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THURSDAY, MAY 21, 1964 GEORGIA BULLETIN PAGE 5 GREASY KID STUFF Immaturity Enshrined Saints in Black and White ST. CHRISTOPHER 99 BY REV. LEONARD F. X. MAYHEW "Today," cooed the sweet young thing over the radio, "is Senior Citizens" Day." She continued, in the soupy, condescending tone conventionally adopted for this subject, to explain that this re cently concocted category' of citizenship included all those over the age of fifty I Those of us under this advanced age are Junior Citizens and it is our solemn duty fo help Senior Citizens amuse themselves. The broad implication of the pitch, with which we are surely all familiar, was that we should hide from those over fifty the fact of theiruselessnessand take as good care of them as I we do our other national shr ines. America today is deep into an j undisceming worship of youth. The objection is that this re- j verse piety concentrates not on I the potential, the adventure of 'becoming which is implicit in youth, but on the mere fact of youth in itself. It is devotion to the physical^ to surface beauty, to the quick and easy, the flashy, that is most apparent about our "mass culture," The level of our reading habits,’ our television entertainment, the appeals of the advertising agencies to our illusions- all bear out with sad finality the enshrinement not of the promise but of the fact of immaturity. AGE IN ITSELF is not an accomplishment. Nor is it necessarily synonymous with exper ience or wisdom. The rejection of age as a respectable value by contemporary America, how ever, has a number of serious implications. It is, at least, a symptom of the anti-intelli gence trend in American society, which is too complex to be treated briefly, too urgent to be ignored, and perhaps too serious to receive much attention, if treated adequately. The pat tern extends from religion to politics to popu lar art. From all reports, the New York World’s Fair is a disaster area of comic book regress ion. If this is true, it is one more evidence, on a grand scale to be sure, of the lavish mental laziness which threatens- to be our trademark. The point is that anything of value, whether it be wisdom or virtue, is attained only with effort, with the expenditure of self, with the facing of demands. This simple, Puritan truth bears in its wake realism, intellectual honesty, the accept ance of hard fact. It rejects escapism and in sists that virtue, scarred and struggled for, surpasses innocence, untried and unaware, on every score. It is either laziness or fear that makes us flee this commonsense conclusion. The world we live in is very complicated; its Issues are hard to resolve; the control of events seems very complicated; its issues are hard to resolve; the control of events seems very distanc. Youth with its filmy gaiety, offers nostalgic irrespon sibility. If this is really the root of our trouble, the price is far too high. A GOOD TURNING point would be to be rid of all this patronizing Senior Citizen nonsense. Without turning to ancester worship, we could re establish the achievements of the mature as a goal for the young. The data of the market resear chers, bedazzled by the commercial prowess of the adolescent, are a poor foundation for a phil osophy of life. When such a mentality engen ders a fear and distaste for responsibility, so much the worse for adult and youth alike. What holds true for the renewal of the Church is equally valid for our secular culture; growth and progress are predicated upon facing the world as it is and seeing its difficutlies, not as purely negative, but as challenge. QUESTION BOX Embryo Acquires Soul? BY MONSIGNOR J. D. CONWAY Q. 1 sincerely hope you won't make yourself vague on the questions 1 am about to put to you. I notice that many of the questions put to you are often altered a bit so that you may make yourself vague. My questions; For centuries the Church accepted the theories of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas that the male embryo acquired an immoral soul about 40 days after conception, and the female about 80 days. This doctrine was gradually abandoned. Why this about face? Now the Church says the embryo acquires an immortal should the moment of con ception. Were females considered inferior human beings in the early days of the Church because it took them 80 days as against 40 days to acquire an immortal soul? A. Your preliminary remark hurt me deeply. I may be vague at times, but I do not alter questions- except to shorten them occasionally or to correct grammatical errors. To the best never held the to their infant. of my knowledge St. Augustine ideas with which you charge him He gave us most of our best concepts about the soul, but he always remained a little doubt ful about its origin. He possibly inclined to the belief that each soul was created Immediately by God, but he was a bit afraid that this notion might contra dict the doctrine of original sin; so he thought maybe souls were handed down from parents St. Augustine was not vague on this subject, merely uncertain. St. Thomas did teach the idea you descri be, but he should have listened better to his 3ld teacher, St. Albert the Great, who held the ipposite; namely, that the soul is created by God nd infused into the embryo at the moment of a conception. Because of the great authority of St. Thomas nany theologians of past centuries have held the \0-day-80-day theory, but never did it, or any- hing like it, become a doctrine of the Church, 'Ihere were always theologians who disagreed. Modern knowledge of the nature of conception and of the embryo have tended to rule out the Thomistic theory. But there are still some of his dedicated followers who hold it today; they tend to be less certain about the time of the infusion of the soul and to eliminate discri mination between the sexes, but they still think the embryo goes through some sort of vegetable and animal stages before it gets a human soul. The Church still has no doctrine on the matter. For practical purposes, like baptism and abor tion, her law presumes that the embryo is a human being from the moment the sperm joins with the egg and they become one living being. This is p*w cisely my own un-vague opinion. But ardent Tho- mists rightly maintain that the law is not doctrine. Of course females were considered inferior human beings in the early days of the church, and they still are today. They may not be priests or even acolytes. They are not even supposed to sing in the choir. TTiey may hold no Church office, in the strict sense of the word.There is even one law which urges that they sit separated from the men in Church. In very few places is it observed. Women have always been considered inferior in civil law, in nearly every nation. Even in America today their legal rights are not equal to those of men. With evident pleasure Pope John XXIII noted in Pacem in Terris; "Women are gaining an increasingawareness of their natural dignity. Far from being content with a purely passive role or allowing themsleves to be regarded as a kind of instrument, they are demanding both in domes tic and in public life the rights and duties which belong to them as human persons." No longer need they wait twice as long as men to become human persons 1 Q. Little Folk's Prayer: Dear Father, hearus as we say, thank you for our food today." A. Recently someone asked about a simple blessing to be used by children before meals. Now I have a number of them, e. g.: Dear Father, we thank thee for giving our food; Please bless it and help us each one to be good. Amen." REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA Your World And Mine CONTINUED FROM PAGE 4 NOR IS THE economic boycott likely to be more than a pinprick. South Africa's trade with boycott ing countries was inflnitesmal, and she has had no trouble in pidking up new markets that fully compensate for the losses. Besides, the losses were more apparent than real.Goods that former ly travelled direct still reach the same customer through intermediaries, Pressures on the white bastion will increase somewhat when self-government comes to the British colonies of Bechuanaland, Swaziland and Basutoland, all scheduled for constitutional ad- vance this year. They may encourage guerilla and sabotage activities, but they cannot alter the pow r structure. THE DECISIVE change would be the collapaeof Portugese rule in Mozambique and Angola.These are the real bastion* of South Africa. They form physical barriers to infiltration from ti» north and supply the underpaid labor on which Souti Africa's gold industry is built. 1 am convinced that Mozambiquans and Angolans have no more sense of allegiance to Portugal than did the Congolese to Belgium, They are held by Portugese force, and South Africa for its own benefit pays a substantial part of the cost of hold ing them. The combination has the power to main tain control indefinitely. But that is on the assump tion that the Salazar regime continues in Portugal. Overthrow of that regime would mean the end of Portugal's empire in Africa and the regime could end any day. SOUTH AFRICA would be tempted to react by herself occupying Mozambique and Angola. But I suspect that opinion on both sides of the Cold War would not stand for that. The efforts of South Af rica to incorporate the trust territory of South West Africa, which she has administered since the 1920s’ are already forming a coalition of the great powers against her. They could hardly stand idly by, if she moved to extend her colonial em pire. ANONYMOUS ATTACKS Catholics Feel Pressure From Mississippi K.K.K. ACROSS 1. Verb form (Archaic) 5. agreement 9. newspapers and periodicals 14. reverberate 15. Turkish measures 16. beginner 18. ostrlch-like bird 19. instruct 21. Mayan gcd £2. girl’s name 24. birds of prey 25. challenge 26. army N.C. officer (abbr.) 28. mlssa est 29. de main 30. object (ftbbr.) 83. hues unorthodox teaching pulsate negative Lincoln’s son 40. thought 41. printer’s measure 42. conjunction 43. His feast is in — - 47. conversed 49. part of airplane 50. continent 51. Mr. 52. John in Paris 53. iron ore 35 36. 38. 39. 54. American 20. educator 23. 57. fragment 27. 69. Arctic explorer 29. 60. Biblical Judge 30. 61. sullen 31. 63. French article - 32. 64. causeway 34. 66. parasite in blood 35. 68. He was very —- — 37. 73. sour 39. 74. unnprve 76. passageway 42. 77. liquid measure 43. 79. nobleman 44. 80. JerK 45. 81. Egyptian deity 46. 82. Peruvian Jndian 48. 83. grasses 49, DOWN 52. 1. take notice of 2. summit 54. 3. Egyptian measure 55. 4. periodq of time 56. 6. kettle 57. 6. Crusaders’ 58 headquarters 63. 7. greatest virtue 65. 8. spoils 67. - 9. not an R.N. 69. 10. boy’s nickname 70. 11. one who slips away 71. 12. fodder 72. 13. alarms 75. 17. variety of corundum 78. born agent pronged conducted funeral notice Rinab cikkege Sisera’s killer girl's name head coverings relected penetrate by digging prejudice union Hindu sorceress legal claim eager bey’s name His Job He is our patron on a — — Congressional — — Var. of Alice Russian leader proprlo . Brown store Paradise oyster farm (Pr.) ceremony glacial ridge national agency acquires language association (abbr.)- state (abbr.) ANSWER TO LAST WEEK'S PUZZLE ON PAGE 7 JACKSON, Miss. (NC) — Ca tholics in Mississippi are be ginning to feel greater pres sure applied by the revived andnew- ly-militant Ku Klux Klan in this state. Klansmen now number 91,000 here and are advertising for more’ native-born, white can didates to join their organi zation. Excludedfrom member ship are Catholics, Jews, "Turks, Mongols, Tartars, Orientals, Negroes, or any other person whose native back ground of culture Is foreign to the Anglo-Saxon system of government by responsible, free, individual citizens." ACCORDING to a Klan cir cular, Catholics are excluded because "they bow to a Roman dictator, in direct violation of the First Commandment, and the true American spirit of re sponsible, individual liberty." Jews are similarly not ac ceptable "because they reject Christ, and through the new machinations of their interna tional banking cartel, are at the root center of what we call ‘communism’ today." Two publications, one of them Catholic, have felt the sting of Klan anger in recent weeks. The Greenwood Commonweal, a secular paper, was assailed after its editor commented un favorably on a series of Klan cross burnings in 64 Miss issippi counties. A printed cir cular issued by an anonymous "local civic group" attacked the paper for its failure to "stand with Mississippians..." ARNOLD VIEWING Act One And The Critic BY JAMES W. ARNOLD In "Act One," Dore Schary has put together the early success story of Moss Hart with the zeal of a scoutmaster recounting the boyhood wildlife adventures of Theodore Roosevelt. The picture is embarrassingly bad, partly because it is told on the sensitivity level of a tum-of-the-century biography for young people. Thus we see the starry-eyed young playwright sitting in an empty theater, dreaming of wild applause and cries of "Author! Author!” Producer-director Schary is so fond of this bit he returns to it, with variations, four or five times. Again, there is the author glowing as he leaves his first professional script- loctoring session ("Moss," he tells himself, as the Skitch Henderson music swells, "you’re in businessl") or riding on a train to his first out-of-town opening ("It’s happening, Moss!’’). THE SHOW is built on the premise that an audience will be entertained by watching an un known playwright sell his first Broadway play and rewrite and rewrite it, out of sheer devotion to money, until it becomes a hit. But why should this be more interesting than watching a man build a button business or construct an empire of artichoke-processing plants? Granted that Moss Hart was a first-rate comic author ("You Can’t Take It With You") and a talented director ("My Fair Lady"). But the film is far less a tribute to an imaginative theatrical artist than to a self-centered, stage- struck youth who wanted (1) to be Somebody and (2) to make a lot of money. Whatever the real Hart may have been, the movie Hart is h^dly worth our time. Schary, who was M.G.M.’s guiding genius in it’s most inventive years, has deep roots in Show Biz and was a friend to Hart and other celebrities depicted in the film. He assumes that because he found these people loveable and magical, they will seem so to us. But he needs to tell us why. Even Shakespeare, 400th birthday notwithstanding, would seem a dull fellow if he did nothing but josh with his cronies at the Mermaid or pace worriedly behind the first-night audience at the Globe. THE MOVIE Hart (flamboyant Jet-Set actor George Hamilton) comes off as an over-dressed 12-year-old. He is always stammering apolo gies to his elders, striking off on emotional tantrums that would do justice to King Lear, or throwing up on opening nights. The only time he is bearable is In a vain attempt to empty a water-filled refrigerator pan in his 1929 Brooklyn apartment. Admittedly, a writer’s story is hard to drama tize. How do you show the brain-cracking labor of two collaborators grinding out a play? Well, you can’t, and you shouldn’t try to make a movie of it. Schary diverts our attention to small threads of humor; one writer can’t stand the other’s cigars, his colleague is starving and survives by stealing cookies. The device gets us happily through the sequence, but what does it contribute to what we know of Hart and George S. Kaufman? Schary fills the screen with men talking to each other on the telephone. He shoots scenes of a play from a stationary camera in mid orchestra, with acres of waste space on both sides of the screen. When he wants to say that an audience is bored, he has them yawn and frown. In one deft sequence, he shows the almost poetic effect on an author of a good actor’s reading his lines. Then Schary has the excited Hamilton fall off his chair to provide a yak for the popcorn- munchers in the back row. The film’s major asset is the almost photo graphic impersonation of Kaufman by versatile Jason Robards. The main delight comes from seeing Kaufman again as he was, playing the worldly cynic to Hart’s Tom Sawyer. Still all we see is Kaufman's pose, the egotist with the heart of gold. If he is loveable I somehow missed it; he seems as unpleasant and insufferable as ever. The moral value of "Act One" is best displayed by its closing scene, in which Hart, fresh from his first triumph, rushes home to Brooklyn and drags his family out of their modest flat in the middle of a violent rain, presumably to lead them to the promised land of Westchester or Sutton Place. "That’s the way it really happened," said one awed lady customer. "And he goes on, from one success to another." The law of averages caught up, posthumously. "THE CRITIC," this year's Academy Award cartoon, is a brief (less than five minutes) spoof on avant-garde artfilms, which occasionally feature squiggles, squares, circles and question marks dancing to far-out music. In essence, "The Critic" allows long-baffled customers to express their frustration through the voice of comedian Mel Brooks, who plays an unconvinced lowbrow. "What’s dis?’’ Brooks asks, as the squiggles and squares flow about in meaninglessly rhythmic color. "Must be two things in love...dirt, dirt and filth...For this I paid my two dollars?...Mus be symbolic...yesh, symbolic of junk." And so on. Lowbrows and highbrows alike will be im pressed, wheather they think it a left-handed expression of Truth or something producer Ernest Pintoff put together with spare film on a rainy afternoon. CURRENT RECOMENDED FILMS: For everyone: It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World; Lord of the Flies, Lilies of the Field. For connoisseurs: Tom Jones, 8 1/2, The Leopard. Better than most: America America, Dr. Stange- love, Love With the Proper Stranger, Billy Liar, Charade, Paris When It Sizzles. The same circular attacked the Center Light, a publication of the St. Francis Center in Greenwood. The center is ope rated by Pax Christi, a group of laywomen who work with Negroes. THE CIRCULAR declared that "this so-called newspaper is nothing but racial agitation in its rankest form. Its sole purpose is to extol Negro can didates for public office and to announce integrated social af fairs and report on their suc cess." The Klan circular continued; "It comes as no surprise that this group of people, who are responsible for this publication, use religion as a camouflage for their integration activity. This misuse of Christianity is time worn and in extremely poor taste..." APPENDED to the comments was a list of white merchants who have advertised in the Cen ter Light. At least one of them has since dropped his adver tising because of pressure from white citizens. In Natchez, Miss., many Ca tholics received an anonymous circular signed by the “Adams County Committee for Religious Integrity" which contained an attack on two priests associa ted with the civil rights move ment. THE CIRCULAR suggests that Catholic churches and schools have become infiltrated by communists, and asks; "Are you, as responsible religious people, going to allow your Church, your Church property' and your Church leaders to be used by communist conspiracy in their fight to destroy all re ligions?" In answer to this circular, Msgr. Thomas Fullam, rector of the Cathedral of Our Lady of Sorrows in Natchez, declared in his Sunday bulletin that the charges are "full of in accuracies and malicious in sinuations." "PEOPLE who hide behind slogans and titles inspired by prejudice and bias, as in the present case, have no love for the Catholic Church or for Ca tholics as such." Seminary Fund Remember the SEMINARY FUND of the Archidocese of Atlanta in your Will. Bequests should be made to the “Most Reverend Paul J. Hallinan, Archbishop of the Catho lic Archdiocese of Atlanta and his successors in office”. Participate in the daily prayers of our semi narians and in the Masses offer ed annually for the benefactors of our SEMINARY FUND. God Love You BY MOST REVEREND FULTON J. SHEEN This letter is typical of those that come from our missionary bishops who are laboring in countries where the Communists are beginning to devastate lands and to renew the Crucifixion. “As a matter of fact, it is very difficult for the propagation of the holy Faith at this time. In more than one parish where the godless Communists are reigning, religion is simply forbidden. The Catholics were told not to go to Church, to catechism classes or to say prayers. The Communists tell them that all these, things are useless to the fatherland. One of my priests had to leave his three parishes under the formal threat of death. The two catechists and two Sisters tried to stay, but were finally forced to leave, God save the poor sheep they left behind, for they are all new converts 1 Another priest got out of II- parish where he was constanly invited to attend Communist meetings. His three parishes are in the middle of the jungle occupied by the enemies of God’s Holy Name. For the last Confirmation tour in the most remote part of my diocese I had to travel incognito so as not to arouse Communist notice. I was almost drowned by the violent waves which rocked the frail craft packed with passengers of all ages. Thank God we were safe and sound, but the sacred vestments were soaked through. The hardships never scare my priests, however, who need and deserve continued assistance in order to carry on joyfully their sacrifices for the greater glory of God and the salvation of souls.” May the bishops and priests of the United States, whose eyes fall upon this letter hasten to make some sacrifice that we may forward it to the Holy Father for this bishop and many other bishops of the Church who are poor. To the laity, too, we send our appeal, inasmuch as you are brothers and sisters of the converts mentioned in this letter. St. Paul tells us that if one member of the Church suffers, the whole Church suffers. This is true of our physical body when, if our tooth aches, our whole organism seems to share the pain. May our Catholic people translate week after week their love of the suffering, crucified Church throughout the world, and do some acts of self-denial for the Holy Father and his Society for the propagation of the Faith, GOD LOVE YOU to Mr. P.K. and family for $70 ’The oldest of our seven children is an aspirant to religious life and upon thinking of this and all the nice things our family has, we think it is time we share. This is a combination of our income tax return, coupon refunds, cigarette denials and, of course, the children put in some of their baby sitting money and their ’gift monies.”’ .... to Mrs, W.R.S. for $3.15 "In thanksgiving for all that we have, upon completing the Nine Day Novena. This represents that extra coffee each day; one cent for each phone call placed or received; and two of our boys gave up their bus ride and used bicycles. Our family of eight is happy to share, hoping it helps someone in need." Why not give a GOD LOVE YOU MEDAL to the graduate in your family? The ten letters of GOD LOVE YOU spell out a decade of the rosary as they encircle the medal originated by Bishop Sheen to honor the Madonna of the World. With your request and corresponding offer you may order one in any of the following styles: $2 small sterling silver $3 small 10k gold filled $5 large sterling silver $10 large 10k gold filled Cut out this column, pin your sacrifice to it and mail It to Most Rev. Fulton J. Sheen, National Directpr of the Society for the Pro pagation of the Faith, 366 Fifth Avenue, New York lx, N. Y. or your Archdioceaan Director, Very Rev, Harold J* Rainey P. O. Box 12047 Northslde Station, Atlanta 5, Ga,