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PAGE 4 GEORGIA BULLETIN THURSDAY, MARCH 21, 1963 the Archdiocese of Atlanta GEORGIA BULLETIN SERVING GEORGIA'S 71 NORTHERN COUNTIES Official Organ of the Archdiocese of Atlanta Published Every Week at the Decatur Dekalb News PUBLISHER - Archbishop Paul J. Hallinan MANAGING EDITOR Gerard E. Sherry CONSULTING EDITOR Rev. R. Donald Kiernan ADVERTISING DIRECTOR Sue Spence 2699 Peachtree N.E. P.O. Box 11667 Norths ide Station Atlanta S, Ga. Member of the Catholic Press Association and Subscriber to N.C.W.C. News Service Telephone 231-1281 Second Class Permit at Decatur, Georgia U.S.A. $5.00 Canada $5.50 Foreign $6.50 Community - People In both the cities and suburbs, Catholic clergy and Catholic lai ty must show a willingness to strengthen the physical assets of the community through spiri tual as well as educational for mation. In this time of transi tion we have a unique opportu nity to live our faith - that we are all one in Christ. The poor and the needy offer us the chance to practice the spiritual and cor poral works of mercy. Did we just learn by rote in our child hood or can we take up the chal lenge of our belief that faith without good works is dead? When the people of a commu nity band together through mu tual sympathy and understand ing great things can be accom plished. However, it is our con tention that too many of us are immature spiritually and social ly. We have an immaturity that blinds us to the immediate and lay apostalate. One June 1 Pope John XXIII “Sincerely invited” 4,000 Salesian lay “co-opera- tors” to assume their “place of responsibility as individuals and members of a community under the friendly guidance of the bishops and at the side of the priests in brotherly under standing.” In his attempts to bring the Church to the world, the Catho lic layman will find himself com ing under heavy fire from timid souls. These are the people who like to think that no improvement of the lay apostolate is neces sary. Of the they are people who show no concern for the world at all, as if the Church had noplace in it. To them, the community means only the Catholic commu nity, and their interest seems confined to this. CAREER WITH A FUTURE LITURGY AND LIFE New Vocation Notions the perceptible. We must, there fore, resolve to grow up with and in the Church by realizing our hidden powers. This is in direct line with the Holy See’s instructions on the The press recently gave pro minent coverage to a story from Baltimore reporting that the teenager concerned in the school prayer case before the Supreme Court had been persecuted by other boys. It was alleged in the story that William J. Murray III had been heckled by anpther boy who waved a rosary in his face. It appears now that young Murray has failed in his attempt to have his alleged persecutor arrest ed. Baltimore Municipal Judge Ho ward L. Aaron has refused to is sue a warrant against Brent Mc- Cully, 16, who denied thehecking and said he actually waved only a package of candy. Young Murray, now an 11th “For a small donation we could get a hot chocolate!” Alas, the layman’s task is not in some ivory tower. He lives in the world and must face the rea lities of it. He must bring the world to the Church in the same manner he is taking the Church to the world. grader at Polytechnic Institute, is the objector, along with his mother, Mrs. Madalyn Murray, in a case that seeks to declare public school religious exercis es unconstitutional. The Murrays profess to be atheists. What is most disconcerning about this alleged heckling is that few papers have reported the latest incident, in which the charge of heckling was dismis sed for lack of evidence. We say this in full knowledge that young Murray should not be persecut ed for his atheistic beliefs. He is entitled to freedom of ex pression. However, this charge has an indirect bearing on the case now before the Supreme Court. In deed, those who support the Mur rays’ position charge that his non-compliance with the public school religious exercises has led to his suffering indignities of one sort or another; and that this is an abridgement of his free dom. Unfounded charges, there fore, are important in the issue -- if only to prove how mis leading the argument can get. BY FR. ROBERT W. HOVDA (Priest of the Pittsburgh Orstory) MARCH 24, FOURTH SUNDAY OF LENT. For the Christian, the Church building, and particu larly the liturgy which is celebrated in that building, is '‘Jerusalem", a foretaste of the Joy and amity, the freedom and fulfillment of heaven. Baptism is the gate to this Jerusalem. So today, midway in our annual baptismal re treat and refresher course, we sing in the En trance Hymn: "Rejoice, Jerusalem; assemble, all you lovers of Jerusalem I You shared her grief, share now her joy..." The "Rejoice" or "Laetare" theme is set in BY REV. LEONARD F.X. MAYHEW March is Religious Vocations Month. This prompts us to take a fresh look at the entire notion of vocation. The idea is simultaneously so familiar and so beclouded with complications and cliches that it needs an energetic re-examina- tion. We need rather desperately to open our minds and to take a clear, unobstructed view of the place vocation holds in the Christian under standing of life. This will be a first step in the direction of understanding a number of related religious problems as well. The first fact to be grasped about vocation is that it is a particular grace, purposeful and in dividual. What 'distinguishes the grace of voca tion is that its aim is not pir- marily the sanctification of the recipient. Its end is ser vice, ministry to others and to the Church. Vocation is a mission, an impulse to meet particular needs of the Mys tical Body of Christ through consecration to a specific form of activity. The salva tion and sanctification of the recipient of the vocation are certainly involved but they are to be achieved from the service bestowed on Christ in his members. Only within the context of the Church can we begin to grasp the notion of vocation. It only has its real mean ing in terms of the bodily unity and mutual de pendence of all the members, each with its dis tinct function "in Christ Jesus". Put into theo logical terms the grace of vocation is in effect a pattern of actual graces designed to achieve a particular end necessary for the well-being of the Church. THE NATURE of vocation is to be outgoing, generous, loving, unselfish. This is an extremely important point. When we speak of vocation, we are concerned not with anything egocentric, "my soul, my salvation," but with a stable direction of an individual’s activity to the benefit and ser vice of others, a social responsibility. It is, then, a specific example of the loving-kindness to neighbor which is for Christians always the sole proof of love of God. Vocation is a logical out come of being a Christian. Within Christianity there must be a sense of vocation - and there must be vocations - because Christians must love and serve their fellows. It is part and parcel of the requisite conformity to Christ who came "not to be served but to serve and to give his life for many." LITURGICAL WEEK the First Reading, which sees Baptism as a li beration, contrasting the Christian age of fulfill ment with the former age of § the Law and of hope. Our eu- charistic pledge of liberty (for we who share Him as our food also live in Him and share His victory) is foreshadowed in the Gospel miracle offeed- MONDAY, MARCH 25, THE ANNUNCIATION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. For the Law could only condemn, since we were powerless to fulfill it perfectly. Until the Word of God, His Son, be came our flesh, man, sharing our condition even to One immediately obvious implication of this understanding of vocation is that it is inseparable from the Christian notion of sacrifice. Corre sponding to the individual grace of vocation there must be a decision on the part of the recipient to dedicate himself voluntarily to the service of the Mystical Body. This decision will necessarily involve sacrifice. Sacrifice is always the price of love. The will to love and to seek a particu lar good wholeheartedly must also have a less positive aspect. IT MUST mean deliberately foregoing other goods that are not compatible with the primary object of love. This is the purest and most abso lute exercise of freedom. In the acceptance of a vocation - any vocation - the goods to be sacrific ed are those which would dilute the unselfish, loving, generous direction of the grace of voca tion. Again, this is a specific and exact appli cation of the fundamental place of sacrifice in Christian spirituality. Against the background of this conception of vo cation as a dedication to service based on sacri fice, we can raise all the particular and vexing questions that face us. Two are especially press ing: the need for and the shortage of priestly and religious vocations on one hand and the equally urgent need and shortage of dedicated and inform ed lay leaders in the Church. In some areas of the world the Church is involved in what can only be described as a last-ditch struggle forsurvival because of lack of priests and religious. In our own country the problem is rapidly growing and in our particular region it has always been a con stant element of concern. THAT the need for dedicated and deeply com mitted lay leaders is most urgent has been the continuous message of the Popes for over a gene ration. Despite numerous and glorious exceptions the laity still has not taken its due place in the struggle to "renew all things in Christ," to bring every sphere of humanactivity under the influence of Christ. How are we to account for these failures? We cannot impugn the generosity of God, as if He could withhold his grace from his Church. The defect may well be that we Christians have lost the true understanding of freedom and the ne cessary mandate of our faith to sacrifice and service. We may have so absorbed a self-indul gent and self-centered conception of life that we do not grasp - and do not communicate to our youth - the disposition to accept the grace of vo cation when it is offered. nine months of IITe in the womb of a woman. Be cause of the event we celebrate today, we know the freedom of God's grace we celebrated yes terday. Mary is herself a hymn to the grace'of God, to the Love that wrought the Incarnation. To praise and to venerate her is to sing such a hymn. MARCH 26, TUESDAY, FOURTH WEEK IN LENT. Lent is a school, but unlike any other school in this one our teacher is Almighty God. Jesus tells us in the Gospel today that the origin of His message and His mission is not that hu man nature which is His. It is the Father, "one who has a right to send" (Gospel). The same Father, who, in the First Continued On Page 5 Misleading Issue? A Foretaste Of Joy And Amity WANT COURTESY Pity The Lay Lecturer BY GERARD E. SHERRY Among the extra curricular activities of the editor of a diocesan weekly newspaper is that of lecturing before parochial groups, from the Holy Name Society down through the CYO activities committee. Most editors don’t fuss about it and willing go out of their way to oblige such organizations. The trouble is, our parochial and diocesan societies have no idea how to treat the average lay speaker. The clergy have no trouble. Whether they are local boys or men from out of town, they are treated as if they are performing a favor in addressing the Catholic group. On top of it all, get the clergy at least one fellow priest present to listen. Alas, lay speak ers, — especially diocesan editors — very seldom get treated with any such respect. First of all, the program chair man is liable to ring up a week before the Communion Break fast is scheduled and explain that he was supposed to ask last month but had been busy. If you say you're booked up that Sunday or that eveny, you’re almost accused of lying or playing hard to get. So, too, if the affair is planned several months ahead, there’s hardly ever any confirmation; and one is supposed to find out the time, place, and how to get there, without assistance. REAPINGS AT RANDOM. THERE also the subject of an honorlum. Most Catholic groups never mention it to a lay speaker and don’t think he expects it. However, with a priest it’s different. Whether Father wants it or not, he’ll be offered one. Sometimes the lay speak er is deliberately embarrassed by the question: "What do you charge?" Don’t misunderstand my point. I am not talk ing here about those persons important enough (or who think they are) to hire a lecture service which makes the arrangements and sets the fees- for a commission. Nol Tm talking about those of us who are expected to go out almost every Sun day morning (and some evenings) to prove how apostolic we are; and who are pushed around as if we had strict obligations and no rights in the mat ter. AND DON'T misunderstand my point on lecture fees. Most editors lecture for nothing. Indeed, I have a policy which is followed by most of my confreres: No fees for monthly communion break fasts, or any monthly meetings of parish groups in the See city. Outside the See city, a token honorium for such meetings to meet gas or other travel ex penses. However, for annual breakfastSjOrmeet- lngs for which there is a charge to the audience, a fee is expected. Nothing fabulous, mind you; just what the traffic can bear. I mention all this because some of us will form a union if Catholic organizations don’t change their ways. In some areas. Catholic groups have found an answer—they form a lecture bureau from their own membership and a good time is had by all. However, the Holy Name Society, The Knights of Columbus, and others, should give lay speakers greater consideration and respect. Most of us who do the running around have families. We go to con siderable trouble, in all kinds of weather, to ob lige. Yet here's the type of thing that happens: Recently I had to get up at an unearthly hour to attend the first Mass at my parish church and then travel quite a distance for a Communion breakfast. It started around 9:15 a.m. and the meal was over some 30 minutes later. Alas, the chairman commenced the monthly business meet ing, which included the election of officers. An hour and a half later, I was expected to give a serious talk to men who wanted to rush home to take their families to the last Mass. ANOTHER recent experience can also be related now that St. Patrick's feast day has just passed. I attended a local Holy Name breakfast, which included community singing as part of the pro gram. Nothing is more revolting to me than bois terous singing at that time of the morning. Can you imagine the choirmaster leading the assembly in two verses each of "When Irish Eyes are Smiling" and "My Wild Irish Rose". The sounds were more reminiscent of closing time at a coun try pub. But that wasn't all. The choirmaster had the gall to leave shortly afterwards, taking with him half my audience. At this particular break fast, we started off with over 100 hardy souls. When I started to talk, there were less than fifty. I’ll admit that I was not as good an attraction as the menu, prepared by the local ladies, but no one knows the difficulty 1 had finding the place—and the time it took to find parking space within walking distance. Yes, the next time you have a lay speaker at your parochial group meeting, give a little thought to the fact that he’s human like you. He may not be a Fulton Sheen or a Frank Sheed— but neither is he that expensive. In most cases all he wants is elementary courtesy — and that is as free as he is.