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' PAGE A GEORGIA BULLETIN THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1964 the Archdiocese of Atlanta ORGIA LETIN SCRVINO GEORGIA'S 71 NORTHERN COUNTIES Official Organ of the Archdiocese of Atlanta Published Every Week at the Decatur' DeKalb News PUBLISHER - Archbishop Paul J, Halllnan MANAGING EDITOR Gerard E. Sherry CONSULTING EDITOR Rev. R. Donald Kiernan 2699 Peachtree N.E, P.O. Box 11667 Northside Station Atlanta 5, Ga. Member of the Catholic Press Association and Subscriber to N.C.W.C. News Service Telephone 231-1281 Second Class Permit at Atlanta, Ga. U.S.A. $5.00 Canada $5.00 Foreign $6.50 Brotherhood Week Brotherhood Week is upon us and we are often asked what contribution can we make to it. What is the problem? Simply put it is that achieving peace between Americans. More tech nically it could be called the search for civic peace, in an area which has been, and can again be, the scene of tension and strife. The early efforts towards the easing of religious and racial tensions fell victim to an over simplification. In the beginning, the suggestion was made that each party should give a little and then peace would be achieved. It was said that if you give a little, and we give a little then we can reach an understanding. Such a simple prodedure struck the practical American mind as quite sensible. But its apparent simplicity was soon seen to be dangerous, because of what each party was asked to give. For instance if, as a Chris tian, we were asked to give up Christ, in order to achieve peace with the Jews, or if as a Ca tholic we were asked to drop the Pope because he was a source of friction with the Protestants, what we would be being asked to do is to give up Christianity for a civic good; we would be asked to stop being a Catholic in order to promote peace in our community. On the other hand, if we asked the Jews to become Christians, which we would be doing if we asked them to accept Christ as the Messiah, or if we asked the Protestants to become Catholics, for that is what we would be doing if we demanded that they accept the Pope, then we would be asking them to become what they are not. Let us not be misunderstood. While recognizing and defending the plurality of a civil society we cannot obviously advocate a permanent religious plural society. Rather our task is to find a basis in a pluralistic civil society for the several re ligions which in fact exist. The nature of religious com mitment is such that there are certain basic things that are held as essential, not only to the commitment, but to the very relationship between God and man. These things are so basic to one’s religion that if they are abandoned, then religion it self is abandoned, and with it the bond with God is broken.* To sacrifice one of these basic things for any reason, as long as they are held at the command of conscience, is to sin. It is fundamentally blasphemous to throw away an essential element of one's religion for any other mere human good. If this is the price of civic peace, then the price is too high, and a con scientiously religious person will have to bear the brunt of the tensions which still exist. It was this implicit blasphemy which kept Catholics from giving wholehearted support to the early efforts towards religious co operation. It was the fear of a sacrilegious denial of the Faith which caused them to look with suspicion upon the Catholic pio neers in this field. But it was the fact that this oversimplification is not es sential to the easing of religious tensions which kept these pio neer Catholics in the work. They saw that the real solution must lie in somehow letting each man keep his fundamental com mitment, while at the same time removing the causes of the tensions. Fidelity to oneself was the first step and understanding of the other per son was the second step. An agreement to accept our differences, to respect each other’s commitment as sincere is the final step. This way is harder and longer, but it is the only way in which the first efforts towards unity can be made. It is the only way in which real civic peace can be achieved. Inthis, as inall realms, peace is the work of justice. GERARD E. SHERRY Embargo On Beatles? The English enemies of the American crewcut exponents ar rived in the United States last week much to the delight of thousands of ever-loving teen agers. The thunderous welcome at the airport was repeated at the television show and wherever they were billed to give a (sic) concert. Criticism has ranged from the quality of their singing to the cut of their hair and it is difficult to find adequate words to describe either of these curious pheno mena. Music critics have become fashion experts and vice versa during this invasion of the young Britons. Anglo - American relations have suffered a number of crises since the War for Independence and will undoubtedly survive this unusual cultural exchange pro gram. For that matter, we need to take a hard look at some of the products we have export ed to foreign audiences before we suggest anything like an em bargo on the Beatles. Some of our hip-twisting, rock ‘n’ roll ers of recent memory gave other peoples a different image of America, to say the least. All of this brings to mind the wonders as well as the worries of worldwide communications. It is no longer possible to shut out--nor should it be--the in fluences whichare at work every where. What is possible, how ever, is to address ourselves to the true values of culture exportation as against a sicken ing musical exploitation. We need to look behind the Beatles, not under their shaggy hair, to find reasons for the latest entertain ment craze. Perhaps the further we look the better we will be musically, at least. BOSTON PILOT ■mi cot/QO SLAIN MISSIONEftS Last Full Measure LOVE AND FREEDOM Lenten Paradox BY REV. LEONARD F.X. MAYHEW Lent comes on us like an annual shock. No sooner is Christmas past then people begin ask ing when Easter is. We mentally estimate the six and a half week previous date of Ash Wed nesday but, in spite of our calculations, the Len ten regulations read on Quinquagesima Sun day always seem to arrive sooner than we expec ted. The inexorable immediate result is a con centration on the laws themselves — on meat less secondary meals and who has to abstain and ‘what about vegetables cooked with a piece of meat?*. Not to mention the problem of what to give up arid of resolutions, sometimes rashly un dertaken and later guiltily set aside or buried in willing oblivion. Lent brings to the fore the most fundamenta 1 question of Christian moral philosophy: the relationship between freedom and obligation, between law and love, the paradox of obligatory love. The heart and soul of Christian morality is love and freedom. Love, Christ taught, is the sum of all moral good. But, love is the most personal, the most free response a man ■ can make 1 to another. Love means responsible, free choice which deliberately takes to itself the good and the true, clearly seen and prefer red to all else. HOW THEN can there be laws? Does not the law, with its threat of sanction upon the diso bedient, destroy freedom, expel love? How can there be a law to worship God, if true worship must be loving? How can there be a law to do penance, if true penance must begin with “re nding our hearts"? Lent makes these very acute questions. Over-simplified even further- and with a twist of pessimism added, we can ask how many people would fast and abstain (or attend Sunday Mass, for that matter) merely on the exhortation of the Church and without the force of the law and the fear of sin as motives. There are two approaches to the answer. First of all, any society must dictate certain reason able and practical regulations for the proper order and benefit of its members. The Church is a society, a body. It must make a practical ap plication of previously existing divine laws (for example, to worship, to do penance, to receive the Sacraments) to the circumstances of its mem bers. ALL THIS is true but it is not the final ans wer. Actually, it only removes the problem to another, admittedly much higher, level of author ity. The ultimate answer will only come from sort ing out the meaning of freedom and the respon sibility it implies and fitting in with that the nat ural aim of authentic, morally biding laws. Law is a dictate of reason, concerned with practical action and with a particular good to be accomplished. So also is each free choice we make in the area of practicality. Laws, then, need not- and indeed, must not- destroy freedom. Their nature is to channel free choice, to guide and direct it, not to stifle it. A good law not only respects freedom; in a sense, it creates it. This it can do by removing the obstacles to freedom, by removing doubt and confusion, fear or passion, which will becloud our vision and render us un-free. VIEWED FROM this perspective, Lent (and all the laws of the Church) become an exercise in freedom. They have their binding force, of course, because the Church can and must govern us. Paradoxically, they will attain their end in the exact proportion that their authoritarian binding force is least important to us. In other words, when they inspire free and responsible choice to the value it possesses and not for the sake of punishment, then these laws are being obeyed most perfectly. Christ has made penance and self-denial con ditions of belonging to the company of his dis ciples. And the Church, as a direct consequence, has made Lent and laws to go with it. And we- we must make the hard decision, to obey freely, as t men, because we see the point and the stake. The restraints imposed and accepted do not limit- they augment our freedom. LITURGICAL WEEK Purifying Our Minds BY REV. ROBERT W. HOVDA FEB. 23, 2ND SUNDAY OF LENT. “We gave you a pattern of how you ought to live so as tt please God," we hear in the First Reading of today’s Mass. And some of the specifics of that pattern are pointed out, in case we have erred, that our penance and good works of Lent might be directed to the recovery of right vision. today’s Gospel tells us in words: that Jesus Is the key to the riddle of our existence, that He is the one we look for in our every effort to under stand ourselves. And the First Reading tells us why. Because we are sinners, helpless and dependent before the Lord, unworthy of His love. But Jesus answers our plight by grafting us into His body the Church identifying us with Him and with His saving deeds. Yet the Gospel presents the Transfiguration, God’s glorification of the hu man flesh of His Son, and in the Collect we pray that God will free us from peril and puri- our minds. Our public wor- never emphasizes our ac tion, our moral response, our obedience to the command ments, without emphasizing al so and above all God’s loving toward us. The liturgy will not permit us to make a little moralism of our faith, but always shows our good works as an answer of love in a dialogue whose initiative is with God. FEB. 24, MONDAY, 2ND WEEK IN LENT. Yes terday’s Transfiguration was a visible sign of what TUESDAY, FEB. 25, ST. MATTHIAS, APOS TLE. Today’s Mass invites us to pray and to thank God for the ministry of the Church, for our bishops as the chief ministers of Word and Sacraments for the sake of the holy People of God and for our priests and deacons who assist them. God uses human weakness all the time, for He uses all of us in the accomplishment of His will. But perhaps this is especially evident in the minis try of preaching and of worship in the Church. Faith tells us all the while that by these means it is to Him we come, it is His yoke we take, it is of Him we learn (Gospel). FEB. 26, WEDNESDAY, 2ND WEEK IN LENT. This theme of the ministry is present again at the end of today's Gospel. Jesus tells the leaders of His Church (for He has made it hierarchial) that CONTINUED ON PAGE 5 TRADITION LOST Inferior Dullness? BY GERARD E. SHERRY Last week we were talking about the low state of TV entertainment# especially in relation to “Beatlemania '. In view of the fact that we are still in Catholic Press Month it would be ap propriate to turn to the press media for some more observations. The quality of many of our newspapers and the quality of the writing in them has sunk well below that of the past. Henry James once said that journalism is criticism of the minute at the minute. But what do we mostly get instead? — sensationalism; constant outrages of privacy; so much so that nothing is sacred any more. As a re suit the people are dulled into an ac ceptance of the in ferior — it’s what comes naturally. ONE CAN have a certain sympathy for the poor journalist, through. There is so much to cover; so many foci of world attention. Just to keep the record clear, I would like to make a few passing references to my own small area of journalism, the corner which is the Catholic Press. If we gauge the failure of secular American journalism, by its failure to live up to the rich heritage of its past, by what should we judge the Catholic Press—and how does it come through its examination? Obviously we must judge the Catholic press by that which should make it Catholic: Horizons which not only girdle the globe, but also reach back through all history and forward to the unending glory of heaven: revealed truths which unlock mysteries and give sure guidance; divine strength, promised and delivered; strength which should give an astral calm and an assured de liberation; these are the things which we bring as Catholics into journalism. This is our moun tain, and from all evidence we do labor. But what a mouse emerges I REAPINGS AT RANDOM THE BOUNDARIES of any urban parish would seem large compared to the little field we tend. We are so nervous that we jump at any boo com ing from any little bigot. One senatorial genera lization sets us in a tizzy. But our worse crime is the constant effort to reduce the majestic truths of God to the tiny dimensions of our own cramped craniums. We have not yet resolved to grown up as Catholics, or as journalists. We must try and encourage not merely a sense of dedication to the reader. Our journalists must constantly radiate that spirit of service and self- sacrifice which is the essence of good journal ism. Above all truth must be the lode stare. Journalists must be encouraged to an accute sensitivity to the need for moral integrity in what is written for the information, instruct ion and entertainment of the public. The journalist must be the first to note the difference between honest interpretation of the news and the subtly printed lie. Between the plain chronicling of the pleasant or un-pleasant fact and the more or less malicious gossip. Indeed, the gossip columnist is a cancer in the body journalistic. EDITORS, TOO, must be men of principle, not expediency. They must be men of courage, not imbued with the fears of a publisher's wrath. They must be men of conscience, too, who rea lize that there is a hierarchy of values; that the news must be placed in proper focus. This is the basic problem for an editor — a problem which cries out for serious study of current affairs both local and national. It also requires of editors that they see in their community and their readers all the human longings for peace and happiness. Publishers and owners of newspapers also have grave responsibilities. While they are free editor ially to propagate their social or political ex pression, they have no mandate to thrust down the mouths of their readers the political or social philosophies of their advertisers. Newspapers operated in such a manner are selling good jour nalism down the river; are causing lack of pub lic respect for the opinions and expressions of many honest journalists; are ringing the death knell of newspapers i n general. THE SAME goes f 0r radio and television. Stations and networks which are only interested in selling products will never sell ideals. Yet, the people need ideals. The people need a goal to achieve; that goal of the good life in the ser vice of one's neighbor, C j tyi st ate and nation. Only then will we be rid of the drift towards the dark emptiness of wasted lives. The communications media has a most impo r _ tant mission to accomplish for the good of our peoples and the peoples of the world. The jou r - nalists and technicians i n the media are the miss ionaries. They need not only knowledge but, j Ust as important, dedication.