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Lenten Living
Ed. Note: First in a series for the
Lenten Season.
BY MSGR. JERRY HARDY
You are invited to a five week
experiment in simpler living, as a way
of coming home to yourself and your
God.
You will not have to travel any
great distance to a campsite or a
convention center.
The only place you’ll have to go is
deep within yourself, for this
experiment called LENT, and its
only movement is the frozen motion
we call a simple stillness of the heart
which allows us to take a good hard
look at ourselves.
But what is this Lent to be about
then?
Is simpler living just another way
of saying “reducing?” Yes, but not
merely our weight and waist/waste
lines ... Lent is about reducing to
essentials, peeling away the layers of
comfort and complacency that slip
so subtly into our patterns of living
that we hardly notice how they’ve
rocked our values to sleep.
Lent understood this way is larger
and deeper and, oh yes, kinder than
our usual thoughts about it: for the
reduction and peeling are done not
by some careless carving of our
hearts, some mindless major surgery
that removes our joy of living, but
rather by a care-fully compassionate
Father, in whose image we are
created into whose likeness we are to
grow. It is done by a loving
Son-Brother, Jesus, who tries to
convince us that life is not life at all
without the dying that sets it free
from Death; and by a Spirit, holy
and gentle and persistent who would
teach us by leading us to levels of
insight where we learn to live with
less so that others will suffer less,
where we learn to sacrifice more so
that others will receive more, where
we learn that such choices, for the
believing person, are not optional but
essential, that the pains possibly
accompanying them are not
punishment but companionship, and
that the consequences of them are
not destruction and death but
liberation and life.
If Advent was “coming home to
the truth about ourselves” Lent is
coming home again to that truth
after we have forgotten or misplaced
it under selfish or unreflective
choices. But then again, of what
importance is the Christmas Story
without Ash Wednesdays, Good
Fridays, Easter Sundays? Is there not
something basically incomplete
about birth alone? And so it is with
us, for we too are incomplete if we
stay only at the place of Jesus’ birth.
Lent is coming home again
beyond the warm limits of manger
and swaddling clothes to the life and
death reality of choosing life over
death at every turn.
Advent told us ours is a
neighborhood God lovingly come
among us as the Jesus of Christmas;
Lent tells us how this God walked
our streets for the rest of His life as
the Jesus of Everyday Choices. And
this is where our experiment in
simpler living enters, for to hear
Lent’s message and absorb its
richness, we will not be able to
proceed “business as usual.”
We will need to fast from food
regularly so we can appreciate better
the deeper hungers of our hearts and
develop our identity with those
whose rice bowls are empty. We will
need to lay aside, even if only for a
time, some of our more accustomed
(Continued on page 3)
University Lutheran Church in La Jolla on Ash
Wednesday. The ashes are a sign that the season
of Lent has begun.
ASH WEDNESDAY - Campus chaplains from
the University of California in San Diego
distribute ashes during an ecumenical service at
Mardi Gras
Mohammed Ali is back from
Africa. He went there as the newest
roving ambassador of the Carter
administration. The trip was a total
disaster. Ali’s greatness,
self-proclaimed and proclaimed by
everyone else, lies behind the punch
of a power-packed glove, not within
the ropes of the political ring.
His mission was to persuade
African countries not to go to
Moscow for the summer Olympics.
He failed.
Thrilled by his
physique,
entertainingly
cheered by his
chatter and
amazed at ms
achievements,
the Africans
loved the man
but not the
message.
There was no
great enthus
iasm to boycott. After all, America
has never shown wild opposition to
racist South Africa, so what was the
big problem of an invading Soviet
machine? Ambassador Ali did not
have the answers, admitted his
deficiency and quickly threw in the
towel, none of which was
appreciated by the Peanut Mafia.
The assignment was totally unfair.
If we send an ambassador and want
him to speak in a political arena,
then only a State Department
heavyweight should go. A sports
great who thinks that great means
“the greatest” is hardly the
messenger we need.
The finest good-will giant ever to
set sail under the U.S. colors was jazz
man supreme Louis Armstrong. To
every continent, every capitol,
behind curtains of bamboo and iron,
he went winning admiring friends for
his style, his music, and his nation.
Louis Armstrong could preach the
message because he did it with an
international language of the heart.
His horn was his passport. Blowing
notes from his golden trumpet and
rasping unintelligable lines of songs
opened gates and doors from
Moscow to Havana. His music said
“America” and that kind of America
was loved and accepted most
melodically, wherever he went.
As the seventies began Louis
Armstrong died. According to his
own beloved Lucille, the great
maestro learned lessons of musical
friendship during the wild, wonderful
r years in his native New Orleans. The
barriers of race were there, firmly
fashioned by the Southern system,
but broken down easily as music men
plied their trade.
“Mardi Gras was best,” the lady
remembers “like a giant army they
marched night and day filling the
festive air with their very own
music,” From the famous Irish
Channel to the venerable St. Louis
Cathedral, along South Rampart, the
French Quarter and bluesy Bourbon
Street they made Mardi Gras and
New Orleans synonomous. Filling the
carnival season with their own
distinctive sound left no opportunity
for thoughtless division.
Louis Armstrong learned those
lessons well and to a world, in
difficult times, he easily passed the
message of brotherhood along.
As the final notes of the Mardi
Gras fade and the solemn season of
Lent begins, the concepts of
goodwill, brotherhood and world
community of peaceful cooperation
and co-existance come to mind.
In the life and death of our
Savior, each of them was preached.
Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta
1 1/
Vol. 18 No. 8
Thursday, February 21,1980
$6.00 Per Year
VISITS HOSTAGES ~ Melkite-Rite
Archbishop Hilarion Capucci is greeted by an
unidentified American hostage at the U.S.
Embassy in Teheran. The archbishop was invited
to Iran by Ahmad Khomeini, son of Ayatollah
APPROVAL QUESTIONED
Khomeini, as part of the first anniversary
celebration of the Iranian revolution. Monsignor
John Nolan was also present during this visit, but
the two did not travel together.
Churchmen Visit Hostages
VATICAN CITY (NC) - Msgr.
John Nolan, president of the
Pontifical Mission for Palestine, said
he traveled to Iran “with the full
authorization of the Holy See.”
In a statement issued Feb. 16,
Msgr. Nolan added that he traveled
unaccompanied to Teheran, the
Iranian capital.
The statement was signed by
Msgr. Nolan and verified as
representing the facts by Father
Romeo Panciroli, Vatican press
spokesman. The statement does not
say what the nature of Msgr. Nolan’s
trip was.
The full text of the statement
says: “Re: the NC News story
2-13-80 ‘Clergymen visited U.S.
hostages minus papal OK, says
Vatican’
“(1) Msgr. John Nolan went to
Teheran with the full authorization
of the Holy See in his capacity as the
national secretary of the Catholic
Near East Welfare Association and
president of the Pontifical Mission
for Palestine. (2) He went to Teheran
and returned to Rome alone and
unaccompanied. He did not, as
reported, attend the conference
marking the 15th anniversary of
Egira. (3) He was a guest of the
apostolic nunciature in Teheran, and
on his return to Rome he was
received in private audience by Pope
John Paul II on Feb. 14.
“(Signed): Msgr. John Nolan”
The “15th anniversary” refers to
the 15th centenary celebrations
marking the founding of Islam. In
Teheran, the ceremonies were held
Feb. 11 to coincide with the first
anniversary of the Iranian revolution.
While in Teheran, Msgr. Nolan
visited the American hostages being
held in the U.S. embassy. Film
provided by Iranian state television
showed Msgr. Nolan and Archbishop
Hilarion Capucci, former
Melkite-Rite patriarchal vicar of
Jerusalem, talking with the hostages.
The visit occurred Feb. 8. After
the visit, a Vatican spokesman said
Archbishop Capucci did not have
Vatican approval and accepted the
Iranian invitation on his own behalf.
Archbishop Capucci is a controversial
figure in Middle East politics and
spent three years in an Israeli jail on
a gun-smuggling conviction.
Msgr. Nolan’s statement was the
first indication that the Vatican
approved his trip to Teheran. The
statement also implies that Msgr.
Nolan’s activities were independent
of those of Archbishop Capucci.
Archbishop Capucci attended the
Feb. 11 ceremonies.
No details have been issued about
Msgr. Nolan’s visit Feb. 14 with the
pope.
The Iranian television film was
broadcast in the United States. Also
visiting the hostages at the same time
was Hojatoleslam Ahmad Khomeini,
son of Iran’s leader Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini.
After the visit, Archbishop
Capucci said the hostages were in
(Continued on page 6)
Bishops Oppose Draft;
Registration Is Favored
WASHINGTON (NC) - As an
antidraft coalition announced plans
for a March 22 protest
demonstration in Washington, the
U.S. bishops expressed their support
for President Carter’s decision to
begin draft registration.
In a statement released Feb. 15 by
the Administrative Board of the U.S.
Catholic Conference, the bishops
restated their opposition to a
peacetime draft and opposed the
registration and drafting of women.
And on the same day, President
Carter appealed to an audience of
more than 250 student leaders for
support of his draft registration
proposals. His appeal apparently did
not persuade many of them to drop
their opposition to registration and
the draft.
“We acknowledge the right of the
state to register citizens for the
purpose of military conscription,
both in peacetime and in times of
national emergency,” the bishops
2 said. “Therefore, we find no
o objection in principle to this action
by the government. However, we
believe it necessary to present
convincing reasons for this at any
particular time.”
Stating that allowing but not
requiring women to serve in the
military was a practice that “has
served us well as a society,” the
bishops said they opposed both the
registration and conscription of
women.
And on the draft itself, the
bishops said they opposed
reinstitution of military conscription
“except in the case of a national
defense emergency.”
The statement repeated the
bishops’ past support for the rights
of conscientious objectors as well as
the right to object to participate in a
particular war. Noting that current
U.S. law does not allow for selective
conscientious objection, they called
for a dialogue among legislators,
lawyers, ethicists and religious
leaders about making effective legal
provision for selective conscientious
objection.
The March 22 protest
demonstration against registration
and the draft was being organized by
a group calling itself the national
Mobilization Against the Draft
(MAD) and including students,
politicians, women’s groups and
religious activists. Endorsers of the
demonstration include the United
States Student Association, which
claims three million members;
Americans for Democratic Action;
Students for a Libertarian Society;
Women’s Strike for Peace and at least
two members of Congress, Reps.
Ronald Dellums (D-Calif.) and
Robert Kastenmeier (D-Wis.).
Meanwhile, the Committee
Against Registration and the Draft
(CARD), composed of more than 40
anti-war, religious and other groups,
accused the administration of a
reversal of position on the
registration issue that could backfire
in Congress, in the courts and on
college campuses.
The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, CARD
chairman, said the administration
had a plan for reaching its
mobilization goals without advance
registration but deleted it from its
report to Congress on registration.
He said CARD is seeking a copy of
the plan under the Freedom of
Information Act.
CARD also accused the
administration of underestimating
the degree of resistance to
registration among young people and
of failing to prepare adequately to
cope with it.
In his meeting with student
leaders, Carter said, “I see no
prospect for a draft under present
circumstances.” He said registration
“will make the draft more avoidable”
because it would signal to the Soviet
Union that the United States is
willing to be prepared to meet
(Continued on page 8)
Lenten Regulations - 1980
1) Ash Wednesday (February 20) and Good Friday (April 4) are
days of abstinence from meat and also of fast.
2) The other Fridays of the Season of Lent are days of abstinence
from meat.
3) All Catholics over fourteen (14) years are bound to abstain from
meat on Ash Wednesday and on Fridays of Lent. Children under
fourteen are not bound by the Law of Abstinence. Catholics who have
reached their sixtieth birthday, are not bound by the Law of Fast.
4) The Fridays of the year outside Lent remains days of penance,
but each individual may substitute for the traditional abstinence from
meat some other practice of voluntary self-denial or personal penance.
This may be physical mortification, temperance, acts of religion,
charity or Christian witness.
Charities Drive ... Service Through Your Gift
... March 2
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