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GEOR' il \ BL LLETIN THURSDAY, AUGUST 29, 1963
the
Archdiocese of Atlanta
GEORGIA BULLETIN
atMB&K
SERVING GEORGIA'S 71 NORTHERN COUNTIES
Official Organ of the Archdiocese of Atlanta
Published Every Week at the Decatur Dekalb News
Published by Archbishop Paul J. Hallinan Printed at Decatur, Ga.
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ivieii
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Pint Size Photo
It is not often that we wish to
quarrel with or criticize an
other Catholic newspaper. All the
more so when it involves an editor
who is a friend. But we must
take issue with the appearance of
a photo in the August 22 Catholic
News of New York.
The photo shows Mrs. Made
line Murray of Baltimore sitting
in a bar with her mother and,
to quote the Catholic News capt
ion, having “a mid-day beer”.
Mrs. Murray is the lady atheist
whose suit against the Baltimore
school system resulted in the
Supreme Court banning Bible re
ading in our public schools. We
reported last week that this same
woman was establishing a center
for atheists in Central Kansas,
and was also trying to ban nuns
from teaching inaKansas school.
We hold no brief for Mrs. Mur
ray’s ideas or actions, which fur
ther atheism. We question, how
ever, the ethics involved in this
type of picture. It is unbecoming
to a Catholic newspaper. We see
no purpose in the photograph,
except perhaps to show that this
atheist woman goes into a bar
for a drink. There is also the
imputation that her atheism and
her visit to a bar have a con
nection.
To us it is a silly business
which makes no sense. After all,
we should be able to disagree
with Mrs. Murray without invad
ing her privacy. She is entitled
to this, and should be fought on
the issue, not on her personality.
It gives us serious concern,
for this type of “fighting back”
at an opponent might well catch
on. I’m afraid that many of us
Catholics would be caught
“Having a pint” in between get
ting public notice as crusaders
and the like.
Let Mrs. Murray visit her
favorite bar if she wants to.
The Catholic press has too noble
a function to waste time or space
investigating that aspect of he
life. We can use our resources
to counteract her atheistic acti
vities in a much more digified
and logical way. It appears to
us that the Catholic News has
succumbed to the petty journa
lism of its secular counterparts.
We hope it was a genuine mis
take; otherwise Mrs. Murray has
scored a point.
On Traffic Safety
Next week some 150,000 youn
gsters will be retuning to our
parochial and public schools in
the metropolitan area of Atlanta
and in many other communities
throughout the state.
The Women’s Chamber of
Commerce of Atlanta and others
have initiated a safety program
to protect our children from the
hazards of careless driving
through school zones. Most com
munities post special speed limit
signs in these areas, and all
drivers are requested to observe
them.
have it as a topic of convers
ation in order that both young
and old may be made aware of
theneed for responsibility. Pers
onal discipline and family dis
cipline is involved. Parents, the
refore, have both a moral and a
civic duty to inculcate into the
minds and hearts of their famil
ies the respect due to traffic saf
ety officials and the programs
they have mapped out to make
G eorgia a safer place to live in.
SOMETHING FOR YOUR COUNTRY
BETWEEN FAITHS
Ecumenical Understanding
BY FR. LEONARD F. X. MAYHEW
The Faith and Order Assembly of the World
Council of Churches was held in Montreal for two
weeks last month. Public prayer was offered
throughout the archdiocese of Atlanta for the
success of the conference. Along with other favor
able statements from Catholic sources and the
active participation of official Catholic observers
this event marked a continuing progress in Catho
lic understanding of the ecumenical movement
among non-Catholics.
Perhaps the most important fundamental de
velopment has been a growing realization that
the Holy Spirit, whose work Christian unity is,
may operate with freedom and effect within any
individual or group and is not limited to the
external boundaries of the Catholic Church. The
improved atmosphere in inter-Church relations
that we have witnessed in the past few years
can only be ascribed to the working s of grace.
Led by the late Pope John and Cardinal Augus
tin Bea, Catholic thinkers are beginning to take
cognizance that there already exists a certain
community among all Christians based on their
common baptism. This community is very far
from perfect and does not in any sense derogate
from the full connatural unity of the visible
Church. But it is a fact, nontheless. And, it
provides a basis fo, mutual understanding,
common prayer, responsible cooperation in
certain areas and a fruitful exchange of views -
all of which ought to be conducive to our ulti
mate oneness.
FAITH and Order is one division of the World
Council of Churches, which includes about two
hundred Protestant and Orthodox churches. From
the viewpoint of Catholic ecumenical activity,
it is probably the most important element of the
World Council. Its concern is with the place
of the sacraments, order (in the sense of the
ministry and also the structure of the church),
and doctrine within the Christian Church. For
this reason it has always been the place where
Christians interested in theology and liturgy
have been most involved.
It is so urgent that Catholics be aware of the
currents of the ecumenical movement, that it may
be permissible to quote at some length the state
ment of purpose of the Faith and Order from a
report published before the recent assembly.
“The Commission on Faith and Order understands
that the unity which is both God’s will and His
gift to His Church is one which brings all in
each place who confess Christ Jesus as Lord
into a fully comm itteed fellowship with one another
through one baptism into Him, holding the one
apostolic faith, preaching the one Gospel and
breaking the one bread, and having a corporate
life reaching out in witness and service to all;
and which at the same time unites them with die
whole Christian fellowship in all places and all
ages in such wise that ministry and member
ship are acknowledged by all, and that all can
act and speak together as occasion requires
for the tasks to which God calls the Church.”
IF THIS definition of Christian unity will sound
somewhat vague and abstract to Catholics, it
can at least be acknowledged that it contains
nothing positively objectionable from the view
point of Catholic faith. Taken against the back
ground of the extreme divergence of doctrines
concerning the nature of the Church actually
held by many Protestants, it certainly repre
sents a basis for discussion and progressive
understanding. It would be naive to pretend that
in the area of doctrine there are not the most
serious obstacles to unity. At die same time we
must rejoice to see these difficult areas exa
mined in a spirit of charity and dedication to
the truth.
LITURGICAL WEEK
COVERAGE IN DEPTH
TV Network
Job Well Done
BY GERARD E. SHERRY
The other night I watched a repeat of the
EfcaPont Show of the Week, “Two Faces of Tre
ason,” on the NBC network. It was an expose
of Communist spy operations in this country,
and was extremely well done.
There is nothing very significant about this,
except for the fact that about an hour before
I had just finished reading the August issue of
The Priest, a magazine published by Our Sunday
Visitor. My attention was drawn to an article in'
the correspondence columns which was signed
by The Mindszenty Foundation of St. Louis. This
group of Catholics (it has no official standing-
in the Church) has as its main preoccupation,
anti-Communism.
THE MINDSZENTY
ask me why it was
put in the letter col
umns) charged that
on our TV networks
Communist proga-
ganda is sodisguis -
ed that “much of it
is subliminally ac
cepted by innocent
viewers.”
It also charged that “all the high drama
of the life-and - death struggle between Com
munist tyranny and freedom - the Red take
over of a dozen countries, the escapes from
behind the Iron Curtain, the missionaries w ho saw
Communism face to face, the courage of the Hun
garian Freedom Fighters and of Bang-Jensen —
is usually passed over by the TV scriptwriters
in favor of resurrecting Hitler and downgrading
America.”
Foundation article (don’t
REAPINGS
AT
RANDOM
IT COMPLAINED that movies on TV seldom
make the Communist a villain and suggested that
the “late show” convinces many people that the
Germans, not the Reds, are the chief threat to
western civilization. Alas, while we must not
forget the ruthless oppression by International
Communism, neither can we forget the lessons
of recent history. The gas chambers of Belsen
and Dachau were not invented by Communist
propaganda. They were the handiwork of Hitlerite
Germany. It cannot be erased from history.
There is very little difference between Com
munism and Fascism. The Church is persecu
ted by both isms — and we have martyrs to
prove it. But this is beside the point. Thereal
issue is whether* the Mindszenty Foundation's
charges are true. The documentation they offer
is the same old rehash of alleged network per
secution of the late Senator Joe McCarthy, the
favoring of Alger Hiss, and the like, with the
same old “Villains” such as Edward R. Murrow
and the Ford Foundation.
I did some research on the subject, and didn’t
have to go back to the 1950’s to prove that the
Mindszenty Foundation’s charges are nothing
more than half-truths and innuendo, which do
little justice to the cause of anticommunism.
FOR EXAMPLE, the NBC correspondent in
Moscow, Frank Bourgholtzer, was expelled from
the Soviet Union early this year because the
network produced four special programs exam
ining Communist ideology in practice. The Russ
ians took umbrage at two of the programs. “The
Death of Stalin” (telecast January 27, 1963)
and “The Rise of Kruschev”, (telecast February
3, 196: ). The aims of the four specials as
announced by NBC, were “To Study What Oppor
tunities Exist for the Free World to Slow or Re
verse the Communist World of World Dominat
ion."
Faith Is Our ‘Yes 9 To His Promise And Love
We heartily endorse sucha saf
ety program and urge our rea
ders to exercise extreme care
and caution when driving thro
ugh a school zone. The streets
must be made safe for all, in
cluding our children. Recent stat
istics show that we in Gerogia
have nothing to be proud of in
relation to traffic safety. Week
after week, the death toll mounts,
apart from the hundreds maimed
and injured; and all this is caus
ed, for the most part, by a lack
of consideration for others.
While we are on the subject
we make a special plea for ex
tra care this Labor Day Week
end. With thousands of additional
drivers on the road, state offic
ials estimate that some 16 per
sons will lose their lives intraf
fic accidents. What a sorry re
flection on our public sense of
responsibility, when it can be
estimated what we, the citizens of
Georgia, will be responsible for
such a loss of life.
The question of traffic safety
is a moral one. A callous dis
regard for traffic laws is sin
ful, It is not a subject which
we can “sweep under the rug”
for someone else to think about.
Every home in the state should
By REV. ROBERT W. HOVDA
THIRTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST.
“Covenant” and "faith” are the themes of to
day’s Mass. The God in whom we believe is a
God who has affirmed our value to such an extent
that He has sought us out, even in our sin and
disobedience, and promised us the world and more.
And to make these promises a covenant, to make
us capable of accepting them, He has poured into
our hearts a divine gift we call faith. Faith is
our “yes” to His promise and to His love.
If a person loves us, we find ourselves per
forming loving deeds. It is natural for us to love,
and to act our love, in return. But these deeds
are not the reason the other person loves us.
They are a response. So our deeds, our “works,”
are not the reason God loves us (First Reading).
We must give thanks by our deeds, as did the
Samaritan (Gospel), but our thanks do not win
us health and life. Only faith, His gift, does that.
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 2
ST. STEPHEN, KING CONFES
SOR. Man is by nature a doer,
an actor. The villain of the
Gospel story thought he was
refrain because he feared the
Lord, he feared responsibility.
But for man there is no neu-
tralarea between doing good
and doing evil.
tf we do not good, we thereby do evil. If we
do not do evil, we there by do good (First Re
ading). The business of public worship is an ex
ample. Refusal to take part in the Sunday assembly
of God’s people is not a neutral act. Insofar
as it is deliberate, it is already idolatry and
sin.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3 ST. PIUS X, POPE,
CONFESSOR. The Gospel is not a message de
vised by men or subject to men’s approval.
But to preach it, to exercise leadership and
authority in the Church, one must love the whole
race of men to whom the Gospel is addressed
(First Reading). And one must love Jesus Christ,
so that one is content and proud to be His vicar
and His instrument (Gospel). Authority in the Ch
urch is a work of love.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 4 MASS AS
ON SUNDAY. Prescriptions, regulations, for
mulae—these things by themselves mean bondage.
They mean slavery to the human elemenr in the
Church. But faith in Jesus Christ breathes holy
liberty into the Christian's life, without injuring
his respect for laws and dogmas. The latter
convince us of our limitatons, our weakness and
infirmity. Faith convinced us of God’s certain
and everlasting love.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5 ST. LAWRENCE
JUSTINIAN, BISHOP, CONFESSOR. To “enter
into the joy of thy master” (Gospel) is a re
ward beyond any legitimate aspiration of a cre
ature. But we are more than creatures, a con
viction we celebrate at every gathering around
the altar. We are sons and heirs. Jesus here
gives us the right to rejoice in confident hope.
The Christian has a right to be happy.
FRIDAY. SEPTEMBER 6 MASS AS ON SUN
DAY. “Remember, Lord, the covenant you made,”
we repeat in the Entrance and Gradual Hymns.
We sing these words, not in doubt of God's
constancy, but to remind ourselves that our
eucharistic assembly is a covenant-assembly—
created by God’s Word, called together by God’s
Word. It is a sure thing, a firm foundation,
in a temporal sphere where hesitancy, insecur
ity and vacillation are common.
SEPTEMBER 7 ST. MARY ON SATURDAY.
Mary, as the first of the redeemed, is the figure
who stands before us all in her full human
glory, “blessed,” “full of grace,” as we re
peat in today's liturgy. For in Jesus Christ it
is neither cynical nor naive to speak of human
glory, of divinized man. Such is His mission.
Such is the effect of His power as Saviour. We
see the result of His mission and the effect of
His power in Mary, and we rejoice in her in
tercession.
CBS network has had even worse luck with
their Moscow correspondents. Both Paul Niven
and David Schonbraun were thrown out of the
Soviet capital for their hard hitting reporting.
In addition for the past eighteen months CBS
has produced quite a number of “anti-Communist
specials” including one in January of this year
entitled, "War on the Top of the World.” In
June, the “Look Up and Live” program had a
fine presentation of thetrialand imprisonment of
the late Cardinal Stepinac of Yugoslavia. Last
year CBS also showed specials on “EastGermany-
the Land Beyond the Wall.” “The Communist
Squeeze in Cuba,” and “Gemany - Red Spy Tar-
II
get.
THERE W ERE, in addition, dramas appearing
on all the networks which gave exposes on Com
munist tactics and infiltration in national and
international life. The Mindszenty Foundation is
quite unrealistic. The television industry has a
function of diversity in information and enter
tainment. It can’t be showing anti-Communist
programs every night, or indeed every week.
But it does enough in this field to more than answer
the petty accusations of subtle Communist infil
tration of its networks.
The war against Communism is a deadly ser
ious business. We will not make any real head
way against it until our anti-Communism is shorn
of political propaganda; until we are prepared
to heed the voice of the Chuch, especially that
of the Popes.
I think the Mindszenty Foundationwould be doing
its members and the country a much more con
structive service if it initiated courses of study
in anti-Communism as so clearly defined in the
late Pope John’s two encyclicals, Mater Et
Magistra, and Pacem In Terris. After all, the
group's named for one ot the greatest heroes in
the fight against Communism. What better tri
bute to Cardinal Mindszenty could there be than
to heed the positive anti-Communism of our Popes ?