FALL RIVER DIOCESAN NEWSPAPER FOR SOUTHEAST MASSACHUSETTS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS
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VOL. 28, NO. 38
FALL RIVER, MASS., FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1984·
$8 Per Year
Not political,
says Abp. Law
By NC News Service Catholic bishops' condemna tion of abortion is not intended as support for President Reagan but is part of a struggle to pr0 tect an individual's right to ute, Archbishop· Bernard F. Law of Boston sald in an interview with The New York Times Sept. 23. The archbishop is one of sev era:! Catholic prelates who have condemned abortion. In a state ment by New England bishops, he and other church leaders re cently described abortion as the critical issue facing the pl1Iblic in 1984. Reagan has often publicly es poused the pro-life cause, in con trast to his Democratic oppon ents. "Whoever is elected in Novem ber ds going to be someone who on some issues is going to find the bishops supportive and some issues is going to find the bish ops a bit of a thorn in their side," he said. His comments on abortion are "not a political strategy to elect someone or to defeat someone," ~hbishop Law sald. Rather, he said, he had strongly criticized
abortion in his March 24 instal· aation homily, before abortion had become a major campaign issue. "If I don't seize every oppor tunity to try to raise the level of public debate, then it is I who am guilty," he said. As other pro-lifers have done, he compared the fight to ban abortion to the 19th-century abolitionist 'effort to end slavery. "It would have been the same thing in 1850 in terms of the abolitionist movement if those great Protestant ministers who led the movement had not been persistent in the f8lOO of great opposition," the archbishop said. "They would have been morally reprehensible. I think that ds a risk one has to take." He said that "if what we are talking about is another human being, then we have moved out of the question of free choice and of private morality and we have moved into the legitimate public concern of the state pro tecting the right of an individ ual whose very right to life is threatened." Turn to Page Six
Abp. O'Connor
agrees with him
By Tracy Early NEW YORK ~C) - Arch !bishop John J. O'Connor of New York said in a televised press conference Sept. 23 that com ments he has made on abortion should not be interpreted to im ply endorsement of President Reagan's re-election or opposi tion to the Democrats' ticket of Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro. He also said ~bortion was not just an issue of Catholic teach ,ing but the most basic of all human rights isSues, and that the media attention his com ments aroused were evidence that the issue has "seething in the heart, the conscience and even the national unconcious·· ness .....: if I may call it such of the American people. It has never been settled." Alternately sitting on a stool or standing, surrounded on three sides qy reporters, Archbishop O'Connor answered questions
for an hour in the second of a series of press conferences on live television. It was during an earlier press conference he made a comment some people interpreted as a signal that CathoHcs shomd vote for Reagan: "I do not see how a Catholic in conscience could vote for an individual ex plicity expressing himself or her self as favoring abortion." New York Gov. Mario Ouomo, a Catholic and Democrat actively supporting the Mondale-Ferraro ticket, questioned the statement. He later said he was satisfied with Archbishop O'Connor's ex planation that he was not trying to tell Catholics how to vote. But pubIic controversy was stimulated further when Arch bishop O'Connor said Ms. Fer raro had misrepresented Catholic teaching when she said dt was not monolithic on abortion. In the Sept. 23 press confer Tum to Page Seven
BISHOP DANIEL A. CRONIN presents a $30,000 grant check from the U.S. bishops' Campaign for Human Development to Fred Johnson of Massachusetts· Fair Share. Others, from left, Rev. Marvin Mottet, CHD executive director; Rosa Neto Lopes, New Bed ford area Catholi~ Social Services director and a CHD advisory committee member·; Rev. P~ter N. Graziano, diocesan Catholic Social S.ervices executive director. (Gaudette Photo)
"riest works for poor around the clock
He preaches, practices
'By Pat McGowan founder Dorothy Day on New Father Marvin Mottet is a York City's lower East Side. priest who practices what he There the 54-year-old prJest preaches. He is the executive shares in creating a welcoming director of the American bish-' atmosphere for an ever-changing ops' Campaign for Human De- . family of as· many as eight velopment, the largest national street men and women. funding program for self-help Guests may stay for one night social change :projects operated or many months, he said. During by and for poor and low-income their stay staff members work groups. to rehabilitate them, aided by He was in Fall River last week a friencMy psychiatrist who stops to present a $30,000 grant to the in daily on his way to work, a Bristol County E~ployment Or ganizing Project (BCEOP), an undertaking sponsored by Massa chusetts Fair Share and en dorsed by the Fall IUver dio cese. Going into his seventh year with CHD, the 10ngest term ever for an executive director, Father Mottet has disbursed millions of dollars for thousands of self help dnitiatives. He exercises on behalf ·of Am erican Catholics the "preferen tial option for the poor" made famous by the bis~ops of Latin America at thei~ historJc 1968 conference an Medellin, Colom· bia. After working hours, he ex ercises that option personally. His home is S1. Francis Cath olic Worker House in the north west section of Washington, D.C. It is a "house of hospitality" for the city's outcasts based on a model developed over a half century ago by Catholic Worker
pS)1lChologist and a group of vol unteers from Alcoholics Anony mous. Now and then there's the satis faction of turning a life aroUnd, said Father Mottet, but more f.requently a person comes, stays months and simply drops out of sight aga~. "We never hear what happened," he said. There are also those who don't come to the house at all Turn to Page Six