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About The Georgia bulletin (Atlanta) 1963-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 19, 1989)
The Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta Vol. 27 No. 3 Thursday, January 19, 1989 $15.00 Per Year Parish Banners Are Carried Into Shrine Before Mass For Dr. King. Archbishop Marino: Dr. King Undeterred By Evil BY RITA McINERNEY Martin Luther King, Jr. did not permit evil to deter him in his journey, but rather taught the power of love, Archbishop Eugene A. Marino, S.S. J., told an overflow congregation at the Shrine of the Im maculate Conception on Sunday, Jan. 15. The afternoon liturgy at the historic downtown church was the sixth annual Mass in honor of the slain civil rights leader. It was the second at which the archbishop was the celebrant. In January, 1988, he came to celebrate the Mass as the guest of the archdiocesan Commission for Black Catholic Concerns. This year he came as “a true son of the city” and the shepherd of Catholics in Ncrth Georgia. The stirring music for the celebration was by the combined choir of the commis sion’s member parishes. Dr. King proved to blacks and whites, ■the archbishop said in his homily, that “it is the determination to love which lifts us above ourselves and makes us the exalted children of God, the Rock, the Church.” “The doctrine of original sin reminds us that we are born into a world which often proves a natural habitat for greed, jealousy and destruction in all their ugly guises,” the archbishop said. Part of Dr. King’s greatness, he con tinued, was that he did not permit such evidence of evil to deter him in his journey of hopes and dreams. “He believed and taught the power of love, the power which defies all evil, even (Continued on page 11) Koop Says Data Unclear On Post-Abortion Trauma BY JULIE ASHER WASHINGTON (NC) - U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop said Jan. 9 he would not issue a long-awaited study on mental and physical health effects of abor tion on women because the evidence on any such effects was inconclusive. In a four-page letter to President s Reagan released by the White House, Koop q said that despite “diligent review on the . m part of many in the Public Health Service z and the private sector the scientific studies ” do not provide conclusive data about the health effects of abortion on women.” Koop, who is an opponent of abortion, also said more research would be needed to develop any further conclusions on the impact of abortion. Reagan ordered Koop in July 1987 to prepare a comprehensive medical report on abortion’s effects on women. Koop in his letter to Reagan noted that in a year of gathering information he talked with 27 scientific, medical, psychological and public health experts who had varied opinions on abortion. He also said that the abortion issue was “so emotionally charged that it is possible that many who might read this letter would not understand it because I have not arrived at conclusions they can accept.” But he said the available evidence “can not support either the preconceived beliefs of those pro-life or pro-choice.” Koop, whose term will expire in November, has come under attack from pro-life supporters who said he has drop ped his longstanding repudiation of abor tion. He has supported the use of condoms to fight AIDS and also suggested that a pregnant woman suffering from AIDS be told abortion would be an option. In a March 1987 interview with NC News he reaffirmed his strong opposition to abortion, but he added that he was surgeon general for all Americans, whatever their ideology or religious and moral beliefs. In reaction Jan. 10 to Koop’s decision on the report, Nellie J. Gray, president of the annual March for Life, which marks the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, said the surgeon general had “totally lost touch with women who have been exploited by abortion.” “I don’t know why he wasn’t able to find the truly anguished souls we hear from,” (Continued on page 6) Jan. 22 To Be Day Of Prayer For Nation WASHINGTON (NC) - Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, has backed George Bush’s re quest that Jan. 22 be observed as a Na tional Day of Prayer and Thanksgiving. “It is a good thing for a country when its leaders acknowledge and express their absolute dependence on God,” said the NCCB leader, in a Jan. 13 state ment. He noted that Bush “requested the cooperation of the churches of this country in making the first Sunday of his presidency a National Day of Prayer.” After being inaugurated Jan. 20, Bush was scheduled to attend a Jan. 22 prayer service in Washington at the Episcopal Church’s National Cathedral “to participate in an ecumenical prayer service thanking God for his blessings on our country and imploring his wisdom and guidance,” Archbishop May pointed out. Cardinal James A. Hickey of Washington was slated to deliver one of the biblical readings at the ecumenical prayer service. Bush also was invited to attend a Mass — the official Catholic com memoration of the inauguration — the evening of Jan. 21 at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington. The Mass, with Cardinal Hickey as celebrant and homilist, was intended to invoke God’s blessings on the nation and its newly elected govern ment. Members of the Bush Cabinet, Congress and the judiciary also were invited to attend. “A new president faces many challenges and also deserves the sup port of his fellow citizens, not least in their fervent prayers that he be in spired always to act justly and wisely and truly in the spirit of righteousness,” Archbishop May said in his statement. In supporting Bush’s request “that all of us strive to make the Sunday follow ing the inauguration a day of prayer for this country,” he said that “I am confi dent Catholic parishes throughout the land will enthusiastically participate in this endeavor.”
