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« 4 t 4 * THE MISSIONARY CHURCH The ‘Medicine Of Mercy 5 Rather Than That Of Severity This article by Archbishop Paul J. Hallinan ap pears in the Spring (1964) issue of SPIRITUAL LIFE, a quarterly published by the Washington Province of the Discalced Carmelite Fathers. It is reprinted with permission of Fr. Sebastian, O.C.D., editor of SPIRITUAL LIFE and a Geoi> gia native from this Archdiocese. BY ARCHBISHOP PAUL J. HALLINAN When Pope John XXIII opened the Second Vati can Council, his magnificent address almost suf fered the same fate as Lincoln's at Gettsburg. In all the pageantry it was almost overlooked. Then, as the Council progressed, his striking words were recalled, re-read, studied, and quot ed. It became quite clear that in these vibrant paragraphs, the voice of Pope John was speaking the same, sure directives that Peter had spoken long ago, and before him, Christ Himself. Pope John said, in regard to the errors that dog the pathway of truth: 'THE CHURCH has always oppos ed these errors. Frequently she has condemned them with the greatest severity. Nowadays, how ever, the spouse of Christ prefers to make use of the medicine of mer cy rather than that of severity." It is time we re-examined this "medicine of mercy" in our day. Because this virtue is rooted in the single heart, it has been neglected in our easy reliance on the collective. Because it is a strange bedfellow for national and racial pride, it has often found itself out on the floor. And because it works best in the quiet shade of humble spirits, it has not received equal billing with the more aggressive virtues. A modern crowd would listen to Our Lord's beatitude, "Blessed are the merci ful!" and askinwonder, "Blessed are the-what?" The brave, yes, or the temperate, even the Just,- but the merciful? THIS IS NOT a homily on mercy. There are plenty of occasions for that as the post-Pentecost liturgy takes us down the long gallery of the Good Shepherd, Our Lord feeding the hungry, having compassion on the multitude, weeping over Jeru salem; the discredited publican in the temple, the good Samaritan, and the ten lepers who were cur ed. As we walk along this gallery of mercy each summer, is it not remarkable how little these images do to us? Yet this insensitivity to mercy is not new. Our Lord met with it too. The most persistent accu sation made against Him was that He ate with the lower classes, associated with them, almost pre ferred their company. Magdalene sensed it, so did the penitent thief, but the average citizen, then as new, was shocked by His unseemly concern for those in need, His compassion for the have-nots, His mercy. He had to remind them, "I say to you, there will be joy among the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Needless to say, this joy was not shared by His respectable critics. THERE ARE not many Catholics, proportionate ly, in the 71 counties that make up the new Arch diocese of Atlanta-about 3%. In some counties, there are not more than a dozen. When the recent census was underway, a priest was explaining, in one remote area, that we would need census- takers to the number of 2/3 of the Catholic fami lies in a given area. One man rose to ask, as he put it, not a theological question, but a mathe matical one. "How do you find 2/3 of four?" How then explain the spiritual prestige of the Catholic Church here? The Church has a good name, "Catholic" is a good word, not in any sur face sense of an artificial image, but in the hearts of men. The impact of the Catholic Church in many areas of the new South has come from several things: the great influx of northern Catholics, the return of lapsed Catholics when a chapel is built nearby, a small but steady stream of converts, particular ly among the Negroes. One factor, often over- CONTINUED ON PAGE 8 RELIGIOUS VOCATIONS MONTH Archdiocese of Atlanta SERVING GEORGIA’S 71 NORTHERN COUNTIES VOL 2 NO 11 ATLANTA, GEORGIA THURSDAY, MARCH 12, 1964 $5.00 PER YEAR GUNMEN FOILED Maryknoll Post Office Held Up OUR LADY of vocations is the title of this statue at the Ameri can headquarters of the Mill Hill Fathers (St. Joseph's Mis sionary Society) at Slinger- lands, N.Y, The community, founded in England in 1866 also sponsors an Association of Mo thers of Priests at its New York shrine • Bottom MILWAUKEE, Wis. (RNS)— St. Aloysius Roman Catholic church in West Allis, a Mil waukee suburb, will discon tinue the first four grades of its parochial school beginning September, 1965, it was an nounced by Father Oscar Win- ninghoff, pastor of ths parish* OSSINING, N Y. (RNS)—Gun men who spent months planning a holdup at the post office of the famed Roman Catholic Mary knoll Mission headquarters near here made their move on a fog-shrouded morning — then discovered in a blaze of gun fire that there was a flaw in their scheme. Police — who had the post office surrounded — wounded and captured three of at least four of the holdupmen and re covered some $50,000 in cash, stamps and money orders. The officers had known of the rob bery plan for months. STATE TROOPERS New York City police and local officers watched as the gunmen drove up to the post office in the three story Price Building. Inside a policewoman and deputy sheriff disguised as a nun and brother they had earl ier relieved, were forced at gunpoint into a bathroom while the holdupmen rifled the safe Grades tendent of Cincinnati schools, said the city would need more operating money, and the school board tentatively adopted apian to put a school tax levy on the November ballot, instead of waiting until 1965 as originally proposed. and desk drawers and stepped outside. A trooper then ordered: "Stop, this is the police." FATHER ALBERT J. Nevins, M.M., director of public rela tions for the mission operation and an eyewitness said the or der was answered with gunfire. "One man was outside the car shooting," he said, "the two others drove away, went over a bank and crashed into a tree." Bullets from police guns riddled the auto as it raced away, Injuring both occupants. The third man also was wound ed. Father Nevins said a fourth man, apparently a lookout, es caped as the shooting started. He may have been wounded, it was believed. POLICE LEARNED of the robbery plan before Christ mas, Father Nevins said, and kept a constant watch on the post office. Word of the exact day of the holdup brought a force of some 50 lawmen to the grounds of the mission head quarters. The priest said the would-be robbers apparently had planned >to holdup the post office last Christmas, but at the last minute postponed the attempt. He reported that suspects had visited the post office "three or four times" in the week pre vious to the actual robbery. TWO OF THE three wounded men were reported in serious condition. One bullet struck a New York City police lieutenant, John P. Jennings, but he was not badly hurt. MILWAUKEE PARM. School Drops 4 He said the decision was made because of growing over crowded conditions in the school and would affect about 600 child ren who must find room in schools of the West Allis-West Milwaukee School District. FATHER WlNNiNGHOFF said the school board had rejected his proposal that it build a 24- room public school across the street from St. Aloysius so that some parochial school pupils could take secular courses un der a shared time plan. "I'm going to quit talking," the P riest "I'm saying, •Here ^00 kids . you solve the problem. And I'mgivingyou a year <md a half to solve it,' " Dr. ' Vende11 Pierc *. superin- Open House Convents of the Archdiocese will hold open house from 3 to 5 p.m. for young girls and their parents Interested in observing convent life at first hand. This Open House is one of the projects of the Commission on Religious Vocations, to which is assign ed the task of furthering the cause of vocations in the Archdiocese. By visiting the home of a contented, well-ordered community of Sisters, young people will *be enlightened and inspired. This will be an opportunity to ask questions about convent life and to inquire about the spirit and work of a particular community. The girls and their parents will learn at first hand that convent life is family life in its most intimate and exalted form. There, under the authority of a superior upon whom grace has bestowed love and solicitude be yond comparison, fraternal charity is the keynote of a happy life. The treasure beyond compare is, of course, the chapel where Christ imself radiates happiness, joy and strength andwhere won- derfu 6 iaces are obtained to carry on His work for souls. IN AN OPEN CAR IN THE RAIN—Enroute to the Church of the Great Mother of God, in Rome, Pope Paul VI waves from an open car as crowds protected by umbrellas line the street. Later, following the annual blessing of automobiles, hundreds of motorists Joined in a horn-honking parade to St. Peter’s Square, where the Holy Father imparted hi/ties sing for their safety in the daily battle with Rome's traffic perils. IN ARTICLE Rabbi Says ‘The Is Anti-Catholic NEW YORK (RNS)— A charge was leveled here by a New York rabbi — writing in the Roman Catholic national weekly, America — that the controversial Rolf Hochhuth drama, "The Deputy," not only will provoke anti-Catholicism but is an "anti-religious" work which should be "quietly for gotten." Rabbi Arthur Gilbert, in a review which found virtually nothing to commend the Broad way production of the play, st ruck out also at the German Protestant playwright. "IN MY judgment Hochhuth has failed both as historian and as artist. He wrote a polemic rather than a profound disco urse," the rabbi said. "It is to the credit of sensitive, sophis ticated critics and scholars that this play has provided an oc casion for serious analysis of the failure of the Church dur ing the Nazi period. The play hinders such an analysis." Rabbi Gilbertstaff consul tant to file National" "Confer ence of Christians and Jews on its Religious Liberty and Public Affairs Project, said he "wrote the review in my private capa city as a rabbi." Calling the play a "misfor tune," Rabbi Gilbert urged that it be forgotten "so that we may better use our energies to re view and discuss the solid, mat ure words of scholarship now available — and soon to be pub lished — that beg for read ers. WITH BROKEN hearts beat ing In some measure of sym pathy and empathy with each other, we may then per haps learn from the mistakes of the past and proceed with the work of serving God through cooperative effort to achieve Justice for all the persecuted of our own day." Thi- .rabbi agreed with some other reviewers’ criticism that the Hochhuth work, which con tends that the late Pope Plus XII should have spoken out pub licly against Nazi exterminat ion of Jews, made a carica ture of the pontiff. HAD THE Pope been dealt Catholics 55% VATICAN CITY (RNS) — Vatican radio said that 55 per c£nt of all Indians and Eski mos living in Canada are Cath olic. It said there were 121,148 Catholics among the Indian-Es- fcimo population of 200,121. Deputy’ Drama with "in some depth," the re viewer said, "The tragedy and the pain, even the culpabi lity Involved In Plus' error In Judgment" might have been re cognized. He also maintained that the play "serves to remove some of the burden of guilt from the Nazis and the Germans" and expressed regret, "as a Jew, that. . .not one Jewish charac ter of dignity was presented." IN HIS charge that the play is "anti-religious," Rabbi Gil bert said that thp young Jesuit hero who goes ti the gas cham bers with the Jews after fail ing to elicit a public condemn ation of the atrocities from the Pope "does not demonstrate st rength of will and purposeful faith as he accepts the cross. "His death is made to appear almost meaningless, and the redemptive quality that both Ju daism and Christianity believe inheres in the suffering of the righteous is painfully lacking." "What disturbs me above all, however," he added, "is that by invoking the ghost of the six million dead, this play arouses within us both profound and base feelings and then it leaves us uncleansed, unhealed, without catharsis." WITH PROTESTANTS Pontiff Calls For Dialogue VATICAN CITY (RNS)—Ac tive support of a dialogue with Protestants was urged by Pope Paul VI during a Mass he cele brated in St. Peter's Basilica to commemorate the fourth cen tenary of the Council of Trent. Among those attending the Mass were 5,000 pilgrims from Trent where the 19th Ecumeni cal Council, called to deal with the crisis of the Protestant Re formation, met at intervals be tween 1545 and 1563 THE POPE said the Counci of Trent had failed to heal the Cathollc-Protestant breach, but he stressed that this was the goal toward which the present Second Vatican was looking with hope and prayer. 'The Council which the Church is today celebrating," he said, "derives from the one now being commemorated. This is seen more clearly and vivid ly in the great and difficult ques tion which gave rise to the Council of Trent but for which the Council of Trent itself did not find a solution: the question of finding a common ground again in the same faith, the same charity, with Christians which the Protestant reform separat ed from this center, this heart of unity." Pope Paul said the city of Trent was chosen for the 16th century Council "to make a meeting ground easier of at tainment, so as to act as a bridge, so as to offer an em brace of reconciliation and friendship. But no such joyous or glorious result came about." HOWEVER, he stressed, 'Trent will always, as will we, as will the entire Catholic world, cherish the desire. Trent must stand out as symbolic of this desire still alive today, a desire even more lively, insis- Protestants Aid Priest-Classmate MARYKNOLL, N. Y. (NC)~ There's nothing unusual about alumni raising funds to aid a former c lassmate -- except when the school is Protestant and the recipient a Catholic priest. A group of alumni raised 320,000 soles more than $11,000 for a Father Frisancho, a form er classmate, now a Catholic priest who plans to build a housing development for the poor near Lima. tent, patient and prayerful." f ‘Trent," the Pope added, "must, by the firmness of her Catholic faith, put up no bar riers. It must open the door, not close it. "It must keep open the dia logue, not with taunts of old mistakes, but ever looking for new virtues, not sitting back and waiting for what has happened in four centuries, but going out in brotherly fashion to find them. 'This is what the new Coun cil, with the help of God, is wanting to do, and this is what you, more than any others In the Church of God, must under stand and give your support to at the present time." Pope Paul, who spoke at the Gospel part of the Mass, began by referring to what he called "a stupendous fact of history-- the fidelity of the Catholic Church to Christ her Founder and Teacher. 'This is a comforting thought now in a time that has such a particular need of certitude as to what ii the essence and gui dance of the Holy Church," he said. 'This certitule is that to day her teaching is as valid as it was yesterday and as it will be tomorrow. 'THAT CONFIDENCE, that adherence to her teaching and her discipline does not make our thoughts sterile nor es trange them from understand ing and acquiring what modern knowledge produces and pos sesses. 82ND ANNUAL medalist - The 1964 Laetare Medal of the Uni versity of Notre Dame has been awarded to poet, Phyllis Mc- Ginley (Mrs. Charles Hayden) of Weston, Conn. Seventeen wo men are among the recipients of the annual award conferred on an outstanding American Catholic lawman, and which is announced on Laetare Sunday.