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PAGE 4 GEORGIA BULLETIN THURSDAY, MARCH 26, 1964 the Archdiocese of Atlanta GEORGIA BULLETIN SftVINO GtOtGIA'S 71 NOtTMHN COUNTICS 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 2699 Peachtree N.E. P.G, Box 11667 Northside Station Atlanta 5, Ga. ASSOCIATE EDITOR Rev. Leonard F. X. Mayhew {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 Easter 1964 “By dying he overcame our death; by rising he restored our life.” Easter is upon us once again with all its exhi laration of mystery and glory and joy. It is the day of mean ing to Christians; the day that finally ties everything to gether, that gives every fact of Christ’s person and life its accurate meaning. As St, Paul pointed out centuries ago, our whole faith in Christ can be summed up as a res ponse to the resurrection. Christ’s resurrection is the absolute, once and for all, overthrow of everything natu ral and normal by God’s jea lous love, Simeon prophesied, when he held the divine Child in his arms, that he was des tined to be “a sign that shall be contradicted.” Christ’s whole passage through this world was a contradiction of everything that was merely human and therefore stained and mediocre. Riches he de spised in favor of poverty and power in favor of meekness. He was the fulfillment of the prophecies and those who had suffered endless torment to preserve the prophecies re jected him. He faced the law of Rome, the proudest legacy of that proud empire, and Rome’s governor decreed: “I find no fault in this man; therefore, I will chastise him.*’ Christ’s crowning paradox is the resurrection. Normal ly, we first pass through life and end in death and that, so far as the visible world is con cerned, is the end of us. Christ contradicts what appeared to be reasonable; He reversed the process. He died, and then began life in new freshness and vigor. He made a living fact out of what could other wise have seemed moral rhe toric: “Unless the grain of mustard seed fall into the earth and die, it remains alone. But if it die, it brings forth much fruit.’’ And: “He who loses his life will save it.” The resurrection is not a matter of snatching victory from the jaws of defeat. It is a brand new re-definition of what “victory” and “defeat” jTS really mean. The cross was ^ not defeat. It was, in spite of appearances, a definitive vic tory over man’s enemies. Christ’s resurrection is the proof positive of that victory. Easter is a feast of mission. Christ’s mission was fully achieved, consummated, when he took back his life. The mis sion of every Christian is in corporated into the mission of Christ at Easter. This is why Easter has traditionally been the feast of Baptism, the tak ing on of Christ’s life and work. The real significance of th e mission that belongs to us as Christ’s members is only clear in the light of His example. Easter recalls the funda mental opposition between what it means to be a Chris tian and what will always re main the stained and mediocre standards of the merely natu ral world-in us andaroundus. There is an unalterable con tradiction between what it and we mean by victory and de- 'n\ feat, success and failure, se- v/ curity and fear. Like the world that awaited Christ’s glory on Easter, our world also de pends on us for its hope of salvation. Our mission is one with His: to save and heal the society in which we live, the men who are our brothers. LEONARD F.X. MAYHEW GEORGIA PINES Milledgeville Chapel BY REV. R. DONALD KIERNAN It must have been an unusal sight for visitors as they drove into the grounds of the State Hospi tal at Milledgeville to see forty priests standing in front of the newly constructed Chapel of All Faiths. The occasion was the dedication of the Catholic section of the Chapel by the Most Rev. Thomas J. McDonough, the Bishop of Savannah, Georgia. Gray clouds began to gather and rain was in the offing, but the weather in no way darkened the spirits of the clergy and laity who gathered to witness this historic event. THE CEREMONY began outside the Chapel. Bishop McDonough invoked the Blessings and the Litany was begun by Father George James of Columbus, Georgia. The procession then moved into the Chapel and following the liturgical prayers. Mass was offered by the Bishop. Priests from every section of the state were present. The various religious orders work ing in both the Archdiocese of Atlanta and the Diocese of Sav annah were represented. Mon- signor Cassidy of Atlanta, Monsignor McDonald, Mons ignor Toomey of Savannah, Monsignor Sheehan of Macon, along with Monsignor Bourkeof Augusta walked in the procession immediately be fore the Bishop TO SOME of the priests present, the Chapel was the fufillment of a long hoped-for project. Often times saying Mass in a make-shift chapel # the priests longed for the day when the Blessed Sacrament would be reserved in a home of its own on the hospital grounds. Monsignor Cassidy had served as pastor for a number of years in Milledgeville. So did Monsignor King of Atlanta, and Monsignor Toomey of Savannah. The present pastor of Milledgeville, and Catholic Chaplain at the hospital is Father Joseph F. Ware. To these men the day had an added significance -one with real meaning. The idea of a Chapel at the hospital was born after former Governor Vandiver and his wife, Betty, visited the state institution. Committees were appointed and members of every faith were called upon to contribute to the facility. THE IDEA materialized just a month ago when the Chapel was formally opened. Although, I know, this description is inadequate it serves to des cribe the building by saying it is in the shape of a T. The center section holds a large sanctuary and the left and right wings serve as the Jewish and Catholic chapels. The Chapel is complete in every way. Colonial in design, the pews are constructed of wood with ends painted in white. The Altar is white marble and the sanctuary iscarpetedin a light green. A sacristy, confessional and organ complete the furnishings. AT THE close of the ceremony, Father Ware introduced Bishop McDonough to the congregation The Bishop paid tribute to those whose vision had made possible the erection of the Chapel. Then the Bishop told how this chapel comple ments the hospital where great strides are being made in mental health. The Catholic Chapel is dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. (When Father Ware announced this fact it drew no small wonder from the clergy present, for with the good Father's devotion to Saint Patrick it must have been a trying deci sion to have made). AS THE Ceremony was finished the rain be gan to fall. Making use of the dispensation grant ed for Saint Joseph’s Day, I lit up a cigar on my way home. Smoking as I drove along 1 could not but help think that in our days when some are crying for "seperation of church and state”, what a wonderful tribute to the people of Georgia who contributed to erect a House of God on state owned property. GEORGES ROUAULT Significance Of Pain BY FR. LEONARD F X. MAYHEW The modern French Catholic artist, Georges Rouault, created as his master work a series of fifty-eight prints under the title "Miserere” ("take pity on us"). They exemplify almost perfectly one aspect of the passion and death of Christ. The series of prints takes the measure of tragic life on earth and illuminates it at every point with the image of the tortured and mur dered Savior. The first print is of the face of Christ. Then, almost as in a motion picture, this is followed with other views of the suffer ings of Christ. Next the artist takes us into the world. The figure of Christ changes into that of a condemned criminal, a shipwrecked sailor, the victims of war, the lonely and the half-mad. The current runs back and forth, with shattering in sight, between the pain of Christ and the pain of his brothers in the twentieth century. ONE OF the most moving of Rouault's pictures is "Christ Mocked by the Soldiers." Christ is seated, almost naked, be tween two brutish louts who spit and scream into his face. The contrast between the Savior and the soldiers is absolute, without being melodramatic. The figure of Christ is possessed of com plete calm and profound dignity. An impression of tremendous sensit.vity flows from the strong, cleanliness of his face and body. He is a man who has tasted every suffering and has not succumbed to it. The blotched, sensuous and stupid faces of the soldiers form an insane kind of halo around his head. No human thought can exhaust the meaning of the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. Its truth is too great and too complex for any complete analysis. The principal significance it has for us and for the world is preserved and dramatized in the liturgy of Holy Week. ONE ASPECT of the meaning of the Passion is presented masterfully in the works of Georges Rouault. He has grasped the peculiar significance of the pain voluntarily accepted by Christ for a century as Involved with pain and death as our own has been. The Christ he depicts, precisely because He is divine, presents also a human ideal. The very perfection of his humanity makes him far more sensitive than the ordinary man. He is able to escape no detail of his agony. At the same time, he is never drawn down to the level of his brutal tor mentors. He stands, at least in that sense, above the storm. He pities, never shares, the very venom that seeks his destruction. CONTINUED ON PAGE 5 GOOD FRIDA Y Darkness And Light BY GERARD E. SHERRY The darkness of Good Friday has often perp lexed the Christian. Here Christ hangs on the cross in desolation and the light of day leaves the earth with mankind seemingly abandoned. Yet such was not the case. Before redemption there had to be the Cross. Without the Cross there could be no liberation. Sometimes God sends darkness, not as a punishment, but as a trial; and that is good. He often seems to withdraw Himself from us, but only seems. He does this for several reasons. To see if we love Him enough to seek Him To show us our weakness. To show us that we have nowhere else to go but to Him. To give us a chance to do penancefor our sins. To give us a chance to do penance for the sins of others. To turn us over to the enemy, as He did with Job, testing our trust in Him. To give us a chance to win light for other souls by bearing the darkness of our own. REAPINGS AT RANDOM And for many other reasons. God permits our baffled hopes to cling to us like ice on an air plane's wings, so that the sun of His love can thaw us out. A mother will withdraw herself from her child to make the child walk to her on legs that will be sturdy because of the trial. God sends us sickness, sadness, sorrow and shame. He seems to withdraw Himself and leave us in darkness, but all the time He is holding out His arms to lead us into them. The reason for this is that the problems exist on our level, not on God's level. God takes a wider view than we do and sees purposes that we do not see. Put it this way. We take a pile of white powder and a pile of black powder. We mix them together. We get a heap of gray powder. What makes it gray? Our level of obser vation. To us it looks gray. But to a microbe in the powder it does not look gray at all. The microbe feels that he is surrounded on all sides by black and white mountains. To the microbe’s eye there is no such thing as gray powder. There are only black and white mountains. From God’s level of observation difficulties may be a blending to our own good. To us, on our level of observation our microbe eyes see only barr iers and obstacles. From God's point of view the Crucifixion was the most important thing in history. From Longinus’ point of view it was only a wasted afternoon. In the darkness we can do either one of two things: we can yield to despair; we can trust God all the more. We can yield to despair; this is the response of the worldling, the indifferen- tist, the atheist, the man who lives for this world alone, the man who cries out, “Why has God for saken me?”, when he has forsaken God, the man who, like the canary, will not sing if the cage is covered. Or we can trust God all the more when dark ness fails. Trust is the response of the Catholic. The Catholic knows that God can guide us by a light in the dark, if He so wishes; or by a hand clasp in the dark, if He so wishes. The Catholic knows that nothing can separate him from the love of God. "What then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, distress or famine? Danger, persecution or the sword? For lam sure that neither death nor life; nor angels nor princi palities nor powers; nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall separate us from the love of God." (Romans, 8:38) The Catholic knows that there is comfort in the picture of Christ hanging on the cross seemingly forsaken. In the trials which God has sent us, is sending us, and will continue to send us, we may feel that we are abandoned. But we can draw strength and comfort from this, that Christ in the darkness still trusted and sang a hymn of hope.