Newspaper Page Text
The
Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta
Vol. 27 No. 39
Thursday, November 9, 1989
$15.00 Per Year
LIVING LESSON — Father Frank Ruff gives
children a memorable lesson on Adam, Eve and
the serpent in this 25-year-old photograph from
Cleveland, Ga. The Glenmary Missioners
recently celebrated their 50th anniversary.
(Photo Courtesy of Glenmary)
Glenmary Footprints Mark N. Ga.
BY RITA McINERNEY
This is the first of two articles recalling Glenmary Home
Missioners service in the north Georgia mountain areas of
the archdiocese of Atlanta. This is the 50th anniversary
year of the Glenmary society.
When Father William Howard Bishop founded the Glen
mary Home Missioners 50 years ago to minister in the rural
South and Appalachia, one of his goals was to improve the
lives of people in these regions, Catholic or not.
In the 29 years Glenmary has been in north Georgia,
Father Bishop’s priests and brothers have followed his
dream while bringing the church to Catholics in small
towns and down the back roads of the scenic region. They
have reached the hidden-away and visible poor through
parish, ecumenical and community outreach.
The work of Glenmarians in the rural South has attracted
others to work with them.
One priest, Father Alex Keenan, appreciates their effort
with the clarity of one coming from another latitude of the
church. On five-year release from the Boston archdiocese
to Glenmary, he sees their work as “incredibly important
to the larger community.”
In the early 1960s, Catholics were scarce in north Georgia
counties. This was why Glenmary came.
A working agreement was signed Feb. 11, 1960, between
Bishop Francis E. Hyland of Atlanta, and Father Clement
F. Borchers, superior general of the Glenmarians, to cover
Lumpkin, Towns, White and Union counties in north
Georgia.
According to papers in the Glenmary archives in Cincin
nati, Ohio, there was correspondence in 1956 in which Glen
mary offered to come to the diocese. This offer was politely
refused. Then, in 1959, Bishop Hyland wrote to Father Bor
chers. The result is a shining chapter in archdiocesan
history.
According to Glenmary archives, Glenmarians
celebrated Mass for the first time in Dahlonega in late 1960,
Cleveland in July, 1961; Clayton in 1963, Clarkesville in
1964, and Blairsville in 1966. In each town, the congregation
consisted at the time of a handful of people.
Three decades later, it is not unusual to see Glenmary-
inspired bumper stickers proclaiming “Proud To Be
Catholic” in areas where people once seemed to relish tell
ing strangers that they “had never met a Catholic before.”
The first Glenmary priests in north Georgia brought to
the few Catholics there a chance to grow in the faith they
had sustained during years of traveling 40 or 50 miles each
(Continued on page 6)
Pilarczyk Voted
NCCB President
BY JERRY FILTEAU
BALTIMORE (CNS) — The U.S. bishops Nov. 7 elected
Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk of Cincinnati as president
of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and U.S.
Catholic Conference for the next three years.
The Cincinnati archbishop has been NCCB-USCC vice
president for the past three years. At the end of the Nov. 6-9
meeting, he succeeds Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis,
president since 1986.
One of 10 archbishops nominated for the top elective of
fice in the U.S. hierarchy, Archbishop Pilarczyk easily won
on the first ballot, receiving 186 of the 277 votes cast.
The remaining 91 votes were scattered among the other
nine candidates. Archbishop William H. Keeler of
Baltimore came in second with 27 votes, 15 more than third-
place Archbishop Roger M. Mahony of Los Angeles, who
had 12. Archbishop Eugene A. Marino, SSJ, of Atlanta, had
seven votes.
Archbishop William H. Keeler of Baltimore was elected
vice president on the second ballot with 189 votes. Arch
bishop Mahony received 47 votes. Archbishop Thomas C.
Kelly, of Louisville, Ky.. 19 votes, and Archbishop Marino,
nine votes.
Archbishop Pilarczyk is expected to chart a middle-of-
the-road course during his term as president.
The prelate, 55, has been a bishop since 1974 and arch
bishop of Cincinnati since 1982. A former seminary pro
fessor, seminary rector and Cincinnati archdiocesan vicar
for education, he is noted nationally for speeches and
writings on priesthood, priestly formation, Catholic higher
education, medical ethics and issues of the role of
theologians in the church and the limits of dissent from
church teachings.
He has chaired the NCCB Committee on the Liturgy and
the USCC Committee on Education, and as Conference vice
president has automatically been chairman for the past
three years of NCCB-USCC Committee on Personnel and
Administration.
Atlanta Seminarian
Ordained A Deacon
Ronald Fuchs, Jr., a seminarian for the arch
diocese of Atlanta, received the order of deacon
from Archbishop Edward T. O’Meara of In
dianapolis, on Oct. 28 in the Archabbey Church of Our
Lady of Einsiedeln at St. Meinrad Seminary in In
diana.
He will finish his course of studies at St. Meinrad
and is expected to be ordained sometime next year,
according to Father Don Kenny, director of vocations
for the archdiocese.
Deacon Fuchs served last summer at Sts. Peter
and Paul in Decatur.
Son of Ronald G. and Emma Faye Fuchs of Bloom
ington, Ill., he was born May 10, 1959 in Huntsville,
Ala.
As a transitional deacon, he can preach, baptize,
witness marriages, offer Communion to the sick and
aged, and perform other ministerial roles.