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National Conference For Diocesan
Vocation Directors In San Antonio
On September 28-October 3 the
National Conference for Diocesan
Vocation Directors was held in San
Antonio, Texas. Rev. Robert Mattingly,
Savannah’s Vocation Director, attended
the Conference.
This is an annual Conference which
meets to determine what can be done to
encourage vocations to the priesthood
and religious life.
Some of the guest speakers included
Rev. Adrian Van Kaam, a noted writer
on spirituality, who presented several
addresses to the group. Rev. Reid Mayo,
the President of the National Federation
of Priest Councils, presented a talk on
“Changing Values in Vocation
Recruitment.” Sisters Vocation
Conference presented a talk on “Stress
in Religious Communities.”
The following resolutions were
approved by the vocation directors:
WHEREAS the NCCB Program for
Priestly Formation supports the
working relationships between the
Vocation Director and Seminary staffs
saying that a close working relationship
with seminary administrators and
faculties must exist to facilitate open
channels of communication with all
aspects of seminary formation.
BE IT RESOLVED that we as
vocation directors make ourselves
available as an extension of the
seminary formation team in an open
spirit of co-operation, and participate
with them in the formation process of
those seminarians for which we as
diocesan vocation directors are
responsible.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that
the individual regions implement this
according to their own situations.
WHEREAS the vocation director has
years of contact with the future
personnel of the diocese and because he
has a good knowledge of these people
and their talents and needs; and
WHEREAS this knowledge is extremely
important in determining personnel
placements;
BE IT RESOLVED that the NCDVD
recommends to the Bishops that the
vocation director be consulted as a
matter of policy by the Personnel Board
of the diocese with respect to the newly
ordained.
WHEREAS Serra has a strong
commitment to the establishment of
Parish Vocation Committees, and since
Vocation Directors sense that this
project is important in vocation
awareness; and WHEREAS there is a
paramount need to stress the role of the
entire community to catechize and be
responsible for ministering to
themselves therefore, BE IT
RESOLVED that the NCDVD
commend, support and co-operate with
Serra International in this effort.
WHEREAS: Vocation Personnel are
faced with the constant pressure to
produce promotional materials with
appeal to various age groups and
situation;
WHEREAS: Individualized effort
dilutes our limited financial resources
and reduces professional in put to our
materials.
BE IT RESOLVED that the
Executive Board of the NCDVD pursue
the production of professionally
designed ministry promotional
materials.
WHEREAS: the World Day of Prayer
for vocations is celebrated at a time
which is inconvenient for recruitment
purposes.
WHEREAS: the World Day of Prayer
falls very often in the midst of other
American celebrations;
BE IT RESOLVED that the
Executive Board of the NCDVD
propose to the NCCB through the
Bishop’s Committee on Vocations the
establishment of an annual National
Vocation Awareness Week including a
National Day of Prayer coupled with a
national advertising campaign in the fall,
to be held in addition to the World Day
of Prayer in the Spring.
WHEREAS: the various educational
systems of the American Church are
prime areas for Education in awareness
of ministry.
WHEREAS: at present the
Educational resources regarding
ministry are nearly non-existent.
BE IT RESOLVED that the NCDVD
through its Executive Board propose to
the USCC Education Division through
its professional services the creation of
ministry educational materials for every
age group.
WHEREAS: vocation personnel are
directly responsible for promoting the
call to pastoral leadership;
BE IT RESOLVED that the NCDVD
encourage the theological, cultural, and
psychological study of the role of
women in the ministry including
Diaconate and Priesthood and that the
regional coordinators be kept informed
of current reports on the subject.
WHEREAS: abstract appeals are
worthless unless made concrete, and
feeling that Resolution No. 10 of the
NCDVD Convention of 1974 be
re-stated:
BE IT RESOLVED that the priestly
life and ministry departments of the
National Conference of Catholic
Bishops and the National Canon Law
Society of America continue to develop
and propose to the National Conference
of Catholic Bishops practical and
specific means of reinstating to active
ministry in some official
Church-recognized capacity those who
have found it necessary to leave the
active ministry and who retain a desire
to serve God’s people through their
ordained ministry.
BE IT RESOLVED: that the new
NCDVD officers establish an Ad-Hoc
Committee to work with representatives
of the seminaries and of the program of
priestly formation to devise model(s) of
program(s) suited to give candidates for
theology who lack a seminary
background and who aspire to the
diocesan priesthood a thorough
grounding in spiritual formation. The
Conference recommends that such a
program should normally precede
entrance to theology. The Ad-Hoc
Committee should submit its report in
advance of the 1976 Convention in such
time that the regions can meet and
discuss the proposal(s).
WHEREAS: there is a need for
guidelines for procedure for
interviewing and accepting candidates.
BE IT RESOLVED that the NCDVD
establish an Ad-Hoc Committee to
develop such procedure.
BE IT ALSO RESOLVED that these
guidelines be flexible enough to respect
the cultural, racial, and ethnic make-up
of individual dioceses.
WHEREAS: the second draft of the
National Catechetical Directory omits
the treatment of the special invitations
to serve the Lord through priesthood
and religious life and,
WHEREAS: the Lord Himself first
summoned Apostles to come and follow
Him before He revealed Eternal Truths;
BE IT RESOLVED that the NCDVD
strongly recommends to the Secretariate
developing the National Catechetical
Directory the inclusion of the theology
of the special call to active ministry in
the Priesthood and the Religious Life.
—
Liberty And Justice Talks At St. Mary’s
^ ^
Sister Anne Brotherton, and Dr. Ellis
Rece will be guest speakers at the third
of a six part twin lecture series at
Augusta’s St. Mary’s on-the-Hill Church.
He served as an Air Force Captain in the
Korean War and is in the Air Force
Reserve Chaplaincy. He is ministering in
Augusta for the third time as pastor.
Sister Brotherton is a native of
Augusta and a member of the order of
the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet.
She is the daughter of Mrs. Charles
Brotherton and the late Mr. Brotherton.
She received her degree from
Fontbonne College, St. Louis, Missouri,
and her Masters and Doctors Degree at
Fordham University, New York.
Presently Sister is in the education
program of the Martin Luther King
Center in Atlanta. Her subject will be
“Christian Non-Violence and Social
Justice,” and she will present her lecture
in the parish hall at ten a.m.
Dr. Rece is Director of Institutional
Research and Planning and Associate
Professor of Religion at Paine College.
He was bom in DeKalb County and
received his B.A. Degree in History from
Emory University and the Doctor of
Divinity Degree from Yale University.
He has also studied at the University of
Edinburgh. His most recent honor is a
P.H.D. in historical theology from
Emory University. His topic will be
“War, a Quaker’s Point of View.” It will
be delivered at St. Mary’s on the Hill
School, also at ten o’clock.
The title of the six week series is
“Liberty and Justice For All.” Other
speakers will be District Attorney
Richard Allen, Judge William Fleming,
Scot McPherson, Dr. Terence Cooke,
Dr. Eugene Howard, Senator Eugene
Holley.
The Reverend Ken Hutcherson and
Robert W. Cullen were guest speakers
on Sunday, Oct. 12.
Reverend Hutchenson who is pastor
of the Providence Baptist Church spoke
on the subject “The Right to be Bom.”
He discussed this from a moral and
scriptural standpoint.
The Reverend Mr. Hutchenson is a
native of Baxley Georgia and a graduate
of Mercer University and the New
Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.
Robert Cullen is a staff attorney with
the Augusta Regional Office of the
Georgia Legal Services Programs. He has
Sr. Ann Brotherton
Rev. Ken Hutcherson
been with this office for the past 14
months.
A graduate of Clark University and
Harvard University, he received his law
degree from Boston College Law School
in Chestnut Hill Massachusetts. His
subject was “The Role of The Legal Aid
Society in The Community.”
Dr. Ellis Rece
Robert W. Cullen
PRAISE ST. MICHAEL - “In the sight of the angels
I will sing your praises” (Ps. 138) The pupils of St.
Michael’s, Savannah Beach, sing in praise of their great
patron, the Archangel Michael, who has protected their
parish for eighty-two years. As a token of gratitude to
God and to St. Michael, at Mass, the children offered
gifts of food for the poor. “We have good reason to
believe in angels” said their pastor, Fr. Payne. “If
Jesus, in time of need, could call on ‘twelve legions of
angels’ (Matt. 26,53) so can we.”
f— OCTOBER 19 TV SPECIAL s
A Home Of Our Own ’
s 1
A HOME OF OUR OWN airs on
Sunday, October 19, as a Bell System
Family Theater special, 8:00-10:00
p.m., on the CBS-TV Network.
The trouble with most people who
complain about TV is that their
attention is too often focused on the
wrong programs. They could accomplish
so much more for television’s
improvement if only they and all their
friends would spend their energies
supporting programs that have a positive
influence on our society. A case in point
is the “Bell System Family Theatre”
special, A HOME OF OUR OWN, to be
broadcast this Sunday, October 19 at
8:00-10:00 p.m. on the CBS network.
It is family entertainment of high order
and a clear alternative to the empty
diversions dominating much of the
regular schedule.
HOME delivers on its promise to be
something special: a satisfying story
about a dedicated individual and the
poor, homeless boys for whom he
becomes responsible, a sensitive
performance by Jason Miller in a role
that offers much more than his acting in
THE EXORCIST, and finally, an
undisguised appeal to the viewer’s own
sense of caring for and sharing with
others.
bf . ..
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A HOME OF OUR OWN is a
dramatization based on the work of
Father William Wasson, an Arizona-born
priest who found himself providing a
haven for an ever-growing number of
destitute children in Mexico, “a poor
country but rich in orphans.”
Fr. Wasson decided to take custody
of a young orphan who had robbed the
poor box of his Cuernavaca
market-district chapel in 1954. The
sight of eight other homeless boys in the
local jail compelled him to take them in
also. By the end of that year, he was
caring for 32 orphans, by 1965 there
were 400, and today Nuestros Pequenos
Hermanos (Our Little Brothers and
Sisters) is home for more than 1200
children, in three sites near Mexico City.
Nuestros Pequenos Hermanos takes in
abandoned children and educates them
until they are prepared to lead
constructive, self-supporting lives as
adults. In accomplishing this, its
operation is quite different than that of
most such institutions in this country.
In making do with the little he had,
Fr. Wasson depended upon the children
to work together for their community
and to share the responsibility for
managing it. His fundamental principle
was that no child would be sent away
for any reason whatever and the result is
a sense of absolute security and love
that these children never had
experienced before.
worst sin of all is indifference to
injustice.
As played by Jason Miller, Fr. Wasson
comes across as a credible man of faith,
single-minded in purpose but entirely
likeable as a human being. There is no
grand exterior action - the character is
built from within. Miller brings it off
because he assumes the part: intense
and forceful yet gentle and sensitive.
Whereas another actor might have
conveyed a sense of weakness jn this
role, Miller is completely convincing as a
strong individual.
The film is episodic, using its
sequences to illustrate key events in the
twenty-year growth of Nuestros
Pequenos Hermanos. The story is placed
in the frame of a young doctor - the
first boy Fr. Wasson had taken in - who
returns to the home to give a year of
service there. The episodes are nicely
integrated into the whole but they are
loose enough to allow one the feeling
that there was much more to the story
than is shown here. In fact, one comes
away with the impression that there are
surely enough stories here to fill a
long-running television series that would
challenge the popularity of THE
WALTONS.
Perhaps what makes this such a
pleasant show is the natural charm of
the children, many of whom are
Pequenos playing themselves (of course,
English-speaking children were hired for
dialogue parts). Watching these healthy,
smiling children tells us all we need to
know about the success of Fr. Wasson’s
work. The production, filmed in
Mexico, also offers some beautiful
locales such as the pristine grandeur of
Cuernavaca’s ancient cathedral. Its
bishop, incidentally, has the most
important line in the show when he
warns that Christians cannot be content
with being passive onlookers to the
sufferings of their fellow men.
This program may not be as
“exciting” as CHER or KOJAK (the
programs it pre-empts for this one
evening), but it has something more
substantial to offer those who watch it.
A HOME OF OUR OWN makes real our
Christian belief that charity extends
beyond our immediate neighbor and
knows no national boundary.
A HOME OF OUR OWN -- Jason Miller (1) and Guillermo San Juan, in
scene from A HOME OF OUR OWN, two-hour film special airing Sunday
evening, Oct. 19 over CBS-TV. Miller stars as Father William Wasson,
American priest who founded a haven for Mexican orphans in Cuernavaca
and who today has 1,200 youngsters as his charges. Guillermo plays the
orphan Julio, whose robbery of the parish poorbox and resultant arrest
triggers the Padre’s remarkable career in caring for Mexican boys and girls.
Enrollment Up At St. Meinrad
Receiving financial support from
neither the church nor the government
Father Wasson’s home has been slow in
developing and always in need of funds.
But because of this, it has escaped
entirely the institutionalized and
bureaucratic spirit that has become
associated with “official” agencies and
their regulations.
The emphasis in this television film is
on how Fr. Wasson - the “crazy gringo
priest” as one of the characters
describes him - overcomes each of the
difficulties that stands in the way of his
family or orphans. His story is that of a
man who is not ashamed to beg for
others and who trulv believes that the
Saint Meinrad Seminary, composed of both the Saint Meinrad School of Theology
and the Saint Meinrad College, opened the fall semester with an enrollment increase in
both schools. The School of Theology began with 169 full-time and ten part-time
students, while the College opened with 241 full-time and nine part-time students.
The President Rectors of both schools, Fr. Daniel Buechlein, O.S.B. in the School of
Theology and Fr. Thomas Ostdick, O.S.B. in Saint Meinrad College, report that they
would be hard pressed to find room for many more students. In fact, the School of
Theology ceased accepting applications for this year’s program as early as July of this
summer.
The Archdiocese of Indianapolis currently has 33 students in attendance at Saint
Meinrad Seminary, the Diocese of Evansville has 14, the Archdiocese of Louisville has
19, and the Diocese of Gary has 19. Other dioceses with 10 or more students include
Belleville, Ill. (19); Joliet, Ill. (24); Nashville, Tenn. (18); Orlando, Fla. (16);
Richmond, Va. (14); Savannah, Ga. (11); Toledo, 0. (19); and Kansas City, Kansas
(12).
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