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Gmorgia
Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta
Vol. 14 No. 45
Thursday, December 16, 1976
$5 Per Year.
Church Law Revision Continues
BING SINGS AT THE BAR -- Bing Crosby and his wife, Kathryn, sing
and dance in Las Vegas at a benefit to raise money for construction of a
church for Holy Family parish. It was the first appearance in the show
business capital for Crosby who is celebrating 50 years as a performer.
Holy Family has been using a converted go-go bar for Sunday Masses.
MICHAEL NOVAK:
Family Is In Trouble
America is conspiring to destroy its most efficient social institution - the family --
charges author Michael Novak. In an interview in the December St. Anthony
Messenger, he suggests concrete ways for government, business and families themselves
to strengthen family life.
Novak lists the many ways our society conspires against the family:
“The great corporations (as well as the universities, the political professions, the
foundations, the great newspapers and the publishing empires) diminish the moral and
economic importance of the family.”
“Social engineers plan for sewers, pipelines, access roads,” but not for the human
environment which “allows families ... to flower and prosper.”
“Almost everything about life in the United States - tax policies, real estate
policies . . . -- makes it difficult for families that feel ancient moral obligations to care
for their aged, their mentally disturbed, their retarded, their needy.”
Such poor treatment of the family is no accident. According to Novak, it results
from a “systematic bias” in American life where the emphasis is always on the
individual.
Novak calls on government to help the family counter this bias and exercise greater
control over its own destiny.
“All those years that a child is nourished, given moral and intellectual guidance in
the family, should be subsidized - at least indirectly - by society,” Novak believes.
“And that means tax breaks.”
Concerning child care he asks: “Why can’t we set up a system so that family
members - grandparents, uncles, aunts -- or even neighbors could get tax breaks for
doing babysitting for one another? That would strengthen local institutions and keep
the hands of government out.”
Novak would also like to see the family’s educational potential recognized. “It
would be far cheaper and more effective in the long run to provide educational funds
directly to families for subscriptions to magazines and newspapers,” so that families
could provide a more stimulating and motivating home environment. “If reading scores
improved by a certain amount over a period of time, the family could get another
payment for things of this sort,” he suggests.
Business and industry, too, have an important role in strengthening families.
Arranging work schedules so working mothers could be home when school is out,
cutting down on the constant transfers that destroy family roots, and providing day
care on company premises so parents could visit children during the day -- these are
among the “numerous things the economic system could do that would be practical
and would probably more than pay for themselves in the long run,” Novak says.
TV Christmas Mass
A special Christmas Mass is scheduled for Christmas day on WSB TV, channel
2 in Atlanta. Archbishop Donnellan will celebrate the Mass which is to be
televised from 11 a.m. till noon.
Father Noel Burtenshaw, who has been celebrating a monthly TV Mass will
assist the archbishop.
Music for the Mass will be provided by the choir from the Cathedral of Christ
the King under the direction of H. Hamilton Smith.
The TV Mass is provided for those who are unable to attend at their parish
church because of illness.
VATICAN CITY (NC) - A giant step
toward finishing the vast revision of the
Church’s Code of Canon Law has just
been completed here by international
specialists.
According ' to officials of the
Pontifical Commission for the Revision
of the Code of Canon Law, study
groups charged with rewriting the
present 2,414 canons (laws) of the
60-year-old code have completed their
work.
The drafts submitted by the study
groups, made up of about 100 clergy
and lay experts from various fields, are
now being sent to the world’s bishops,
to offices of the Roman Curia (the
Church’s central administration) and to
Catholic universities for evaluation and
criticism.
The consultation with these groups is
expected to take a year, according to
Msgr. Mariano De Nicolo, an official of
the papal commission.
The revised draft on Church trials and
“processes” has already been sent for
criticism to the bishops, Curia and
universities, and the other sections of
the drafts will be in the mail soon, Msgr.
De Nicolo added.
The suggestions resulting from the
consultation will then be analyzed by
the commission. “The time it takes for
the commission to complete the analysis
will simply depend upon whether we get
back 1,000 or 10,000 responses,” said
the monsignor.
The present Code of Canon Laws,
which became the general law of the
Church in 1917, lists rights, duties and
obligations of various groups in the
Church from the Pope and bishops, to
priests, Religious and associations of lay
people.
It regulates celebration of the
sacraments, and includes lengthy
sections on marriage legislation - much
of which has already been updated by
special papal decree.
The current code also regulates
penalties for various offenses, process
for ecclesiastical trials, and a host of
other disciplinary matters.
Pope John XXIII announced in 1959
that he would begin revision of the
World-War-1 era code. The papal
commission has been working since
1963 on the current revision. The 1917
revision had taken 13 years to complete.
Eastern Catholic Churches have a
code of law distinct from that used in
the Western or Latin church. In 1972
Pope Paul VI established a separate
pontifical commission to revise the
Eastern Code.
Forty-four cardinals from all over the
world are the members of the Latin-rite
law commission.
Their task is to review the work of
the 100 experts and the suggestions of
the world’s bishops, the Curia and
Catholic universities.
General Absolution Draws Response
WASHINGTON (NC) - The president
of the National Conference of Catholic
Bishops (NCCB) has emphasized that
“individual private confession and
absolution represent the ordinary way
of celebrating the Sacrament of
Reconciliation,” or Penance, in the
Catholic Church.
“It is not the intention that general
confession and absolution be the
common form for this sacrament, but
rather that they be reserved for
exceptional cases involving real
necessity,” said NCCB president,
Archbishop Joseph L. Bernardin of
Cincinnati in a statement issued here.
The statement answered inquiries
made after a Dec. 5 reconciliation rite in
Memphis, Tenn., during which Bishop
Carroll T. Dozier of Memphis and 60
priests administered general absolution
to a crowd of about 11,000. The
archbishop said it was up to Bishop
Dozier to decide whether to use that
form of the sacrament under those
circumstances.
In another statement, Archbishop
Jean Jadot, apostolic delegate in the
United States, said that, contrary to the
impression given in some news reports,
he had not given approval or disapproval
to the use of general confession and
absolution as part of the Memphis
ceremony.
“In fact I made no judgment on the
matter,” Archbishop Jadot said. “It
would have been beyond my
competence to do so.” He said he had
merely encouraged Bishop Dozier, in
efforts, in accord with Church teaching
and discipline, to reconcile alienated
Catholics with the Church.
Bishop Dozier told NC News: “I
BviLLftitYS
Value Of Life Conference
DALLAS (NC) - More than 500 people representing 94 communities throughout
Texas focused on bioethical concerns at the three-day Value of Life Conference at the
Dallas Hilton Hotel. The ecumenical conference, three years in planning, was designed
as an open forum to raise public awareness and understanding of bioethical issues. A
relatively new term, “bioethics” has been defined as “the moral, ethical, and legal
implications of contemporary life sciences technology.”
Ecuador Expells Priest
QUITO, Ecuador (NC) -- The military government here said it has expelled Spanish
Father Juan Casanas Curi “for mingling in national politics.” The rest of the 28
persons detained at the end of November, including two former Religious, remain in
jail here. At the time of their arrest, Interior Minister Bolivar Jarrin said the group was
planning to stage a coup and establish a “totalitarian” regime.
Argentine Torture Described
LONDON (NC) - Father Patrick Rice told reporters here that he was beaten and
subjected to water torture and electric shock treatment by Argentine police during the
first three days of his eight-week imprisonment before he was released and deported
Dec. 3. The 31-year-old Irish priest described details of his arrest and imprisonment at
press conference here Dec. 7.
$1 Million For Pro-Life
CINCINNATI (NC) -- More than $1 million was budgeted and expended for pro-life
services in the Cincinnati archdiocese in 1975 and 1976 according to a report released
Dec. 9 by Father James H. Garland, archdiocesan director of Catholic Charities. The
report showed expenditures of $502,985 in 1975 and an expected total of $572,066
for 1976.
Low-Income Housing
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (NC) - The Springfield diocese has formed a corporation to
finance housing for low-income people, Bishop Joseph A. McNicholas announced here.
The corporation has applied to the federal government for a $4.4 million loan to
provide financing for housing construction in a four-block area of Springfield’s east
side.
Definition Of Death Hearings
ALBANY, N.Y. (NC) - After taking testimony in New York City, Rochester, and
here in the state capital, the state assembly’s subcommittee on health eare has
completed public hearings on legislation dealing with the definition of death and the
so-called “right to die.” A parade of expert witnesses, including doctors, lawyers and
spokesmen for religious organizations, passed before the subcommittee, which will
help decide the fate of proposals dealing with death, including a suggested bill
proposed by the Society for the Right to Die which would allow the drawing up of
“living wills.”
strongly agree with Archbishop Jadot’s
assessment.”
Bishop Dozier said also that “three
months of total indoctrination” using
the diocesan newspaper, sermons and
other means of communication had
explained the need for interior sorrow
to receive general absolution worthily
and the obligation to make an individual
confession within a year.
Archbishop Bernardin noted that
Church law permits general confession
and absolution under certain conditions
and it is up to the local bishop to decide
whether circumstances in his diocese
meet the conditions. “Thus,” he said,
“the decision in the case of the
Memphis ceremony was Bishop Dozier’s
responsibility. It was not a decision
about which he either consulted the
conference of bishops as a whole or was
obliged to do so.”
Archbishop Bernardin also noted that
for divorced and remarried Catholics to
participate in a rite of general
confession and absolution “by itself
does not regularize their marital status
in the eyes of the Church.”
“Where such regularization is or may
be possible, it must come through the
Church’s established procedures for
marriage causes,” he said.
Bishop Dozier said he rejected “the
connotation that someone may have
received the sacrament unworthily.”
The requirement of making an
Memphis Details
See Page 7
individual confession within a year after
the general absolution was “stated in
the program handed to everyone coming
into the auditorium,” he said, and those
present were asked to make some
outward sign, such as a bow of the head,
of their interior sorrow.
The bishop noted that “no sacrament
against which a difficulty is placed,”
(Continued on page 3)
Pope Meets Rome Mayor
During Religious Function
ROME (NC) - Pope Paul VI met Rome’s new Communist mayor at a religious
function here Dec. 8 beneath a statue honoring the Immaculate Conception.
Communist Mayor Guilio Carlo Argan talked cordially for about a minute with the
Pontiff. Pope Paul was making his annual pilgrimage to the statue of Mary which
surmounts a column in Piazza di Spagna.
Last spring the Pope made it clear to Italians that they should not vote for
Communists in national and local elections. Despite his warnings, one out of three
Italians voted Communist.
Mayor Argan, a former art historian, was among the new slate of city officials
elected last June on the Communist ticket.
Immediately after the short, evening service of prayers to Our Lady, Pope Paul
walked toward the mayor who bowed and appeared to be making a genuflection.
Rome’s mayor traditionally greets the Pope on behalf of the city at the Piazza di
Spagna ceremony.
Recently Argan wrote the Vatican to request a private papal audience, but the
Vatican has not yet made public its decision on whether the Pope will receive the
mayor.
Argan said that he wants to discuss some urgent problems facing the city, including
how best to save the city’s vast art treasury from modern urban pollution.
Before the Pope’s arrival, Argan met briefly with the Pope’s vicar for the Rome
diocese, Cardinal Ugo Poletti. Their first public meeting took place two months
previously at a Mass in the Church of Santa Maria in Ara Coeli on the Capitoline Hill.
The cardinal had led a vociferous crusade against the election of a communist city
government in Rome.
After his exchange of greetings with the cardinal at the Mass Sept. 8, the mayor told
NC News that “it is neither in the character of Cardinal Poletti to play Don Camillo
nor in mine to play Mayor Peppone.”
The reference was to a series of books by Giovanni Guareschi about a Communist
mayor and a Catholic pastor in a small Italian town who start out as enemies but
gradually learn to collaborate and become friends.
Thousands of Romans jammed Piazza di Spagna and small streets leading into it to
see the Pope. A break in a month of nearly constant rain brought clear skies and warm
temperatures to the city on the feast day, which is also a national holiday.
Pope Pius IX had the column and statue erected to commemorate his proclamation
of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in 1854.
Pope John XXIII revived Pius’ practice of praying at the column on the feast.
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