Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 6 - The Georgia Bulletin, August 23, 1990
Rural Illinois Community Has Its Own 'Field Of Dreams'
RURAL DIAMOND - Farmer Bob Durdan first carved this baseball
diamond out of his corn fields near Grand Ridge, Ill., 20 years ago, long
before the film “Field of Dreams” was popular. Neighborhood children
maintain the field and during summer months there are games nearly
every evening. (CNS photo by Rick Wade, The Catholic Post)
BY RICK WADE
GRAND RIDGE, Ill. (CNS) - Bor
dered by a two-lane country road nick
named "Ron Santo Drive" and acres of
com as far as the eye can see is a rural
Illinois community’s own "field of
dreams."
Bob Durdan likes to call it "the field
that kids built."
“They keep it up and chalk the base
lines,” said Durdan, a central Illinois com
and soybean farmer who’s also a parishio
ner at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in
Grand Ridge. "June’s a big month. There
are games almost every night."
Durdan is talking about the baseball
diamond that some 20 years ago - long
before the film "Field of Dreams" was
popular — he carved out of the fields
across the road from his home at the
request of neighborhood children who
didn’t have a place to practice.
A sort of rural sports mecca for T-ball,
youth baseball and adult softball enthusi
asts, the neatly trimmed and weeded field
rivals the turf of many minor league ball
parks.
The fenced-in baseball diamond boasts
a right field scoreboard, bleachers and
backstop, a barbecue grill in a picnic area,
and a concession stand. The center field
flag pole proudly flies the U.S. flag. And
"Ron Santo Drive" memorializes a former
star third baseman for the Chicago Cubs.
Building a baseball diamond for chil
dren may seem a bit unusual in an era
when the television set is used by many
as a babysitter, but not in Grand Ridge,
where Durdan says family comes first.
"There are good parents in this area.
They really take an interest in what their
kids are doing," said Durdan. "You’ve got
to make time for your family. All our
neighbors are like that."
Free time is hard to come by for Durd
an, a farmer who runs a weekend catering
business and an electrical company with
the oldest of his five children.
"That’s what makes it tough farming,"
Durdan said. "You can neglect your fami
ly if you’re not careful. I can always
harvest, but if I miss a football or volley
ball game - it’s history.
"That’s why I don’t work on Sunday.
That way we can make plans. I might
combine beans if I’m really pushed but I
don’t like to. It could become a habit."
Durdan and his wife, Cheryl, consider
themselves partners on the family farm.
While Bob works the fields, Cheryl is
bookkeeper, payroll clerk, dispatcher and
homemaker.
"We have a lot of faith in God. That’s
the way we were both raised," said Durd
an, who lives less than a mile from the
church his grandfather helped build.
"Faith and farming. It’s just got to be
there.”
FOIL CHAMP
St. Plus X sophomore John
Griffin won the gold medal
in the under-17 fencing
event at the Inaugural
Games 1990 at Georgia
Tech in June. He also won
the silver medal in the
under-20 class. Gold medal
in this event was won by
Craig Harkins, 1989 gradu
ate of SL Pius X. John Is
the son of Jack and Mary
Jean Griffin of St. John the
Evangelist in Hapeville.
Marino—
(Continued from page 1)
desist from advancing rumors’ ’ following a disputed report
alleging that the archbishop had attempted suicide earlier
in August.
“I deny that report categorically and, based on informa
tion from people in direct contact with Archbishop
Marino, I can give firm assurance that the report has no
foundation in fact,” Bishop Lyke said Aug. 16.
Monsignor Robert N. Lynch, general secretary of the
National Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington,
D.C. labeled “categorically false” the Aug. 15 news
report by WAGA-TV, Channel 5.
People in daily contact with Archbishop Marino while
he was serving as archbishop of Atlanta also gave radical
ly different views to those aired in an Aug. 16 press
conference by Vicki Long and a new attorney, Gloria
Allred.
The attorney alleged the archbishop and Ms. Long
“spent almost every night together when he was in
town,” frequently were together at public events, “went
on numerous trips together” and were “married” in a
wedding performed by the archbishop.
Father Don Kenny, who shared the archbishop’s
residence with him for a year from June 1989 to May
1990, said Aug. 17, “I never saw her (Vicki Long) at the
house.”
Father Kenny said the archbishop would leave the house
each morning at 7:10 and that he would leave a few
minutes later.
“I would always get home from work at 4:30 or 5 p.m.
Knights Get Early Look At Pro-Life Campaign
SAN ANTONIO (CNS) - Msgr. Robert N. Lynch,
general secretary of the National Conference of Catholic
Bishops-U.S. Catholic Conference, called abortion "the
equivalent of a moral civil war."
"Our republic is as divided" as in Civil War times,
Msgr. Lynch said Aug. 9 at the Knights of Columbus
national convention in San Antonio, “and the consequen
ces are every bit as important to the soul of our nation and
its future.”
In giving Knights what he called a peek at an upcoming
pro-life public relations campaign sponsored by the
bishops and funded by the Knights, Msgr. Lynch said, "In
the battle for both the hearts and minds of the public, we
must have the finest state-of-the-art communications
professionalism at our disposal."
Hill & Knowlton, a public relations firm, and the
Wirthlin Group, a polling organization, have been hired to
coordinate the campaign. It will cost in the neighborhood
and we would eat together if (the archbishop) wasn’t
going out We’d always try to eat together once or twice
a week.”
They also routinely spent 15 minutes together in the
kitchen about 11:15 at night, Father Kenny said, having a
late snack and talking.
The housekeeper at the residence said she had seen Ms.
Long at the house during the daytime “five or six times”
in two years.
“I’ve seen her in the parlor like anybody else” visiting
the residence, she said. “The child was always with her.
It was always very proper.”
“She had an occasional lunch that lasted about an hour
or so. Nothing ever went on that was the least out of
order. Nothing at all.”
Gerard O’Connor, the archbishop’s master of ceremo
nies and assistant, said that m his 12 months working for
the archbishop he never saw Ms. Long at the archbishop’s
residence or at the airport when the archbishop was
departing or arriving.
“We worked from eight to 16 hours a day,” O’Conndr
said. “Since Christmas (1989) our average was 60 to 80
hours a week. The week before he got ill, we worked 103
hours.”
According to Catholic News Service, Ms. Allred of Los
Angeles is the attorney representing Norma McCorvey, the
Jane Roe of the landmark 1973 abortion case Roe vs.
Wade in the U.S. Supreme Court, and in 1984 represented
a Los Angeles woman in a multimillion dollar lawsuit
against the Los Angeles archdiocese and seven priests who
the woman claimed seduced her.
(Gretchen Keiser contributed to this report)
of $3 million with an "open-ended" deadline, USCC
spokesman Father Kenneth Doyle told Catholic News
Service Aug. 10.
The Knights gave the bishops $3 million for the
campaign, and have pledged another $1 million in in-kind
services.
The campaign, Msgr. Lynch said, will have four aims:
- "Reawaken the hearts and minds of the public --
especially Catholics - on the issue of abortion."
- "Strengthen the Catholic Church as a major opinion
leader on the issue and in the movement."
- "Position pro-life as a viable public policy position."
- "Set the stage for a pro-life revitalization."
In the wake of the Supreme Court Webster decision in
1989 giving states the right to restrict abortions, "the
pro-abortion movement has captured the offensive in both
national debate and in the political arena," Msgr. Lynch
said.
In announcing the public relations effort, "ironically we
have been criticized for utilizing the same modem com
munications that has so skillfully aided the opposition," he
said.
"The opposition has had a public tantrum," he added,
because "they know state-of-the-art communications
analysis and strategy will help us become far more
effective and convincing."
The Catholic Church is not "entering uncharted waters"
with the pro-life campaign, as some detractors maintain,
Msgr. Lynch said.
As precedents he cited USCC lobbying which in 1973
helped prevent a CBS-TV rerun of the "Maude" episodes
in which the title character chose to have an abortion;
testimony by four U.S. cardinals to a U.S. Senate subcom
mittee in 1974 on a proposed human life amendment; and
$4 million spent in 1973 nationally and in the states on
abortion-related "government relations and public affairs."
Msgr. Lynch said that through analysis of how the
church is organized and its present pro-life efforts, "our
friends at (Hill & Knowlton) and Wirthlin" have been
"candid" in their assessment of the church effort.
"We have a strong grass-roots force, though not neces
sarily well-armed with consistent themes and messages or
with the tools to carry forth a strategic communications
plan," Msgr. Lynch said.
"Difference of opinion exists on strategy and tactics," he
added, but "there is clearly a lot of common ground and
a great deal of willingness to accept support and direc
tion."
Wirthlin "attitudinal research" of Americans on abortion
cited by Msgr. Lynch indicates a "contradiction” - most
Americans feel abortion should be more restricted than at
present yet call themselves pro-choice.
"After 20 years of hard debate on this issue," Msgr.
Lynch said, the abortion debate "cannot be turned around
overnight.... We must steel ourselves for the duration."