09.30.94

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FALL RIVER DIOCESANi NEWSPAPER FOR SOUTHEAST MASSACHUSETTS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS VOL. 38, NO. 38

• Friday, September 30,1994

FALL RIVER, MASS.

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Quoting famed Jesuit

Buckley says Catholics may be last defense of U.8. political morals NEW YORK (CNS) - James L. Buckley, a federal appeals judge and prominent Catholic layman, said the nation's bishops have been lax toward Catholics who fail to support church positions on issues such as abortion.

Citing work by the late Jesuit Father John Courtney Murray on the compatibility of Catholicism and American principles, he said Father Murray was aware that dissent from those principles might some day shatter the consensus on which the nation was built. and

that guardianship of the consensus "would have passed to the Catholic community."

"Murray's fears about the shattering of the consensus appear, alas, to have been well grounded," Buckley said. "He may be proved right in another respect as well: that it may fall to Catholics, often the victims of American intolerance, to draw on our own faith to defend the American political tradition from those who would strip it of its moral content."

Turn to Page Eight

Papal health:. always under a microscope VATICAN CITY (CNS) .Those who have followed Pope John Paul II for many years can close their eyes and see his trademark gesture: feet planted firmly. arms outstretched to the crowd and a wry smile on his face.

But lately, that image has been supplanted by another, less majestic one: A pope who walks with a cane, occasionally winces in pain and has been known to rest his chin on his chest when he reads his speeches.

Like everyone, the Polish-born pope is growing older. Like few before him, he is growing older under the magnifying lens of the global media and the watchful eyes of his aides.

At 74, Pope John Paul hopes to

CSS photo drawing by Terrill Anne Hosford. age 12

Respect .Life Month 1994 Special Section pages 9-16 ....---- Also In This Issue An Interview with Principal of Bp. Connolly Page; 3

How People Feel about Sacrament of Reconciliation Pag~ 4

BallguetHonors Memory of Card~nal Medeiros !P,~ge 7

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preserve the chemistry that worked so well in earlier years: the fusion of papal charisma and the media ,potlight. But while the TV cameras are still rolling, today they reveal the inevitable ebb of physical energy in a man who has spent his entire career putting in long hours.

His recent injuries - a shoulder separation last November, a broken thigh bone last April- have slowed the pope down noticeably. His slow-healing leg forced him to cancel an October visit to the United Nations and three U.S. cities; some Vatican officials were relieved that a hobbling pope would not be put on display.

In early September, arriving for Turn to Page Eight

PACE urges support

of Senate Bill 2 The Parents' Alliance for Catholic Education (PACE), has announced support of State Senate Bill No.2. The bill proposes to amend the Massachusetts Constitution by striking out its language specifically prohibiting provision of public funds to private schools and substituting the words "The General Court shall make no laws respecting an establishment of religion."

Executive director Stephen A. Pcrla said PACE support for the bill would be demonstrated at a Government Education DayThursday. Oct. 6, at the Boston State House. beginning with a speakers' program at 10 a.m. at the building's entrance.

Perla urged participation at the

event by "all people who support preserving non-public schools in Massachusetts." Noting that support of the senate bill will insure continuance of the "minimum services," such as transportation, that non-pUblic school children now receive, he said "parents of nonpublic school children are taxpayers and their children deserve their fair share."

He also stressed that closing of private schools due to inability of parents to pay increased fees would greatly increase public school enrollment, thus raising taxes for all citizens.

"Our state Constitution's language is more prohibitive than [that of] our federal Constitution."

Turn to Page Eight

Religious: life is·',synod topic political changes worldwide and dramatic changes in the church, the synod will examine who the religious are and where they fit in the church's structure.

Though less than I percent of the church's membership, the more than 1.1 million men and women religious in the world are regarded as the backbone of the church's work force.

They administer hospitals, schools and other institutions: lead much of the church's missionary activity; continue a tradition of special ministry to those left out of

VATICAN CITY (CNS) - The life and ministry of men and women religious is the focus of the world Synod of Bishops meeting at the Vatican Oct. 2-29 to discuss "The Consecrated Life and its Role in the Church and in the World."

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normal church or social structures; and support the church with constant prayer.

The more than 3,000 Catholic orders and institutes and the variety of ways in which members live their vocation - whether in hermitages and cloisters or in homeless shelters and AIDS hospices - mean that the synod discussions could touch virtually every area of church and social life.

Relations with local bishops and diocesan clergy, cooperation with lay persons, liturgy, feminism, formation, missionary activity and involvement in justice and peace issues all have been mentioned in synod preparatory documents.

The synod is planned as the universal church's first opportunity since the Second Vatican Council to examine how religious can be relevant to the world while preserving traditional identity.

The Union ofS uperiors General, an international group of the heads of men's communities, said it hopes the synod will make it cle'}r that consecrated life can "respond to the challenges and expectations of our contemporaries in various cultural, social and ecclesial contexts."

The question has practical implications as religious orders face declining and aging memberships.

Especially in North America and Europe, where women's communities have experienced the greatest decline in membership, some orders are not just closing institutions, but are facing veritable extinction.

This possibility "is generally viewed with serenity and faith.

There is a convergence of opinion in declaring that what no longer generates life has no evangelical reasons to survive," said a report on responses to the synod's preparatory document prepared by the International Union of Superiors General, the leadership organization of women's orders.

In an early September interview, Father Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, superior general of the Jesuits, said, "the increasing or decreasing number of consecrated people and the obvious value of their works is not so important."

"What is important is that in all they do, praying and working, consecrated life preserves and emphasizes its mission in the church for the world," he told SIR, an Italian Catholic news bulletin.

The identity and spirituality of consecrated life should undergird all of the discussions, said the synod's working document.

"The consecrated life is a prophetic witness to the primacy of God and to the things that do not pass away," the document said.

"Its value lies more in 'being' from God and for God - than in 'doing,''' although when lived properly religious identity and mission should be in harmony.

Meeting heads of religious orders last November, Pope John Paul said their consecration and vows are a sign of their "radical gift of seW' to God and to the church so that they can be witnesses of Gospel values in the world.

The synod's working document presented the vows not only as an imitation of Christ, but as opportunities to proclaim lasting truths in a changing world.

Where the authentic meaning of sexuality, the family and the virtue of virginity are being lost or even attacked, it said, voluntary celibacy, along with Christian marriage, "show the power of love which integrates, gives of itself and is committed."

AT THE BLESSING and dedication of Hope House, a home for persons with AIDS sponsored by St. Anne's Hospital, Fall River, Sister Joanna Fernandes, OP, center, chairperson of the hospital's board of directors, and Bishop Sean O'Malley, who blessed the new facility, speak to a Hope House supportet as they stand before the building(top photo); below, Toby Shea, RN, MSN, director of the house, and Sister Fernandes participate in the blessing ceremony. A full story, more pictures will appear in the Anchor for Oct. 7. (Hickey pl:,otos)

Three from diocese at vocations parley Msgr. John J. Smith, Fall River diocesan director of vocations; Rev. Craig Pregana, assistant director; and Sister Mary Noel Blute,.

RS M, Episcopal Representative for Religious, joined nearly 200 vocation directors from other dio11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

Where a push for profit and the accumulation of things has put money ahead of people and relationships, it said, a vow ofpoveriy frees people from materialism and helps them live in solidarity with the poor.

Where personal autonomy and self-fUlfillment have led to isolation and self-centeredness, the vow of obedience is a surrender to God's will and to service of others, it said.

Women religious - because they make up almost three-fourths of all consecrated people and as one of the most highly ed ucated groups of nonordained Catholics - are expected to draw a lot of attention at the synod.

While rejecting "extreme present-day forms of the feminist movement" - and even blaming them for creating confusion within some communities - the working document said the equal dignity of women must be recognized.

It said women are "still far from full engagement in the church, despite the magisterium's directives in this regard," adding that "it is urgent that they be given greater involvement in processes of discernment and decision-making in what concerns their lives as consecrated women."

ceses for the annual meeting of the National Conference of Vocation Directors, held last week in Philadelphia.

The meeting's theme, .. From Melting Pot to Mosaic: Vo,:ation Ministry in a Multicultural Church," was the topic of the keynote address by Rev. Cyprian Davis, OSB. Other speakers discussed the challenges of vOI:ation ministry in American culture in general and in American Catholic culture in particular.

Rev. Canice Connors, OFM Conv., Ph. D., presented a symposi!Jm on issues involved in healthy psychosexual development.

Sister Mary Noel commented that the conference was marked by much useful exchange of information among the vocation dire:ctors on ways of encouraging consideration of church service by pott:ntial candidates.

Correction In last week's Anchor a photo caption indicated that St. Anne's parish, Fall River, was celebrating its 25th anniversary. In fact, the parish is marking. its 125th year.

The Anchor regrets the error.

1I1111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 THE ANCHOR (USPS-545-020). Second Class Postage Paid at Fall River, Mass.

Published weekly except the week of July 4 and the week after Christmas at lI8? Highland Avenue. Fall River. Mass. 02i20 by the Catholic Press of the Diocese d Fall River. SUbscription price by mail, postpaid $11.00 per year. Postmasters send address changes to The Anchor. P.O. Box :'. Fall River. MA 02722. .

The following interview was recently conducted with Father John P. Murray, a Jesuit prieslt and the principal of Bishop Connolly High School, Fall River. Father Murray will leave Connolly in June 1995 to begin his tertianship, a year of formation undertaken by Jesuits in preparation for taking final vows in the Society of Jesus.

Anchor: Father Murra:r, what is tertianship?

Father Murray: Sevent,een years ago this fall I entered the Society of Jesus and began the long road of formation to become a priest.

Jesuits prepare themselves over a IO-year period with studies in spirituality, philosophy, theology and usually a specific area of education. All these studies lead to priestly ordination, which came for me in 1987.

The final stage of Jesuit formation, known as tertianship, is a year of in-depth spirituality, prayer, work with the poor a.nd study of the basic writings of St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits.

All Jesuits, both pri,ests and brothers, participate in this experience, which St. Ignatius called "the school of the heart."

Anchor: You speak of "the school of the heart"; Whllt exactly does that involve for a Jesuit?

Father Murray: In my 17 years of learning to become a Jesuit priest, I am keenly aware of how God has called me to be II part of the heart of Jesus. In pronouncing vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as a Jesuit, I am acknowledging my deep dependf:nce upon God's graces. With eaeh passing year, I have asked the Lord to keep my heart open to the needs of God's people.

In tertianship, I hope to renew my heartfelt intention of serving God by serving God's people. This requires a time of seriolls reflection and prayer which Jesuits experience through the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. These exercises take place during a 30day retreat, which seeks to build upon the many graces God has given one. Once this period of prayer is completed, a Jesuit spends time working in a Jesuit mission, an experience of working and living among God's poor. The challenge is to build on the graces of one's retreat and to find God in all things and all peoples, no matter what their limitations.

Anchor: How does tertianship impact you as principal of Bishop.

Connolly High School?

Father Murray: Well, by choosing to enter tertianship I will complete my term of office as Connolly's principal. When I first came to Connolly, Bishop Cronin asked me to make a three to five year commitment. In agreeing, we knew that my tertianship year would come in 1995. It doesn't seem possible five years have just about come and gone.

Bishop O'Malley has been wonderful to me and to thl: school, in accepting my desire to continue my formation. In many ways the Emmaus program run for the diocesan clergy under Bishop O'Malley's care reflects his commitment to see that his priests receive graces similar to those associated with the school of the heart.

Anchor: Will Connolly have a new principal by the time you leave?

Father Murray: The diocese has

high school, like Connolly, or for our own Jesuit high schools is no longer possible. Our Jesuit mission today encompasses a greater collaboration with our lay colleagues in our institutions as we Lltce our own reduced manpower.

However, Bishop O'Malley has stated that an effort will be made to identify a Jesuit or a religious for the position. The final decision . will depend upon the qualifications of the candidates who come forward in the process. The bishop has stressed that a profound faith

life and strong commitment to the ideals of Catholic education must characterize the new principal.

Anchor: Will this year then present some new challenges for you as principal?

Father Murray: (with a hearty laugh) Every year as principal has new challenges! We have 115 freshmen, which is a great challenge Turn to Page Six

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IN THIS 1993 photo, Bishop Connolly principal Father John P. Murray, sj, right, and Bishop Sean O'Malley hold the school's IO-year certificate of accreditation as Father Richard W. Beaulieu, director of the Diocesan Department of Education, looks on. a very strong commitme\lt to Catholic education at both the elementary and high school levels. The Catholic Education Department, under the care of Father Richard Beaulieu, has worked out a very professional and careful search process to find principals for all Catholic schools.

now have lay people as principals.

With commitments we have in our own high schools, colleges, universities and parishes, our ability to continue to supply a Jesuit as principal for a very fine diocesan

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During the search iii 1990 fqr Connolly's principal, I was one of many competent candidates, both lay and religious, who were considered. The actual search process for my successor begins in January, 1995 with a series of interviews with potential candidates and a final decision will be, made by Bishop O'Malley in May, so that a new Connolly principal will be in place by June 30, 1995.

Anchor: What is the likelihood that the new principal will be a religious or a lay person?

Father Murray: G04 works in very wonderful ways when it comes to finding a qualified candidate for such an important position. In my discussions with Bishop O'Malley, he has expressed his deep desire that Connolly find tHe best qualified person to continue a work he sees as vital to the diocese.

As in the other diocesan high schools the availability of religious has noticeably decreased. This is a reality which brings with it a mixture of feelings shared by bishops, religious and lay people alike. My own feeling is there are quality people in all our diocesan schools whose faith and devotion to teaching young people will produce quality candidates. Most recently, a search process at Bishop Feehan produced several strong candidates, both religious and lay. Mr. George Milot, the new Feehan principal appointed by Bishop O'Malley, is a fine example of a' lay person devoted to the faith and teaching of young people.

Anchor: Specificaily, Father Murray, do you forese,e a Jesuit as filling the role of principal at Connolly?

Father Murray: The Jesuits are responsible for many diverse commitments in New England, in the U.S. and around the world. When the Jesuits were founded over 450 years ago, we pledged ourselves to the service of the Church in any part of the world at t,he direction of the pope. Today, the demands on Jesuits· have increased while our numbers have deClined.

In Jesuit high schools in New England and across the U.S., many

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4 THE ANCHOR -

,

Diocese of Fall River -

Fri., Sept. 30,1994

the moorins.-,

the living word

A Reminder to All Candidates In the ideal, the political community exists for the common good; this is its justification and the cause of its existence.

It is obvious that the persons who make up the political community are many and varied ..Likewise, it should be clear( that the political community and public authority in general are based on human nature. Their aim should always be achievement of the integrity of the human person. This goal. should be accomplished by peaceful and honest means.

Seen in this light, the tactics which have been introduced into current Massachusetts politics are not only far from the ideal but are to be condemned. Vicious attacks on the personal religious beliefs of candidate and uncalled-for comments on church teachings have no place in a political campaign.

But Catholics and Mormons have always been seen as fair game for bashers. Can we ever forget the anti':Catholicism that targeted John F. Kennedy when he ran for president in 1960?

1t is sad today to see his brother and nephew adopt the same tactics that were used against him. It is disgraceful to see Joseph Kennedy demeaning and degrading the Mormon church. Kicking off a campaign by stating that this particular denomination is a "white boys' club" that reduces blacks and women to the status of second-class citizens is outrageous.

As the Boston Herald editorialized: "It is wrong for Joe Kennedy to haul the religious issue back into the race. Voters deserve more from the Kennedys when the general election campaign begins. Let t he battle be over political issues."

To add insult to injury, Senator Edward Kennedy has introduced Church teaching on the ordination of women into the political arena. He indeed has failed to follow President Kennedy's example whh regard to the separation· of church and state. On this issue and others it is most unfortunate that the senator cannot seem to resist attacking the Church or its teachings while he is on the campaign trail.

We are certainly off to a bad start in this campaign when candidates stoop to ridiculing the Mormon and Catholic churches in the hope of boosting their own public acceptance.

Does that not tell us something about the tenor. of the times?

Does that not clearly indicate the state of politics in today's America? Does that not cause us to question the personal integrity of those who feel that such actions are justified?

The people of this state and this country are facing genuine problems that truly a.ffect their living. The loss of jobs, uncheckeq crime, security for the elderly and the demise of public education are but a few of the concerns that all Americans want their elected officials to come to grips with. Today Congress is a joke. Its members have made sure of their own pensions and health care plans while showing little concern for those of their constituents. This is only one of many reasons why so many Americans place little trust in those whom they have elected. .

The Fathers of Vatican II summarized these feelings well. In the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World they reflected, "Christians must be conscious·.oftheir proper·role in the political community; they should be a shining example by their serise of responsibility and their dedication to the common good; they should show in practice how authority can be reconciled with freedom and the needs of the whole social framework."

Let those words be a reminder to those seeking public office.

The Editor

the

OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF THE DIOCESE OF FALL RIVER Published weekly by The Catholic Press of the Diocese of Fall River 887 Highland Avenue P.O. BOX 7 Fall River, MA 02720 Fall River, MA 02722-0007 Telephone 508-675-7151 FAX (508) 675-7048 Send address changes to P.O. Box 7 or call telephone number above EDITOR Rev. John f. Moore

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GENERAL MANAGER Rosemary Dussault ~ Leary Press-Fall Rive,

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ULove one another." }n. 15:12

Diocesan paper reports on penance ERIE. Pa. (CNS) - Joseph vices to recapture the communal church is willing to forgive them," Hodges said he struggled for years sense of sin and reconciliation. said Father Frank Przep'ierski. with his inability to forgive others.

- More emphasis on the joy of Like many priests today, he likes Not only was he bogged down pardon and peace that comes from to link penance to sins confessed by feelings of resentment and anger, . the sacrament and on a more bibrather than to assign a standard set he was haunted by Jesus' words: lical sense of Christ as healer welof prayers as priests once: did.

"Forgive us the wrong we have coming the sinner back to grace "Most people's sins are about done, as we forgive those who and wholeness. actions. so I'll give them an action wrong us."

- Provision for face-to-face type penance," he said. "That might Finally. "through the grace of confession as an atmosphere "more be to compliment your husbllnd or suitable for celebrating this sacGod, I decided to carry my burden wife, your kids." rament of joy." to confession.... Today forgiveness Father John Carter said he tries Priests of the Erie diocese said is easy for me - it literally comes to make penance "an experience." in interviews that they feel peace naturally." he said.

Sometimes he asks a penitent to when they receive the sacrament stand in silence at the foot of the Hodges was one of many Cathand joy when they help others cross. olics who wrote to the Lake Shore Or he may ask a penitent to sing grapple with failure, guilt, pain Visitor, which had asked readers a joyful song while driving home. to comment on the sacrament of and sorrow.

"It's a chance for them to hear "Some giggle and laugh at that, reconciliation. that God loves them, that the but eventually they agree to do it.

Karen Martin described confesThe idea is to go out witt.! joy and sion as a way for people to forgive peace." themselves.

Priests interviewed said they "Preparing for confession ... respect the desire for anonymity of [and] having to articulate the many Catholics who prefer consituation helps make it real to fessing from behind a screen, but me .... The healing process can't they prefer the face-to-face apbegin until a person is able to proach and find a growing number acknowledge and speak about the Prayer for Life of people using it. hurts and ·problems in their lives," Franciscan Sister Rose Kuzma, she wrote. .

Lord God, Father of all a parish director of religious edulife, we praise and honor "I sincerely believe that Jesus is cation, said that for a while the the one who hears my confession you. We thank you for the .sacrament of reconciliation was and absolves me through the priestgift of life that in your great neglected in religious ed ucation. confessor," wrote Maxine Taucher, love you have generously But now she sees a revi ved emone of many respondents who said phasis on reconciliation in relibestowed upon us. they still prefer traditional confesgious education at allleveh:. sion with the screen.

Gather us to yourself so She tries to teach the joy of the Other respondents, however,' that we might be transsacrament and its importance for liked the face-to-face approach. formed by your light. ongoing spiritual growth, not just "I prefer [it) because of the conStrengthen us, that we may forgiveness of past sins, st.e said. versational feel," said Kathy Pino.

To illustrate her point she rebe willing always to speak "When you've developed a trust called a time when she wa:, on her and act on behalf of the with your confessor, then this way to an appointment for confesmethod seems most natural to dissacredness of human life. sion and began to fume at a slowcuss your progress."

Guide and inspire us by the moving truck driver ahead of her.

In an article on the sacrament's Holy Spirit with wisdom, At the end of her confession, the history, Father John P. Schanz. priest told .her for her pena nee she mercy, love and patient theology professor at Erie's Ganshould pray for truck drivers. endurance. non University, noted that the.

Eight years later she is still prayUnited with Mary, our practice of regular private confesing for truck drivers, Sister Kuzma sion began· among Anglo-Irish mother, and the angels and said, and that confession was one monks a few centuries later and saints, we beg the grace of of the experiences that helped her gradually spread through Europe, learn that her basic probh:m was conversion for all wfiose he said. anger. acts and policies lead to the He said that in renewal of the "I don't go to reconc:Jiation destruction of life. This we sacraments after the Second Vatibecause I'm bad," she said. "I pray through Christ, Our can Council, the reform of the sacreceive the sacrament be(:ause I rament of penance included: Lord. Amen. need the grace to help me become - Provisions for communal sera better person."

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Q. I've been searching for information on Jesus' life from ages 12 to 30. Do the Dead Sea scrolls tell us something? I don't want fiction.

I hear there is a Gospel of Thomas, which is my confirmation name.ls it possible that that would give some information?

A. Many archeological and literary discoveries. including to some degree the Dead Sea scrolls, reveal a significant amount of information about what life was like around the time of Jesus.

Major works by two Jewish historians. Philo and Flavius Josephus, who wrote in the same century that Jesus lived, and some other ancient authors add more to the picture we have.

The Bible, of cours(:, both the New Testament and the later books of the Old Testament. is another place we can look.

All these sources tell us a great deal about how people lived in those days, what the:y ate and believed, how they gn:w up and what they learned, what were the troubles and pursuits of their daily existence.

However, they tell liS little if anything specific about the adolescent and adult life of Jesus before he appears as a disciple of John the Baptist.

As far as the four Gospels are concerned, this should not be surprising. They are not intended as a biography of Jesus or any other biblical figure.

The Gospels. as they themselves

Iteering pOintl SEPARATED/ DlVOI~CED CATHOLICS, TAt:NTON New support group for separated/ divorced Catholics of Taunton area will begin meeting 4 p.m. Oct. 30, St. Joseph's parish center, 499 Spring St .. N. Dighton. under direction of pastor Father James McLellan. Decisions about time and structure of future meetings will be made at that time.

SACRED HEART, TAUNTON Rosary and Benediction 7 p.m.

Oct. 3, the first of several spiritual events planned for CeD program.

All invited.

STONEHILL COLLI<:GE, N.I<:ASTON Musicians of the Old Post Road will perform concert of "Classical Music in England" 8 p.m. Oct. 5, Martin Institute. Reception will follow. Free admission: open to the public. Information: 230-1487.

ST. JOSEPH, TAUNTON Brenda Austin of Fall River Council on Alcoholism will discuss "Dangers for Young People in Drug and Alcohol Use" 6:30 p.m. tomorrow, church hall.

ST. PATRICK, FR Women's Guild living rosary 7 p.m. Oct. 3, followed by open ~~et­ ing at which pastor Father Wilham Campbell will speak.

ST. LOUIS, FR Women's guild potluck supper 6 p.m. Oct. 5.

ST. MARY, MANSFIELD Adult education series on basic teachings of Catholic: faith will be offered in two sessions: 7 p.m. Sundays beginning Oct. 2 and 10 a.m.

Tuesdays beginning Oct. 4. Information: 339-2981.

By FATHER JOHN DIETZEN tell us, have one purpose: to convey how God's love and presence with us are revealed by and in Jesus, and how we are to respond to the revelation in our hearts and in our lives.

As the fourth Gospel puts it, "These [signs] are written that you may 'come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name" (20:31).

Thus, many details of our Lord's life might satisfy our curiosity, but they're not relevant for our faith.

The so-called Gospel of Thomas, one of several that surfaced in the early Christian centuries, is a collection of more than 100 sayings of the "living" Jesus. They are interesting to read, but where they do not parallel the canonical Gospels they often reflect some firstand second-century gnostic departures from beliefs of the main body of Christians.

As far as I know Thomas was never considered a generally accepted Gospel, even among Christians of those decades.

SECULAR FRANCISCANS Members of St. Francis of the Cape Fraternity will attend a day of recollection Oct. 2 at St. Joseph Friary in Onset. It will be conducted

by Brother Giles Kelly, OFM, and 'will include a Transitu~ service. Registration at 10:30 a.m. will begin the day.

HOLY TRINITY, W. HARWICH The parish has initiated 24-hour adoration of the Blessed Sacrament each First Friday, with exposition beginning in the Children's Chapel after 9 a.m. Mass on the Friday and ending with Benediction at 8: 15 a.m. prior to 9 a.m. Mass on the Saturday. Sign-up sheets are posted at church doors in advance of each First Friday. The upcoming date is Oct. 7.

SS. PETER AND PAUL, FR Bishop O'Malley will celebrate 9 a.m. Mass Oct. 4 at the school for presentation of certificate recognizing completion of diocesan school self-study process. Afterward the bishop will bless students' pets in observance ofthefeast ofSt. Francis.

VINCENTIANS, TAUNTON .

Taunton District Council Mass 7:30 p.m. Oct. 3. St. Joseph's Church, 19 Kilmer Ave .. Taunton. Meeting will follow in church hall.

O.L. CAPE, BREW~TER Healing service with Mass celebrated by Father Dick Lavoie, MS. 7:30 p.m. Oct. 5: inf~Hmation: 4324934.

ST. MARY, N.ATTLEBORO Healing service and Sunday Mass with Father William T. Babbitt, 2 p.m. Sunday. Adoration of Blessed Sacrament following 7 a.m. Mass Oct. 7 until 9 a. m. Mass Oct. 8 in chapel at rear of church. Prayer at 9 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m. Saturday.

Information: Joan Provost. 6992430.

"

1

Q~ Myf~i'end and "'weredisc~s~-

ing the size of churches. My recollection was that the largest is St. Peter's in Rome. But she said there's one larger than that. Who is right? (Texas) A. Your friend is right. For the last five years the largest Christian church in the world has been the cathedral of Our Lady of.Peace at Yamoussoukro, Ivory Coast, in western Africa.

Designed by French and Israeli architects, it was built in three years by President H ouphouetBoigny in his native village, at a cost of $130 million. He claims to have accomplished the job with his own money, but was criticized for such extravagance in a nearly bankrupt nation.

Pope John Paul declined the invitation to consecrate the new cathedral in April 1989.

Q. My granddaughter was divorced recently and was tOld after she started the proceedings that she could not receive communion.

She understands that her exhusband can receive because he did not file for the divorce. Is that correct? N either of them is remarried. (New York) A. No, it is not correct. Both of them are entirely free to receive the Eucharist.

The only requirement for either of them before communion is the same that applies to anyone else: to repent of any sins committed and, if a serious sin is involved, to receive the sacrament of penance.

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Fri., Sept. 30, 1994'5

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Daily Readings Oct. 3: Gal 1:6-12; Ps 111:1-2,7-10; lk 10:25-37 Oct. 4: Gal 1:13-24; Ps 139: 1-3,13-15; lk 10:38-42 Oct. 5: Gal 2:1-2,7-14; Ps 117:1-2; lk 11:1-4 Oct. 6: Gal 3:1-5; lk 1:6975; lk 11:5-13 Oct. 7: Gal 3:7-14; Ps 111:1-6; lk 11:15-26 Oct. 8: Gal 3:22-29; Ps 105:2-7; lk 11:27-28 Oct. 9: Wis 7:7-11; Ps 90:12-17; Heb 4:12-13; Mk 10:17-30

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The Diocesan Department of Education and Bishop Stang High School have announced changes in the governing structure at the North Dartmouth high school.

The innovations have been made to implement curriculum and technological changes; maintain a Catholic character and family- and value-oriented atmosphere; and better serve the local and business communities as well as the families associated with the school.

Theresa Dougall, formerly Bishop Stang's principal, assumes the title of president. The president will take responsibility for the spiritual and sacramental life of the school community; coordination of a president's advisory board;' fiscal management; and institutional advancement, including development, marketing, recruiting and community relations.

During this transitional year, Ms. Dougall will also perform the duties of academic principal, managing school operations pertaining to faculty and academics, such as curriculum development, faculty reviews, master sched uling and technological innovation. A search will be initiated to fill the position of academic principal beginning with the 1995-96 academic year.

Ms. Dougall, a Marion resident, has been Stang principal since 1987 and was previously chairperson of the science department. An alumna of the high school, she also holds a bachelor's degree from S tonehill College, North Easton, and a master of education degree from Bridgewater State College.

She is a regional representative to the National Catholic Educational Association board and a member

of the board of directors of the Stonehill College Catholic School Ed ucation Consortium.

Robert Zukowski has been named principal of students. He will manage student affairs, including athletics and the student council, and coordinate activities of the dean of students, athletic director, and advisors to students.

Previously Zukowski was assistantprincipal. A North Dartmouth resident, he is also a graduate of Stang and Stonehill College. He holds a master's degree from Providence College. He and his wife Patricia have two daughters, Maureen and Kate.

Michael O'Brien has been appointed dean of students, reporting to the principal of students and responsible for maintaining a safe and ordered environment conducive to learning and implementing the regulations of the student handbook.

A graduate of Norwi(:h University, Northfield, VT, he has been a member of the Stang faculty since 1986. A member of the :;ocial studies department, he was recently honored as social studies teacher of the year by the Veterans of World War II. He developed a study skills program at the school, and is also assistant varsity football coach, winter trae k coach, and an outing club advisor. He resides in Mattapoisett with his wife Lois and son Patrick.

To involve all faculty ill curriculum changes. Bishop Stang has added a curriculum planning module to all faculty schedules. Faculty members will spend at least one class period on alternate days in a planning session. Said Ms. Dougall, "We view the c.:>llaborative process as an essential ingredient in ensuring the success of our curriculum planning for the 21st century."

Connolly principal intervie'wed Continued from Page Three and the largest incoming class in my five years. So the school is growing and we are looking carefully at how we want to serve our students and families into the next century. The school has received its 10 year reaccredition and we will be seeking to implement our Five Year plan with curriculum improvements in the year ahead.

The rumors I have heard of Connolly's demise or closing are very erroneous. The school has a mission, supported fully by Bishop O'Malley, to teach young people the importance and centrality of the Gospel message. With that message comes a dynamic, quality education and some very outstanding athletics and extracurriculars.

There will always be challenges when young people search out the truth in theii-lives. That is exciting and it requires great patience and prayer.

Anchor: Well, Father Ml;Irray, after five years you must have some outstandi'ng memories of Connolly. Are there any in particular you, would like to share?

Father Murray: There are many, too' many! I came to Connolly with the one hope to be a pastor

Oct. 2 1961, Rev. Joseph E. Sutula, Pastor, St. Casimir, New Bedford Oct. 3 Great Prayerbooks 1991, Rev. Msgr. Arthur G. 4 Keys To Heaven $ 1.50 Considine, Retired Pastor, St. Mary. Teach Me To Pray (New Bock) 1.50 Mary, South Dartmouth Pieta Blue Bock , 1.50 Oct. 6 Gold Bock 01 Prayers 3.00 1916, Rev. Stephen B. Magill, Thirty Favorite Novenas 75 Assistant, Immaculate Concep7/8 x t2 - 51% Beeswax Candles 1.50 Prayerbook':-Favonte Litanies 9.00 tion, North Easton 10 hour Votive Light-Blessed 25, Excellent ReaCling 1987, Rev. Roland Brodeur, 6 day Votive Light·Blessed 1.75 The Final Hour-Michael Brown ,: 11.50 Uniondale, New York The Thunder 01 Justice 11.95 Survival Kit -RosRI)'. SC8{XJlar plus 4 Keys 10 Heaven Oct. 7 Our Lady 01 Garabandal 5.00 Prayer Boo/l and Holy Picture. Prayer Callis ..•• 2.00 1951, Rev. Caesar Phares, Pas- , tor, St. Anthony of the Desert, The annual wedding anniver'sary Poslage: purchases under $5.00 add $1.00 - $5,-10 add $2.00 - $10.00 & over-$3.oo.

Mary's Callis a tax exempt corporation. Any donation you wish to make Fall River ' celebration Mass and renewal of will help spread the devolion to our Blessed Mother around the world.

1975, Rev. Msgr. Arthur G. vows for couples celebrating 25,50 P.O. Box 162 Dupuis, Pastor Emeritus, St. Louis or more years of married life in de France, Swansea 1994 will take place at 5 p.m. SunSalisbury, MO 65281 1988, Rev. Andrew Jahn, day, Oct. 16, at St. Mary's Cathed816-388-5308 5S.Ce., Sacred Hearts Seminary" ral, Fall River. Those wishing to participate, in the ceremony should . Wlcm,ham

for the teachers and students. I have learned that being pastor includes not only saying Mass, but going to hockey games, plowing snow, running bingo, visiting students in hospitals, listening to teachers, crying with teachers, and sharing my faith in ways God had not yet told me about. Each day I have said a small prayer:, "Lord, help me to serve you in serving others, so that your Kingd om may be-brought about to last f,)rever."

Sometimes at 4:30 a.m. when I was climbing into our plow to clear the snow, I would say Hail Marys in the hope the old plow would hold up. And you know, I could almost feel my 400 little angels saying an equal number of Hail Marys that Father Murray would end up, plow and all, permanently stuck in a snowbank .... and no school.

What counts in the end is the prayer. I will remember always the prayers of hope, the prayers of love, the prayers of my young students who have blessed my life beyond anything I could ever have imagined. Connolly teachers, staff, students and families will always remain part of my "school, of the heart."

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notify their pastors as soon as possible.

Uprising "To clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of our uprising against the disorder of the world."-Karl Barth

THE ANCHOR -

Diocese of Fall River -

LEMIEUX

COLLINS CONSTRUCTION CO., INC. There fronrt start Dear Editor: I was dismayed to see the caption "Catholic education returned to Cape Cod on September 7th" (Anchor, Sept. 16).

May I say, as a parishioner of Corpus Christi on Cape Cod, that Catholic education arrived on the Cape with the first Catholic parents of the first bapti7ed Catholic child whom they raised in their Faith. whether or not there was a "Catholic" school. Probably they preceded the establishment of the first Catholic parish on the Cape (and I think we know which parish that is).

As the product of a Catholic elementary school, high school, and college, who hotds no resentment and much appreciation for all I have received, I think I can speak out.

As a former public school teacher and a retired ORE from the archdiocese of New York, I think I am qualified to witness to the good that is done and the excellence of education that is received in our public schools.

Faith is a gift that we receive at Baptism, but, like alii gifts, it must be nurtured. Catholic school education is one means among many the good Lord showers on us. Do we equate evangelization with Catholic school education? Is parish life open only to parents of children in the school?

I have found many good things in "The Anchor" since I have begun reading it, but this is the first time I have been prompted to express my thoughts in a letter to the Editor, and, although I wish good luck and Godspeed to the sincere people who have been c:alled to serve their God in this way, I hope and pray, as I stand with those who might feel "left behind," that the effect of the caption, whose only aim, I am sure, was to give recognition to a worthy cause, is not to stir up a hornet's nest of division.

Jean Stavrakas Forestdale

Life is pref.~minent Dear Editor: It is gratifying to belong to a diocese whose conc:ern for life is preeminent. Remember, we ranked number one for postcards (opposing abortion in health care reform) mailed to our elected officials this past January.

When Bella Nogueira, president of the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women, formed a new council commission, a Pro·,Life Commission, and asked that I serve as chairman, I accepted with joy and gratitude. Respecting life has always been and wiB always be of utmost importance; we have to defend those who cannot defend themselves.

An invitation from Father Stephen Fernandes to serve on the Diocesan Pro-Life Apostolate Committee, representing the DCCW, added to my enthusiasm. Father Fernandes, Pro-Life Apostolate director, will also serve as spiritual advisor to the new DCCW commission.

The goal of this commission is

to inform, educate, recruit and involve more council members in pro-life activities through prayer, devotion and determination.

We have the support and dedication of our bishop and Father Fernandes. Bishop O'Malley has participated in every rally and March for Life in Washington, DC, since its inception, and that certainly speaks for itself.

As Congressman Henry Hyde of Illinois said at the Intefaith Assembly for Life in Boston last January, "Life is God's gift to us; respecting life is ou~ gift to God." Madeleine Lavoie Chairman, DCCW Pro-Life Commission Westport

Worldwide Rosary Dear Editor: I am writing to ask people to join their prayers with the Worldwide Rosary for Life taking place, Saturday, Oct. 8. This prayer event is being coordinated by the Rosary for Life associations.

Reciting the rosary is a great way to strengthen the unity offamily life. bringing peace and holiness. We pray that Jesus through Mary will fill the hearts of all mothers-to-be with the grace to love and protect the unborn child in their wombs. and to convert the hearts and minds of all people with the knowledge and understanding that life is sacred and must be protected from the moment of conception.

The Rosary for Life will be recited Oct. 8 at St. John the Evangelist Church in Pocasset, following an 8 a.m. Mass (offered] for the sanctity of life. For information and Rosary for Life booklets, write or phone Rosary for Life Association. PO Box 340017.

Brooklyn, NY 11234-0001. Tel. (718) 377-6920 or FAX (718) 3776973.

Joanie Zak Monument Beach

"

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Annual ADCUP Mass, banquet honor late Cardinal Medeiros Antonio Cardinal Ribeiro, the Cardinal Patriarch of Portugal, will be principal celebrant and homilist at a Mass preceding the 26th annual banquet sponsored by the Association for the Development of the Catholic University of Portugal to benefit the university.

The bilingual Mass, at 5:30 p.m.

Saturday, Oct. 8, will be celebrated at St. John the Baptist Church, 344 County St., New Bedford, and will have as concelebrants Cardinal Bernard Law and Bishop Sean O'Malley. Lectors will be ADCU P members and Deacon Manuel Camara will read the Gospel and the Prayer of the Faithful, while Deacon Thomas Souza will be liturgical deacon.

The music ministry will be by the combined choirs of Immaculate Conception, Mt. Carmel and St. John the Baptist parishes, all of New Bedford, and will be directed

by Victor de Matos. The organist will be Douglas Marshall, president of Rodgers of New England Organ Co., and the leader of song will be Rev. Andre Faria.

The following banquet will be served in St. John the Baptist parish hall. The benefit event, which honors the memory of Cardinal Humberto Medeiros, founder of ADCUP, is chaired by Very Rev. Henry S. Arruda, VF, pastor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel parish.

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Our Lady's Monthly Message From Medjugorje September 25th, 1994 Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina

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God sends me to help you and to guide you towards paradise, which is your goal.

Therefore little children, PRA Y, PRA Y PRA Yl Thank you for having responded to my call."

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Continued from Page One Buckley also argued Catholics in public office should have no hesitation in letting their religious convictions influence the performance of their official duties.

Answering questions following an address to the Federalist Society at the Fordham Law School in New York, the judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit suggested the bishops needed to be "a little sterner in drawing the line" to build a united front.

To a similar charge raised by U.S. Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill., in a speech last February, the spokeswoman for the U.S. bishops on pro-life issues said the general public simply doesn't see much of the effort made by the bishops on the subject.

"We have made every effort to get this position into the public square," said Helen Alvare, director of information and planning for the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. "The Catholic bishops and the staff of our office are trying extremely hard to speak out on this. I don't think it could be much clearer."

Buckley's address, titled "The Catholic Public Servant," was drawn from an article he had pub-

lished about two years ago in First He also said that thoBe who Things, a monthly journal edited warn against legislating morality

by Father Richard J. Neuhaus. ' ,or imposing one's own morality Regarding Catholics in public were "ignorant of both history and office, Buckley said the authors of the law." Every system of laws, . the Constitution knew when they incl~ding the U.S. civil rights laws ruled out any religious test for of recent tiines, involves morality, office - and allowed for the pos- he said. .Buc'kley- said that as ajuoge he is sibility of officials ofarly religion or none - that "the views of reli- not allowed to· introduce t.is pergious individuals will inevitably sonal conscience or doctrina.1 views reflect their religious beliefs." into his decisions.

Buckley, a brother of author "Should 1 eyer be asked 1.0 hear and commentator William F. a case in"\vh'ich the application of Buckley Jr., served one term as the law might result in my material U.S. senator from New York and complicity in an immoral act, I later as a Reagan administration would have to examine my conofficial before his appointment to science and, if it s·o dictated, recuse the judiciary in 1985. myself," he said. But he added he Noting that he had served in all had never come across a case that three branches of the federal gov- presented such a problem. ernment, he said the Constitution's He took issue with a philosophy . only provision applying to all three once expressed by Justice William and to state and federal officials as J. Brennan J r. in an address at well was the requirement in Article Georgetown University, stressing VI of an oath or affirmation in the "adaptability" of constitutional support of the Constitution but principles to current needs. Buckprohibition of a religious test. ley said that reliance on the "origiBut Buckley said that in requirnal meaning" of the document was ing the oath the founders were better in principle and also a safeenlisting the support of religion guard against "the ultimatl: judibecause the power of an oath ciaI sin: the abuse of power." "derives from the fact that in it we The work of ajudge may benefit, ask God to bear witness to the however,from the "Catholic ethos" promises we make with the implicit that "nurtures a respect for and expectation that he will hold us acceptance of lawful authority and accountable for them." tradition," he said.

Papal health always under microscope!

Continued from Page One an overnight visit to Croatia, he could not bend over to kiss the ground, another of his trademark gestures. Instead, a bowl of earth was lifted up to the pontiff. When he ascended Ihe altar in Zagreb, the Croatian capital, he chose not to walk up the steps but rode a specially constructed elevator out of public view.

U.S. prelates who have seen the pope in person say he looks and sounds good. But in public, with his face often hidden by his hand in meditation; and with a voice that no longer rings out sharply, it's easy to get a different impression.

At an audience with pilgrims at , the Vatican Sept. 21, the pope inched along the receiving line, a curved figure leaning on a thin black cane. He gingerly made his way to the oversized papal throne, where he sat looking rather uncomfortable for more than an hour, then needed help going down four steps afterward.

Doctors and curial officials say the pope's general health is good, . but that his two falls have made him much more tentative in public. They say the pope is quite conscious of his changing image, and that can have a negative effect.

"I think the day he doesn't feel like he's being examined every time he takes a step, he'll walkjust fine," said one member of the pope's medical team, who asked not to be identified.

The doctor said the pope had assured him he had never felt pain in the right hip, where reconstructive surgery was performed in April.

He said the pope may still occasionally feel discomfort in the leg, especially as he gets used to walking regularly again, bot the pontiff was swimming at his ~uri\lner villa outside Rome and managed to walk more than two miles at a time during his summer stay in the italian mountains, he said.

"My advice is don't watch how he walks - and then you'll see that

he walks much better," the doctor steps, which the pope could not said with a laugh. handle. The sick eventually were But it's hard not to notice how hauled up the steps - wheelchairs the pope is moving these days. and all - so they could greet the pope.

Photographers still follow him everywhere, and papal well-being Before leaving the hall that day, is often· judged on the basis of a the pope turned back to acknowlfew seconds of video footage. What edge one final burst of applause. many people don't realize is that, With a spotlight on him, he raised like the rest of the world, most one hand in salute, then he ld up his cane and shook it - as if he'd Vatican officials see the pope more like to throw it away. on TV than in real life, too. If news broadcasts show the pope on an off day, questions about papa! health begin to whisper through curial offices.

Continued from Page One The Vatican press office is sensiPerla said, adding that "as a. contive to all this. During the pope's sequence, non-public school chilfour-week hospital stay last spring, dren in Massachusetts do not rethe Vatican made public a humor- ceive many of the services that ous exchange between the pontiff private school students get in other and his surgeon. The pope reportstates. " edly told the doctor that together To enact Senate Bill 2, he said, they had to mend his leg, because Massachusetts senators and repre"there is no place for a retired sentatives must meet in joint sespope." The remark was seen by sion before the end of 1994 and a many as a Vatican effort to trunmajority of them must support the cate any such speculation as quickly bill. If it is passed, the proposed as possible. amendment will appear on the In recent remarks about aging, November, 1996, ballot. the pope offered some insight into Perla asked that persons unable how he may be approaching his to participate in the Oct. 6 action own status as a "senior citizen." call or write their representative Particularly in the church, he said, and senator to express their supthe older person can still make port for Bill 2. He said those needimportant contr.ibutions "even ing transportation to the State when advancing age imposes the House or further information on red uction or suspension" of physithe bill could call the P ACE office cal activities. at (508) 852-2200.

"We should remember, as old Organized earlier this year, people, that with health problems P ACE is sponsored by the Massaand the decline of our physical chusetts Catholic Conference. It strength, we are particularly assowas explained to Fall River dioceciated with Christ in his passion san school principals and pa:;tors and on the cross," he said. of parishes with schools at a May Indeed, the pope has always felt luncheon addressed by Perla. He a special closeness with the sick said the organization's objective is and suffering. Ironically, his recent the p'romotion and furtherant:e of 'mobility problems have made it the mission of Catholic education more difficult for him to mingle in Massachusetts. AIr Catholics, with the sick and show them that especially pa'rents of schookhilextra attention. dren arid gniduates of Catholic At the Sept. 21 audience, the s.chools, are invi~ed.t,o suppor'~ the group of sick and disabled sat in efforts of PACE. the front rows, many in wheelchairs. But separating them from the pope were 10 polished marble

Senate Bill 2

r<espeCL Lf

By Father RichardJ. Neuhaus

It has been a long moment, this

Ours is a mo'vement of pro·life struggle; and, it will be longer still. Those who have been love, and;, if it ever stops engaged in it for twenty-five years being that, it wW cease to and more know that there were claim our commitment. times when people talked about 11 is a movement of love for God, and of love for the neil{hbor whom others would exclude {rom the community of caring and concern. Seldom in human history have so many done so much for so long out of no rational reason other than the relentless imperative of love. When you are weary of dIe struggle, when you are tem/)ted to despair, remember that to us has been given the gift - and with the gift the obligation - of sustaining amidst the darkness the luminous moment of love that is dIe pro·life cause.

when it would end, about when victory would he achieved, and some still talk that way today.

Slowly we have learned, but surely we have learned, that we are enlisted for the duration. So long as we have the gift of life we must protect the gift of life. So long as it is threatened, so long must it be defended. This is the time to brace ourselves for the long term. Weare today laying the foundations for the pro·life movement of the twenty· first century. Pray that the founda· tions are firm, for we have not yet

seen the full fury of the storm that is upon us.

But we have not the right to despair. We have not the right and we have not the reason to despair ifwe understand that our entire struggle is premised not upon a victory to be achieved, but a victory that has been achieved. If we understand that, far from despair we have right and reason to rejoice that we are called to such a time as this, a time of testing, a time of truth. The encroaching culture of death shall not prevail, for we know, as we read in John's gospel, "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it." The darkness will never overcome that light. Never, Never.

September 1993 Life Insight

The Family••• The Sanctuary. of Life V ATICAN CITY (CNS) - Pope John Paul II told families the love and acceptance they show for each other are society's first··line defense against attacks on human dignity.

In a "Letter to Families" marking the 1994 celebration of the International Year of the Family, the pope said he wanted to speak to every family througho'ut the world about the beauty and power of their witness to humanity.

"The family has its origin in that

same love with which the Creator on the stable bonds of marriage, embraces the created world," the Pope John Paul said. pope said in the 102-page letter.

The pope criticized attempts to The letter defined God's plan define as a family unions between for the family as being based on a unmarried people or between peoman and woman married for life . pie of the same sex. He condemned and open to the possibility of havabortion, the "use" of another ing children. person in sexual intercourse out"The beauty of love and the side of marriage and the selfishness beauty of the human being who, by of couples who refuse to have the power of the Holy Spirit, is children. capable of such love," are ful1y realized only within a family based Turn to Page 12

CNS/phoro

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Stella Carmody. left. of Marian Manor. andfriend Angie Medeiros walk to the home's Senior Olympics celebration during National Nursing Home Week.

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Abortion and the Kind of People We Are

By George Weigel fortable things. We see the human carnage of 1.6 million innocents Wherever you go the!;e days, killed every year. We see the physpeople are convinced that our ical and emotional wounds inflicted country is living through a proon women in distress by the aborfound moral crisis. =-=--..,.'-"'I"ro-I~min~dpeople·have long. tion in$:hlstry, and by pro-abortion groups who treat ev'eryunmtffided heen aware of this moral crisis. For pregnancy as the moral equivalent when we look at American after of a bad toothache. And we see the Roe v. Wade, we see a lot of uncom-

betrayal of the American promise of Ii berty and justice for all in the name of a "liberty" that is, in truth, a private license to commit lethal violence for personal convenience.

SeeingaH that, we-wonder just_ what kind of a people we have become.

Today's sense of moral crisis in American life should be seen as a wake-up call reminding us of two basic facts. First, happiness is not a function of wealth, possessions, or social status. What makes us happy are faith, family, friends; what gives us the greatest human satisfaction to full participation of persons are obligations fulfilled, kindnesses with disabilities in the church performed, wounds healed, insights gained.

Secondly, democracy requires a virtuous citizenry if it is to survive.

The question that Lincoln asked at Gettysburg - whether a nation "so' conceived and so dedicated can long endure" - is a question for each generation of Americans.

Our answer to that question indicates what kind of people we are and whether we are a people fit to govern ourselves.

Why has the abortion issue been The work of His hands the most fevered public question . in American life for more than 20 SERVICES OFFERED: years? In part because it has become the symbol of the sexual revoluCNSpho'o • RELIGIOUS SERVICES • EDUCATIONAL tion. And why has the sexual revoSign Language Classes stressing Signed monthly Mass and Social FOR SALE? So-called "new reproductive technologies," fetal lution been so bitterly contested? total communication skills Communion and Anointings Because it has become the symbol tissue experimentation, artificial birth control and abortion treat (administered ot home ~r necessary) Captioned films human life as a commodity. Children come to be regarded as burdens Home Visitations of the belief that freedom is autoServices to persons with nomy: the "right" of the individual or possessions, leading us to wonder, just what kind of people are we?

Consultation In multiple disabilities Religious Education to do whatever he or she likes, so The cute young lady above, incidentally, is drumming up lousiness (pre-s{'hool through adult) long as nobody else (or nobody in for a sidewalk sale. and Referral Service Resource and whom the state declares a "comSacramental Preparation: In-Service Seminars pelling interest") gets hurt. This (First Communion. of other things. Some would argue ing, and far more affirmin:~ of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, . debate over autonomy is at the Outreach & Awareness Workshops that the sexual revolution - the human person in all its dimenConfirmation) ({ur Children & Adulls) heart of the question about what sions, than the thin egocentrism of radical challenge to the traditional kind of a people we are and what Diocesan Apostolate for Persons with Disabilities moral codes that once guided Amer- the Playboy philosophy. kind of democracy we shall be. Is ican sexual conduct - has made us The abortion license created by 243 Forest Street. Fall River, MA 02721 freedom the power to do what we more honest (meaning less hypoRoe v. Wade has also done serious like? Or is freedom the right of Tel. 679-8373 Voice & TTY critical) about sex. But whatever damage to our country's legal and being able to do what we ought?

REV. JOSEPH VIVEIROS, Diocesan Director the modest accomplishments of political orientation. Both ':he hisThe abortion debate is about torical record and reports of the abortion. But it is also about a lot the sexual revolution may be, at the very least it has also had an justices' intentions at the time show enormous and, I would argue, overthat the Supreme Court first depowering dark side. cided to create a "right to aborBy radically sundering the protion" and then cast about in the creative and unitive dimensions of Constitution for some me,ans of sexuality, and by treating sex as a justifying it. This constitutional form of recreational activity, the fishing expedition has con.tinued sexual revolution has stacked the ever since. psychological and cultural deck in In the 1992 decision Casey v. favor of men, for whom promis- Planned Parenthood of Southeastcuity generally has fewer and less ern Pennsylvania, three of the severe biological consequences.

Court's justices, seeking to legitimate their decision to uphold the The sexual revolution has de~ "central finding" of Roe v. 'Wade, meaned women. A single-minded insistence on sex as recreation and had this t~ say about the m~aning of freedom in America: personal pleasure has reinforced the image of women as instruments "At the heart of liberty is the for the sexual gratification of men. right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, l)f the By fracturing the linkage between universe, and of the mystery of childbearing and sexuality, the sexual revolution also has denied human life." Despite the highsounding words, one would have (and demeaned) the most distinctive element of female sexuality: its to go back to the Dred Scon decinatural connection to procreation. sion to find a judicial pronouncement more ominous in its im.plicaThe abortion industry, a $500 million-a-year business run largely by tions for American democracy. men making considerable profits For what Justices Kennedy, O'out of women's anguish, is a terriConnor and Souter really said in ble, if fitting, symbol of what hapCasey, knowingly or not, iii that pens when women are made into democracy is merely an ens(~mble objects, depersonalized - and, ul- of procedures by which we regutimately, defeminized. late the pursuit of our purely perThere is no long-term solution sonal concerns. The goal of the to the moral crisis of American American experiment has become "Caring With Christ" society symbolized in the practice the satisfaction of the unencumof abortion-on-demand that is not, bered, autonomous, self-constiat the same time, a solution to the tuting, Imperial Self. moral crisis ofthe sexual revolution.

The logic of the Imperial Self If we have been cowed by the that has driven the movement for culture of the sexual revolution, abortion-on-demand is that we are, Rev. Edmund J. Fitzgerald Sr. Rachel LaFrance, seQ we need not be. The Catechism of ultimately, a nation of strangers.

Moderator the Catholic Church and Pope John President We form no communities of real Paul II's 1993 encyclical Veritatis consequence: not of husband and Splendor offer an account of human sexuality that is far more compellTurn to Page IS

CELEBRATE THE CHALLENGE

Fall River Diocesan Council of Catholic Nurses

Catholic Nurses Answer the Church's Voice!

We Respect

Life

by Caring for the Young and the Old

THE ANCHOR-Diocese of Fall River-Fri., Sept. 30, 1994

Life Before Birth Conception A new human life begins. In the

split second when the sperm penetrates the egg, a genetically distinct inditlidual comes into being, possessing all the infomnation necessary to build the new person's body and brain. Within six hours a fabulous multiplicatioll of cells is in progress. Nothing new will henceforth be added eXCi?JJt nourishment for growth and development.

One Week The embryo implants in the womb.

Three \Veeks Already 10,000 times larger than at conception at one-sixth of an inch long, the baby has detleloped foundations for the brain, spinal column and digestitle, cardiotlascular and nervous systems by the 20th day.

The heart begins to beat on the 21st day.

Five 'Weeks The umbilical cord joins the unborn baby to the JJlacenta and to the yolk sac, which manufactures blood cells during the first weeks of life. Arm and leg buds appear.

Six W'eeks The brain is functioning with measurable brain watles at 40 days.

Mouth and lips are present. Motles and resJJonds to stimuli.

Seven Weeks Now three-quarters of an inch long-40,ooO times larger than the fertilized egg from which it arose-the embryo has etJOltled three initial sections of the intestine and a litler, which tak,?s otler producing blood cells. Fingers take shape, lengthen and separate. Toes appear.

Nose and ears take .lhape. The retina detlelops behind the future lens of the eye. The circulation system for the brain, begun at the third week, is now completed.

Eight Weeks Bones begin to detlelop. The baby is perfectly formed, with hands and fingers, feet and toes. All tlital organs are pre.l'?lIt. Responds to touch and painful stimuli; can

grasp an object and make a fist; sucks thumb.

Heartbeat can be.heard on ultrasonic stethescope.

Everything is now present that will be found in a fully detleloped adult.

Ten Weeks Fine details, such as fingernails, fingerprints and eyelashes are present. Baby can kick, curl toes and bend fingers.

Eleven Weeks Baby can smile; eyelids cOtler the eyes and will remain sealed until the setlenth month to protect maturing nertle fibers. The umbilical cord delitler.l a half-pint of blood a minute.

Baby begins to breathe amniotic fluid to develop respiratory system.

Twelve Weeks Baby weighs about one ounce; can squint, swallow, make a fist, sleep and wake. Bones etlident.

While.gender is determined at conception, external sex organs detlelop between the second dnd third month.

Fine hair begins to grow on the head.

Only 42 daYf old, the fetus is a tiny person full of life.

Fourteen Weeks Muscles lengthen and become organized; baby is mOtling though still too small to be felt by the mother since the inside uterine wall has feeling. A true epidermis (outer skin) has replaced the first protectitle membrane.

Six~een Weeks &by is about 5 1/2 inches long and weighs about 6 ounces. Ears are functioning.

Eighteen Weeks &by can hatle dream (REM) sleep. External etlents, especially noises, reach the baby and protloke reactions. In the brain, sensations are recorded.

Five Months &by now weighs more than a pound and is strong enough to dent the outside uterine wall when he or she kicks, so that the mother can now feel mOtlement.

Six Months Weight i.l approaching two pounds. Babies born prematurely at this point hatle a chance of surviving. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has remarked that Roe tI. Wade is on a colli.lion course with itself regarding fetal viability; each pas.ling year medical advances allow physicians to .lave younger and younger premature infants.

Seven to Nine Months The eyes open at seven months.

The baby now uses. the four senses of vi.lion, hearing, taste and touch and can recognize the mother's tloice. A fat layer is .ltored under the skin for insulation and nourishment. The baby absorbs a gallon of amniotic f1uid per day; the fluid is completely replaced every three hours.

Birth The only change at birth is in the external life support system of the baby. Air sweeps through the nostrils and exJJands the lungs. Then the newborn utters a first cry. He or she is no different now than before birth except he or she breathes and eats differently.

no

Life begins... in a petri dish?

In October 1993, some very young twins died but no one mourned their passing. In fact, the whole episode was heralded by many as a scientific breakthrough.

The event, of course, was the first laboratory duplication of a human embryo which took place at George Washington University in Washington, DC. Tiny litde lives came to be and expired in a lab dish as part of an experiment.

These techniques, and others which involve intervention in the process of conception or the artificial creation of life, are commonly called the New Reproductive Technologies (NRT), or the New Biology..

We might ask why this is even a pro-life concern. After all, NRT creates new life, right?

The answer is that NRT is problematic both in an immediately visible way and in a more intangible way. The most evident, physical concern is that human eggs are fertilized by human sperm in laboratory experiments, yielding new, distinct human beings. Many of them die. Lives are wasted in petri dishes - sometimes unintentionally, sometimes by deliberate action.

The 'intangiblt: threat of .NRT, however, is just as real. It has many

manifestations, all stemming from the same bad rpot, namely the abandonment ofthe truth that life is a gift from God over which we have dominion but not control.

Once we disconnect from that truth we quickly begin to set ourselves up as autonomous arbiters of our fate. Soon society begins to embrace the notion' that adults have a right to have children - and a certain kind at that, their own flawless genetic offspring, whenever and however they desire to have them.

It is not then a large leap oflogic to begin to devalue everyone in the creative process - men, women and children. The great threat of NRT is that it can reduce human lives to mere commodities. When we lose our sense of the origin of life and of our roles as co-creators with God, we reject human dignity.

Although these concerns are intangible, they' are by no means purely theoretical. The NRTare affecting the lives of real people in real ways. Mary Beth Whitehead became a household name after she agreed to serve as a surrogate mother but couldn't bear to relinquish her baby after giving,b,irth.

And what about the case of the

Davis couple whose divorce case held the nation's attention a few years ago? Unable to have children, the couple had sought infertility treatment at a local IVF clinic.

Nine extracorporeal embryos were created and frozen. When the marriage ended in divorce a dispute arose as to the proper disposition of the frozen offspring. The husband wanted the embryos to be treated as property of the marriage.

(You get the house, I get the car, you can have the T. V. and I'll take the embryos). The wife argued that the frozen embryos were children of the marriage and as such entitled under the law to a custody hearing.

Ultimately the husband prevailed.

Real people. Real lives.

Those of us who are dedicated to standing up for human life whenever it is threatened must be vigilant where the NRT are concerned. The pro-life community has a duty to be aware of the huge gap, which exists between what medical science can produce and the law's slow response. The public debate on NRT is gaining momentum and we must be prepared to raise our voices in defense of the sanctity and dignity of human life.

From November 1993 Life Insig~t.

~'I NTHE NEWBORN CHILD IS REALIZEDTHE COMMON GOODOFTHE FAMILY." POPE JOHN PAUL II LETTER TO FAMILIES 1994 YEAR OF THE FAMILY

RESPECT ALL LIFE THE PERMANENT DIACONATE FAMILY DIOCESE OF FALL RIVER 500 SLOCUM ROAD, NORTH DARTMOUTH, MA02747

TELEPHONE 993-9935

11

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Euthanasia: The Illusion

By Richard M. Doerflinger Disagreements on euthanasia run deep. Supporters insist that the issue is all about liberation: freeing .~he de\;lilitated elderly and terminally ill from involuntary suffering' and dependency.

Opponents reply that it is not

about freedom but about death.

Euthanasia takes away any freedom people might have left by taking away their lives. It may free their families and communities from the burden of taking care of the seriously ill, but their selfish freedom will last only until the time

CATHOLIC LEAGUE for Religious and Civil Rights

IIAMERICA ••• DEFEND LI'FE!II His Holiness, Pope John Paul II Denver, Colorado August 12, 1993

MASSACHUSETTS CHAPTER 85 BROWN AVENUE BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 02131

TEL. (617) 325-6357 FAX (617) 325-6358

of Freedom when they, too, become "usele'ss" and feel the social pressure to make a "final exit." And the move from voluntary to involuntary euthanasia will be quicker and easier than many suspect.

"Suicide doctor" Jack Kevorkian insists that while the patient has the wish and the need for death, the doctor has the medical expertise, co~mon sense and logic. It is the doctor who does the real rational decision making, judging whose wishes to die are valid and which medical conditions create a "need" , for assisted suicide.

The major 1993 court decision upholding Kevorkian's legal right to practice his profession of" medicide" took a similar approach.

Wayne County Circuit Judge Richard Kaufman recognized that an unlimited constitutional "right" to assisted suicide would lead to the deaths of many young and healthy people who have an "irrational" wish to die. He therefore ruled there is a constitutional right only to "rational suicide."

Two peopie may want assistance in committing suicide equally strongly; however, the objective "reasonableness" of their claims 'will be reviewed by a judge, who may grant one request and reject the other, based on which person's illness or disability is serious enough to warrant death.

In a case dubbed the "Roe v.

Wade of euthanasia," on May 3, 1994, a federal judge in Seattle struck down a Washington State law that banned assisted suicide, declaring that terminally ill people have a "constitutionally guaranteed right" to hasten death.

U.S. DistrictJudg~ Barbara Rothstein sa\d ·the right ~f a terminally ill person to end his or ,her life is akin to the right to end life sup~ port,. or the right to choose abortion. .

Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los

UIt is the right of every Pregnant woman to give birth. the right of every child to be born."

.,and

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Angeles, Chairman of the U.S. Bishops' Committee for Pro-Life . Activities, termed Judge Rothstein's ruling "profoundly disturbing."

"All that it serves," he said, "is the attitude that we can solve peopie's problems by getting rid of people."

strained by the growing cost of MediCaid and other health programs, leading in some insta:lces to ill-conceived experiments in health care rationing.

Consider Oregon's new Medicaid rationing scheme. That state has ranked about 600 treatments for cost effectiveness, and decided The Netherlands already has ~ they will not provide to the poor kind of laboratory experiment in - the treatments which fall bdow a voluntary euthanasia. In 1973, the certain point on the list. TreatDutch courts began to set forth ments falling low on the list include life-sustaining treatments for paguidelines for acceptable euthanatients with AIDS, the late stages of sia. First among these standards is that euthanasia must only be persenile dementia, and for very lowformed at the voluntary, explicit, birthweight infants. and persistent request of the patient.

What happens when assisted But as Dutch physicians have suicide is added to this mix? Probecome accustomed to administereuthanasia groups have introduced ing death, they have taken it upon a ballot initiative to allow doctors . themselves to decide on their pato prescribe lethal drug overdoses tients' behalf when it is time to die. for their seriously ill patients. If The Dutch government's own study approved, indigent Oregoniar.ts with commissioned in 1991 found 2,300 some serious illnesses could not cases of voluntary euthanasia, 400 obtain life-extending treatment but cases of assisted suicide, and 1,000 could qualify for "aid in dying" or cases in which physicians killed assisted suicide! their patients without their request.

How impatient is our s,)ciety Even some Dutch physicians who generally with sick or disabled practice euthanasia think the expeople who are hard to care for? periment should not be tried in the How many people would consider United States. They acknowledge their deaths as the lifting of a that in a society where doctors and burden - not a liberation of them, hospitals face growing pressure to but a liberation of the rest of us unburden themselves of the termifrom them?

It may be that freedom hali very nally and chronically ill, euthanalittle to do with this agenda. sia would not be a voluntary option but a,forced choice. . Richard M. Doerflinger is assoThat health care costs are out of date director for policy det'elopcontrol in' our country is hard to ment at the NCCB Secretariat for deny. State budgets have been Pro-Life Activities.

The Sanctuary of Life Continued from Page Nine God and bringing into the Vlorld Healso criticized me'n .who fail another person created in God's to take full responsibility for the image. ,Prayer is an important part of childr,en they help conceive, and he urged societies to recog~ize that a parenting, the pope said, mentionwoman's efforts with and on behalf ' ing in several parts of the letter the of her young children are "so great challenges of raising children, eduas to be comparable to any profes- cating them and preparing them to sional work." exercise their own vocation to love.

The pope said the modern famThe extra work a baby brings, ilyis "placed at the center of the the strain on financial resources great struggle between good and and even a diffused feeling th:lt "a evil, between life and death, between child comes to take up room when love and all that is opposed to it seems that there is less and less love." room in the world" can make peoReal love has very little to do ple question whether or not a baby with most depictions of love on is a gift and a blessing, he said. television, in the movies and in But every child becomes a gift to advertising, he said. its family, the pope said. "Its life Real love, he said, "contains the becomes a gift for the very people acknowledgement of the personal who were givers of life and who dignity of the. other and of his or cannot help but feel its presence, her absolute uniqueness." its sharing in their life and its conWhen a man and a woman love tribution .to their common good each other, he said, their unity and to that of the community of "rather than closing them up in the family." themselves, opens them toward a In the eyes of the church, he new life, toward a new person." said, family life is a true vocation.

"Fatherhood and motherhood "Families are called to contribrepresent a responsibility which' is ute to the transformation of the not simply physical but spiritual in earth and the renewal of the world, nature," since the couple is particof creation and of all humanil:"y," ipating in the creative activity of he said.

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uCan a mother forget her infant, be without tendern«~ss fOT the child of her womb?" Is. 49: 15

The Words of Life While the rhetoric of "abortion rights" promoters can appear logical on the surface, and many of us know people who have swayed by it, the words ring hollow when their meaning is scrutinized.

Following are examples of pro-abortion arguments and pro-life responses.

Argument

Response

Abortion is a matter of individual choice because no one can sa'l for certain when a fetu:s becomes a person.

When human life begins is not a religious, moral, or philosophical issue.

Scientists know a distinct human life begins at conception.

Every woman has the right to control her own

All human beings have rights which must be protected. A woman has a right to protect her own body. Her child, too, has rights, beginning with the right to continued life. Furthermore, the unborn child is an individual, separate and distinct from the mother.

body.

The government should not interfere in this highly personal issue.

A woman may need an abortion because ofp£.,rsonal circumstances

which make it impossible for her to care for her child.

Abortion is used only as a last resort and is frequently the result of rape, incest or danger to the mother's life.

If safe and legal abortions are not available, women will be drit'en to danRerous back-alley abortions, resulting in needless injury, et'en death.

A mericans who are lorochoice do not necessarily advocate abortion, but believe in an individual's right to choose an abortion. Even many elected officials who Clre personally opposed to abortion support the right of others to choose.

"One cannot at whim dispose of human life by claiming an arbitrary power over it. Medicine loses its title of nobility when instead of attacking disease, it attacks life....One can never claim that one wishes to bring comfort to a family by suppressing one of its members...."

- Pope John Paul II, Statement on the U.N. International Year ofDisabled People, 3/4/91

Thomas Jefferson wrote, "The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government." In modern America, it is naive to suggest that government can absent itself from the debate on the right to life. The government acts through law to regulate in areas much less fundamental than this.

Children's lives should not be sacrificed as a means of solying problems.

Assistance is readily available to any woman who chooses life for her child.

If she wishes to raise her child, there are countless Church ~nd other p~o­ grams that can provide counseling, housing, medical care, job training, food, clothing or other needed services. If the woman feels that she cannot provide for her baby, adoption is another positive alternative. Two million couples-at least four, and by some estimates, 20, for each available child-are waiting to adopt. Yet, for each child adopted, 50 are aborted.

The truth is that abortion has become a widely used method of birth control in this country. By 1988,43 percent of all abortions were repeat abortions.

Each year, about 1.6 million abortions are performed in the U.S. At most, one percent of these are obtained for reasons of incest or rape, seven percent to protect the mother's life or health.

Abortion advocates fail to mention the other 92 percent.

A death occurs every time an abortion is performed-the death of an unborn child. And many women are pressured or rushed 'into the decision to abort without knowing the facts or the physical and emotional trauma that can result. Many women sl;lffer post-abortion complications, such as cervical muscle damage and damage to the uterine wall, which can lead to scarring, future miscarriages or ectopic pregnancies. Since the Supreme Court's 1973 decision on abortion, hundreds of women have died from what were termed "safe and legal" abortions.

Abortion also puts women at mental and emotional risk, with many suffering anguish over the decision for years afterward.

There is no convenient middle ground when human life is at stake. The only "choice" being advocated here involves the life or death of an unborn child.

Those who feel abortion is wrong do so because it is immoral, unsafe, the destruction of innocent human life. Can they then support the right of others to do what they know is wrong? Politicians who say they are "personally opposed but..." likewise contradict themselves.

PATRONESS of the

FALL RIVER DIOCESAN COUNCIL OF CATHOLIC WOMEN

UPHOLDS THE SANCTITY OF LIFE Pastoral care of the sick brings His life to hospitalized patients, nursing home residents and parish homebound...

HOSPITAL CHAPLAINS AND PARISH PASTORAL CARE OF THE SICK PROGRAMS Serving Catholic patients in the following area hospitals.

STURDY MEMORIAL, ATTLEBORO • CAPE COD, HYANNIS ST. ANNE'S, FALL RIVER • CHARLTON MEMORIAL, FALL RIVER TOBEY, WAREHAM. BARNSTABLE COUNTY, POCASSET ST. LUKE'S, NEW BEDFORD • MORTON, TAUNTON

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"Sometimes the sick are not considered .ft~ ~~ as persons, and their care can become a .~ Jr~>"F~·.I.: !l.··~'';~~====;=';;:5 'job'. ... You are called to lhumanize"'''\~' ~ . ,..... sickness; to treat the sick as a creature of ,'. ." ~ God, as a Brother/ Sister in Christ. It is . <l..>~ ~ f.·t1\~· without doubt a difficult and demanding . ~;t J ~ mission. " \ ~ Pope John Paul II - Address to the Hospitaller Order of St. John of God

Diocesan Department of Pastoral Care to the Sick 306 South St., Somerset, MA 02726-5617 (508) 672-1523 Rev. George C. Bellenoit, Diocesan Director Sr. Shirley Agnew, R.S.M., Assistant Director

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the Catholic Church, would be must meet certain moral and ethiBy. Christopher Dodson, Esq. forced to pay insurance premiums The BiblicaJ command "Love cal criteria: * Universal coverage. The plan fot policies that cover abortion your' n~ighbor as yourself" Inay well have had more influence on should cover all people and .give and other morally objectionable procedures for their employees.

Western medicine and health care special priority to the poor.

Most federal proposals and most * Respect for human life and than all·the sCientific advances of states have "conscience clauses" the past 2,000 years. It proclaims human dignity. Abortion and euththat protect health care workers that respect for human· life !lnd anasia have nothing to do with from being forced to participate in human dignity and genuine co·n- health. abortions; virtu~lly no state pro* Contain costs. The system cern for one another are infinitely more important than considerations should eliminate waste so that val- tects all health care workers from of technology, efficiency, pr.agmat- uabie resources are not squandered.. violating their consciences on other * Serve the common good. The issues. As the threat to life increases ics and economics. This belief and with the growing acceptance of behavior are in jeopardy in our plan should serve the needs of all, not the desires of special interest euthanasia and· infanticide, such society. workers need protection. As more The ancient Greeks developed groups.

The bishops remind us that life experiments are performed with the basic science and skills of modern medicine. They also practiced itself is threatened when we treat fertility methods and fetal tissue, infanticide and allowed the chron- health care as a mere commodity to lab workers will require similar protection. ically ill to die because to do so was be produced and distributed like If abortion is treated as health practical. Jewish and Christian so- all other goods and services. Since care, preserving life cannot be conciety dismissed arguments of prac- health care is essential to the pres- sidered an essential purpose of ticality in favor of love of neigh- ervation of life and the dignity of health care. If that is so, then bor. It is not surprising that the the human person, any health care nothing exists to prevent an inprogram must ensure that everyone Catholic Church became deeply crease in euthanasia and physicianinvolve4 in founding and adminis- has access to medical care and that assisted suicide. Once they are destering hospitals, nursing homes, the poor receive ,equal considercribed as "health care" they will be shelters, and dispensaries, or that ation. increasingly accepted. medical assistance became a comIt is, therefore, greatly disturb. Health care and its distribution ponent of missionary work. ing when a proposal for any health involve significant moral choices.

The U.S. Catholic bishops have care program - federal, state or That is why health care must be spoken out in favor of health care private - includes abortion. rooted in a particular moral code.

It is truly frightening to consid~r Without it, the skills of medicine· reform for 'the past 75 years. In June f993, the Bishops issued a that under some proposed'health can be applied with disastrous resolution entitled "A Framework reform plans, every abortion would effects. for Comprehensive Health Care be funded wholly or in part with Christopher T. Dodson, a Reform: Protecting Human Life, tax money and/or mandated insuPromoting Human Dignity, Pursu- rance premiums. Even those who lawyer, is a lobbyist on health ing the' c::;ommpn Qood." 'While find abortion morally repugnant care issues for the North Dakota Catholic Conference. not ~ndorsingparticula,r health care would be forced ~o pay for other proposals, the statement is a re- . people's abortions..

Under some proposals, employminder to Catholics arid others . that a good health careprogrum ers opposed to abortion, including

r<espect: If.J:e

CHRIS GODFREY

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Pro-Life Athletes president to speak Chris Godfrey, a former pro football player and president of Pro-Life Athletes, will speak to students in diocesan schools today in a program organized by the diocesan Pro-Life Apostolate. Godfrey will visit SS. Peter and Paul School, Fall River, at 8:45 a.m. to speak to grades 6,7 and 8 and then speak to grades 7.and 8 atTaunton Catholic Middle School, 10:15 a.m., and Holy Family-Holy Name· School. New Bedford, at I p.m.

Pro-Life Athletes is a fellowship of professional athletes who foster respect for life by .speaking to youth and promoting :assistance for pregnant women. In 1992, with the Knights ofColumhus, the organization produced the video "Life: The Way of Champions," featuring members of the Washington Redskins and Buffalo Bills teams of Superbowl of XXVI. Godfrey travels to sp~ak to young people and to professional sports

teams on pro-life topics and was scheduled to give sucha talk to the New England Patriots yesterday.

A professional football player for nine years and member of the 1987 New York Giants Superhowl team, Godfrey lives in South Bend, Ind., with his wife Daria and their five children.

Amo,ng other endeavors at the Pro-Life Apostolate: - A pro-life newsletter has been lau~ched in the Cape Cod deanery, edited by Dana McCarthy of Holy Trinity. parish, West Harwich, and soon to become diocesanwide. .

- The diocese will send three buses to the ann.uai March for Life in Washing~on D.C., leaving Jan. 22 and returning Jan. 24.

- A dio~esan pro-life convention is in the early planning stages for the fall of 1995.

- The offic,e is expanding its chastity programs.

,He came that we might have ~IFE.~ndh(lve it more abundantly .~

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MINISTRY TO THE WIDOWED

PREPARATION FOR MARRIAGE

.Rev. Horace J. Travassos

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'Teen ttAJho was never ttborn" to speak at ~MCFL convention, dinner Gianna Jessen is Ii' years old, but she doesn't have a birthday.

Gianna was never born. She was aborted.

The teenager from San Clemente, California will be the keynote speaker at the MCFL Convention and Dinner, both to bE: held Saturday, Oct. 22.

"My birth mother chose to have a saline abortion when she was about 24 weeks pregnant, but by

the grace ofGod I survived," Gianna explains.

Medical records conflict as to how far along Gianna's mother was in her pregnancy when the abortion took place-24,2Q or 29 weeks.

In any case, under the Roe v Wade abortion decision, the abortion was legal and her mother's doctor injected a saline solution into her uterus, expecting to deliver a dead fetus the next day.

The kin,' of People We Are Continued from Page 10 wife, parents and children, or any other community ofcommon memory and mutual aid. We are only autonomous selves, strangers, maybe even enemies; and the state's job is to prevent others from interfering with personal autonomy.

The abortion license is most especially about abortion, and about our obligations to the weakest and most helpless among us. But the abortion license is also about America. The license is doing, and indeed has done, terrible damage to individual lives. The logic of the license is doing, and indeed already has done, terrible damage to the fabric of our society. We are a morally coarser people because we have accustomed ourselves to the annual slaughter of 1.6 million innocents.

We are a society with a weaker grasp on the cause to which our ancestors pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, because we have emptied "free-

dom" of its moral content and fiHed the vacuum with a radical individualism that is a sure prescription for endless personal and civic strife.

In defending the right to life of the unborn, in providing assistance to women in crisis, in refusing to be cowed by the claims of the sexual revolution, in challenging the lethal logic of Roe v. Wade, we are obeying the Lord's command that we be servants of the least of his brethren. But we are also working to give America a new birth of freedom. And we are testing today's answer to Lincoln's Gettysburg question: Whether a nation conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, can long endure.

George Weigel is president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington and the author or editor ofl5 books on religion and public life.

THE. ANCHOR-Diocese of Fall River-Fri., Sept. 30, 1994

Instead Gianna was delivered alive, weighing two pounds, her brain starved for oxygen during the hours she spent gulping the saline solution. A nurse of the abortion clinic's staff rescued Gianna and kept her alive in an incubator.

She was diagnO!ied with cerebral palsy which has resulted in four major operations. She still walks with a slight limp and sometimes stumbles but she is otherwise a bright, energetic teenager with some amazing talents.

She has written many songs about her unique birth and her deep and personal feelings on the abortion issue, and the songs have been recorded into a record album.

When she appears at the convention and dinner, she will not only tell her unique story, but also sing her songs. She includes a rendition of Michael W. Smith's song "Friends" in each of her appearances and dedicates it to "the little babies that die every day from abortion, because they are my friends and I will see them in heaven someday."

Last April at the National Right to Life's "Proudly Pro-Life Dinner" at the Waldorf-Astoria, Gianna sang a soul-moving version of "Amazing Grace."

Gianna's mother, Diana DePaul, travels and speaks with her daughter at churches and pro-life meetings around the country.

Ms. DePaul, the former chairperson of Crusade for Life in North San Diego, CA, adopted Gianna 10 years ago and has led her through physical therapy.

, GIANNA JESSEN Programs The MCFL Convention will be held 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Oct. 22 at St. Tarsicius parish hall, Rt. 135, Framingham. Gianna Jessen will give the keynote address from 11 a.m. to noon, and plenary speaker Msgr. WilliamF. Murphy, STD, will speak from 3:30 to 4: 15 p.m. on "Population Polemics and the Cairo Conference."

The MCFL annual dinner will be held that evening at the SheratonTara Hotel on Rt. 9 in Framingham with a reception at 6 and dinner at

7.

Information on registering for either event is available from MCFL at Scrafft Center, 529 Main St., Boston 02129-1101, tel. (617) 242-4199; or from Lisa Brown, (617) 235-7422.

All you who thirst come to the waters... Isaiah 55: 1

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All CATHOLIC SOCIAL SERVICES ATTLEBORO 10 MAPLE ST. 226-4780 • • • •

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FALL RIVER 783 SLADE ST. P.O. BOX M ' SO. STA. 674..4681

ADOPTION SERVICES CAMPAIGN FOR HUMAN DEVELOPMENT COUNSELING • INFANT FOSTER CARE INFORMATION/REFERRAL

NEW BEDFORD 59 ROCKLAND ST. 997..7337

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PREGNANCY COUNSELING PROGRAM REFUGEE RESETTl,EMENT ST. FRANCIS RESIDENCE FOR WOMEN SOCIAL ADVOCACY

SPONSORSHIP: ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS • SOUP KITCHEN SPECIAL APOSTOLATES APOSTOLATE FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES ARLENE A. MeNAMEE, Executive Director FUNDED BY: CATHOLIC CHARITIES APPEAL

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Lord our God, help all of us to work together to make a better world where it will be easier to be good ... a world where life will be reverenced, especially when it is most fragile. Free us from our moral blindness and help us to recognize the dignity of each and every human life made in your image and likeness."

- Bishop Sean P. O'Malley, OFM Cap., 22 January 1993, Washington, DC.

"Life: The Right Choice" PRO-LIFE APOSTOLATE 路 DIOCESE OF FALL RIVER 500 SLOCUM ROAD. NORTH DARTMOUTH, MA 02747-2930 (508) 997-2290 REV. STEPHEN A. FERNANDES, Diocesan Director MRS. MARIAN DESROSIERS, Assistant To The Director