Newspaper Page Text
The Southern Cross, Page 4
Thursday, May 11, 2000
The rock of New York
By Tom Barton
ohn Joseph Cardinal O’Connor
died on May 3, at age 80, as the
most influential figure in the
American Catholic Church.
Leading 2.4 million parishioners in
New York for the past 16 years
alone would elevate one's status.
So would having a close relation
ship with Pope John Paul II.
But his stature was bolstered by
more than sheer numbers and
friends in high places.
Intellectual brilliance (he held
master’s degrees in advanced ethics
and clinical psychology and doctor
ates in political science and philos
ophy) and his determination to be a
visible and publicly accessible
voice for higher truths earned him
the respect and admiration of many
people of faith.
His often blunt outspokenness
and orthodoxy,
especially on such
contentious issues
as abortion, birth
control and homo
sexuality, raised the
ire of his oppo
nents. Given New
York’s roily poli
tics, such conflict is
unavoidable.
“I cannot change
church teaching,”
he once said. “I
can’t fudge on it. I
can’t be ambiguous.
But it would be a mistake to car
icature him as a reactionary. In fact,
he was quite the opposite—a man
dedicated to broadening his experi
ences but who never abandoned his
spiritual base and consistently prac
ticed the traditional ideal of com
passion.
He learned
Spanish to better
communicate
with the growing
number of
Hispanic
Catholics in New
York. He was an
advocate for the
homeless and
supported labor
unions. Despite
his affirmation of
the church’s
belief that homosexuality is a sin,
his archdiocese became one of New
York’s largest providers of AIDS
services; Cardinal O’Connor him
self would spend time in AIDS
wards tending to patients.
He was committed to improving
Catholic-Jewish relations. In 1988,
on the 50th anniversary of
Kristallnacht, he placed candles in
the window of his residence and
said that “in this house lives a spiri
tual Semite.”
Last fall, he wrote a letter of pro
found apology to New York’s Jews
for sins committed by Christians,
presaging the pope’s own gestures
of reconciliation toward Jews in
Rome and Jerusalem this spring.
Cardinal O’Connor stood out in a
world in which it has become
unfashionable to take strong moral
stands and defend sacred principles.
His loss, like his leadership, will
be felt far beyond New York and
Catholicism.
Tom Barton is Editorial Page
Editor of the Savannah Morning
News, from which this tribute is
reprinted by permission.
What Catholic educators are doing right
By Paula G. Williamson
Savannah
ducational reform is a phrase being heard
constantly these days. Many are looking at a
variety of solutions to improve the public educa
tion system.
Private and parochial schools have always gar
nered attention, says the new Superintendent of
Schools for the Catholic Diocese of Savannah,
Sister Rose Mary Collins. “There is a very spe
cial dimension to who we are. I feel very strong
ly about how hard educators work, but to com
pare us with the public schools is comparing
apples to oranges,” says Sister Rose Mary.
“It is complicated for the public schools
because there is a political dimension. Part of
that system is the state and local requirements. It
is different for us, because we don’t have all that
legalese and the financial aspect of taxpayer
funding.” The faith-life commitment found in
parochial schools is very important to Sister
Rose Mary and all those involved in Catholic
education. Non-Catholics who work within
and/or attend their schools have to understand
and respect that they practice their faith while
participating as best they can, says Sister Rose
Mary.
But that doesn’t mean that they do not adhere
to certain educational standards. All diocesan
elementary schools are accredited by the Florida
Catholic Conference Accreditation Program.
This change began in 1996 when Bishop J.
Kevin Boland requested and received approval
from the metropolitan of the Florida Province for
Diocesan Schools, Archbishop John C. Favalora.
According to a statement made by Archbishop
Favalora to The Southern Cross in February,
1999: “The standards of this accreditation pro
gram are derived from sound educational
research and influenced by Catholic educational
philosophy which integrates faith and values
with life and learning. These standards assist
schools in working through a dynamic self-eval
uation process which promotes accountability
and ongoing educational excellence.” There also
is an option for the deanery schools to be accred
ited by the Southern Association of Colleges and
Schools. By working with both agencies, it helps
raise the bar and makes sure Catholic schools are
a cut above the rest, says Sister Rose Mary.
Saint Frances Cabrini school is the first school
to be started completely from scratch by the
Church in quite some time, says the pastor,
Father Francis J. Nelson. They too will follow
the guidelines set by the Florida Catholic
Conference, which establishes a maximum stu
dent teacher ratio of 25:1.
Their mission? To continue the educational
aegis of the Church: “Our future is in our chil
dren. It is our responsibility to give them a solid
foundation in faith to prepare them for life.”
Brenda Boutin is the mother of two boys.
Nine-year-old Justin currently attends Saint
James Catholic School on Whitfield Avenue. His
mother was finally able to get him in for second
grade. It was worth showing up for registration
at 3:30 a.m. to be one of the first people on the
waiting list, because she felt Justin needed the
more disciplined and structured environment of a
parochial school.
“I also liked the religious and moral aspects
that is part of the everyday curriculum,’’adds
Boutin, “and I also felt it was a little more
strict.”
Sister Rose Mary emphasizes that they “work
every single day to see that students understand
responsibility for themselves, responsibility of
family and that they are reared in their faith and
behave in a principled manner. We are educating
the complete person—spiritually, physically,
socially.” Father Nelson eventually would like to
see the curriculum have a greater emphasis on the
arts. “That is too often missing from education
today. It is part of educating the whole person.”
Reprinted by permission of the SAVANNAH
Morning News.
S uestion: What happened to the traditional
:olor of purple covering the altar during
Why is red used instead? What happened
to the traditional color of blue for the Blessed
Mother’s Chapel? White for spiritual purity, blue
for spiritual maternity. She’s the Mother of the
Church. Blue and white are her colors, not pink.
—A note left at the Cathedral of Saint John the
Baprist on Good Friday
A nswer: The season of Lent, whose liturgical
color is violet (purple), begins on Ash
Wednesday and ends on Holy Thursday before
Questions & Answers
the Mass of the Lord’s Supper. The liturgical
color for Good Friday is red, and has been so for
over 30 years; before Vatican II, the color of
vestments for Good Friday was black; it was
never purple.
The colors blue and white are traditionally
used in artistic depictions of the Blessed Virgin
Mary. White is her liturgical color (that is, the
vestments worn on her feast days are white),
while blue is traditionally used as the color of
her sash or robe in paintings or on painted stat
ues. On the statue of the Blessed Virgin in Our
Lady’s Chapel in the Undercroft of the Cathedral
of Saint John the Baptist, her robe is white and
her sash is blue, symbolizing purity and mother
hood, as the author notes.
However, these colors pertain only to represen
tations of Mary and not to the walls of chapels
or churches in which these representations hap
pen to be. There is no rule or binding custom
that says that the walls of Marian chapels should
be blue and white, or that churches dedicated to
martyrs, like John the Baptist, should be painted
red, the liturgical color used on feasts of martyrs.
—DKC