FALL RIVER DIOCESAN NEWSPAPER FOR SOUTHEAST MASSACHUSETTS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS
VOL 31, NO.4.
Friday, January 23, 1987
Southeastern Massachusetts' Largest Weekly •
FALL RIVER, MASS.
$8 Per Year
'Sacred Hearts withdrawal announced Six parish~s affected.
Motta photo
ANCHOR INTERVIEWEES, from left, Susan Legare, Susan Sayle, Lina Maria Sousa, Lisa Francis and Susan M. Tracy
32nd annual Bishop's Charity Ball
"This ball is the best ever!" By Joseph Motta In an elaborate and impressive ceremony, 35 young women representing diocesan parishes were presented by their fathers or other male family members to Bishop Daniel A. Cronin at last Friday's 32nd annual Bishop's Charity Ball, held at North Dartmouth's Lincoln Park Ballroom. Thousands attended, a boon to the hundreds of exceptional and underprivileged children who will benefit from the event's proceeds at diocesan summer camps. Other diocesan charitable apostolates are also beneficiaries. Bishop Cronin was the ball's honored guest for the 17th consecutive year. He was escorted by honorary ball cochairman David J. Motta, president of the Fall River district council of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, and Mrs. Aubrey Armstrong, president of the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women. Themed "Land of Liberty," the social and charitable event com-
memorated the 200th anniversary of the and signing of the U.S. Constitution. Msgr. Anthony M. Gomes was the ball's diocesan director. Before the ball, The Anchor spoke with a presentee (rom each of the five diocesan deaneries. Susan Legare represented the Attleboro deanery; Susan Sayle, the Cape and Islands; Lina Maria Sousa, Fall River; Lisa Francis, New Bedford; and -Susan M. Tracy, Taunton. All were presented to Bishop Cronin by their fathers. l6-year-old Susan Sayle is the youngest. From Our Lady of the Isle parish, Nantucket, she traveled farther to the ball than any other presentee. A senior at Nantucket High School, where she's a basketball team forward, she confessed that she was a bit nervous about the event. "I just want everything to work out all right," she said. However, when her pastor, Father Philip A. Davignon, asked
Miss¡Sayle,. who is active in the parish Newman Club, to represent Our Lady of the Isle, she jumped at the opportunity. "I thought it might be interesting to do," she said. "It's just different. I've never done anything like it." Miss Sayle was the only Anchor interviewee who designed and made her own dress. She completed the project with the assistance of her mother and a family friend. The island presentee traveled to the mainland the day before the ball as insurance against bad weather. Susan M. Tracy, 21, ofImmaculate Conception parish, Taunton, a bank employee, said that being chosen as a presentee by a parish committee "came as a big surprise. "I'm having tremendous fun getting ready," Miss Tracy said. "My whole family is coming." Asked if, due to peer pressure, it takes guts for a young person to Turn to Page Eight
The Very Reverend William Heffron has communicated to Bishop Daniel A. Cronin the decision of the provincial chapter of the Community of the Sacred Hearts to withdraw from the pastoral direction of a number of parishes in the diocese of Fall River. This decision of the local chapter follows closely upon directions taken at the last general chapter. The chapter called for examination of the congregation's commitment throughout the world in light of its missionary vocation, Vatican Council II, and the diminishing numbers of men available. In order to assure a smooth transition in the withdrawal, Bishop Cronin and the provincial formed a task force consisting of Msgr. John Oliveira and Father John Perry from the diocese and Father Thomas McElroy and Father Columban Crotty from the Sacred Hearts Community.. The Congregation of the Sacred Hearts indicated its intention to withdraw from Our Lady of Lourdes, Wellfleet; Sacred Hearts, Fairhaven; St. Boniface, New Bedford; St. Anthony, Mattapoisett; Holy Redeemer, Chatham; and Holy Trinity; West Harwich.
The congregation will withdraw according to the following schedule: June 1987 -Our Lady of Lourdes, Wellfleet; Sacred Hearts, Fairhaven; St. Boniface, New Bedford June 1988 - St. Anthony, Mattapoisett; Holy Redeemer, Chatham June 1991 - Holy Trinity, West Harwich Bishop Cronin will undertake a study with consultation of the clergy and parishioners regarding the future viability of the parishes of Sacred Hearts, Fairhaven, and St. Boniface, New Bedford, in light of the withdrawal of the Sacred Hearts Community. "We wish, in one way, that things would never change. These are wonderful parishes, and we have been a part of them for as many as 80 plus years. We love the, people we serve in these communities, and we have been loved and supported by them," said Father Heffron. "At the same time, we must be faithful to our missionary vocation, to the decisions of our chap- . ter governments, and to the desires Turn to Page Six
Worcester auxiliary is named When Father George E. Rueger is ordained Feb. 25 in St. Paul's Cathedral as an auxiliary bishop of the Worcester diocese, Father. Vincent Diaferio hopes to be there. Father Diaferio, pastor of Holy Rosary parish, Fall River, was a seminary roommate of the bishopelect. He remembers him as a "good seminarian, very popular, humble and always smiling/' He retains those qualities, said Owen Murphy, editor of the Catholic Free Press, newspaper of the Worcester diocese. "The priesthood is his life," said Murphy. "He has never drawn the spotlight to himself." The bishop-elect has taken as his motto "That All May Be One,"
a reflection of his keen 'interest in ecumenism and also in recognition of the fact that his appointment was announced during the annual Week of. Prayer for Christian Unity. He will be the first native of Worcester to serve the diocese as a bishop. Bishop-elect Rueger will be- ordained at 7 p.m. Feb. 25 in Worcester's St. Paul's Cathedral. Cardinal Bernard Law will preside and Worcester ordinary Bishop Timothy J. Harrington will be principal concelebrant and ordaining prelate. Coconsecrators will be retired Worcester Bishop Bernard J. Flanagan and Burlington, VT., Bishop John A. Marshall. Turn to Page Seven