Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 4—The Southern Cross, August 16,1973
The Southern Cross
Business Office 225 Abercorn St. Savannah, Ga. 31401
Most Rev. Raymond W. Lessard, D.D., President
Rev. Francis J. Donohue, Editor
John E. Markwalter, Managing Editor
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‘Maude
Readers may remember that late last
year, the MAUDE comedy series,
broadcast by the Columbia Broadcasting
System (CBS), aired two segments which
this newspaper characterized as “blatant
propaganda for the pro-abortion position
and . . .tasteless in the extreme.”
We reported that a New York based
organization called Women For The
Unborn was trying to mount a
letter-writing campaign to the
Federal Communications Commission
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.
We also urged readers to write to the
FCC at 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.
Apparently nothing came from the
letter-writing campaign, because not
only was no hearing ever held, and not
only did CBS fail to offer air time -for a
responsible presentation of the
anti-abortion position, but the two
segments are now part of the network’s
summer re-run schedule. The first
segment was broadcast last Tuesday
evening and the second one will be
shown next Tuesday (Aug. 21).
Tragedy
In the past few years, American
Catholics have been called upon to come
to the aid of calamity-stricken people in
India, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Peru, and
Nicaragua. Through Catholic Relief
Services (CRS), they have responded
quickly, generously and effectively.
Now they are being asked to come to
the aid of six million people in a huge
drought-ridden area of West Africa
comparable in size to half the continent
of Europe. These nomadic desert
tribesmen and millet and peanut farmers
are among the poorest people on earth.
After five years without rain they face
famine, disease and death.
The area’s top soil is exhausted. Once
available lands and pastures have become
desert-like. For five years an entire
generation has been growing up with
inadequate nutrition for good physical
and mental development.
Protest
We think it is very important for
broadcasters to know that there are very
many people who do not find the
advocacy of abortion a proper subject
for comedy, most especially a comedy
program shown during prime- time when
children as well as adults are watching
television.
CBS already knows it because there
have been several meetings and
exchanges of correspondence between
spokesmen for the United States
Catholic Conference and high officials of
the network, including CBS Television
President Robert D. Wood, concerning
the two MAUDE segments, but CBS
apparently doesn’t care. Perhaps local
broadcasters do. One way to find out is
to write them and make your feelings
known in a courteous manner.
If you were distressed by MAUDE’s
advocacy of abortion and feel that it is
not proper subject for a family-type
comedy program, then we suggest you
say so to the following people:
In Augusta write to Mr. James
Armistead at WRDW 1301 Georgia Ave.,
North Augusta.
In Columbus contact Mr. J. W.
Woodruff, WRBL, 1350 13th Ave.;
In Macon the man to write is Mr.
Albert Sanders, WMAZ, Box 5008;
Savannahians should get in touch with
Mr. F. Schley Knight, WTOC, Box 8086.
in Africa
Governments are extending aid. The
major food-producing countries of the
world have undertaken the task of
supplying several hundred thousand tons
of basic food needs and are providing
supplemental air and road transport,
seeds, fertilizer and technical know how.
But more help is needed -- on a people
to people basis - and it is needed NOW.
Jesus fed the hungry and healed the
sick and invited his followers to imitate
him.
Send your gift to help feed the hungry
and heal the sick in drought-stricken
Africa to:
WEST AFRICAN FAMINE FUND,
CATHOLIC RELIEF SERVICES,
EMPIRE STATE BUILDING, NEW
YORK,N.Y. 10001.
I Liked First Communion
Before First Confession!
Mary Carson
I was very disapppointed at the abrupt
decision by Vatican officials to end the
experimentation permitting children to receive
First Communion before going to Confession.
This experimentation was taking place in 96
dioceses throughout the United States,
including the one in which I live.
My comments here are based only on
practical experience, not on any theological
training. The five oldest of my children made
their First Confession before First Communion;
the next two received Communion before
Confession; and the youngest, who is retarded,
has just begun her religious education in a
CCD class for exceptional children.
First of all, from the children’s point of view,
I don’t think it mattered which came first. But
it was very important to the parents!
Our parish set up two tracks for the children
preparing for First Communion, one with
Confession first, one with Communion first.
The parents made the choice for their child.
So the principal benefit derived from this
experiment was directly involving the parents in
the formal religious education of their children.
In deciding which course our children should
follow, my husband and I opted for
Communion first and our thinking followed
this line:
Sin is the deliberate turning away from God.
It is not possible to reject God and His love
until one knows Him. The Eucharist
strengthens the knowledge and love of God.
So we reasoned that it was more important
for our children to receive Communion first.
Other parents made other decisions based on
their children’s needs. We have no argument
with them.
But we do argue with the concept that all
children will benefit from the Eucharist only at
the point in their lives that they learn to
commit sin. That’s nonsense!
Even a toddler grasps the idea of love; he
responds to love. And his knowledge of love
outstrips his knowledge of guilt for many years.
I do believe that a child has some sense of
right and wrong. But when he does wrong, I
find it impossible to believe that he does it
deliberately . . .knowing and understanding that
he is turning away from God.
And one very personal question really
bothers me. What about my eighth child?
Bobbie is going on seven. Although she is
retarded she responds to love, and I think she
will have some understanding of the Eucharist
soon. But if she has to wait until she is capable
of turning from God and committing sin before
she receives, she will wait a very long time.
About two-thirds of the dioceses in the
United States had approved this
experimentation. I don’t know if these Bishops
were consulted regarding how it affected
religious education programs in their dioceses.
But two-thirds of the Catholic parents were
also involved! Did the Vatican officials consider
finding out from them how the program really
worked? Or do they think that parents
shouldn’t have any say in the decisions
regarding their own children’s spiritual
development?
If you had a child or children involved,
please write to me in care of THE SOUTHERN
CROSS, Box 232, Waynesboro, Georgia 30830.
I’ll forward your letter to Cardinal John
Wright in Rome so that he can share your
thoughts with the Vatican officials who made
the decision.
OUR
PARISH
“Let’s send someone out
for a bucket of chicken
and roast beef sandwiches!”
Task Force on
Poverty
co ^//
Kueng Isn’t
A Radical Theologian
Reverend Andrew M. Greeley
Copyright 1973, Inter/Syndicate
The last thing in the world we need at this
point in time (as they say at the Watergate
circus) is a battle between Hans Kueng and the
Roman Curia. The demand that Kueng “submit”
or go to Rome for trial (which of course would
be in secret and for which he would not even be
given documentation of accusations against
him) sounds like the nineteenth century or
possibly the sixteenth, but hardly like the era
after the Second Vatican Council. What good
can possibly come from such a fight is terribly
hard to imagine.
Some of Kueng’s friends have had a hard time
understanding why he has expanded so much
energy on what is apparently such a trivial
issue. After all, if it took nineteen centuries to
discover that a doctrine was part of the faith, it
could scarcely be all that central a doctrine.
Kueng, it is argued, should be concerned about
more fundamental issues like God, Jesus, Life
and Death.
Or, as someone remarked, if infallibility
doesn’t apply to something as critical as the
birth control encyclical (and no one claimed
that it did) it really doesn’t seem to be a
terribly useful attribute.
There is some point to the argument. I
think that Kueng is at his best when he is
developing a positive theology for our time, as
he did in his speech at the CONCILIUM
Congress in Brussels a number of years ago. But
those who cannot understand his interest in
such a peripheral issue of ecclesiastical structure
as infallibility make the same mistakes that his
Roman adversaries do: They fail to understand
that Hans Kueng is a profoundly conservative
thinker. The Curia has him written off as a
troublesome rabble-rouser who could be
another Luther.
I cannot imagine anyone more unlike Luther
in temperament, training, personality or
conviction. Kueng is absolutely loyal to the
Church, so loyal that he still cares about the
credibility of Church structures, a subject about
which the more radical theologians couldn’t
care less. There are many radical theologians in
the Church today. I could name names if the
Holy Office were interested. But because these
radicals address themselves to questions which
did not exist in the theological manuals of a
generation ago and to topics which the Curia
does not even remotely understand, they will
not get in trouble and will never be an object
for a Holy Office document.
But Kueng is conservative enough to care
about theological traditions, and a churchman
enough to be concerned about the Church as an
institution. It is the very traditionalism and
conservatism of his theological interests that
makes him a target.
In addition, the real radicals are writing
about things that do not appear to be a threat
to anyone’s power. Kueng, on the other hand,
is easily perceived as a threat to power because
he is taking on the ecclesiastical establishment
on what it thinks - quite mistakenly - is the
basis for its ability to influence the rest of the
Church.
I defy anyone to read THE COUNCIL,
REUNION AND REFORM, STRUCTURES OF
THE CHURCH, THE CHURCH, and
HONESTY IN THE CHURCH and not
conclude that here is a man who is trying with
all his very considerable talent to make the
Church a light shining on the mountaintop to
whom all men will come for illumination and
warmth. If only the Romans were smart enough
to realize it, they would recognize Hans Kueng
not as an enemy but as one of their strongest
potential allies.
His points about infallibility must be seen
not as an effort to destroy the effectiveness of
the Church but to enhance it. Any dialogue
with him that does not take place in that
context misses the whole point of Kueng’s
entire career as a priest and as a theologian.
I’m all for Hans Kueng being summoned to
Rome. But not as a heretic to stand trial. Make
him secretary of state. I can think of nothing
which would more effectively improve the
prestige and influence of the papacy than his
presence as a major theological and religious
adviser in Rome.
How Does Christ Live In Us?
Rev. Joseph Dean
People are unhappy basically because they
are so self-centered .. . Hence, this question: Is
there a power or a Person in the universe who
can come into our human nature and shift the
center of our lives from self to something, or
Someone, higher? And break our self-obsession,
and somehow set us free? Jesus tells us, Yes.
“Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch
cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the
vine, so neither can you unless you abide in
Me.”
How then does Christ live in us? How does
this life of Jesus come into our very persons?
What must a man do who wants that divine life
flooding his stunted soul?
1. He must believe in its possibility on the
promise of Jesus Himself.
2. He must want it ardently. God is drawn to
us through our strong desire. This desire is
inflamed by study of the life of Jesus in the
four gospels. Desire is inflamed also by prayer.
Just to think of Him and to murmur His name,
“Jesus! Jesus!” increases this longing.
3. He must open his mind to the incoming of
Christ. During our school days our teachers
urged us to give our minds to things, to give full
attention to this or that study. We give our
mind to Christ when we attend to Him, think
of Him, talk to Him, work with Him, rest with
Him, walk with Him-and the more we give Him
our minds, the more He gives us His. If we want
this, we must learn how to give Him our minds.
We must be resolute, methodical, and eager. We
must see it as the chief business of every day.
We must ask for His help because we cannot
succeed alone.
a. Turn your mind at once to Him. If you
wake slowly, let each step to wakefulness be a
step toward Him. Address to Him your first
words of the day. Say in your heart: “I am
here, Lord, and eager for another day .”
b. Cultivate the custom of linking your Lord
and yourself with “We.” “What are we going to
do today together, Lord?”
c. If it seems too familiar at first, remember
that He encourages such intimacy: It is beyond
understanding why He should want to live in
our soiled hearts - But He does, and this united
life is made easier with the plural pronoun. Say,
“We.” Glance ahead at the day. “We are going
to do everything together today, Lord.” See
yourself going through the day with Him. Meet
every known duty in -thought with Him before
you meet it (still with Him) in reality. “We
must make the most of that opportunity,
Lord.”
4. Then go to work in Jesus. Talk with Him
as you go. “What do you want to do today,
Jesus?” Talk with Him as you work. “We
finished that job, Lord, and we did it together.”
On the way home, notice various sights. “Look!
Lord Jesus, look!” In the evening, on different
occasions, “Thank you, dear Jesus!” or “I am
sorry for that remark, my Jesus. Help me make
things right again.”
Keep a set of words for patience, love, joy,
peace in the foreground of your mind for
prayer to your Friend, for conversation with
your Brother, for a good-night whisper to your
Savior and Redeemer.
Stoop
A Little
Reverand James Wilmes
Benjamin Franklin as a youth was tall,
self-assured, and at times too big for his boots.
One day on entering the house of the Rev.
Cotton Mather, young Ben hit his head on a
ceiling beam. Said the Rev. Mr. Mather, with
significant inflection, “Stoop a little, Benjamin,
as you go through life. It will save you many a
hard knock.”
Young Franklin got the point and later in life
plaee Humility high on his famous list of
desirable character-traits. In after years he
wrote, “He who falls in love with himself will
have no rivals.” And is it not so?
Pride and arrogance are unbending and must
take many a hard jolt. Humbleness of spirit is
resilient. We speak of an inferiority complex as
a dreadful handicap, which it is. But far more
hobbling is the feeling of superiority.
Turn to the biographies of the great, and on
many a page you will find some giant
personality peering out from behind frightened
eyes, speaking with halting speech, confessing,
“I did not control events. Events controlled
me.”
The Braggarts are there, too, but their works
do not justify their cocksure self-appraisal. “I
am the state,” announced a haughty king; but
who remembers what else he was? To stoop a
little as one makes his way in the world is good
for the soul.
< 111 — (Fr. Greeley’s column appeared in
most Catholic papers last week, and
prompted this week’s column by Joe
Breig.)
1
Infallibility
“Trivial?”
Joe Breig
In his syndicated column which is published
in a number of Catholic newspapers, Father
Andrew M. Greeley writes with an almost
unbelievable superficiality on the topic of papal
infallibility.
Defending Father Hans Kueng of Germany
who has attacked the teaching of the First
Vatican Council in this matter, Father Greeley,
believe it or not, writes, “If it took 19 centuries
to discover that a doctrine was part of the
Faith, it could scarcely be all that central a
doctrine.”
This is incredible. Is it really possible for a
man to go through the studies required for the
priesthood, and be ignorant of the fact that
papal infallibility has been a part of Catholic
belief-and indeed a part the importance of
which is almost beyond words-from the first
beginnings of Christianity?
Does Father Greeley hot understand that a
formal definition of a doctrine of the Faith is
not the “discovery” or the invention of the
doctrine, but rather a formulation of the
ancient Faith which is necessary or at least wise
in view of certain circumstances?
Historically, it has generally been true that
infallible definitions have been given only after
a dogma held and taught by the Church
through the centuries came under serious
attack. Such was the case, for example, with
the definition of Mary’s Immaculate
Conception. A notable exception was the
definition of her Assumption into Heaven,
which had not been seriously questioned.
Father Greeley must be fearfully uninformed
about Church history and Scripture when he
can write, as he did, that “some of Kueng’s
friends” (obviously including himself) “have
had a hard time understanding” why the Holy
See is concerned about papal infallibility, which
Father Greeley describes as “apparently such a
trivial issue.”
The fact is that unless the teaching authority
in the Church is infallible-that is, is divinely
protected from teaching error in Faith and
morals-we are left spiritual orphans; and Christ
promised that that would never happen to us.
Jesus asked his Apostles who they thought
he was. Then he asked Peter, who alone gave
the answer, “You are the Christ, the Son of the
Living God.” and Jesus responded that Peter
knew this only because God had revealed the
truth to him.
At that, point, Christ the Son of the Living
God appointed Peter the rock upon which Jesus
would build the Church. And he said to Peter
and the others, “As the Father has sent me, so I
send you. Go teach all nations. And behold I
am with you to the end of time. Who hears
you, hears me. Who despises you, despises me.
What you bind on earth shall be bound in
Heaven; and what you loose on earth shall be
loosed in Heaven.”
All power in Heaven and on earth, said Jesus,
had been given to him; and this power he
placed in the care of Peter and th& others. So
there we have it: either the Church, through the
pope, afid the pope and the other bishops, can
teach us infallibility what God requires of us, or
the whole thing is meaningless. And Father
Greeley, writing for Catholic publications, has
called this “a trivial issue.”