Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 5—September 16, 1971
NOTRE DAME UNIVERSITY
Worship Is Down But
Campus Keeps Catholic
NOTRE DAME, Ind. (NC)
— University of Notre Dame
students may not go to
Sunday Mass as regularly as in
the past, but the faculty and
the school’s by-laws keep the
campus mood Catholic,
according to Father James T.
Burtchaell, the provost.
The priest saw both
weaknesses and strengths in
assessing how Catholic his
school is for “Insight: Notre
Dame,” quarterly magazine
published by the university’s
information department.
“Let me begin with the
bad,” the Holy Cross priest
wrote.
“The first most serious
deficiency in our religious
situation is a certain
persistent disregard for the
common good.” Students
“fail to see that a society of
trust needs members who will
not only contribute their
personal integrity, but will
take responsibility to oppose
publicly those who exploit
the common good.”
A second negative sign he
cited is a lack of participation
in worship.
“Worship is down, and I
am unable to understand it to
my own satisfaction or to
explain it to yours,” he
added. In the 1950s about 90
percent of the students
regularly attended Sunday
Mass, compared to about 65
percent of parishioners
around the country. “Today,
participation on campus
would run about the same as
in the average parish” (63
percent according to the most
recent Gallup Poll), Father
Burtchaell said. Notre Dame
has more than 6,000
students.
The priest said he believes
the trend goes far beyond the
campus in that “a growing
majority of Catholics in our
country have silently
discontinued the practice of
confession.”
KENNEDY CENTER OPENING
Mixed Reviews For
Bernstein’s “Mass”
WASHINGTON (NC) - A
celebrity-studded audience
attending the opening night
of the John F. Kennedy
Center for the Performing
Arts applauded Leonard
Bernstein’s “Mass” for 10
minutes - but the nation’s
theater critics gave it
generally mixed reviews.
“Mass,” as Bernstein
describes it, is “a sincere
work of faith” combining
modern slang, blues, jazz and
Latin. He called it “a
fulfillment of my life’s
work.”
Mrs. Rose Kennedy hailed
the performance as
“stupendous,” while New
York critics called it “a
sentimental response to the
great problems of our times”
and basically trivial.
“Mass” -- subtitled “A
Theater Piece for Singers,
Dancers and Players”
opened the $70 million
cultural enter at the request
of the late president’s widow,
Mrs. Jacqueline Onassis.
The Washington Post, in a
complimentary review,
described “Mass” as “the
greatest music Bernstein has
ever written - a shattering
experience that signally
honors its creator, the center
and the memory of the man
(Week of September 19-25)
Sunday, September 19, 7:30
p.m. — GUESS WHO’S COMING
TO DINNER (1968) — Stanley
Kramer’s fourth film to deal with
an aspect of racial or religious
bigotry is a bright comedy
starring the late Spencer Tracy
and Katharine Hepburn as parents
whose daughter (Katharine
Houghton) wants to marry a
distinguished Negro doctor
(Sidney Poitier). Though the film
stacks the deck somewhat, since
this particular couple will never
have to face the social
circumstances others would, the
effort of both their families to
cope with the race issue and the
generation gap adds a dimension
of truth. Mr. Tracy and Miss
Hepburn are at their greatest as a
team. Fine support by Roy
Glenn, Beah Richards, Isabell
Sanford. Original script by
William Rose. (A-ll) (CBS)
Sunday, September 19, 9:00
p.m. — EL DORADO (1966) — El
Dorado (U.S.). A rancher tries to
force out his neighbors and take
their land. The town sheriff
(Robert Mitchum), who is
immobilized by drinking, is
helped by his old partner (John
Wayne) who suffers occasional
paralytic spinal spasms. The halt
and infirm pair join forces to
clean up playfully the
professional band of cutthroats
terrorizing the town.
Producer-director Howard Hawks
has concocted a good mixture of
action, farcical situations and
unconventional treatment to
make this color Western worth a
trip to the theater. (AM!) (ABC)
Monday, September 20, 9:00
p.m. — THE ALAMO (1960) —
Second of two installments (Part I
was shown on Sat., Sept. 18) of
the huge iohn Wayne-produced
and directed epic about the
famous Texas outpost. The Duke
also stars in a mighty way. Fine
action adventure for the mass
audience, although historians
might find some bones to pick.
(A-l) (NBC)
Jhursday, September 23, 9:00
p.ftt. — THE AMBUSHERS
(1968) — A pandering film, the
latest and most inferior of a poor
for whom the center was
named.”
Father Gilbert Hartke,
chairman of the speech and
drama department at the
Catholic University of
America here, criticized the
Bernstein work, saying “he
doesn’t even know anything
about the Mass - he’s not
even a believer.” Bernstein is
Jewish.
But another Dominican
priest Father Thomas Heath,
said in a letter to the
Washington Post that he
thought the intention of the
drama “was to show how
people can have a shaky faith
restored, not destroyed by
shock.”
The 2,300-seat opera house
was filled with Kennedy
family members and others,
including Mrs. Robert F.
Kennedy, widow of the
senator, and six of her 11
children. Mrs. Onassis had
previously declined an
invitation to attend the
opening night for “personal
reasons.”
President Kennedy’s
mother said of the cultural
center: “It is what Jack was
interested in - culture, art,
joy and pleasure in the arts.”
“Jack would have loved
it,” she added.
spy series. The almost
non-existent plot, full of devices
from other films, is itself only a
device for spewing out a
succession of single and double
entendres (mostly single) . and
degraded sexual encounters in
which women are used as
“things.” Sloppy, smutty, it could
appeal only to the lowest
intellect, the meanest
imagination. All concerned, but
especially Dean Martin, who is
made to carry the burden of this
mindless bomb, can do better. (B)
(CBS)
Friday, September 24, 8:30
p.m. — LOCK, STOCK, AND
BARREL — TV film starring Tim
Matheson, Belinda Montgomery,
Jack Albertson. A young couple,
Matheson and Miss Montgomery,
have a tough time house-hunting
in the Old West. (NBC)
Friday, September 24, 9:30
p.m. — A TATTERED WEB —
90-minute television film. A
bizarre killing brings about a
personal, paternal, and
professional crisis for a Los
Angeles detective (Lloyd Bridges).
It makes sense, you see, because
he did the killing. (CBS)
Saturday, September 25, 8:30
p.m. — THE DEADLY DREAM —
Another TV film starring Lloyd
Bridges, this one casting him as a
brilliant research scientist driven
to near-madness because of a
recurrent nightmare. Gradually,
the scientist’s ability to
distinguish between waking and
dreaming has an understandably
bad effect on his work and
personal life. (ABC)
Saturday, September 25, 9:00
p.m. — THE SECRET WAR OF
HARRY FRIGG (1968) —
Grinning Paul Newman fills the
title role in this off-base Army
comedy-satire. Frigg is a private
whose only proven adeptness has
been in the area of escaping from
the base stockade. His peculiar
skill comes in handy when he is
promoted to the rank of brigadier
general in order to help spring a
covey of fellow generals being
held prisoner by the Italian Army.
Sylvia Koscina, Andrew Duggan,
Tom Bosley co-star. (A-ll) (NBC)
The priest refrained from
discussing such social
problems as promiscuity,
drinking or drugs because, he
said they are being handled
without acquiescence but
with knowledge that they
exist “in surprisingly fainter
measure at Notre Dame than
at most schools one knows.”
He went on:
“As a confessor and as a
man, I have some
acquaintance with the
frailties of man. I suppose we
have less fornication among
our students than adultery
among the adult population
and certainly less
alcoholism.”
Turning to “those good
features of life at our school
that afford hope for
religion,” Father Burtchaell
cited strength in the healthy
state of the department of
theology.
“We have a second
strength, even more crucial in
the long run, in our faculty,”
he said. “Faith is shared by
old with young, through a
mysterious transmission of
cherishing and teaching.”
It is a faculty, he said,
“who make Notre Dame
Catholic. By statute a Holy
Cross priest, Father Theodore
M. Hesburgh, is president.
Our by-laws firmly state that
we are a Catholic institution.
Theology is required in the
curriculum. But none of these
things make a university
Christian. The people do: the
people who teach.
“All that we can do is
provide that the
predominating inspiration
and ~ membership of ; our
faculty are Catholic and
Christian, and let the active
ferment within the Church
bring what God wills.”
Father Burtchaell said his
primary concern, rather than
writing documents asserting
institutional commitment, is
to assemble “a team of
scholar-teachers who are men
and women of faith and
desire to share their values
and lifestyle with their
younger companions.”
That has been difficult in
recent years, he said, because
“the more brilliant young
Catholic academics have
made for the state and secular
colleges, feeling perhaps that
to stay in a Catholic school
was to spend one’s career in
the minor leagues.
“Our recruitment this year
suggests a turnaround in this
trend.”
Still another good sign “is
the noticeable involvement of
students in socially
constructive service projects,”
the priest said.
In summary, Father
Burtchaell said he does not
assess the Catholicity at
Notre Dame by “comparing
the strengths and weaknesses
I have reported above. I live
in it, and know it as priest,
administrator, counselor,
teacher, writer, assistant
rector, changer of fuses, and
all the other things we find
ourselves doing.
“The situation is good.
Times change, but people do
not.. .We grow tired of
outsiders criticizing the work
we do, for we know the
hearts of these young men,
and as we teach them what
we can, in this season of new
Spirit in the Church, there are
also things they have to teach
TV Movie
Reviews
IN THE FALL A YOUNG MAN’S FANCY TURNS TO FOOTBALL - Here, players work out
under the watchful eyes of head football coach, Jim Lansing, at Fordham University. (NC PHOTO
by Chris Sheridan)
CANADA BISHOPS ON SYNOD PAPER
Priesthood Document
Seen Too Simplified
ARMAGH CARDINAL:
4 Vicious Circle 9
Must Be Broken
OTTAWA (NC) - The
bishops of Canada have told
the Vatican that the synod
working paper on the
priesthood “oversimplifies
the causes of unrest among
the clergy.”
Furthermore, commented
the Canadian hierarchy in a
25-page report, the
priesthood document to be
taken up when the worldwide
synod opens in Rome in two
weeks, fails “to situate that
unrest in the context of- the
present unrest in society and
in the Church.”
The priesthood paper,
along with another on world
justice, was circulated among
the world’s bishops as
advance material for the 1971
synod. The Canadian bishops
made their appraisal after
consulting with priests, nuns
and laity.
Father Edmund Roche,
director of the Canadian
Catholic Conference’s office
for the English-language
clergy and one of two
priest-auditors from Canada
who will attend the synod,
said about the Canadian
response:
“Many bishops see the
unrest in a positive way, as a
good sign. If priests were
comfortable in their ministry
in today’s world, it would be
an unhealthy sign, a sign that
they are not really grappling
with the problems of today.
Priests have a very difficult
task to preach the word of
God and minister to the
needs of people today.”
The Canadian bishops said
the crisis in the priesthood
should be discussed not only
in terms of contemporary
secularization “but also in the
context of other phenomena,
such as the technical society,
the mass media, the growing
democratization of
institutions, contestation in
institutions, ideological
pluralism, growing
urbanization, the influence of
human sciences on thinking
and behavior.”
WASHINGTON (NC) -
“Theological smog” is
clouding the Church’s
teaching that Catholics are
obliged to attend Sunday and
Holy Day Mass “under pain
of grevious sin,” the bishop
of San Diego said here.
Bishop Leo T. Maher said
parents and teachers must
help students to “brace
themselves against the winds
of doctrinal fads so prevelant
in these days of crisis and
confusion.”
Bishop Maher made his
observations in a pastoral
jtter to the half-million
Catholics in the San Diego
diocese.
The bishop wrote that
“worship of God is the
essential purpose of man’s life
The Vatican document
takes “too negative an
approach,” the bishops said,
in attributing the present
problems of the priesthood to
an excessive influence of the
human sciences.
“The human sciences when
objectively used are the best
way of understanding cultural
changes which underlie
unrest, the way in which
reality is seen in a different
light,” the bishops said. “The
human sciences are often the
instruments through which
we see the signs of the times
and the action of the Spirit.”
The reply said that most of
Canada’s 85 bishops consider
it important that the bishops
of a country be able to make
decisions about forms of
ministry and styles of life for
their own priests and people,
and that a synod cannot be
expected to set guidelines
that would apply in different
countries except in the most
general way.
‘‘After suitable
consultation with other local
churches,” the bishops said,
‘ ‘ national and regional
conferences of bishops should
be empowered to make even
very important decisions in
order to meet the pastoral
needs of the faithful of their
areas.
“In this way the synod
should provide for a
consistent evolution in the
Church’s structures and
processes and thus make
possible a much more rapid
deployment of resources and
personnel in order to serve
new, rapidly developing, and
sometimes transient pastoral
needs. This flexibility,
however, should not endanger
the unity of the Church.”
The Canadian bishops said
they favor ordaining married
men to the priesthood, as
well as a thorough synod
discussion of the whole
question of the
inter-relationship of celibacy
and the priesthood in the
Latin rite.
The bishops said the synod
on earth and attending Mass
on Sunday is a primary means
of worshipping God.”
There can be no true
Christian charity unless it
feeds on the Gospel and the
Eucharist, the bishop said. He
added that “in the Mass our
Lord asks exactly the same
faith as he asks on every page
fv-»^ n^cr-vol Tf ho acks for it.
VI kite VOp»-l. 11
here in the most complete
form, it is because he gives
himself wholly and entirely.”
“Let no theological smog
in any manner cloud or
obscure the authentic
teaching of the Church that it
is grave obligation binding the
conscience of all Catholics to
participate in the Mass on
Sundays and holy days of
obligation,” the bishop said.
V
should consider the question
of a ministry of married
priests in the Latin rite under
three headings:
“-Should persons already
married and of mature age be
admitted to the ministerial
priesthood?
“-Should priests who have
married or who will marry be
allowed to resume or to
continue an active exercise of
the priestly ministry?
“-Should acceptance of
celibacy continue to be a
requirement of the
priesthood for future
priests?”
A — Section I -
A — Section II
A — Section HI
A — Section IV
HOA BINH (Transvue Films)
Raoul Coutard has proven himself
to be one of the world’s most
creative cinematographers. His
visual contribution to the look of
the New Wave in France was as
important as that of directors
such as Godard and Truffaut for
whom he worked. His own
experience as a combat
cameraman in Indochina and later
as photographer of a
documentary about the French
soldiers there, convinced him to
makt his own film about a
country and a people which he
admired.
His film is about life in
Vietnam as seen through the eyes
of an eleven-year-old boy. Except
for a helicopter attack under the
opening credits, the physical war
of combat, bombings, and daily
terrorism is not shown. Coutard
instead wants us to experience
what life has come to mean after
thirty years of warfare for the
average Vietnamese. We see the
war through its consequences for
the civilian population living in a
modern doomsday world.
The film is about a child who
has never known a day of peace.
He, his sick mother and baby
sister are refugees who move from
place to place as the opportunity
for work impels them. When the
mother is hospitalized, the boy
undertakes to provide for his
sister by shining shoes, selling
newspapers, working on the
docks, even stealing. The mother
dies and all that keeps the boy
going is his hope that some day he
and his sister will be reunited with
their father who is presumed to
have joined the Viet Cong.
This fictional dramatization of
human reality is closer to the
humanistic tradition of Robert
Flaherty’s documentaries than to
today’s politically committed
brand of radical cinema. Coutard
has made a positive anti-war film,
one that will reach the moral
indignation of its viewers by
depicting the brutalization of the
everyday life of a child rather
than by detailing monstrous
scenes of torture and atrocity. He
has also succeeded in making it
possible for us to know the
Vietnamese as people rather than
casualty figures, an achievement
♦ j-«-»♦ is perhaps the best thing
about the film.
It is a film of compassion and
not polemics. Coutard is not
interested in judging the
combatants or voicing rhetorical
condemnations. Both Americans
and Viet Cong give short
explanations of their military
actions. It is left to the viewer to
judge whether either side can
condone on political grounds
what has happened to even this
one unfortunate child, let alone
the millions of dead, wounded
and uprooted Vietnamese.
Coutard’s concern for
RFALPOLITIC makes
ARMAGH, Northern
Ireland (NC) — The “vicious
circle” of injustice, .violence
and repression in Northern
Ireland must be broken,
Cardinal William Conway of
Armagh said in a new appeal
for peace in this strife-torn
country.
In a special statement, the
Catholic primate of All
Ireland called on those “who
are seeking a solution by
violent means” to consider
what is likely to be left “at
the end of a trail of
destruction and death.”
“At this time of crises,
“Cardinal Conway said, “it is
important for people to think
clearly and, above all, to
think ahead. What lies ahead
if the present wave of
violence and violent
repression continues? That is
the question which everyone
should be facing up to at the
present time.
“Anger and frustration-
have accumulated in the
minority here over the past
50 years and have reached a
new peak as a result of events
in recent weeks. I share these
emotions myself, but no one
should allow anger and
frustration, however natural
or justified, to cloud his
reason or dim his Christian
faith in the doctrine of love.”
“We all know that the
present wave of violence and
repression could lead to even
greater suffering and death,”
Cardinal Conway said. “The
responsibility for this is not
all on one side. It is shared by
those who neglected to
remedy-or who turned a
blind eye to-genuine and
deep-seated political and
social grievances for over 50
years. It is shared by those
who have indulged in
excessive measures of
repression.
“But someone must break
this vicious circle of injustice,
violence and repression. I beg
of those people, few in
number, who are seeking a
solution by violent means to
pause and reflect before God
what it is they are about; to
consider what this vicious
circle of which they are a part
in doing to innocent people,
Catholic and Protestant, in
terms of physical and mental
suffering; above all to reflect
on what is likely to be left at
the end of a trail of
destruction and death.”
The people who are
seeking a solution by violent
means have absolutely no
mandate for this from the
Irish people, the cardinal
stated. Moreover, their
doctrine has been repudiated
by all responsible political
parties and community
leaders throughout Ireland,
he said.
“The current of opinion
which sees the need for a new
political framework for
democracy in this country is
very strong, even in Britain,”
Cardinal Conway asserted. “Is
this not the time to give this
opinion an opportunity to
bear fruit?
“For the sake of the
suffering people, I appeal to
those who are seeking a
solution by violent means to,
for God’s sake, stop and give
peaceful means a chance.”
Adults, Reservations
former black mistress, and his
current girlfriend, a
topless-bottomless go-go dancer.
Blame most of the failures on the
film maker’s preachy attempts to
put down hard drugs but advocate
the softies-all on a low, low
budget. (B)
NIGHT OF DARK SHADOWS
(MGM) Folks in Tarrytown, N.Y.,
are well aware of the spooky
qualities of the old Jay Gould
mansion nestled there. Now folks
all across the country can get a
look at the place, for it more than
anyone or anything emerges as
the star of this campy chiller
based on the now-defunct TV
soap-opera, DARK SHADOWS.
Just as in last year’s initial entry
based on the series, HOUSE OF
DARK SHADOWS, NIGHT sports
a conglomeration of sinister or
helpless characters and a plot too
complicated to mention. While
the gore in the movie is
unexpectedly mild, the sexual
innuendo and action are rough
enough to warrant an adult
audience. (A-lll)
THE BIG DOLL HOUSE (New
World Pictures) In an era of total
permissiveness, it is almost
refreshing to find an
“old-fashioned” exploitation film
full of innuendo as heavy as the
passionate breathing and in which
the camera pulls away just before
anything is actually uncovered.
This comparison is only relative,
however, and on the objective
scale this sex melodrama about a
bunch of desperate female prison
inmates suffers from a morgl tone
as low as its production values.
The movie was shot on location in
the jungles of the Philippines, and
it should have been left there to
rot. (B)
SWEET SAVIOUR (Trans
World Amusements) Troy
Donahue has gone far since those
early days in PARRISH and A
SUMMER PLACE, and from the
looks of this sick and revolting
exploitation number based
transparently on the Charles
Manson-Sharon Tate murder
sensation, it’s been downhill all
the way. One can speculate why a
seemingly respectable actor would
accept such a tawdry film, but
there’s no doubt about the
producer-director-writer Bob
Robert’s intentions: cash in on
the headlines. This is
pornography. (C)
Recent NCOMP
Classifications
Play Misty for Me (Universal) —
A-l V
Clay Pigeon (MGM) — B
Some of My Best Friends Are
— (Amer. Intnatl.) — C
Sweet Saviour (Trans World) —
C
Film Classifications
Morally Unobjectionable for General Patronage
Morally Unobjectionable for Adults Adolescents
Morally Unobjectionable for Adults
B - Morally Objectionable in Part for AH
C — Condemned
Morally Unobjectionable for
HOA—BINH a work that with
each succeeding year will become
more important as a document
for all mankind of the human cost
of war and, in particular, as a
reminder for Americans of their
moral responsibility in mending a
devasted land. (A-ll)
THE RETURN OF COUNT
YORGA (American International)
(In release) Without a doubt,
Robert Quarry is one of the most
appealing actors playing vampires
in today’s horror movies. This
may seem a dubious distinction,
but Quarry’s popularity as the
ghoulish nobleman in last year’s
COUNT YORGA, VAMPIRE
places him up there next to Bela
Lugosi on the film vampire’s
ladder of fame. His popularity
also accounts for the present
sequel, THE RETURN OF
COUNT YORGA, which finds the
slightly lecherous leech and his
army of catatonic females settling
into a splendid San Francisco
Victorian Mansion. Once the
moon is full, the Count and Co.
repair to various neighbor’s digs
to borrow a cup of blood, and at
one stop the count finds to his
own horror that his very survival
is being threatened-he is falling in
love. After centuries of avoiding
romantic entanglements, the only
thing to do is for him to whisk his
ladylove away to his castle for
vampirish conversion, something
worse than a fate worse than
death. The ensuing battle of wits
between the wily count and the
young lady’s befuddled
psychiatrist fiance provides the
nip-and-tuck substance of the
film.
Were all of this presented in a
chillingly serious manner,
RETURN might definitely
present a problem for most
viewers. But RETURN is played
for laughs, and for those who
enjoy campy take-offs on the
classic vampire genre, the movie
will prove a delight, albeit a lurid
and sanguinary one in certain
spots. (Moreover, impressionable
youngsters may be troubled by
the inclusion in the film of a
young lad as go-between for the
count and the “straight” world.)
In any case, director Bob Kelljan
has paced his film in a sprightly
manner, and provides as neat and
ghoulishly funny a twist ending as
you’ll ever hope to see. (A-ll)
CLAY PIGEON (MGM) A
disillusioned Viet Nam war hero
returns to Los Angeles and
becomes involved in an elaborate
plot to entrap the area’s big-time
drug supplier. Tom Stern plays
the ex-GI, and also directs. Telly
Savalas is sinister as the Federal
“narco” agent who uses
emotional blackmail and
downright deviousness to get
Stern to stick his neck out;
Robert Vaughn is simply too
twitchy and kooky to be
believable as the heroin king.
Seriously marring an already weak
dramatic line are a series of sex
vignettes involving Stern, his
Obligation To
Attend Mass