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GEORGIA BULLETIN THURSDAY, MARCH 7, 1963
PAGE 5
GEORGIA PINES
Tom-A Faithful Servant
BY FATHER R. DONALD KlERNAN-
Of all the virtues that shine forth in the life of
our divine Savior, there is none so prominent,
none so conspicuous as His compassionforhuman
suffering. This was His characteristic virtue; the
salient point of His character, if we may apply the
term to One who was perfect in every virtue. On
every page of the Gospel, that golden word'mercy*
shines forth, brightening every page, cheering
every heart.
Never do we find our blessed Savior exercising
the rigors of His justice, but every day behold
Him doing works of mercy. Truly then we may
say with St. Paul: "Blessed be God...the Father
of mercies and the God of all consolation, who
comfort us in all our tribulation."
SEE IN the Scriptures the miracles of Christ.
His miracles were performed to lessen the suf
ferings of men and to lighten their burdens. He
manifested His power by going about doing good. He
gave sight to the blind; speech to the dumb;
health to the sick; life to the dead; and the power
of walking to the lame.
But nothing is more mani
fested in the Gospels than the
sympathy of Jesus for the
poor. He chose to be born of
humble parents, in a cold
stable and in an obscure vil
lage. Nearly His whole life
was spent in a town that was
looked upon with contempt. He
chose his twelve Apostles from the humblest
walks of life, men without wealth or learning,
or influence, or any of the qualifications re
garded as essential for the success of any great
enterprise. His command to preach the Gospel
carried the clause*'...especially to the poor."
These features in the life of Christ are re
called to our mind not only for admiration, but
still for our edification and example. The closer
we resemble the Ideal, the nearer we approach
Christian perfection. No matter how insignificant
we may be, we can exert some beneficial power
QUESTION BOX
Say ‘No’ To Grandad?
BY MONSIGNOR J. D. CONWAY
Q. I CORRECTED MY GRANDCHILD, NEARLY
10 YEARS OLD, WHO WAS MAKING THE SIGN
OF THE CROSS WITH HIS LEFT HAND. HIS
FATHER DID NOT THINK IT WOULD MAKE ANY
DIFFERENCE. PLEASE GIVE AN ANSWER.
A I hope you did your correcting gently. Con
form ity has certain advantages, but they are not
gre.t enough to be gained at the cost of embar
rassment in matters of this kind.
Generally, I believe it is a sound principle
tiat a parent should make decisions about the
faming of his own children without interference
fiom grandparents.
***
WE USED TO LIVE AMONG SOME VERY
SUCERE NON-CATHOLIC FRIENDS, AND THEY
HAD A HABIT AMONG THEM
WHEN THEY SIGNED THEIR
NAMES TO PUT BEHIND IT
SOMETHING TO THIS EF
FECT: JOHN JONES, PSALMS
23, 1-2. I WAS CURIOUS SO
I ASKED "WHAT FUR". IT
WAS EXPLAINED TO ME
THAT THIS INDICATED A
PARTICULAR TEXT OR LINE
FROM THE BIBLE WHICH
HELPEL ENCOURAGED OR LIFTED THIS PAR-
T1CULAF PERSON. THE TEXT QUOTED HERE
IS "THE ORD IS MY SHEPHERD, I SHALL NOT
WANT.**
NOW 1H VE NEVER BEEN GIVEN TO HUNT UP
i A TEXT OR MYSELF, FOR I AM A POOR
CATHOLIC WHO IS HONESTLY STRIVING FOR
A VERY MCH CLOSER RELATION TO OUR
LORD. SOMhpiMES AT DAILY MASS AND HOLY
COMMUNIONi FEEL ALMOST AS IF I HAVE
* JUST ABOUTviADE THE GRADE. THEN EVEN
AS I AM RETURNING TO MY SEAT FROM
THE CQMMUNW RAIL, THAT NASTY, HORRI
BLE THOUGHluiTS ME: "WHAT IF YOU’RE
SOME KIND OF a NUT OR SOMETHING, AND
THIS ISN'T REA-ly JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF,
BUT JUST A PIECE OF BREAD. ORDINARILY
I WOULD SAY "THAT SCARES HELL OUT OF
ME," BUT INSTEAD IT SEEMS TO PUT A BIT
OF IT IN ME.
BUT NOW I KNOW I HAVE FOUND MY TEXT.
IT IS FROM A LETTER IN ONE OF YOUR RE
CENT COLUMNS: "THE PEACE OF SOUL EN
JOYED BY A SAINT (WHICH I AM NOT? IS NOT
THAT OF A CARNATION COW". BY THIS TEXT
I SHALL LIVE. WHAT I WANTED WAS PEACE
AND QUIET WITHOUT ANY DOUBT, BUT I HAVE
FOUND OUT IT GETS MORE PEACEFUL AFTER
EACH BATTLE MAKES ME LESS AFRAID OF
THE NEXT ONE.
DO I MAKE SENSE TO YOU, OR AM I REALLY
SOME KIND OF A NUT?
A. You make sense.
• **
Q. DURING LENT CAN ONE PARTICIPATE
IN ACTIVITIES SUCH AS HAVING A CARD
PARTY AT ONE’S HOUSE, OR SQUARE DAN
CING IN A PRIVATE HOME ON SUNDAY? WHAT
ABOUT SUCH ACTIVITIES IN A PUBLIC PLACE?
A. It is the spirit of the thing which counts.
Lent is a time of penance. The entire liturgy of
the Church emphasizes it. But the only law is
that we fast each weekday, if our age, health and
work leave us subject to this law. Other means
and manners of penance are of your own choosing.
Penance and mortification are necessary for all
of us; so you should do something, and it should
be adapted to your special needs and capabilities.
However, you cannot do everything. It would
hardly be wise to deny yourself all fun and rec
reation for 40 days. You might become unbear
ably grumpy. But I would recommend that your
lenten levities be rather quiet and private, lest
you distract other people from the spirit of pen
ance.
LITURGICAL WEEK
A ‘Pnview 9 Transfiguration
Continued Page 4
of God, and away from ^ varieties of idolatry.
Men may be, and often an His instruments, but
they are never Him. Lentw rnsus against placing
our trust elsewhere than in'{ im> against allow ing
our etiquette to carry us to Vg point of forgetting
our basic baptismal equality.
MARCH 13, WEDNESDAY, gcOND WEEK IN
LENT. Today’s Gospel contirtpg lesson of
yesterday’s. The Christian coiC,,^ the new
People of God, will have ordei and hierarchy,
as will any society of human beL s> j t w m h aV e
"lords", but no "lording it ovt*. the resl> It
will have power, but no vaunting . power. The
Son of Man came to serve and to giv answer
to the evil times upon us (First Re^ r ^ ls Q 0( j* s
rescue in Jesus' Resurrection (Gosj^
MARCH 14, THURSDAY, SECONL \ VE p^ ^
LENT. Lent’s rehearsal of the grtaL hemes of
the Old and New Testaments, its exposv^ ^ sal _
vation history, offers us another chanjjL.
ten to Moses and the prophets" (Gow^x t0
place our trust where it belongs (First R ac jmg)
Saints in Black and White
TERMS IN CATHOLIC USE 13
over tne tide of human sufferings by striving
for this Ideal and putting this Ideal into practice
in our own life.
CERTAINLY in our own midst there is much
need to help the less fortunate. In most parishes
this cry for help is answered by a group of volun
teers, dedicated and determined, known as the
St. Vincent de Paul Society. No priest who has
ever served as a chaplain to this group has failed
to be touched by the sanctity of its members
and the self-sacrificing spirit which permeates the
organization.
Last week, in Atlanta, death claimed one of
Atlanta's oldest members, Tom Clark. In a requiem
held from the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception
many attending were those who had received the
kindness of his words or the charity of his spirit.
Known well to priests all over the state of Geor
gia who had ever served at the "I.C,” and known
better to thousands living in the shadows of the
mother churches’ spires, physical infirmities failed
to keep Tom Clark from serving well this organiza
tion to which he was so dedicated up to the end.
FOR YEARS he successfully directed and operat
ed in a quiet way what is probably the largest dis
tribution of food baskets at Christmas time in At
lanta. The greatest force of the St. Vincent de Paul
Society lies in its anonymity. Tom Clark was true
to this ideal all of his days.
A sort of official greeter on the steps of the Im
maculate Conception Church Sunday after Sunday,
Tom Clark never failed to brighten the lives of
those with whom he came in contact.
Tom Clark’s place will be filled and in time his
good works forgotten. This is the plan of the St.
Vincent de Paul Society. This is the organization to
which Tom Clark was so dedicated and served so
w ell. But what is far more important, he will be re
membered forever in the prayers, good works and
sacrifices of those with whom he served.
"Well done, thou good and faithful servant. . .*’
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ACROSS
1. Phonograph Record
5. Smart
9. Giving No Heed
13. Affirm
14. Burmese Viol.
15. Ram
17. Bull
18. Scottish Highlander
20. African Antelope
22. Eradicatori
25. Joined
26. Wild Plum
27. Scythe
28. Ideology
29. Retin
30. Annoy
31. Early (Comb. Form)
32. Extra Pay
64. Boundary, Comb.
Form
65. Degree
67. Ascend
69. Biblical High Prieit
70. Male Graduate
72. Complete
74. Emperor
76. Combining form;
of the air
77. Song Bird (Europe)
79. Leaf Bearing Plant
81. Feminine Nickname
82. Sediment; Wine
83. Period of Time
84. English Statesman
DOWN
23 Within; Comb. Form
24. Reichsmark, Abbrv.
29. Shellac Base
33. One Spoke to
Abraham
34. Ohio College Town
35. Her; Obt.
36. Age
37. Thing; Lot.
38. Wide Awake
40. Crony; Old Eng.
42. Blackbird
43. Attack
45. Hindu Cymbal
46. Diamond; Slang
47. Lively Dance
49. To Have; Scot.
50. Vestry
34. Pros
1. Fruit, Tropical
Abbrv.
35. German Gentleman
2. Creamy White
55.
Archbishop
39. Showing Blood
3. Serums
56.
Bulwark
Vessels
4. Bishop's Staff
57.
Peculiarity
41. Wrath
5. Cent
58.
A Nun
42. According to; Fr.
6. Keeps Close
61.
American Railway
44. Authoritative
7. Masculine Name
Union
48. Temerity
8. Reduced to Ashes
64.
Old Latin
51. Birth, by
9. Prosecuting Officer
65.
Pix Container
52. Alas
10. Before
66.
Oriental
53. Air-filled Space
11. Troubles
68.
Roof Edge
55. Entreaty
12. Allegiance
70.
Scope
56. Quintuple
16. Sleeping Sound
71.
Requisite
59. Buckle
19. A Part of the
73.
Mendacity
61. Land Measure
Scriptures
75.
100 Sq. Meters
62. Canticle; Scripture
21. Algerian Governor,
78.
Saints
63. State of being;
Pi-
80.
Vocalized pause
Suffix
ANSWER TO LAST WEEKS PUZZLE PAGE 7
WASHINGTON - NC— The
administration’s youth employ
ment bill would be of particu
lar benefit to boys who drop
out of high school, the secre
tary at the National Conference
of Catholic Charities told a
Senate subcommittee.
Msgr. Raymond J. Gallagher
said that under the Youth Em
ployment Act of 1963 such young
men would be able to continue
the basic learning process in
terrupted when they left school.
He testified (Feb. 28) before
the Senate subcommittee on em
ployment and manpower.
THE $100 million youth em
ployment program seeks to es
tablish a 15,000-member Youth
Conservation Corps to work in
the countryside and a Home
Town Youth Employment Corps
of 50,000 for the towns and cit
ies.
"It is my conviction,” Msgr.
Gallagher told the subcom
mittee, "that the provisions of
this program, far from pro
posing to turn out highly skil
led technicians, will nonethe
less turn out young men pos
sessing many basic skills. When
the participants in this program
have completed their tour of
duty, it is conceivable that they
will have enough knowledge of
and respect for tools, and what
they could accomplish, to be
readily employable."
MSGR. Gallagher said it is
his understanding that the pro
gram "will provide opportunity
for a training, supervision and
living regimen that will include
adequate opportunity to practice
the specific religious observ
ances."
"These three ingredients
seem to me," he added, "to
be essential to character build
ing within our young people un
der all circumstances of their
life."
He said the "most signifi
cant contribution" of the pro
gram lies in "the fact that
these young men will learn
to know the dignity and nobil
ity of labor.’’
Peachtree Road
Pharmarmacy
Pick Up and Delivery
Service
CE 7-6466
4062 Peachtree Rd. Atlanta
ARNOLD VIEWING
6 A Child Is Waiting
BY JAMES W. ARNOLD
Lazarus’ poverty is a symbol of the helplessness
of the human race, a helplessness which has great
potentiality for receiving and responding to God’s
blessings.
MARCH 15, FRIDAY, SECOND WEEK IN LENT.
Even our sins, the sins of which we repent es
pecially during this lenten retreat (Collect, Tract),
cannot frustrate the providence and the design of
God. His messengers, and even His Son (First
Reading and Gospel), we may reject, persecute and
kill. Yet that stone "has become the chief stone
at the corner" (Gospel). CXir confidence and trust
finds expression in today’s Communion Humn:
"You will watch over us, Lord, and keep us safe
from this world for eternity."
MARCH 16, SATURDAY, SECOND WEEK IN
LENT. The failure of Israel to respond with love
to God’s love, generously to His generosity, is
held up to the New Israel, the Church, frequent
ly during Lent. Both Scripture lessons today, as
yesterday’s Gospel, tell the same story. Esau,
the first-born, loses his blessing to Jacob-come-
lately. And the repenting wanderer displaces with
the passion of his return even the complacent ha
bitue of God’s household.
Stanley Kramer specializes in first films about
challenging subjects. In an industry which some
times seems to feel that the only adult theme is
adultery, producer and sometime-director Kram
er has persevered in a long string of films
grappling with issues important to oyr times:
race relations, nuclear war, religion and evolu
tion, war crimes. Often they’ve been propagan-
distic, and not all have been good ("Pressure
Point"), but some have been
extraordinary ("High Noon,"
"Judgment at Nuremberg").
Now comes "A Child Is
Waiting," which reflects in
creased national concern for
the problem of mental retar
dation. Kramer insists that
his films be entertaining as
well as public-spirited: "If 1
don’t make it entertaining," he says, "I'm lost."
To achieve this he uses highly dramatic stories,
well-known stars and heavy promotion. The ap
proach always risks pleasing no one: there may
be too many concessions for serious filmgoers,
not enough for the mass audience.
"JUDGMENT at Nuremberg" was certainly bet
ter art than box-office. On Saturday night, custo
mers preferred not to meditate on Nazi war
guilt, even if the cast included Tracy, Clift and
Lancaster. Hollywood has so long brainwashed au
diences to believe that entertainment equals
escape that few people will accept that hard rea
lity, even tragedy, can also entertain.
To entertain means to amuse, to divert; we get
this kind of entertainment from golf, poker, do
ing the twist, or even (in desperation) from TV.
Life without it would be Intolerable. But enter
tainment also has a deeper meaning: the intellec
tual pleasure or delight one gains from good art,
whether it be painting, music or drama. This
pleasure need not always be "happy" (witness
"Hamlet" or "Oedipus") or escapist (as film-
goers discovered in "Marty"). About this sort of
entertainment one thing is certain: to be fully
human, man needs it as desperately as he needs,
sometimes, to laugh and to forget.
Whether the blame belongs to the schools or
simply to the general brutality of modern life,
many people leave this kind of pleasure unex
plored. Serious drama, they feel, offers little but
tedium and depression: boy loses girl, and bodies
litter the set. Perhaps the artist is partly to blame,
for people no longer trust him. Nobody, they feel,
can make a repulsive subject interesting or "en
tertaining." Many viewers avoided "West Side
Story" because they doubted beauty could be found
in slum-bound juvenile delinquency; they did not
know, or trust Bernstein, Laurents and Robbins.
The same was even truer of "Judgment at Nurem
berg," which had no pretty girls, songs and
dances.
"A CHILD Is Waiting" is neither tragic nor de
pressing, but it is a serious picture about an un-
UNIQUE
KNITTING
COMPANY
MANUFACTURES OF
ENGLISH RIB & SPORT
HOSIERY
Acworth Georgia
pleasant subject. The retarded, through history,
have been feared, mocked and abused as much as
the insane. The film at times is unbearably sad,
because it concerns children who want and need
love, but do not get it. Yet the dominant note is
one of hope, even joy. The important thing is that
audiences should trust Kramer and his gifted
young director, John Cassavetes, to entertain
them on several levels. The failures, in fact, oc
cur in the direction of box-office rather than art.
The film has too much "Ben Casey" in its blood,
the syndrome of souped-up medical soap opera.
More crucially, the picture is an uncertain cross
between documentary and drama: a horse that is
half-racer and half-dray is unlikely to be good
either at Hialeah or at pulling milk wagons. Writ
er Abby Mann (who won an Oscar for "Judg
ment”) wants to move us to love and action for
the retarded. So he tells us about them: who they
are, how they got that way, what they need, how
they can be helped.
THIS ELEMENT in the movie is superb, chief
ly because of the children from California’s Paci
fic State Hospital. Simply by being themselves,
under the shifting, probing camera of Joseph La-
Shelle, these youngsters eloquently describe not
only their needs but the heartbreaking beauty of
the human personality.
But to hold that slippery audience, Mann adds
a story about one boy, his divorced parents (Gena
Rowlands and Steven Hill), and a sympathetic
teacher (Judy Garland). Miss Garland comes
equipped with several standard neuroses, and
meddles enough to cause the child to run away;
she draws the wrath of the stem, dedicated head
psychologist (Burt Lancaster).
One problem is the child-actor, who is not con
vincing as "retarded"; the viewer is not quite
overwhelmed by the miracle of it when, at the
end, he is able to recite a speech in a play. The
adult actors all seem larger than life, straining
to shrink into real people. None approach the
effectiveness of one nameless actor who, in a bit
as a father bringing his son to the hospital, breaks
down describing their last moments in the car.
NOT ENOUGH can be said about the vigorous
work of director Cassavetes, whose creative
use of camera angle and closeup is the most re
vealing and incisive by a young American since
Blake Edwards' "Experiement in Terror". The
sequence of shots of Visitors Day, when no one
comes for the "child who is waiting," and few of
those who do arrive come with understanding, is
a cogent summary and commentary on the pic
ture’s central theme.
"Child" is most entertaining when it is edu
cating, and rather too supercharged when it is
being dramatic. It’s a near-miss for Stanley
Kramer, but this is a man who deserves respect,
who has spent his creative life opening windows,
and encouraging us to look out and see, not what
we’d like to see, but what is there.
Shamrock Knitting Mills
Marietta, Georgia
Phone: 428-9007
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In The Georgia Bulletin
Phone: 231-1281
God Love You
MOST REVEREND FULTON J. SHEEN
A Russian Orthodox priest was asked how, in
a Communist government, seminarians were re
cruited for the priesthood. He answered that such
a young man never enters the seminary without a
complete and total renouncement. One day he walks
out of his home without telling a soul and without
saying goodbye to anyone, for no one can be
trusted. He walks to the seminary, often a dis
tance of a 100 miles; there he assumes a new
name, so that he cannot be traced. Not even the
seminary officials know his family name.
Go now to another part of
the world. We recently inquir
ed of a Bishop of Borneo con
cerning the spiritual lives of
his primitive people. He told
us that they quickly reached
an eminent degree of sanc
tity, because when they en
tered the Church they put a
period after their old lives ra
ther than a comma. The old ways of living were
completely broken off, leaving more room for
the Lord. This is true also in other countries
behind the Iron Curtain, where every Catholic lives
ready for martyrdom.
This brings up the question: What is it that
makes a saint? It is always having something to
do for Christ and the Church, something to give
up for the spread of His Gospel — perhaps a
neighbor to convert, someone sick to visit, some
poor sinner to bring back to the Sacraments. A
Borneo chief, whenever he assists at a board
meeting in Australia, makes it a point to ask
each of the members if they have prayed to God
that day. A saint never has time on his hands.
Thus, Our Lord was described as "always going
about doing good."
Fellow Catholics of the United States: Be not just
"Sunday Catholics," but "Take-up-your-Cross-
daily-and-follow-Me-Catholics. ’’ Give yourself a
Mission. Don’t just sit there making money! Do
something! While you are ascribing "otherness"
to someone else, everybody else is pinning "other
ness" on you. That is why the world is the way
it is. Why not start with this idea? Every morn
ing, resolve to deny yourself during the day some
little luxury worth a dime. Make a like sacrifice
daily; do it for the poor in Asia...or Africa...or
Oceania. At the end of the month, send the $3.00
to the Holy Father. He, knowing the Mission
needs of the world better than anyone, will see
that it goes where it is most needed. This he does
through his Society for the Propagation of the
Faith.
GOD LOVE YOU to D. T. for$10 "In answer for
a favor received." to J. R. W. for $6.83
"This represents savings from eating some meals
in a cafeteria instead of a good restaurant, on a
recent business trip." to P. A. D. for $5
"Please accept this money which was giventome
by my recently ordained cousin. The money was a
gift to him; he gave it to me; I give it to you."
to F.M.C. for $6 "This is in thanksgiving.”
Are you on our MISSION mailing list? MISSION,
you know, is the SPOF magazine containing arti
cles, anecdotes, cartoons and pictures which is
published every two months by The Society for the
Propagation of the Faith. Our March-April issue is
a special issue, directed to American Catholics.
Won’t you write in now and ask to be put on our
list? A subscription is only a dollar. If you al
ready subscribe, watch for this special issue.
Cut out this column, pin your sacrifice to it and
mail it to Most Rev. Fulton J. Sheen, National Di
rector of the Society for the Propagation of tlje
Faith, 366 Fifth Avenue, New York 1 N. Y. or your
Archdiocesan Director, Very Rev. Harold J. Rainey
P. O. Box 12047 Northside Station, Atlanta 5, Ga.