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SERVING 88 SOUTH - GEORGIA COUNTIES
The Southern Cross
DIOCESE OF SAVANNAH NEWSPAPER
Vol. 50 No. 44
ST. WILLIAM’S CHURCH, dedicated in 1915, has served three generations of Fitzgerald
Catholics. It has recently been replaced by a new edifice which will be solemnly dedicated at
ceremonies on Sunday, Dec. 14th. The old structure has been sold. Present plans call for its
demolition and use of the grounds as a parking lot.
ST. WILLIAMS CHURCH
Fitzgerald Dedication
Rites Set For Dec. 14
A landmark church
familiar to Fitzgerald
residents since 1914, St.
William’s, has been sold to
the Central Methodist Church
in that South Georgia city. It
has been replaced with a new
one which will be dedicated
next Sunday, Dec. 14.
Dedication rites will take
place during a concelebrated
Mass at 5:00 p.m.
Concelebrating the Sacred
Liturgy with Bishop Gerard
L. Frey will be the present
pastor, Father Gerard Moran
O.M.I. and three former
pastors. They are Fathers
Gerald Keneally O.M.I.,
Thomas McGrady O.M.I. and
Leo Wetzel O.M.I. Also
concelebrating will be the
head of the Eastern Province
of the Oblates of Maty
Immaculate, Father Thomas
Reggy O.M.I.
The congregation of St.
William’s, a mission of St.
Paul’s church, Douglas, has
never been a large one, but it
has been a long-lasting one.
Presently consisting of 48
members, St. William’s traces
its history back to 1896 when
the first Catholics came to
Fitzgerald.
In the beginning the Jesuit
Fathers, who then staffed St.
Joseph’s church, Macon,
cared for the spiritual needs
of the small band of
Catholics. In 1900, the
diocese of Savannah assumed
care of the Fitzgerald
community and continued to
do so until the coming of the
Oblates of Mary Immaculate
in 1941.
The church which has
become so familiar to three
generations of Fitzgerald
residents was dedicated
December 8, 1915.
Monsignor Herman Deimel,
recently retired from St.
Patrick’s church, Augusta,
celebrated his first solemn
Mass there after his
ordination in 1928.
Other missions of St. Paul,
Douglas, are St. Ann, Alapaha
and Holy Family,
Willachoochee.
MEETS IJ\ MACON
Pastoral Council Votes
To Restructure Itself
Restructuring of the
Savannah Diocesan Pastoral
Council (DPC) and the
establishment of Deanery
Pastoral Councils were the
principal topics for discussion
and action at a meeting of the
Diocesan organization last
Saturday, Dec. 7 in Macon.
Six resolutions submitted
by he DPC Executive Board
were adopted by the Council.
As a result, all DPC
standing committees have
been dissolved and ‘ad hoc’
committees will be formed in
the future as diocesan needs
require.
Council membership voted
to restructure the Diocesan
organization so that
membership will now consist
of 17 lay people, 7 priests
and 7 religious. Members
from each group will be
elected by their peers. Lay
representatives will represent
the deaneries according to the
population of the seven
deneries.
Priests and Religious of
each deanery will be
represented by one member
elected from the respective
> clergy and Religious groups.
The Executive Board of the
restructured DPC will be
headed by Bishop Gerard L.
Frey as President. A lay
chairman, a Religious, a priest
and 2 lay members will be
elected to the Executive
Board by the general
membership of the Council.
The Council approved a
resolution that they meet at
least semi-annually.
Noting that January 1,
1970 is the ‘deadline’ for
every parish in the diocese to
have an active Parish Pastoral
Council, the DPC approved
March 1, 1970 as the
effective date for the
implementation of seven
deanery Pastoral Councils.
The Very Rev. Kevin
Boland, Chancellor and
Executive Secretary of the
Diocesan Pastoral Council
noted that, owing to the
varying sizes of the deaneries,
it will be necessary for each
deanery structure to procede
along different lines in
determining deanery Pastoral
Council representation. “For
example,” he said, “the
Savannah Deanery will have
to be representative of eleven
parishes and many other
institutions which exist in the
deanery. A deanery like
Statesboro has fewer parishes
and, hence, its formation will
be a little different.” 1
No date for the next
meeting of the Diocesan
Pastoral Council was
announced.
INSIDE STORY
Hunger Conference Pg. 2
New Mass Explained Pg. 6
CFM Rebuttal Pg. 7
Adult Education Pg. 8
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THURSDAY, DECEMBER 11,1969
$5 Per Year
ALSO UNCERTAINTY ON FINANCES
NCCM Consultants Express
Catholic Education Support
WASHINGTON (NC)--An important “elite group” within the Catholic population
has expressed support for Catholic education, confidence that it is improving,
commitment to educational reforms, and a willingness to help given the
opportunity.
It also expressed uncertainty about the financial operations of Catholic education
and gave a clear message to the American Catholic hierarchy: “The lay people
should be dealt into the game.”
HITS ‘ABORTION-ON-REQUEST’ - Patrick Cardinal O’Boyle,
Archbishop of Washington, at a press conference (Dec. 9)
denounced an effort to ease the anti-abortion law in the District
of Columbia by permitting an abortion to be performed on any
woman who requests one. (NC Photo)
CATH. THEOLOGIAN
Sees Protestant
Ministries Valid
The ‘‘elite
group”~consultants to the
National Council of Catholic
Men (NCCM)--also rejected
overwhelmingly three of the
principal charges made
against Catholic schools
during the past decade: that
they were not changing to
meet the new nneds of the
Church, that they were
academically inferior, and
that they have a divisive
effect on American society.
The consultants, while
expressing support for
Catholic schools despite some
reservations, also served
notice they think more
Church finances and
personnel should be pumped
into other segments of the
Church’s educational
apostolate-such, for example,
as the Confraternity of
Christian Doctrine (CCD),
Newman work, and programs
of adult education.
According to Father
Andrew G. Greeley these
were principal conclusions
arising from responses to a
55-item questionaire which
the NCCM distributed to its
consultants last September.
Father Greeley, program
d. rector at the National
Opinion Research Center,
University of Chicago, was
asked by the NCCM to
p wide an expert analysis of
the survey results.
The questionnaire was
initiated as part of NCCM’s
national consultants program,
ai. effort begun some two
years ago to widen dialogue
a long members of the
C lurch at all levels. Some
6 ( ?0 consultants from all
w Iks of life, but for the most
part from the business and
p ofessional leadership class,
who participated in the
program have completed
surveys on such issues as the
U.S. bishops’ pastoral on the
( hurch; Humanae Vitae,
+*je Paul’s encyclical on
artificial contraception; and
on the revision of the
Church’s code of canon law.
The latest questionnaire
comes against a background
of confusion in Catholic
education highlighted by
financial crisis, widespread
school closings, and dispute
within Catholic educational
circles over the matter of
“priorities” --such questions,
for example, as whether the
Church should withdraw
more finances and personnel
from the parochial school
system in order to better
serve large numbers of
youngsters and adults who
never attend parochial
schools.
Father Greeley termed the
questionnaire “the most
intensive ever developed to
measure Catholic attitudes
toward Catholic education.”
“The findings ofthe NCCM
survey are relevant, not
because they are
representative of the
American Catholic
population, but because they
give some indication of how
an important elite group
within the Catholic
population reacts to the
parochial schools,” he stated.
“The findings in the NCCM
study confirm earlier
research: Catholics are still
sympathetic toward their
schools. They are aware of
the improvement that has
gone on and they want to see
still more change.”
Detailing results of the
survey items, Father Greeley
said the consultants
apparently did not think that
a certain proportion of priests
or nuns was important to
maintain the “Catholicity” of
a school. Only 13% agreed
with the idea that “if the
number of priests or
Religious teaching in a
Catholic schools drops too
low in proportion to the
number of lay teachers, the
school isn’t really Catholic
anymore.”
He said the consultants had
“dramatically endorsed” new
educational activities on
which Catholic schools have
embarked. Only 5% disagreed
with the new emphasis on
social justice and world peace
and only 14% disagreed with
sex education “at all levels.”
“Those bishops in the
country who are harassed by
the anti-sex-education
campaign and who think that
the fanatics behind this
campaign are representative
of an important element of
their dioceses should ponder
carefully the NCCM results,”
Father Greeley stated.
“Curtailing the sex education
program may appease the
fanatics but it will
profoundly offend important
leaders within the Catholic
community,” he asserted.
Even though their position
was generally sympathetic
towards Catholic schools,
Father Greeley said, the
consultants also have
some “strong reservations.”
He noted only 33%
thought it would be desirable,
even if it were possible, for
every Catholic student to
receive all his teaching in
Catholic schools, even though
80% of the respondents
thought every Catholic child
should have some Catholic
schooling during his academic
career.
“One concludes .. .that
(Continued on Page 2)
PHILADELPHIA (NC)-A
priest-theologian has
contended the Catholic
Church should recognize
certain Protestant ministries
as valid.
Father Georges Tavard,
A.A., in an editorial in the
Winter, 1970 issue of the
Journal of Ecumenical
Studies, published at Temple
University here, stated that
“recognition of ministry is
one of the major problems
that stand in the way of
reconciliation between the
churches which believe in
‘apostolic succession’ through
episcopal consecration and
ordination and those which,
having lost this mode of
ordination, interpret
apostolic succession
differently.”
Father Tavard, visiting
professor at Pennsylvania
State University, University
Park, Pa., said there is some
evidence that early and
medieval Christianity
“entertained the concept of
priestly succession as a valid
means of perpetuating the
ministry.” Current Roman
Catholic teaching-a tradition
which, the author said, dates
back only three
centuries-demands that valid
ordination be the province of
a bishop.
He added that he “would
be prepared to admit the
episcopal succession is not
absolutely required for valid
ordination. Presbyteral
(priestly) succession suffices,
for these two successions are
of one and the same kind,
episcopacy and priesthood
constituting one sacrament
only.
“This conclusion,” he
continued, “is tied to
theology of the priesthood
which sees no essential
difference between priests
and bishops as far as Orders
go, the difference lying in the
order of jurisdiction,
authority and mission.”
His position, he noted, is
not original, for it
corresponds to the doctrine
of St. Thomas Aquinas. It
has, however, been “a
minority position in more
recent times,” he said.
Father Tavard explained
that in earlier ages of the
Church, different ways of
passing on the ministry were
accepted by Catholics.
Recent developments in the
official Church attitude
toward Martin Luther,
permitting greater catholicity
for Catholicism, should allow
for expansion in the area of
sacramental validity.
“Our problem is not to
stress the past,” said, “but to
prepare the future by trying
to open new theological
avenues . . . The past, in such
a matter of fact as the
validity of Protestant
Eucharists and Orders, cannot
normatively determine the
position we should take
today.”
In view of a possible
change in this tradition,
Father Tavard outlined a
number of justifications for
it, c urrently under
examination by theologians.
Father Tavard concluded
by emphasizing that “the
main problem in our
ecumenical context does not
lie in evaluating historical
lines of succession but in
appreciating the catholicity
of Protestantism today.”
On the basis of this line of
thought, Father Tavard
expressed hope that the
officail Church will
eventually recognize the
validity of Christian
ministries other than its own.
HEADLINE
HOPSCOTCH
/f
tt
Catholic-Jewish Guidelines
BROOKLYN,N.Y. -An unprecedented set of “Guidelines for
the Advancement of Catholic-Jewish Relations,” advocating
formation of joint community level councils and outlining
ground rules for interreligious dialogue, was released here by
three New York area Catholic Sees. The document, eight
months in preparation by Catholic and Jewis Leaders, is
expected to serve as a model. It wili be sent to Catholic dioceses
throughout the country, said Father Edward H. Flannery,
executive secretaty, Secretariat for Catholic-Jewish Relations of
the U.S. Bishops’ Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious
Affairs.
Vatican I Documents
VATICAN CITY (NC)-Pope Paul VI has authorized the
publication of secret documents from the Vatican archives
pertaining to the First Vatican Council on the 100th anniversary
of that event. “His Holiness has authorized the Vatican secret
archives to avail themselves of such collaboration on the part of
scholars, historians and theologians which they will regard
necessary for a good start on the work,” according to a Vatican
statement. The documents are to be divided into three
categories: preparatory acts, conciliar acts, and accessory
material such as letters,notes and diaries.
NFCP Opposes Abortion
DENVER (NC) — The National Federation of Catholic
Physicians’ Guilds at its annual meeting here unanimously
approved a resolution opposing any action by the American
Medical Association, or other organizations, which would
approve the principle of abortion on demand. The AMA House
of Delegates, which held a four-day meeting here following the
Catholic Physicians’ meet, took no stand in support of efforts to
liberalize state abortion law reforms. Instead, the AMA
delegates retained a 1967 policy that approves abortions if the
physical or mental health of the mother is in danger. The 1967
policy had replaced one that had been on the books since 1871
and that stated that AMA denounces the conduct of
abortionists and “holds no intercourse with them
professionally.”
Saturday Mass
CHICAGO (NC)-John Cardinal Cody has announced that the
Sunday Mass obligation may be fulfilled on Saturday evening in
the Chicago archdiocese, effective after the first of the yea”.
Cardinal Cody, in a letter sent to all priests of the archdiocese,
also announced that Sunday weddings would be permitted in all
narichps Traditionally. weddings are held on Saturdays.
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