earned his bachelor’s degree in Philosophy
at St. Vincent College in 1948 and was ordained to the
priesthood in 1951.
NATION
Schools' Cutting Edge’
SAN FRANCISCO (NC) -- “Catholic education must become
the cutting edge of the Church’s effort to serve the world,”
Bishop Ernest J. Primeau of Manchester, N.H., told 12,000
delegates to the opening session of the 65th annual convention
of the National Catholic Educational Association (NCEA) here
(April 15). He continued: “This' is a moment for us to grapple,
to the best of our ability, with the new ills that cry out for
curing in our troubled world. “And no American Catholic
educator need look far to know what these ills are: grinding
poverty that degrades and destroys the human spirit, the
pervasive strain of violence that runs like a malignancy through
American society, the terrifying racist bent that threatens to
rend our nation and divide it into armed camps, black and
white.”
EUROPE
No Aid To Rebels
NOORDWYKERHOUT, Netherlands (RNS) - A suggestion
that the Roman Catholic Church should give material as well as
moral aid to revolutionary movements in developing countries
was rejected here by the Netherlands Pastoral Council. Reason
given was the interpretation that might be given to the term
“revolutionary.”
COMMEMORATING A DREAM-Richard Cardinal Cushing spoke at a memorial service (April 8)
for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on historic Boston Common. Some 30,000 persons attended the
service, sponsored by Catholics, Protestants and Jews. Cardinal Cushing called for the building of
“a new world of dignity and justice, of hope and opportunity, from which no man would be
excluded.” (NC Photos)
THEOLOGICAL JOURNEY
The Faith Of Dr. King-
Told In His Own Words
MIAMI, Fla. (RNS) -
Mu< 4 is being said and
written about Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr., today
because of his tragic and
violent death. But very little
is being said rbout what
made him what he was - his
faith.
As he wrote in his book,
Strength To Love (Harper,
1963), his faith did not
become firmly anchored in a
personal God until he
underwent the trials and
persecutions forced upon him
as he accepted leadership of
the non-violent movement for
social justice.
Like many a young and
intelligent seminary student,
Dr. King was attracted by
“theological liberalism”
which was much more
opt imistic than his
fundamentalist background.
“Liberalism provided me
with an intellectual
satisfaction that I had never
found in fundamentalism,”
he wrote. “I became so
enamored of the insights of
liberalism that I almost fell
into the trap of accepting
uncritically everything it
encompassed. I was
absolutely convinced of the
natural goodness of man and
the natural power of human
reason.”
While Dr. King retained
liberalism’s devotion to the
search for truth with an open
and analytical mind, “I began
to question the liberal
doctrine of man.
“The more I observed the
tragedies of history and man’s
shameful inclination to
choose the low road,” he
wrote, “the more I came to
see the depths and strength of
sin.”
Yet he could not embrace
neo-orthodoxy. “In its
attempt to preserve the
transcendence of God, which
had been neglected by an
overstress of his immanence
in liberalism, neo-orthodoxy
went to the extreme of
stressing a God who was
hidden, unknown, and
‘wholly other,’ ” Dr. King
explained in his book. “In its
revolt against overemphasis
on the power of reason in
liberalism, neo-orthodoxy fell
into a mood of anti-ration
alism and semi-fundament-
alism, stressing a narrow,
uncritical biblicism.”
Then he discovered
existentialism and became
convinced that it had
“grasped certain basic truths
about man and his condition
that could not be
permanently overlooked.”
Dr. King found JJiat “an
understanding of the ‘finite
freedom’ of man is one of the
Continued on Page 5 •
BAPTIST COMMUNION
RFK Explains
Church Action
WASHINGTON, D. C.
(RNS)-Sen. Robert F.
Kennedy (D.-N.Y.), a Roman
Catholic, explained to
newsmen here his reception
of Holy Communion at a
Baptist church recently.
He said that he had
received a cup of grape juice
and a biscuit at New Bethel
Baptist church here as a
“gesture of fellowship,” and
not as sacramental
Communion.
Kennedy received
Communion in the Baptist
church on April 7 after a tour
of Negro ghettos where
violence had occurred.
His explanation of the
gesture was made through
Frank Mankiewicz, a press
assistant, after reporters
asked why the senator had
received Baptist Communion.
In May 1967, the Vatican
Secretariat for Christian
Unity issued a document
specifying that Catholics
“may be allowed to attend
occasionally the liturgical
services of other brethren if
they have reasonable
ground. . .
“This participation, from
which reception of the
Eucharist is always excluded,
should lead the participants
to esteem the spiritual riches
we have in common and at
the same time to make them
aware of the gravity of our
separation.”
Commenting on the
Kennedy incident, an
ecumenist here said that the
“whole question of
inter-communion involves a
complex of theological
questions which are the
subject of on-going bilateral
consultations between the
Catholic Church and a
number of other Churches at
the national level, and also
the subject of discussion at
the international level.”