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PAGE 6—December 9,1976
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Announcements
And Parish Bulletin
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BY FATHER JOSEPH M. CHAMPLIN
My predecessor initiated a very wise
policy for weekend Masses: He insisted
the parish bulletin be distributed after
the liturgy, not beforehand.
That procedure avoids or eliminates
many problems. Youngsters are not able
to make paper airplanes so easily during
Mass; adults more readily listen to the
homily rather than read through the
bulletin; the pews remain relatively free
of litter after each Eucharist.
This in no way minimizes the
importance or value of that weekly
newsletter. Nor does it suggest we spend
a lengthy period at Mass giving verbal
announcements which already appear in
the printed bulletin. Such a practice,
unfortunately still prevalent in many
Churches, really insults the intelligence
of worshipers and causes them to
disregard the published handout. Why
read this piece of paper when its
contents have just been proclaimed
from the pulpit?
Our experience over five years
indicates that people do check the
bulletin quite carefully and will respond
to its messages with little or no mention
of those items from the altar. This
enhances the prayerful atmosphere of
the liturgy itself and keeps distractions
at a minimum. Persons who come to
Church hoping to hear a message about
Jesus Christ the Lord, King and Messiah
find frustrating the recitation of tedious
announcements about forthcoming
meetings or activities.
The Roman Missal rather subtly, it
seems to me, makes a similar point. In
its section giving the rubrics for the
celebration of Mass with a congregation,
the General Instruction, article 123,
only suggests there may be
announcements and places them at the
end of Mass before the concluding rite.
This directive states: “If there are any
brief announcements, they may be
made at this time.” Note the “if,” the
“brief,” and the fact the Church locates
these messages here rather than before
or after the sermon.
An attractive bulletin, interestingly
written and full of significant material,
serves as one of the strongest
communication vehicles we have in a
parish. A few illustrations should prove
that point.
* Mention of who will preach next
week and on what topic stimulates
interest. It also reveals to the people the
advance planning which has gone into
the Sunday liturgy and homily.
* Listing the scheduled lectors and
gift bearers for the day’s Masses helps
build a community spirit. “I often
wondered who that family was.” “So
that’s the reader’s name.”
* Reporting the previous weekend’s
collection and nothing any major
expenditures fosters trust, shifts the
financial burden from the priest’s to the
congregation’s shoulders and is a step
toward fiscal accountability.
* Welcoming by name new Christians
or parishioners as well as mentioning the
sick or deceased deepens the bond
linking the parish family together.
This fall at Holy Family we
developed a leaflet, “Holy Family
Happenings, 1976-77,” distributed after
all the Masses during a September
weekend. Based on a similar publication
from another parish, it noted the
schedule of activities for the coming
year with, among other data, specific
dates for all instructions connected with
the First Communion, First Penance
and Confirmation programs.
Photos taken the previous year of
parallel events and a professional layout
by an artist-parishioner enhanced the
beauty of this program. We hope it will
be fixed to refrigerators and remind
people of coming events.
(Copyright (c) 1976 by NC News Service)
photomeditation
Photo and Text by Cart J. Pfeifer
(Copyright, 1976, NC News Service)
TEARING DOWN
Urban renewers . . . tear down a building . . . crashing into walls that
once provided shelter . . . into rooms that experienced unseen acts ... of
tenderness and harshness .. . caring and disregard . . . celebration and
desecration . . . life and death.
Workers paid to destroy ... to demolish . .. what once was a sanctuary
of community . . . and nurturer of creativity ... in order to make way for
new buildings . . . more hospitable to people . . . more stimulating of
creativity . . . with their steel instruments of destruction . . . they tear
down ... to build up.
The dust rising from the rubbled walls . . . chokes one with sadness .. .
for something has died . . . but the cleared space . . . expands one’s
heart... to sense possibilities for new life . . . latent in the scarred space.
Tearing down ... is part of every upbuilding ... in renewing cities . . .
and people . . . Dying contains seeds of new life . . . which blossoms only
through death.
As God sent His prophet Jeremiah ... so he sends each of us . . . into
our own hearts . . . and into our world . . .
“to root up and to tear down,
to destroy and demolish,
to build and to plant.” (Jeremiah 1:10)
1977 Catholic
Almanac Published
HUNTINGTON, Ind. (NC) ~ The
1977 edition of the 72-year-old Catholic
Almanac, edited by Franciscan Father
Felician A. Foy, has been published by
Our Sunday Visitor, Inc., here.
The 1977 edition contains a special
report on the observance of the U.S.
bicentennial, including the text of the
bicentennial message from Pope Paul VI
to members of the Church in the United
States.
There are special reports on the 41st
International Eucharistic Congress in
Philadelphia last August and the Call to
Action Conference in Detroit in
October under the sponsorship of the
U.S. Bishops’ Committee for the
Bicentennial.
The almanac contains the text of a
statement by the U.S. bishops last May
on political responsibility and a
summary of testimony on various issues
presented to the Democratic and
Republican party platform committees
by the U.S. Catholic Conference.
Another section discusses the
decision of the New Jersey Supreme
Court in the case of Karen Ann Quinlan,
who has been comatose since April,
1975.
Other special reports deal with
ethnics in the Church and American
society; the study “Catholic Schools in
a Declining Church” published by
Father Andrew Greeley and associates
at the University of Chicago’s National
Opinion Research Center; Catholic
teacher unions; the case of traditionalist
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre; the
ordination of women; religious and
charitable fund-raising; and TM, yoga,
Zen Buddhism and Christian asceticism.
The almanac contains explanations of
Catholic doctrine; sections on the
history of the Church; brief biographies
of the Pope, cardinals and U.S. bishops;
and statistics on the Catholic population
of the United States, bishops, priests,
Religious, laity, churches and schools.
The 703-page almanac is described by
its publishers as “the most complete
one-volume encyclopedia of Catholic
facts and information on the Church.”
Thomas More Medal
Winner Announced
CHICAGO (NC) - Novelist Tom
McHale of Boston has won the 23rd
annual Thomas More Medal “for the
most distinguished contriubtion to
Catholic literature,” it was announced
here by the Thomas More Association.
The Chicago-based literary and
publishing house cited McHale for his
“razor sharp irony and humor,” and
called the author of “School Spirit,”
“Principato,” “Farragan’s Retreat” and
“Alinsky’s Diamond,” “a writer of rare
originality and style.”
A native of Scranton, Pa., now living
in Boston, McHale has been nominated
for the National Book Award for fiction
and was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1974.
He received a bachelor’s degree from
Temple University, Philadelphia and a
master’s degree from the University of
Iowa, Iowa City.
Previous winners of the Thomas More
Medal include Graham Greene, Muriel
Spark, Piers Paul Read, Flannery
O’Connor, Father Daniel Berrigan,
Father Hans Kueng, Father Andrew
Greeley and Father Eugene Kennedy.
The Church And The Death Penalty — Part I
BY JIM CASTELLI
(First of Two Parts)
The Supreme Court’s reinstatement
of the death penalty and the somewhat
grotesque case of Gary Mark Gilmore,
the Utah condemned man who has
asked to be executed, have renewed
public debate about capital punishment.
The death penalty is a divisive issue
within the Catholic Church. A national
poll, for example, found a strong
majority of Catholics in favor of the
death penalty. But in November, 1974,
the U.S. Catholic bishops issued a
one-sentence statement opposing capital
punishment. The statement was so short
because the bishops could not agree on
a satisfactory explanation of their
reasons for opposing the death penalty.
A previously unreported staff
document prepared by the Pontifical
Commission for Justice and Peace
supports the U.S. Church’s position
opposing the death penalty and suggests
that a more detailed “pastoral”
statement be issued.
The commission paper supports “a
pastoral attitude that says: for the
ethical values involved and because of
the lack of probative arguments to the
contrary, the abolition of capital
punishment is to be favored.”
The commission paper suggests that
the U.S. bishops address their
opposition to the death penalty in the
same “respect for life” context as their
opposition to abortion and euthanasia.
VATICAN CITY (NC) - The Vatican
weekly magazine expressed in an
editorial Nov. 25 its hopes that the
Jimmy Carter Administration would
restore the moral health of America,
damaged, it said, by liberalized abortion
legislation.
The magazine Osservatore della
Domenica asked in an editoral that
“under the guide of its new President
the United States might again take the
higher path it started out on two
centuries ago.”
“It is an ascent which is not only
material, but primarily moral, since the
vigor of a nation and a people lies in its
This, in fact, is exactly the approach
used by some Church people who
oppose the death penalty. Bishop
Bernard Flanagan of Worcester, Mass.,
for example, calls the death penalty
“brutal” and “barbaric” and “gravely
counter-productive” to the “pro-life
crusade.”
A number of bishops and church
organizations have opposed capital
punishment.
For example: the four bishops
heading dioceses in New Jersey; Bishop
Louis Gelineau of Providence, R.I.;
Cardinal John Cody of Chicago;
Archbishop John Quinn of Oklahoma
City; Bishop Carroll Dozier of Memphis,
Tenn.; Bishop Joseph Durick, who
resigned as bishop of Nashville, Tenn.,
to serve as a prison chaplain; the
National Conference of Catholic
Charities; the National Federation of
Priests’ Councils; the National Catholic
Conference for Interracial Justice; the
National Coalition of American Nuns
and the Leadership Conference of
Women Religious.
In October, 1975, Pope Paul pleaded
for clemency for Basque terrorists
scheduled to be executed by Spain;
when the executions were carried out,
the Pope expressed his “bitterness”
toward a “murderous repression.”
The statements made by all of these
people and groups make similar points
which form the basis of a growing
Catholic opposition to capital
punishment:
morality and in the type of life which is
fed by such morality.”
The editorial, signed by former
Vatican spokesman Federico
Alessandrini, said that the moral
“loosening up,” illustrated recently by
liberalized abortion laws, “is not a good
sign since decadence of public morality
carries with it a backward slide in other
areas.”
In the editorial, Alessandrini also
warned the Soviet Union that any
attempt to “take advantage of the
transition period between the Ford and
Carter administration would be “a
serious error and an evident threat to
coexistence and detente which are going
on, at least formally.”
- All life belongs to God and man
does not have the right to decide who
will live and who will die.
- The death penalty is irreversible:
this means that a sentence cannot be
taken back if the condemned person is
later proved innocent. It also cuts off
any opportunity for rehabilitation and
repentance.
- The death penalty has been
imposed disproportionately on blacks
and other minority groups. “Like many
other issues,” according to Father James
Sheehan, executive director of the
National Catholic Conference for
Interracial Justice, “without being
explicitly a racial issue, this is a racial
issue.”
- The way the death penalty is
imposed today exchanges “one horror
for another.” A brief filed a year ago by
a number of religious groups argues, “in
place of physical cruelty, we substituted
an exquisite torment - the months and
years that intervene between sentence
and execution, while the miserable
condemned man alternates between
hope and fear, not knowing from stay
to stay what his fate will be.” At the
same time, the condemned person is
treated as though he were “already
dead.” It was apparently this “exquisite
torment” which led Gilmore to seek his
own execution.
- The question of whether the state
has the right to impose the death
penalty to protect itself must be seen
within the context of the justification
for the death penalty and its impact on
society.
- The death penalty cheapens all life
and teaches brutality. “Back in 1764,”
noted Bishop Durick, “a wise and
compassionate Christian lawyer in Italy,
Cesare Bonesana Beccaria, made the
first great plea for an end to capital
punishment. Among other things he
pointed out that ferocity of punishment
breeds ferocity of character, even in the
non-criminal public. This is as true
today as it was in Beccaria’s day.”
Vatican Editoralist Asks
Moral Health Restoration
Copyright (c) 1976 by NC News Service
LIFE IN MUSIC
BY THE DAMEANS
BY THE DAMEANS
Nights Are Forever Without You
Lying in bed with the radio on
Moonlight falls like rain
Soft summer nights spent thinking of you
When will I see you again?
Soft and low, the music moans
I can’t stop thinking of you
Thinking about you
I didn’t know it would be so strong
Waiting and wondering about you
I didn’t know it would last so long
Nights are forever without you.
Curtains still dance with the wind and the sky
The sun will be coming up soon
But I just can’t sleep for thinking of you
Here alone with the moon.
Soft and low the music moans
I can’t stop thinking about you
Thinking about you.
I didn’t know it would be so strong
Waiting and wondering about you
I didn’t know it would last so long
Nights are forever without you.
Written by Parker McGee
((p) 1976 Atlantic BMI)
England Dan’s last name is actually “Crofts,” and, yes, he is the brother of
Dash Crofts of singers “Seals and Crofts.” England Dan has teamed with John
Ford Coley (whose real middle name is not “Ford,” but Edward) to produce
some very nice sounds. Their last release was “I’d Really Love to See You
Tonight,” a hit song about a guy who goes back to see his girl after a long
separation.
Their last hit has not yet disappeared from the charts and they are rising fast
with a new release. Once again, the song is about separation. This time there is
less story line and more is left to your imagination. But there is also a better
chance that you will fill in the details according to your own life situation.
“Nights Are Forever Without You” sets a scene where there is too much night
and too little sleep. It oppresses a guy whose heart moans more loudly than the
radio because of the absence of his loved one.
If you are a teenager who has lost a boy or a girl friend, this song probably
calls up in you the nervous and anxious experience of an uncertain future. If you
are married and your husband or wife is distant, the song will remind you of
how painstakingly you count the days until reunion. Or if for some reason, you
are separated for life, the song’s title line about forever nights will strike even
harder.
The lyrics remind you of the truism that love changes time. When you are in
love, the clock seems to move faster and work becomes easier. Love brings
melody and lightness to the chiming of the hours.
Separation from someone you love does the opposite. The clock seems to
grind to a halt, or at least to move in maddening slow motion. Time advances
with excruciating slowness. “I didn’t know it would be so strong, waiting and
wondering about you. I didn’t know it would last so long; nights are forever
without you.”
Oddly enough, it is often the times of separation that do the best things to
lovers. When reunion comes, togetherness is frequently at its sweetest. Distance
often forces people to get in touch with their feelings, to put their values in
order, and to communicate their love more clearly.
It is this kind of mood that England Dan and John Ford Coley have set out.
There is quiet resolve to be better for the woman whom this man loves. He will
remember this night when he has dropped stones down the well of his heart,
discovering that vast and empty chasm. And his song will rise from that
experience in the days to come to communicate his need of her.
Whether the loved one returns in your life or not, after a night which lasts
forever, all of us have to be changed. We discover that it is only love which
makes time move. And all of the love to come in our lives will be better because
we have discovered how time should be arranged.
(All correspondence should be directed to: The Dameans, P.O. Box 2108, Baton Rouge,
La. 70821.)
J