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PAGE 4—The Southern Cross, December 7,1972
The Southern Cross
Business Office 22S Abercorn St. Savannah, Ga. 31401
Most Rev. Gerard L. Frey, O.O. President
Rev. Francis J. Donohue, Editor John E. Markwalter, Managing Editor
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CBS and Propaganda
A couple of years ago two fine
comedians, the Smothers Brothers, lost
their network television show because
they forgot that they were supposed to
be entertainers and that the air waves
over which their program was carried
belong to the people.
They tried to create a new role for
themselves -- social satirists -- and that’s
not necessarily a bad role for capable
performers. But it is bad when it ceases
to be artistic satire and becomes, instead,
blatant political propaganda or brutal
caricature of moral and religious values
held dear by significant portions of the
viewing public.
Theoretically, the air waves belong to
the people. But the Smothers Brothers
used them as if they were their own
personal property and those who
violently disagreed with their “material”
found themselves completely frustrated
in any effort to make their voices heard
over the same air waves.
At least one new, “adult comedy”
program, MAUDE, seems to be adopting
a similar role and usurping the public air
waves in the same way. Only, in this
case, the program seems to have the
backing of the network, CBS.
Recently, MAUDE presented two
half-hour programs on abortion. They
were blatant propaganda for the
pro-abortion position and, from our
point of view, tasteless in the extreme.
They were carried nationwide in
prime-time to millions of people.
A New York-based organization,
Women For The Unborn, is trying to
mount a letter-writing campaign to the
Federal Communications Commission
(FCC) and Washington legislators aimed
at promoting a public hearing into the
MAUDE situation and leading,
hopefully, to a requirement by the FCC
that CBS grant equal time for a
responsible presentation of the
anti-abortion position.
According to Ellen McCormack, of
Women For The Unborn, the view that
the MAUDE programs were pro-abortion
propaganda is shared by a great many
people, including a number of
professional television reviewers. She
cites two, Kay Gardella of the New York
News and Anthony LaCamera, critic for
the Boston Herald-Traveler.
Said Kay Gardella: “What the
producers of Maude and a lot of other
behind-the-scenes Hollywood types are
doing is using whatever vehicle they can
to promote their own ideas. The idea
behind Maude is not to just make people
laugh, which was the basis once for a lot
of good comedy, but it’s also designed to
make people think - the way the
producers and writers do, of course.”
Referring to remarks by MAUDE’s
executive producer, Norman Lear, Mr.
LaCamera made this statement:
“Whether one is for or against its
liberalization, moreover, there is little
doubt that Maude turned into a
propaganda tract for abortion. And that
raised a very pertinent point: Since the
FCC’s so-called fairness doctrine requires
networks and stations to present both
sides of a controversial issue of wide
significance, how can CBS go
unchallenged in its stacked, propaganda
piece clothed in old burlesque comedy?
“Producer Lear, in an Associated Press
interview, described station managers
who refuse to carry certain telecasts as
‘out of touch with their audience’ - as if
television were watched by a monolithic
mass. ‘They don’t understand their
audience,’ he was quoted as saying.
‘They’re much more intelligent than
they think.’
“We certainly are, Norman, and that’s
why we can see through what you’re
doing. Or, for that matter, through what
CBS is doing.”
We urge our readers who value the
right to life to write to the Federal
Communications Commission, 1919 M.
Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.,
expressing their disagreement with the
abortion position espoused by MAUDE
and requesting a public hearing into the
situation. Ask, also, to be notified of the
dates of such a hearing.
Women For The Unborn cautions that
you will probably not receive a response
since the FCC receives a great many
letters, and urges that opponents keep
on writing and that they encourage their
friends to write the FCC regularly. The
group also strongly encourages similar
letters to your congressman and
senators.
We join Women For The Unborn in
their campaign. Americans would not
tolerate a government propaganda
department. They shouldn’t tolerate the
Columbia Broadcasting System trying to
act as one, either.
As Long As You’re
Not Doing Anything —
Mary Carson
Whenever my kids answer the phone, and the
question is, “Is your mother busy?” they
always reply, “Nope - Mommy’s not doing
anything.”
It doesn’t matter if I’m doing laundry,
cooking dinner, bathing the baby, cleaning the
house, or washing dishes .. .“Nope - Mommy’s
not busy.”
The other day, I was on the top of a ladder
hanging an eight foot strip of gluey
wallpaper. . .“Nope - Mommy’s not doing
anything.”
I don’t mind stopping what I’m doing to
answer the phone, but I would like a little
credit for doing SOMETHING!
Maybe the kids are reflecting the attitude
many people have regarding housework and
motherhood . . .“That’s doing nothing.”
Frankly, I think being a wife, mother and
homemaker IS doing something .. .SOME
THING VITAL.
I was talking to a neighbor the other day.
She commented, “I get tired of all the articles
in magazines that try to convince me I’m a jerk
because I’m ONLY a mother.
“I should be out ‘fulfilling’ myself; I should
be ‘developing a career’; I should be ‘exploring
broader horizons.’
“Every time I finish reading one of those
articles I wonder if there is something wrong
with me. I LIKE being a mother. I don’t feel
suppressed, neglected, rejected or unfulfilled.
“When my kids are grown, if I choose, I can
go back to work .. .but right now I want to just
be a mother! And I’d like the people who write
all those articles to realize that if some women
want careers outside their homes - fine. But MY
PROFESSION is PARENTHOOD!”
I had to agree with her. I consider
motherhood a very skilled, demanding,
rewarding, praiseworthy job.
She kept going: “When we go to a party,
someone asks my husband, ‘What do you do?’
He says, ‘Sales executive.’ They look at him as
if he were the Pope.
Then they turn to me, ‘And what do you
do?’ I answer, ‘I’m a mother.’ The faces drop,
and they sigh, “Maybe some day, when the
children are older, you can get out and do
something!’ ”
She exploded. “Some day I’m going to
punch someone . . .right in the nose!”
Trying to calm her down, I said, “Next time
it happens, why don’t you say, ‘I’m the General
Manager of a small corporation. I handle
finances, purchasing, training personnel,
maintenance, and security; I’m in charge of
company sponsored activities.
“ ‘It’s a great business and growing rapidly.
There is constant need for me to revitalize
procedures, re-train the employees in new
methods, and develop new organizational
techniques. Fm developing a good product,
much in demand on the market.’
“You don’t have to tell them it’s managing a
home, and raising a family. And it would be the
truth!”
There are times when I get tired of the lack
of appreciation for the great responsibility of
motherhood, and I’m tempted to sign my
name, Mary Carson, M.S.
I don’t have a Master of Science.
It stands for “Mother Superior.”
It’s an Argument,
But Not Theology
Rev. Andrew M. Greeley
Slam Door
On Women?
Joseph A. Breig
A woman phoned to say that a couple of her
women friends were so mad they were
threatening to stomp right out of the Church,
because they thought Pope Paul had slammed
the door on the Christian equality of women.
They thought so because they had read it in a
newspaper or heard it on a newscast.
But the Holy Father had done nothing of the
kind. He had merely remarked, in a brief
document on liturgical ministries, that “in
accordance with the venerable tradition of the
Church,” formal installation in the offices of
acolyte and lector was reserved to men. Not the
offices - just formal installation in them. And
he didn’t say forever.
Why, then, didn’t Pope Paul say something
like “for the time being?” I think the answer is
that he was afraid the communications media
would leap to the conclusion that he was saying
that women soon would be ordained - that he
was deciding the question before the
theological studies of it had matured.
Reports from Rome indicate that Paul VI has
yielded to the pressure of conservative cardinals
(a not infrequent response) and decided against
expanding the College of Electors who choose
the Pope. The reason given, according to the
press, is “theological:” The Pope is Bishop of
Rome, and the Bishop of Rome should be
chosen by parish priests of Rome.
The argument would be fair enough under
two sets of circumstances: (1) If the Pope were
only the Bishop of Rome and did not exercise
worldwide administrative control in the
Church; and (2) if the cardinals were really/
parish priests of Rome in anything but the
thinnest legal fiction.
But in the present state of Church structure,
the Pope is not merely the Bishop of Rome, not
merely the presiding bishop of the Catholic
Church; he also exercises direct and immense
control over what goes on in every parish in the
world. To pretend that his election is merely a
concern of the clergy of Rome is to overlook
the worldwide administrative power of the
papacy.
On the other hand, it is absurd to argue that
the cardinals really are the parish clergy of
Rome. If the Pope is essentially the Bishop of
Rome and if the theological right to elect him
resides in the clergy of the diocese of Rome,
then he should be chosen by those who are in
fact and not in fancy the clergy of Rome. As it
is now, the electors represent neither the parish
priests of Rome nor the Catholic people of the
world; they represent, rather, the
self-perpetuating power structure that runs the
Church.
Whether this power structure is doing a good
or a bad job may be a matter for differences of
opinion; whether it ought to stay in power or
not may also be subject to debate. But it is less
than honest to contend that the power
structure represents the interests and the
concerns and the theological rights of the
priests and people of the city of Rome.
Logically there are two choices. If the Pope
is going to be the administrative head as well as
the spiritual leader of the whole Church, then
the whole Church should participate in his
selection - in line with the canonical dicta,
“QUI PRAEFUTURUS EST OMNIBUS, AB
OMNIBUS ELIGETUR” (He who presides over
all should be chosen by all) and “QUOD
OMNES TANGET, AB OMNIBUS
DECIDETUR” (What affects all should be
decided by all). If, on the other hand, he is to
administer only Rome and act as presiding
Bishop and religious and spiritual leader for the
rest of the world, his selection might well be
left to those who are involved in the day-to-day
ministry of the people of Rome. There is no
theological or historical reason against the latter
alternative. Indeed, worldwide papal
administration is a recent phenomenon; if it
does flow from the theological essence of the
papacy, then that theological essence was
ignored for the first twelve hundred years of
Christianity.
What makes the “theological” argument
against expansion of the papal electors so ironic
is the assertion that theologically the right to
elect the Bishop of Rome belongs to the clergy
of Rome. One can make a good historical case
for the argument.
But the case can be made with equal validity
for all dioceses. Indeed, the argument that the
Bishop of Rome should be elected by his own
diocese is merely a conclusion from the larger
historical, canonical, and perhaps theological
proposition that the right to elect a bishop -
any bishop - belongs in the diocese over which
he is to preside.
The conservative cardinals have pulled
another fast one. They have resurrected an
ancient canonical principle to justify the
continuation of their own power. They have
blithely applied the principle to the Diocese of
Rome and ignored the fact that if it applies to
one diocese it should legitimately apply to all.
And there’s not a chance of that happening.
Why is the pope gun-shy about the media?
Well, consider what an incredible mess they
made of the reporting of the reform of the
Church calendar - a reform made to center
devotion more upon Christ. And recall what
happened in 1964 when Pope Paul announced
appointment of a commission to put before
him all the latest arguments for birth control.
What happened was that the media jumped
seven leagues to the conclusion that the
Church’s teaching on contraception was about
to be changed; and millions were badly misled,
including not a few priests.
The media leaped because journalists
covering the Vatican had never done their
homework; and never studied the 20-century
history of the teaching, not even the recent
teaching of Pius XI, Pius XII, or John XXIII
and the Second Vatican Council. The
journalists did not even realize that the teaching
concerns divine law, not Church law.
So the media ran wild. Pope Paul tried to
save the situation. He issued a grave warning
that the Church’s teaching authority was not in
a state of doubt, but merely in “a moment of
reflection concerning matters put before it as
worthy of the most attentive consideration.”
But the damage was done; and when the
pope issued his encyclical “Humane Vitae,”
reaffirming the moral law, many people felt
betrayed.
Therefore Pope Paul, having learned a bitter
lesson about the press and radio and TV, is now
a very cautious man. He merely mentioned in
passing that formal installation as acolyte or
lector is reserved to men as has traditionally
been the case; but again the media, thirsty for
sensational headlines, accused him of slamming
the door on women.
I will concede that there is room for
improvement in the Vatican’s handling of news.
But this is a two-way street. Journalists at the
Vatican should provide themselves with some
background knowledge of things Catholic.
After all, editors don’t send, to cover football,
men who don’t know a punt from a pass. And
further, the Vatican journalists should recite 10
times a day the motto of the old International
News Service: “Get it first - but first get it
right.”
Pointers
For Parents
Rev. Joseph Dean
As long as a child is under the parents’ eye he
has good habits, he goes to church, he does
what he’s told. But as soon as he is away from
home and parents, he will do what is right, only
if he has formed basic convictions, based on the
real values in life, and on a moral code that he
sees makes sense to him.
For instance, he needs to be taught a high
ideal for marriage, that sex is sacred, and holy,
and a gift of God, a sharing with husband and
wife in the creation of new human life. He
should be shown that the period of courtship is
a preparation for the married state, that the
best wedding gift he, or she, can give the
marriage partner is a life of virtue, a pure and
unsullied body, a character of self control. If he
can be trusted with his companions of the
opposite sex before marriage, then he can trust
himself after marriage.
Marriage should be presented, not as it is
portrayed in the amusement world, as merely a
sexual union, but it should be presented as a
composite union, a union of mind, of heart and
will, a union of 2 persons with the same basic
convictions on life and morality, a harmony of
temperament and character, a union of
individuals with mutual interests and
sympathies, a union of people whose emotions
and feelings at least balance off.
These types of union are the ones to be
stressed in time of courtship, for they will last
throughout the marriage, long after the physical
attraction wears off at the end of the
honeymoon period.
If a young person is convinced of these
truths from early teens, then he will use good
judgement on what he does with his eyes, ears,
speech, companions and free time, every day.
He will see clearly why he should have a
variety of friends, and not to be tied down to
going steady until he is out of high school. He
will see the reasons why his parents show their
love by their concern. He will in turn become a
responsible parent with responsible,
appreciative children.