The Catholic times. [volume], May 13, 1955, Image 4

About The Catholic times. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1951-current

Image provided by: Ohio History Connection, Columbus, OH

                
4—THE CATHOLIC TIMES
Friday. May 13, 1955
THE
CATHOLIC TIMES
Published Every Week by
Th* Catholic Times, Inc.
Columbus. Ohio
NOTIC•p Send All Changes of Address to
p. 0 13ox 636 Columbus. Ohio
Executive and Editorial Offices:
”46 E Tom n Street, Columbus 15. Ohio
Addrc ss all communications foi publication
O Box 6"6 Columhus 16. Ohio
Teleulilones: CA 4-5195 CA 4-5196
The 1 •yelc brings
A
us n
Sunday hclorr th Asce.ision, and
Christ elected bjr the Church for the
the M:' s arc im]lortant ones indet*d,
nw tri the 1 351
the words
Bunday’s Epistle apeak* of “the perfect law nf
Mhertv,” which is not license to do as one pleases,
fnr any such license could lead only tn social chaos,
political anarchy and individual ruin. True liberty
i* freedom from the bondage nf sin, derived from
the acceptance and practice of the teachings of the
Savior Its marks are faith and hurtnility and joy, and
It is protected and sustained by sincere, trustful
prayer.
No Place for Worry Warts
The saddest man today is the lad u'ho has ulcers
and nn success to show for his worry. ApparentIv
thia includes most of us. We arc living in a world
that demands a hard if not callous indifference to
trifles. And yet we are immersed in them. If we are
not anxious about health or bills or exams or labor
demands or the tightening newsprint market, we
ni
Gospel of
standing 35
sage before He leaves the world tr
Father And they are words of com
ncc which He clearly wished His fol
rs to keep before them at all times.
If vou ask the Father anything in My
loved Me, and have believed that I came forth trom
God.” Asking is thus made the test of the Christian s
faith: since you believe in Me. the Savior says, you
dependence upon Him thus will you
s in His friendship and make yotir
•ficiaries of His Almighty strength
leave to His all-wise judgment the
doctrine of prayer—the asking of God, in Christ
me for whatever wp need—that the Church sc
aside the three days before the Feast of the Asc
ngation Days, with special Mass and a
during which the intercession nf the
nvoked to lay our petitions before God.
In olden time* these processions moved through It1
fields, with pravers to God tn make them fruitful,
sn that men might havp what they needed for the
physical as well as the spiritual sustenance of life:
a reminder that the farmer must pray as well a*
wnrk. and a reminder, too, that the city-dweller must
|mn in prayer that the labor of the farmer may
bring forth, with God’s help, a bountiful harvest.
And prayer, most assuredly, should go with every
man, woman and child in their activities their
wnrk. study, recreation, worship that all they do
may be worthy nf God’s blessing Whatever econnm
If, social and political evils prevail among us can
he ascribed tn the sad fact that prayer, earnest and
confiding, is not a preliminary tn the plans and
decision* men ma ke they dn not ask God tn direct
them, but obey their own selfish instincts they dn
nM rely nn His infallible guidance, hut follow their
own judgment, repeatedly proven weak and incom
pet ent.
an ulcerous tension by conjuring
icn on the mo
id much time
Some I*pp(h»iiition
If these
to the
each, or
foliar hill than for a poor
li. We are all preoccupied
ind warts Passing the cn
after death depends pretty
idence we had in ourselves
be dost roved
cplied the Pre
If I were to try to read
made on me, thi
and face a big building problem.
“Thus, non-Cathohcs could contribute one-half or
more of the amount »ought in the current drive,
and profit. Of course, they are not expected to do
so, hut it is to their interest and quite in order
for them to help some.
“Catholics pay taxes for public schools, whether
their children attend them or not. In addition, they
pay the cost of sending their children to Catholic
schools.”
As has hern said before in this column, our non
Catholic neighbors are, for the most part, quite fair
minded. If some such encouragement such as thia
in the Houston paper were to be given them instead
of haters of the Catholic Church stirring them up
through unfounded fears, there would be a quick
justice in the matter, so that tax money paid by
Catholics could he used to benefit their children
as it is used to benefit the children of other tax
payers.
Just Among Ourselves
Patting Comment Contidered er Incontiderate
Next Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday,—th*
three days preceding the Feast of the Ascension of
Our Ijord into heaven,—are called "rogation” or
“asking’’ days. They are days of especially urgent
prayers of petition that God will spare us the rigors
of His justice, and will bless us in His mercy, be
stowing upon us abundance of spiritual and material
benefits. Among the good things we ask for are
the fruits of the earth by which our bodily life
is sustained.
The observance of Rogation Days began in the
fifth century in a diocese of what is now France.
Terrible calamities had afflicted the place, and to
prevent their recurrence a solemn service of petition
and penance, including processians and recitations
of litanies, was instituted, and set for the three days
preceding the Ascension. Within a few years, the
local practice had spread through all France in
three and one-half centuries, the Rogation Days were
observed throughout the Church.
It is suitable indeed that tho faithful should,
sn to speak, gather around Our I-ord during the last
hours of His sojourn on earth, before His glorious
Ascension into heaven, and heg Him for necessary
gifts and blessings. True, Our Lord is always with
us according to His word, He has not left us or
phans He dwells among us, God and Man, in the
Holy Eucharist. But His visible bodily presence
among men was to end when he rose from the
Mount of Olives, forty days after His Resurrection
from the dead, and the Apostles saw the bright
cloud which received Him out of their sight.
It was at noon, in the light of mid-day, that Our
lxrd ascended into heaven. Two angels appeared
to th* watching Apostles to tell them that Christ
would come again nn the last day, as gloriously and
visibly as He had then departed from them Th*
Apostles returned to the city of Jerusalem to wait,
in obedience to the Lords command, the coming nf
the Holy Ghost nn Pentecost Day, ten days later.
Our Izird was the first to enter the gates of
heaven which in had closed against the human
race, and which His work of Redemption had re
opened. 'I’he souls of the just that waited in Limbo
for this hour followed their Redeemer into the eter
nal happiness and glory of the Beatific Vision.
We remember always that the saints who lived
before Christ and during His days on earth were
all enabled to save their souls by lhe grace and mer
its He won for them With Our Ixird when he ascend
nd intn hehvrn were the souls of our first parents
nf Abraham, Isaac, Jacob of the holy Job of the pen
itential David of all the great and small of the hu
man family who had help to the hope of the Re
deemer, and who had kept pure, or made pure by
penance, the souls touched in anticipation by the
grace and merits of Christ and Him crucified.
For Christ is the center of all history His com
ing and His work, culminating in Death and Resur
rection, make Him the Sun of Justice whose rays
penetrate in all directions, hack as well as forward,
into the past as well as intn the present and the
future. 'I’he one true religion is the religion of
Christ, this religion is now exercised in the one
Church which He established Yet his true religion
was exercised in hope and in expectation among all
those who lived before the Church was actually in
stituted, and w'ho believed in the Redeemer to come.
No grace comes from God but through Christ,
God made Man Even the grace which enabled the
faithful angels to obey God was grace won hy the
Redeemer and applied, as we should say, in antici
pation. 'I’he fallen angels rejected the same grace
of hrist. 1 hr Blessed Mother of God was conceived
immaculate and filled with grace through the fore
seen merits of Her Divine Son. Our laird Jesus
Christ. I he fidelity nf the patriarchs, the fruitful
repentance of sinners like David, the enduring vir
tue of steadfast souls like Tobias and Job, were all
made possible and actual hy the grace and merits
of the Saviour who was yet to come, but whose
infinitely meritorious work is always present to the
eternal God.
Mistaken people have found difficulty in be
lieving that the holy persons of Old Testament times
could enter heaven, since they had not been bap
tized. This notion involves two errors first, it fails
to notice that Baptism was made necessary hy Our
Lord who instituted it as a sacrament, and from
that moment on it is necessary to salvation. In I he
second place, the mistaken notion fails to realize
that there is such a thing as implicit baptism
of desire, and, allowing that baptism is always neces
sary, we justly maintain that the Old Testament
saints were baptized hy such a desire.
For a person who does not know the obligation
of baptism, even a person who has never heard the
name of Christ, may have the strong good will to
serve God as he ought And such a will implies the
person’s wish to do whatever God would have him
do it thus includes, albeit unconsciously, the desire
for baptism. The requirement for the sacrament of
baptism tn he conferred by the use of the water
and the name of the Three Divine Persons of God,
was not imposed upon mankind until Our laird
declared it necessary.
A simple desire for baptism, expressed or iin
plied, is sufficient to product the main effects of
the sacrament—cleansing from all sin in guilt and
penalty, and giving the soul birth into the family
and heirship of God—only when the desire cannot,
in fact, be realized. It is mere folly for a person to
say, "I desire baptism therefore I am baptized
there is no need for me to receive the sacrament
by way of water." A person w ho iL.'ould say that
would have the lie tn his dami to hiive desire. For
desire looks on to fulfillment, it nc'rr rejects ful
fillmcnt Desire is itself of v aluc finly when fill
fillmcnt is not possible, and while fulfillment re
mains possible.
Besides, baptism does not imprint upon the soul
the indelible character of the first and most neces
sary sacrament. A person who has baptism of desire,
and then is enabled to receive baptism of water, is
not twice baptized. The baptism of water fulfills
the desire and impresses the baptismal character
for the first and only time.
Well, we seem to have wandered far afield. Rut
nor wanderings have nn( been unpleasant, nor. one
hopes, without profit.
r#c I
CAV/4R II
OF
IL
4 SHING TON TETTER
WASHINGTON A story
about the Bandung Conference
that seems not. to have been re
ported in any other medium has
made its way back here in cor
respondence.
A letter received here reveals
that th* topflight participants
in the Bandung meeting invoked
the Deity so consistently that it
irked Chou En I^ai, the commun
he letter
quotes a really lop leader of the
conference as saying that all rep
resentatives invoked the Deity,
but that seems to he a slight
exaggeration, because Chou En
Lai seems to have been an ex
ception. The reporter says this
reverence annoyed the boss of
the Red regime in Peking. Chou
En Lai, he saltd, asko1 for tolet
a nee of atheism.
Thie letter reveals, too, lha
nothing was brought up at th
conic•rrncc relating to the rf
leasp of A rocricans held in car
tivity by the Red Chinese govern
ment.
While it is not yet known
what the full American stand
wdll be on the amendment of
the United Nations Charter, for
eoi
ns
f.
in
den/.
It is my painful duty to re
port that the Daily Worker is
carrying forward the three front
psychological w'ar on the Amer
ica n nation
with the same
fury and by the
same devices
with which it
conducted “the
battle against
McC a y
ism Wp arc
w i n esses to
the Red i
umph in that
"battle" in
that effective Congressional in
vestigations into the Soviet fifth
column have come to a halt.
We are now to be pulverized
into agreeing to the end of our
internal security system from
within, and to further set backs
in Europe and Asia. If that Mos
row program goes through, then
our great military establishment
and our tremendous ability in
production will prove largely fu
tile in our defense.
Complete Retreat, The Program
On April 10. the Daily Work
er, in huge headlines on its
front page, runs the slogan
which it has been emphasizing
for some weeks: NO QUEMOY'
WAR! The comrades are given
instructions to spread the idea
that unless the United States
abandons Quemoy and Matsu,
war will be the outcome with
"cities reduced to ashes."
We have been advised, by the
admissions of Malenkov and
Kruchshev, that Soviet power is
so weak internally it dare not
have a full-dress war against
the United States. We have been
forewarned, in the Daily Worker
of April 3 and in current issues
of the New Times, direct from
Moscow, that American surren
der of Quemoy and Matsu will
be followed by Red moves
against Formosa and South Ko
rea. The program of the New
Times is complete American re
treat across the Pacific.
Confidentially... No!
of
■Ni
w
Vietnam exceed 800000
W. ...... I,
Chou En Lai Irked as Bandung
Meeting Members Mention God
vhich a confer cncip roay hp 1call
(his year, it has been sugjjest
again that WP work for he
limination of thr1 veto on the
admission of new' members.
Henry Cabot laidge, Jr., U.S.
representative to the UN, told
the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee that the U.S, should
support the holding of a confer
ence to review the charter, but
should work to restrict amend
ments to the elimination of the
veto on new members.
By the terms of the charter
itself, the question of its review
arises automatically this Fall.
Former Presidents Herbert Hoov
er and Harry S. Truman indicat
ed to the Senate committee that
they did not think much could
bp accomplished in the way of
an advantageous revision of the
charter. Mr. Ixidge was more
hopeful.
Senator Alexander Wiley of
Wisconsin, chairman of the Sen
ate committee, has pointed out
that "the United States is al
ready on record as favoring re
moval of pacific settlement of
disputes and admission of new
members from the province of
the veto.” To go beyond this, he
'Reds' lake Up the Pen Again
Boldfaced Instruction
Apparently, many men in pub
lic lite and many editors of our
daily papers do not understand
this program, for the Daily Work
er can quote them in support
of this first item of the current
Communist line.
Indeed, the Red organ chides
the trade unions in an April 10
loading editorial for not having
conic forward favoring the sur
render of Quemoy, Matsu and
Formosa as have so many pub
licists and men in public life.
Five days later, the Daily Work
er gets the ball really roiling
with this boldfaced instruction
to its readers: “As protests,
against military intervention in
Quemoy and Matsu grow' through
out the country, we urgently
need the help of our readers in
covering this great story. Please
send us clippings from your lo
cal newspapers of letters to the
editor and editorials."
As usual, it is the United
States which is accused of “mil
itary intervention.”
Negotiations The Goal
The same tactic is to be used
now as was employed so effec
tively in “the battle against Mc
Carthyism”— that is, the conceal
ed Communists will induce un
wary persons to write letters,
favorable to American surrender
in the Far East then the Daily
Worker will print these letters,
thus stimulating still others to
deluge the newspapers and
Washington with this "demand.”
For weeks during 1952 and 1953
the Daily W orker ran a special
section every day, "Americans
Versus McCarthyism,” containing
such letters and editorials from
local newspapers.
By April 17, the daily organ
of the Red conspiracy can glee
fully proclaim in great headlines:
WASHINGTON SPLIT OVER
QUEMOY. New instructions are
now given the comrades again
in boldface type —“Wire, write
the President, your Representa­
added, raises fundamental ques
tions.
One of these fundamental
questions is whether to work for
the elimination of the veto in
the Security Council, where is
sues involving the use of Amer
ican troops abroad arise.
Mr. Ixidge said he was not
prepared to see this country give
up the veto in the Security Coun
cil, but that the veto on new
members was another thing. He
pointed out that 14 "deserving
and qualified nations” have been
blocked from membership in the
UN because of Soviet Russia’s
abuse of the veto. These include
Italy and Japan, and will include
the Federal Republic of Germany
and Spain, if and when they ap
ply.
Mr. Lodge could have said,
too, that Soviet Russia has in
voked the veto power some 60
times, and that nearly half of
these times it has blocked the.
admittance to the UN of nations
which had received more than
enough favorable votes in the Se
curity Council.
Russia has vetoed the admit
tanee of Ireland three times and
that of Italy five times.
tive, your Senators, demanding:
Hands off Quemoy-”
The entire hullabaloo is clear
ly set forth as not merely pres
sure to induce the United States
to abandon the off shore islands,
but also to compel our Govern
ment to enter into negotiations
with Red China, as proposed by
Chou En-lai.
A Super-Yaita Their Hope
The whole history of such "ne
gotiations” in accord with the
nature of Soviet Communism—
has been the total defeat of the
United States. We can be certain
that a super-Yalta will come
forth from any new parley of
this kind, the opening scene of
a debacle for our Government in
the Pacific.
Patriotic America, being ill
informed by our daily press con
cerning the Communist line, is
counted upon by the Communists
to let this campaign be lost to
Moscow by default. From the
Red stress on letters and tele
grams to Washington and to the
press, it is evident ‘hat they ex
pect to dominate American opin
ion by superior activity.
While the Communists are do
ing all these things under the
Stalin slogan of “peaceful co
existence,” William Z. Foster ad
vises them in the Daily Worker
of April 29 of what their real
goal in all these maneuvers hap
pens to be.
Political Milestone
Writing on the Bandung con
ference, where the Asiatic and
African nations came together,
Foster states: "Bandung was one
of those political milestones by
which the historians of the fu
ture (and many of today) will
mark the decay and decline of
the world capitalist system.”
Of the Bandung conference I
shall write later. But one thing
came out of it: the importance
of friends for the United States
in Asia. We cannot w'in such
friends if wc abandon some of
them to the Reds.
Inquiry Corner
-------------------Fathar Haalay ■............■
Q. If there is a good reason
(e, ff. a desire to return some
distance to the parental hovne
where you are well known) can
permission be obtained to have
n baby baptized in a parish other
than your own?
A. The administration of the
Sacrament, of Baptism is reserv
ed to the pastor of the place in
w’hich the parent live (or to the
Bishop) but with the pastor’s
permission the Baptism could
take place in another parish.
Such exceptions should be rare
for the pastor is the spiritual
father of all in his parish and
it is his privilege and duty to
care for the souls within the
limits of his pafish. There is
the additional problem here of
the delay in having the child
baptized, but if your pastor
judges the reason mentioned to
he sufficient he can give his
permission.
Q. Is it always sinful to be
nngry? It seems difficult to
avoid some feeling in correcting
the children and sometimes
seems the only way that regis
ters with them i.e. when they
see that you really mean it.
A. It is not always sinful to be
angry. We read in the New
Testament of Christ's anger
(e g. with those who were buy
ing and selling in the temple
John 2:15-17) and we know that
Catholic philosophy includes it
In the passions, which may be
good or evil, depending upon the
circumstances. It is listed as one
of the seven capita! sins when it
is uncontrolled, unjust or arises
from malice, selfishness or ha
tred. While parents and others
who are “aided” in exercise of
authority by just anger should
take care to keep control and
to have motives of love, such
anger is not sinful unless it is
indulged in without sufficient
reason or control.
Q. Must we stand by and let n
good and innocent person suffer
when a s i pie and pain less
treatment or drug would relieve
him nf hopeless suffering?
A. If the “treatment or drug”
simply relievos pain there is no
reason in Catholic morality
against such usage. If the re
lief from "hopeless suffering”
means euthanasia or mercy-kill
ing that is a different matter.
We are not judges or executors
of life and death for innocent
people even if they are suffer
ing. “Or do you not know' that
your members are the temple
MON SIG NOR HIGGINS
Eyes That
Max Eastman, one of the most
articulate ex-communists and
anti-communists in the United
States, has just published a book
that ought to
serve as a
warning against
the uncritical
acceptance of
every policy or
program which
happens to be
merchandi sed
under the label
of anti com
munism. This
is no reflection
in Mr. East
man's sincerity.
...
He is utterly sincere in his op
position to Marxism no doubt
about that Nevertheless his own
alternative to the Marxist pro
gram is not only inadequate-from
the practical point of view, but
completely unacceptable from the
point of view of Christian so
cial ethics.
The fact that he himself is not
aware of this is bad enough.
Much worse are th facts that
"Reflections on the Failure of
Socialism” was published by a
firm with some Catholic connec
tions, reprinted in David Law'
rence’s weekly magazine, enthus
iastically reviewed in many re
spectable periodicals, and is be
ing distributed free of charge hy
at least a few individuals or
corporations.
This would almost seem to indi
cate that many influential Amer
icans have become so obsessed
by the evil of communism that
they are no longer able to recog
nize anticommunist materialism
when they see it. In this respect
they are no better than the fuz
zy-minded ultra-liberals of the
thirties and the early forties
w’ho were so obsessed by Naziism
and Fascism that they were un
able or unwilling to recognize the
evils of communism until it was
almost too late.
Laissez-Faire Plus Birth Control
Mr. Eastman’s alternative to
communism and socialism is a
combination of birth control and
laissez-faire economics. Fie thinks
that “there are too many people
in the world,’ and he feels very
strongly that something ought to
be done about it.“More goods and
fewer people,’1 he says, is the
slogan I should like to see car
ried at the head of humanity’s
march into the future.”
According to Mr. Eastman,
"mankind is confronted with a
choice between two and only two
business systems.” One is a sys
tem "in which amount and kind of
goods produced is determined by
the impersonal mechanism of
the market The other is a
system "in w’hich this is deter-
of the Holy Spirit, who is in
you, whom you have from God,
and THAT YOU ARE, N O
YOUR OWN? For you have
been bought at a great price.
Glorify God and bear him in
your body.” (1 Corinthians 6:19
20) Again St. Paul gives the
Christian answer to suffering:
“With Christ I am nailed to the
that live, but Christ lives In
me." (Galatians 2:20).
Q. Do we have to call a clerk's
attention to receiving too much
change after all they often
make mistakes the other way?
A. The Golden Rule prohibits
this evasion of justice. Wc all
know that we call the clerk’s
attention to a mistake to our
disadvantage, so we should have
the same zeal for justice when
the mistake is going the other
way. It simply is unjust to re
ceive more goods than wc are
paying for and it is self-decep
tion to argue that they probably
have cheated us in the past or
“it is such a big company and
they’ll never miss it” etc. Some
times, of course the error is
trivial and we notice it at home
or we’re not sure and then there
is no strict obligation to remedy
the situation.
Q. How is a. St. Christopher
medal different from, a good
luck charm? A Protestant friend
of mine wants one and I'm not
sure he understands I want
to be able to explain it to him.
A. There is a great difference
between a sacramental and a
superstitious object. Supersti
tion means attributing to a pro
cess or thing some power it does
not have e. g. a rabbit’s foot
which is superstitiously suppos
ed to bring good luck. This is
irrational and sinful if deliber
ate- The sacramental such as a
St. Christopher medal is not
taken as a charm or magic in
strument, but as something en
dowed with power by Christ's
Church. This power comes only
from prayerful and reverent use
of the object as a sign of honor
toward the saint and as a re
minder to pray for his interces
sion. Saeramentals in their use
are directed to the Blessed Vir
gin, to the Saints or to th*
Blessed Trinity and always ulti
mately to God and in accordance
with His law and His will.
Send questions to Father Ed
ward F. Healey, Inquiry Comer,
The Catholic Times, Box 636,
Columbus (16) Ohio.
See Not!
mined by commands issuing from
a personal authority, hacked hy
(armed force. There is no other
alternative.
Moral inconsistency
1 would hate to think that Mr.
Eastman’s twofold formula of
universal birth control and
Jaissex-faire economics is the
best that the United States has
to offer to a world on the brink
of disaster. If it is, we might just
as well do awa with the Voice
of America and our other infnr
jnation agencies and stoically pre
pare forXhe deluge.
Reverse of Formula
'i’he Christian tradition is ex
actly the reverse of Mr. East
man’s formula.
On the one hand, Christian .m
cial teaching completely rejects
the notion that economic life can
or should he regulated exclusive
ly bv the impersonal, automatic
operation of the law of supply
and demand. And, while it also
rejects the alternative of social
ism, Christian social teaching ex
plicitly says that the various
groups engaged in economic life
have not only the right but the
duty, in cooperation with one an
other and with the government,
to regulate the market conscious
ly and deliberately in the inter
est of the common good.
On the other hand, the Chris
tian tradition condemns as sinful
any artificial restriction or con
trol of population by means of
contraception. vurth e rm ore,
while the control of population
by abstinence or periodic contin
ence is legitimate under certain
conditions, it is not permitted
much less encouraged—merely
as a means of progressively and
indefinitely raising the standard
of living of an arbitrary maxi
mum o‘ human beings.
Decrease Whose Population?
To give the devil his due, even
the communists, with all their
diabolical contempt for human
life and human values, have not
yet officially advocated anything
quite that selfish with respect to
the problem of population. They
may eventually do so, of course,
if it suits their evil purposes.
Meanwhile, whatever their mo
tives, their official policy in this
one respect is better than Mr.
Eastman’s and, incidentally, is
likely to have a greater appeal to
the suffering masses of the
world. For the people of Asia
and Africa and other under de
veloped areas are smart enough
to know, or at least to suspect,
that v-hen Americans begin to
talk about decreasing the popula
tion of the world, what they prob
ably mean is decreasing the pop
ulation of Asia and Africa and
othei under-developed areas out
side the continental boundaries
of the United States-