Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 3—The Georgia Bulletin, January 22,1981
Itinerant Preaching: Reviving A Tradition
BY THEA JARVIS
When Brother Dominic Guzman commissioned the
first members of his preaching order in the early 13th
century, he bade them travel in pairs.
Two by two they were to set out on their
journeys, walking the path of poverty, dependent
upon the good will of others for food and lodging.
Over 700 years later, Father Stanford Van Hoeck,
O.P. and Sister Joan Nolan, O.P. are continuing the
tradition of their founder. Traveling the country in
their “Valiant Lady,” a ’74 Plymouth with 149,000
miles behind it, Father Stan and Sister Joan
“We are never disappointed in the turnout.
Our best record was 99% attendance in a little
Tennessee hill town where 24 out of 25
parishioners came faithfully. ”
encounter the faithful anywhere from the mountains
of West Virginia to the lakes of Michigan, meeting in
parish homes and sharing the scriptures.
“Sometimes we are invited to stay with lay people
in a parish and find ourselves cooking, socializing, and
even babysitting,” laughs Sister Joan, who holds two
theology degrees as well as certification in pastoral
counseling. “That keeps us in touch with the practical
side of family living!”
The scripture sharing is held in local homes twice a
day, with a liturgy before the morning session.
“We are never disappointed in the turnout,” says
Father Stan, a two-year veteran on the team whose
theology and scripture studies as well as past
experience as pastor enables him to relate easily to
the people he serves.
“Our best record was 99% attendance in a little
Tennessee hill town where 24 out of 25 parishioners
came faithfully,” he remembers with a smile.
The energetic preaching team was in Atlanta
recently conducting a renewal at Holy Cross Church
in Chamblee. They stayed for two weeks, presenting a
model for home-centered scripture sharing which can
be continued after they move on.
“We come for a short time and can’t really say
who the Spirit has moved and to what extent. But we
were gratified to learn recently that one parish we
visited in Fairfax, Virginia has continued the scripture
sharing for the past several years,” says Sister Joan.
The tradition of traveling team preaching was
renewed in 1970 when two Kingstree, South Carolina
retreat masters were faced with an empty retreat
house.
“They came up with the idea of going where the
people are,” recalls Sister Joan, “and traveled to some
small parishes in South Carolina to share the word.”
From the Carolinas, the Dominican priests moved
on to Virginia, living in a • small house close by
Washington’s birthplace. They were soon joined by a
Dominican sister from Adrian, Michigan.
Word spread about their work, and Bishop Hodges
of West Virginia invited a team, to come in 1976 as
official diocesan evangelizers, working there four
months out of the year and continuing to travel
throughout the country.
Presently, there are three preaching centers in the
country where men and women are sharing this
ministry. A total of 12 Dominicans are based in
Wheeling, West Virginia, Raleigh, North Carolina, and
Nashville, Tennessee. In addition, Texas boasts a team
of four itinerant preachers who minister to the
Spanish-speaking community.
Both Sister Joan and Father Stan make their home
at the Nashville center.
“At the centers, we try to keep the contemplative
life alive. Men and women come together for
common prayer, meals, and study,” says Sister Joan.
“We find if we are praying together, it is easier to
minister together.”
Father Stan adds that the Dominican tradition of
collaboration between men and women has made it
easier for such communal life to thrive.
“Since Dominic emphasized pair-preaching, the
step to men and women sharing this work was
relatively natural. It has been working well for seven
years.”
He realizes, however, that “not all parishes are
ready to accept this approach to sharing God’s
word.”
After their two-week stay in a parish, Father Stan
and Sister Joan climb aboard the “Valiant Lady” and
head for Nashville. There, they take a week’s respite
and prepare for the next journey.
“We usually have a ‘desert day’ before we leave.
\Ye fast and pray and come together in the evening
for a little soup. Then we share the readings for the
following Sunday,” says Sister Joan.
“We usually have a ‘desert day’ before we
leave. We fast and Dray and come together in
the evening for a little soup. Then we share
the readings for the following Sunday. ”
It is clear that traveling agrees with the two roving
Dominicans. Sister Joan claims, “I taught for 17 years
and I’ve never felt so alive as I do now.”
Father Stan nods in agreement. Life has never
been better or more rewarding.
“To tell the truth,” says the friendly, bearded
preacher, “the only life left to worry about is the one
keeping our old Plymouth together!”
Father Stanford Van Hoeck, O.P. and Sister Joan Nolan.
O.P. can be contacted at the Dominican Preaching Center,
Box 342, Route 1, Pegram, Tennessee 37143.
Marty and Hugh Downey
Bringing The Homeless In From The Cold
NC News Service
The hardest part of
running an emergency-
shelter for the homeless is
not taking in cold, dirty
alcoholics or mentally
disturbed people, say
those involved in such
programs. It’s having to
turn them away.
“Saying ‘no’ is the
hardest thing,” said Father
Robert Reynolds, who
founded shelters in Peoria
and Rock Island, Ill. “It’s
kind of like playing God,
saying ‘I know you’re not
looking for a job’ or
‘you’re causing trouble.’”
Father Reynolds and
other shelter directors said
they sometimes have to
say no to people because
there just isn’t room.
Catholic Worker
Houses, social agencies,
parishes and religious
orders in Chicago; Omaha,
Neb.; New York;
Washington, and
Providence, R.I. are among
those helping provide
temporary lodging for
“street people’’ who
would otherwise spend
winter nights on steam
grates or in abandoned
cars, risking their lives in
the winter cold.
Some homeless people
refuse to stay in
government-run shelters,
saying that they are
dangerous arid impersonal.
Cities report people
freezing to death on the
streets as temperatures
drop to record lows,
particularly in the
Northeastern United
States.
According to shelter
volunteers, a shortage of
low-income housing and
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changes in state mental
institution laws have
forced people into the
streets. And a colder than
average winter has forced
many of them into
emergency shelters.
Father Reynolds said
that the shelters he
founded can hold about
Lamy, who helps staff a
small shelter in uptown
Chicago.
She works for the
Eighth Day Center for
Justice in Chicago, a
coalition of religious
orders which helps
coordinate social
programs.
“Grass Roots” Justice
CHICAGO (NC) - The Claretian Fathers and Brothers
have published SALT, a new social justice magazine “for
grass-roots Christians seeking social justice.” The new
publication, whose first issue is dated January 1981, will
appear 10 times yearly.
According to Claretian Publications, the new magazine
is aimed at an audience not usually involved in social
justice issues. In addition, it hopes to foster “incremental
change - not make raging radicals of its readers
overnight.”
“SALT believes the moral distance between doing
something and doing nothing is momentous indeed,” said
Tom McGrath, director of marketing for Claretian
Publications, quoting a remark of Jesuit Father Daniel
Berrigan.
“SALT is for everyday Christians who wonder how to
work for justice in their home, neighborhood, city and
country,” the magazine’s first editorial said.
The first issue contains articles and sections on church
teaching and social justice, on a storefront lawyer
representing poor Latins, on Father Berrigan’s work in a
hospital for terminally ill people, on nuclear energy use
and on other social justice concerns.
20 men each but at times
he has put people on the
floor in the winter. If
there is an overflow, some
can be housed in private
homes.
Most emergency
shelters are open only at
night and many limit a
person’s stay. Some serve
meals, others are located
near soup kitchens. During
the day people look for
jobs or public assistance or
roam the streets.
“There’s a whole set of
people who are going to be
on the street for a long
time, if not forever, unless
there are halfway houses
for them,” said Elaine
Many of the women
have mental problems,
while the men are often
alcoholics, according to
Ms. Lamy. Unemploy
ment, sexism and the
unavailability of decent
housing all contribute to a
woman’s plight, she said.
The Dwelling Place, in
the Times Square area of
New York, provides not
only overnight shelter for
women, but helps them
find more permanent
homes at a nearby hotel.
“We take in 12 women
we can help and then try
to get them rooms at the
Times Square Motor
Hotel,” said Franciscan
Sister Naureen Kelly, the
Archdiocese Of Atlanta
OFFICE OF CATHOLIC SCHOOLS
PUBLIC STATEMENT OF ASSURANCE
Schools in The Archdiocese of Atlanta admit
students of any race, sex, color, national and ethnic
origin to all rights, privileges, programs, and
activities generally accorded or made available to
students at the schools.
They do not discriminate on the basis of race,
sex, color, national and ethnic origin in
administration of educational policies, admissions
policies, loan programs, and athletic and other
school-administered programs.
Schools in this system are as follows:
METRO ATLANTA: Christ the King School,
Immaculate Heart of Mary School, Our Lady of the
Assumption School, Our Lady of Lourdes School,
St. Anthony’s School, St. Jude the Apostle School,
St. Paul of the Cross School, St. Thomas More
School, St. Joseph School, Marietta, St. Pius X High
School, Village of St. Joseph, Ss. Peter and Paul and
St. John the Evangelist. St. Patrick’s Kindergarten,
Norcross.
ATHENS: St. Joseph School.
ROME: St. Mary’s School.
Sister Roberta Schmidt
Superintendent of Schools
shelter’s administrator.
She said there are usually
about 80-90 women at the
hotel.
“It’s been so cold we’ve
set up chairs, whatever we
have around,” to give
women a place to sleep
out of the cold, Sister
Kelly said.
January temperatures
have dropped to near-zero
in New York and East
Coast temperatures are
about 10 degrees colder
than average this winter,
according to the National
Weather Service.
At The Dwelling Place,
which was opened by the
Franciscan Sisters from
Allegheny, N.Y. in 1977,
women can sleep, take
showers and get clean
clothing. At the hotel the
nuns have started a social
hour and thrift shop and
Mass is celebrated.
“One of the greatest
problems, is that the
women are afraid to go
where there are men -
they would rather stay on
the street sometimes,” said
Sister Kelly.
Another problem is
that more shelters are
available to men. “If you
look at the history of the
homeless, the men are
more apparent. You hear
of places like the Bowery.
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“If anyone would go to
the Port Authority or
Penn Station any day, any
time, they would see
women sleeping on floors,
all over the place. A lot of
people may not want to
see that - but it’s all
over,” Sister Kelly said.
Mount Carmel House,
another shelter for
women, opened in
Washington in November,
the 40-bed facility has
been overcrowded this
winter, according to
Carmelite Sister Rosa
Alverez.
Sister Alverez said she
was a shelter volunteer for
the past several winters. “I
saw the problems, the
great„. needs of the
homeless,” so she and two
other nuns opened the
shelter which is owned by
the Washington
Archdiocese.
Smallest Relief Agency
BY RICHARD TUCKER
DENVER (NC) - Hugh and Marty Downey of Golden,
Colo., have been running what they call “the world’s
smallest international relief agency” in Africa for nearly
20 years.
The agency, called Lalmba (pronounced la-loom-ba),
which means “a place of hope” in Amharic, the language
of Ethiopia, began in 1962 when Downey was sent to
Ethiopia by the U.S. Army and met a young Ethiopian,
Sium Andegherghis. The two men built a two-room school
in the village of Scinnara.
A third partner joined the agency in 1965 after
Downey’s discharge from the Army and marriage to a
childhood sweetheart, Marty Meagher.
On an unconventional honeymoon in Ethiopia, the
Downeys and Andegherghis began planning their
development program, which included a hospital, a
community library, an artificial limb show, an orphanage
for 100 homeless children, an obstetrics clinic and
self-help projects like digging wells and improving farms.
Downey, 39, and his wife, 36, have been spending part
of their time in the Sudan and part in rural Jefferson
County about 10 miles from Denver. They do so to earn
money and to provide good schooling for their
11-year-old daughter, Keren, who is named after the town
in Ethiopia, and their 8-year-old son, Mikaii, who is
named after the town’s patron, St. Michael. “Good
schools are non-existent there,” Downey said.
Neither Downey nor his wife, Who lost her first child
and was shot in both legs during the Ethiopian war,
planned to do what they are doing, he said. “It’s as if the
Lord said, ‘This is what you are going to do,”’ he said.
They and the other volunteers receive satisfaction from
“being doers of the word, not just hearers,” he said. For
many refugees, he added, “the only Christ they see are the
doctors and nurses who are there because they love their
brothers.”
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