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The Southern Cross
DIOCESE OF SAVANNAH NEWSPAPER
Vol. 57 No. 46
Thursday, December 23, 197 6
Single Copy Price — 15 Cents
Christmas 1976
My dear friends in Christ,
Once more, our celebration of the holy feast of
Christmas invites us to reflect on the mystery of
Christ, the story of the Son of God who at a certain
moment in history reached out from eternity to join us
on our human pilgrimage. In faith, we know that He
chose to take on our humanity so that “his sinlessness
might cover our sins.”
Still, as we look at the world about us today,
indeed, as we look at ourselves, we are tempted to ask
if He really did accomplish that mission. In shame, we
confess to our abiding selfishness and pride, because --
let us admit it frankly -- we are still filled with
wickedness. In similar honesty, we acknowledge the
persistent presence of evil and suffering in the world,
the increasing breakdown in public and private
morality, the burgeoning phenomenon of violence
and terrorism in our local neighborhoods and in the
world community, the growing assaults on human life
itself at its every stage. As we behold these disturbing
realities, we are tempted in a moment of despair to
join the unbeliever in asking, “Where then is your
God!” For if God, through His Son, really did become
one of us and by His life and death did work out our
peace and reconciliation with God and with each
other, then why is it that sin and evil, that guilt and
hate still abound so much to this day?
The response of the Christian during this holy
season is to proclaim in confident praise and joy, “Go,
tell it on the mountain, our Jesus Christ is born; the
Lord, Emmanuel, God-is-with-us, is his mighty name!”
Yes, He who alone is good has made known to us
through His beloved Son His immeasurable generosity
and love. Instead of showing hatred or vengeance, He is
patient and merciful, giving His own Son “as the price
of our redemption, the holy one to redeem the wicked,
the sinless one to redeem sinners, the just one to
redeem the. unjust, the incorruptible one to redeem the
corruptible, the immortal one to redeem mortals”
(Diognetus).
It is not, however, that we have been made holy
and good and just in a single event in time as the birth
of Christ at Bethlehem. It is rather that in that
historical moment, our loving and gracious Father
opened an era of holiness, making it now possible for
us to be holy and good and just. The price of salvation
has been paid by the One who took on our likeness,
and our sinfulness can now be covered by Him who
alone is sinless. For us now to enjoy the benefits of
salvation, we must put on the likeness of God, made
known to us by His Son, Jesus Christ.
Christmas is commonly seen as a celebration of love,
when we gratefully recall the love which God has
shown us through His Son and when we are again
called to respond in love to Him and to each other. It is
a correct as well as challenging understanding of the
meaning of the Christmas mystery, but it is one we can
grasp only in faith. Otherwise, our celebration will be
little more than the tinsel and plastic of our decorated
trees and attractively wrapped gifts, or even the
once-a-year gestures of good-will to our neighbors.
The more specific point I want to make, however, in
this letter of greetings is that an essential and equally
important aspect of the mystery of Christmas is that
its message is one of hope. It is a message of promise
that assures us that, while not all is well and good, it
can be; a message of promise that guarantees that,
while not all of us are yet holy and good, we can be,
because the King who is our peace has come and “has
made salvation possible for the whole human race and
taught us what we have to do . . . while we are waiting
in hope for the blessing which will come with the
appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour
Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:11-13).
My dear friends, in sending you this affectionate and
heartfelt Christmas greeting, I pray that the celebration
of this feast will be for all of you a moment of peace
and love and blessedness. But even more, I pray that in
the mystery of Christ’s birth you will be renewed in
your hope that these precious gifts will be made
perfect and enduring in your lives, “for the glory of
God . . . through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom
we have now received reconciliation” (Rom. 5).
I
Devotedly yours in Christ,
aJ^
Bishop of Savannah
Peace Day Message Denounces Abortion, Arms Race
WASHINGTON (NC) - “If you want
peace, defend life,” Pope Paul VI told
the people of the world in his 10th
annual message to mark the World Day
of Peace celebrated by Catholics on Jan.
1.
Pope Paul denounced “the false and
dangerous program of the ‘arms race,’ of
the secret rivalry between peoples for
military superiority,” and called
abortion a “crime against life” and “a
blow at peace.”
The Pope’s message for the 1977
World Day of Peace was made public
here by the National Conference of
Catholic Bishops (NCCB).
Pope Paul said that “if, in defiance of
logic, peace and life can in practice be
dissociated, there looms on the horizon
of the future a catastrophe that in our
days could be immeasurable and
irreparable for both peace and life.” He
added: “Hiroshima is a terribly eloquent
proof and a frighteningly prophetic
example of this.”
If “peace were thought of in
unnatural separation from its
relationship with life, peace could be
preferred, at the expense of the
oppression or suppression of others,”
the Pope said. “Is that peace?”
Although peace and life “are supreme
values in the civil order” and are
“interdependent,” they have often been
in conflict in human history, the Pope
noted. Even today this conflict
Message Text On Page 2
imposed as the sad triumph of death,”
the Pope said, quoting the words of the
Roman historian Tacitus: “They make a
desert and call it peace.”
“Again, in the same hypothesis, the
privileged life of some can be exalted,
can be selfishly and almost idolatrously
“continues to desecrate and stain with
blood many a page of human society,”
he said. “The key to truth in the matter
can be found only by recognizing the
primacy of life as a value and as a
condition for peace.
“The formula is: ‘If you want peace,
defend life.’ Life is the crown of peace.
VERY REV. CONAN FE1GH OSB
Saint Vincent Registrar Named
New Headmaster At Benedictine
If we base the logic of our activity on
the sacredness of life, war is virtually
disqualified as a normal and habitual
means of asserting rights and so of
insuring peace.”
Denouncing the arms race, the Pope
said that, even if war does not break
out, “how can we fail to lament the
incalculable outpouring of economic
resources and human energies expended
in order to preserve for each individual
state its shield of ever more costly, ever
more efficient weapons, and this to the
detriment of resources for schools,
culture, agriculture, health and civic
welfare.
“Peace and life support enormous
burdens in order to maintain a peace
founded on a perpetual threat to life,
and also to defend life by means of a
constant threat to peace,” Pope Paul
said.
Warning that such a concept of
international relations “must one day be
resolved in the ruination of peace and of
countless human lives,” the Pope
praised “the effort already begun to
reduce and finally to eliminate this
senseless cold war resulting from the
progressive increase of the military
potential of the various nations, as if
these nations should necessarily be
enemies of each other . . .”
“But it is not only war that kills
peace,” Pope Paul continued. “Every
crime against life is a blow to peace,
especially if it strikes at the moral
conduct of the people, as often happens
today, with horrible and often legal
ease, as in the case of the suppression of
incipient life, by abortion.
“The suppression of an incipient life,
or one that is already born, violates
above all the sacrosanct moral principle
to which the concept of human
existence must always have reference;
human life is sacred from the first
moment of its conception and until the
last instant of its natural survival in
time,” Pope Paul said. This means, he
continued, “that life must be exempt
from any arbitrary power to suppress it;
it must not be touched; it is worthy of
all respect, all care, all dutiful sacrifice.”
“If we wish progressive social order
to be based upon intangible principles,
let us not offend against it in the heart
of its essential system: respect for
human life,” the Pope said. “Even under
this aspect peace and life are closely
bound together at the basis of order and
civilization.”
Reviewing the “hundred forms in
which offenses against life seem to be
becoming normal behavior,” the Pope
cited “individual crime . . . organized to
become collective; to ensure the silence
and complicity of whole groups of
citizens; to make private vendetta a vile
collective duty, terrorism a
phenomenon of legitimate political or
social affirmation, police torture an
effective means of public power no
longer directed towards restoring order
but towards imposing ignoble
repression.”
“It is impossible for peace to flourish
where the safety of life is compromised
in this way,” Pope Paul stated. “Where
violence rages, true peace ends,” he
continued. “But where human rights are
truly professed and publicly recognized
and defended, peace becomes the joyful
and operative atmosphere of life in
society.”
LATROBE, Pa. - Very Rev. Conan E.
Feigh, O.S.B., Registrar at Saint Vincent
College, has been appointed prior of the
Benedictine Priory and headmaster of
Benedictine Military School, Savannah,
Georgia, effective January 3, 1977,
according to an announcement by
Archabbot Egbert H. Donovan, O.S.B.,
of Saint Vincent Archabbey.
In his new position, Fr. Conan will
head the Benedictine monastery and
supervise a 500-student military high
school there.
A native of Carrolltown, he is the son
of Mr. and Mrs. Charles A. Feigh of
Flick Ave., Carrolltown and attended
St. Benedict Grade School there.
A graduate of Saint Vincent Prep,
Seminary and College, Fr. Conan also
attended The Pennsylvania State
University where he earned a master of
education degree in 1969. He received
the master of divinity degree at Saint
Vincent in 1974.
A member of the Benedictine Order
since 1951, he was ordained at Saint
Vincent in 1957 by the late Bishop
Hugh L. Lamb of Greensburg.
Fr. Conan has served as assistant
pastor at Saint Bruno, South
Greensburg; Sacred Heart, Saint Mary’s;
and Sacred Heart, Jeannette. He was
named director of guidance and
placement at Saint Vincent College in
1965, acting registrar in 1970, and
registrar in 1971. He was a member of
the College Board of Directors from
1970 to 1975 and served as an elected
member of the Archabbey Council of
Seniors since 1967.
He has been a member of the Greater
Latrobe Chamber of Commerce, Middle
Atlantic Placement Association, and the
Association of Collegiate Registrars and
Admissions Officers.
Fr. Conan will replace the Very Rev.
Aelred J. Beck, O.S.B., who has held the
position since November 1967. A
former academic dean and director of
development and public relations at
Saint Vincent College, Fr. Aelred will
return to Saint Vincent for
reassignment.
A
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HEADLINE
HOPSCOTCH
Very Rev. Conan E. Feigh, O.S.B.
‘Not Heart Of Christmas’
VATICAN CITY (NC) - Santa Claus and Christmas trees are nice, but they are not
at the heart of Christmas, Pope Paul VI said at a general audience here. The real
meaning of Christmas, the Pope declared, is found only at the “enchanting scene of
the manger.”
Candle Warning
WASHINGTON (NC) - The Consumer Product Safety Commission has warned
consumers and religious groups about the “potentially harmful” effects of candles
with lead-core wicks, used primarily in church votive lights. “In view of the known
harmful effects of lead ingestion and the growing concern over amounts of lead in the
environment from a variety of sources, the continued use of lead-core wicks in candles
may be unwise,” the agency said.