Pope Pius XII 1 Marriage and Morals Y. C. W. Publication* 

Pope Pius XII 16 Reply to Critics 638 W. Qeming Place 

John and Mary Ryan 23 Marriage: A Vocation C h i c a £ ° , 4 ' , l l i n 0 , S 

Charles and Rita Strubbe 30 Why Marry? 

Msgr. Reynold Hillenbrand 38 The Mass and Marriage 

Alexis Carrel, M.D. 48 Marr :°d Love 

Aileen Hogan 54 Training for Childbirth 

Edward B. Lyman 61 Let's Tell the Whole Story 

Must the Mother Die? 

t Reader Reaction 

X j g r c t r r A ' Abbey Newsmonth 

^ ^ v What ' s A Magazine For? 

y r Books on Marriage 

SPECIAL EDITION 
Christian Marriage 



MANIFESTO O N MARRIAGE 

WHEN Pius XII speaks, the world listens. Whether he is talking to a 
group of local bricklayers or an international 
Marian Sodality, his words are heavy with 
truth, and they apply in a way to all coun-
tries and all times. 

His recent message to the Union of Italian 
Midwives was no exception. A few state-
ments from it, badly misinterpreted, re-
ceived wide publicity in many parts of the 
world. But the rest of the message, as far 
as most people are concerned, has already 
been consigned to the vast boneyard of 
historic papal addresses. 

The purpose of this special issue of the 
Grail is to highlight this great document 
for the thing that it is: a manifesto on 
Christian marriage. 

The text of the Pope's message is the 
core of the issue. In order to make it more 
to the point we omitted the passages that 
referred only to the local audience. To 
make it more readable we clarified and 
shortened the sentences wherever possible. 
But the substance of the message remains 
intact. 

In the remaining pages we gathered arti-
cles to explain and illustrate the main ideas 
in the papal messages. The medical testi-
monies strongly support the reasonableness 
of the Pope's words on the value and in-
violability of human life. Aileen Hogan's 
article summing up the latest information 
on training for childbirth will encourage 
fathers and mothers in their vocation of 
parenthood. The meaning and purpose of 
marriage are discussed in a dialogue writ-
ten by a husband and wife. 

The rest of the articles speak for them-
selves. In one way or another they all 
contribute to the Christian design for mar-
riage. 

Walter Sullivan, O.S.B. 

the GRAIL 
Title registered 
U.S. Patent Office 

EDITOR 
Walter Sullivan, O. S. B. 

ASSOCIATE EDITORS 
Patrick Shaughnessy, O. 8. B. 
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Christopher Hoolihan, O.S.B. 
C. Q. Mattingly 

MANAGING EDITOR 
Paschal Boland, O. 8. B. 

OFFICE MANAGER 
Geoffrey Gaughan, O. 8. B. 

STAFF ARTISTS 
Timothy Kennedy, O. 8. B. 
John Harding 

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Substance of talk given on October 29, 1951, to the Congress of 
the Italian Catholic Union of Midwives. Asterisks indicate omis-
sions of specific references to apostolate of midwives. 

MARRIAGE and MORALS 

THOSE approaching the cradle of new life to assist this activity 
in any way should know the order the 
Creator wishes preserved there and 
the laws governing that order. So 
this is not a question of mere physi-
cal or biological laws which unrea-

soning agents and blind forces nec-
essarily obey; this is a matter of laws 
which God has laid down to be ac-
cepted and fulfilled by the free and 
voluntary cooperation of man. 

God's Perfect Intelligence has es-
tablished an order in creation which 

Pope Pius XII 



aims to fulfill His Divine Will . This 
order embraces man's external activ-
ities and the internal cooperation of 
man's free will. It places upon man 
the duty of acting in accord with 
the law of God and of nature. Na-
ture puts at man's disposal the whole 
chain of causes that bring about a 
new human life. It is man who has 
to release the living force. Once re-
leased, this force is developed and 
brought to completion by the laws of 
nature. Once man has performed his 
part and set in motion this marvelous 
evolution of life, his duty is to re-
spect its progress religiously. This 
duty forbids his halting the work of 
nature or hindering its natural de-
velopment. . . . Conscience, enlighten-
ed by reason and faith under the 
guidance of the Authority established 
by God, teaches how far lawful ac-
tion extends and where the obliga-
tion to abstain from action strictly 
imposes itself, 

i 
$ $ $ $ # 

The world today has to be con-
vinced by the triple testimony of 
mind, heart, and facts. . . . You are 
capable of understanding and appre-
ciating what human life is in itself 
and what it is worth in the eyes of 
sound judgment, your conscience, 
society, the Church, and, especially, 
God. The Lord has created all other 
things on earth for man; but man, 
in the full meaning of his existence 
and essence, has been created for 

God, and not for another creature, 
although, as far as his activity is 
concerned, of course, man has obliga-
tions toward the community. 

The Right to Live 

Now the infant is a human being, 
even though it be not yet born, to 
the same degree and through the 
same title as the mother. Every per-
son, even the infant in the mother's 
womb, has the right to life directly 
from God, not from the parents or 
any human society or authority. 
Therefore no man, no human author-
ity, can lawfully dispose of an inno-
cent human life; that is, no one may 
purposely destroy life; not even as 
the means of accomplishing another 
purpose, however good the latter may 
be in itself. N o science has this 
power Over life. N o medical, eugenic, 
social, economic or moral reason can 
be found to justify direct and deliber-
ate attack on an innocent human life. 

Certainly the saving of a mother's 
life is a most noble purpose, but the 
direct killing of the child as a means 
to accomplish that purpose is unlaw-
ful. A few years ago the direct de-
struction of what was called "worth-
less life," born or unborn, was prac-
ticed on many occasions. But the 
practice simply cannot be justified. 
From the start the Church declared 
such killing illegal, even though it 
be ordered by public authority. To 
kill the innocent who are not only 
useless to the nation but also a bur-
den upon it, is contrary to positive 

6 T H E GRAIL 



natural and divine law. The life of 
an innocent person is untouchable. 
Any direct attempt or attach against 
it is a violation of one of the basic 
laws that make it possible for men 
to live together in safety. . . . Re-
member that the law of God rises 
unshakable above all human laws, 
above all so-called "justifiable rea-
sons." 

Gift of God 

In mind and heart the father and 
mother should tenderly treasure and 
joyously desire the as yet unborn 
child; they should welcome it with 
love from the moment of its birth. 
The child formed in the womb of 
its mother is a gift of God. He en-
trusts it to the parents. How deli-
cately, how charmingly Holy Scrip-
ture describes the father sitting at 
table surrounded by his children! 
They are the reward of the upright 
man, just as sterility is often the 
punishment of the sinner. Scripture 
so perfectly expresses this in the 
verses of the Psalms: "Your wife 
(shall be) as a frui tful vine within 
your house, your children as olive-
shoots round about your table. Be-
hold, thus is that man blessed who 
fears the Lord" (Ps. 127, 3-4). But 
in reference to the wicked: "May his 
posterity be given over to destruc-
tion; may their name be blotted out 
in the next generation" (Ps. 108, 
13) . 

At the birth of the child, hasten, 
like the Romans of old, to place it 

FEBRUARY, 1962 

in the arms of the father, but for a 
much nobler reason. By this act the 
old Romans paid respect to the father 
and his authority; but with you it is 
reverent recognition of the Creator, 
a petition for His Divine blessing, 
the loving and devoted fulfillment of 
God's Will. The Lord praises and 
rewards the faithful servant for the 
frui tful use of his five talents (Math. 
25, 21 ) . What praise, what reward 
will He have for the father who has 
cherished and reared for Him the 
human life entrusted to him! A life 
worth more than all the gold and sil-
ver in the world! 

Mother's Love 

And now concerning the mother. 
There is no doubt that the voice of 
nature speaks to her heart and fills 
it with the desire, the joy, the cour-
age, .the love, and the will to look 
after the child. Yet, this voice needs 
to be strengthened and to assume a 
supernatural tone, so to speak, if it 
is to overcome cowardly suggestions 
of various kinds. The young mother 
needs help to appreciate the great-
ness, the beauty, the nobility of that 
young life forming and living with-
in her womb, born to her, carried 
in her arms and fed at her breast. 
Her heart and eyes should glow with 
that great gift of God's own love 
for her and her child. In many 
passages Holy Scripture echoes the 
supplicating prayers and the hymns 
of joyful thanksgiving of many a 

3 







mother who has had her prolonged, 
tearful prayers for the grace to be-
come a mother finally heard. 

Because of original sin, the mother 
must suffer to bring her child into 
the world. But that very labor is 
actually another bond drawing moth-
er and child even closer. The more 
pain it costs her, the more a mother 
loves her child. He W h o moulds 
the mother's heart expresses this truth 
with deep and moving simplicity: 
"A woman about to give birth has 
sorrow because her hour has come. 
But when she has brought forth the 
child, she no longer remembers the 
anguish for her joy that a man is 
born into the world" (John 16, 21) . 
And by the pen of St. Paul the Apos-
tle, the Holy Ghost again shows the 
greatness and joy of motherhood: 
God gives the child to the mother, 
but in so doing He causes her to 
cooperate effectively in the unfplding 
of the flower whose seed He has 
placed within her. And this co-
operation becomes a path leading to 
eternal salvation: "Woman will be 
saved by childbearing" 1 Tim. 2, 
15) . 

The great need today is for ap-
preciation and- love of a life just 
begun. -Unfortunately, and too fre-
quently, even a cautious reference to 
children as a "blessing" is sufficient 
to stir up contradiction or even de-
rision. The idea of the great "bur-
den" of children is quite prevalent, 

4 

judging from remarks. Such a frame 
of mind is so opposed to God's plan, 
to the language of Holy Scripture, 
and even to sound reason and natural 
feelings! There may be conditions 
and circumstances when parents can 
avoid the "blessing" of children with-
out violating God's law. Yet these 
cases of "pressing circumstances" do 
not permit the perverting of ideas, 
the belittling of values and the de-
spising of the mother who has the 
courage and the honor to bring forth 
new life. 

Supernatural Life 

" So far W e have spoken of the 
protection and care of life on the 
natural plane. W e are much more 
concerned with the supernatural life 
the child receives when it is bap-
tized. At present there is no other 
way of giving this life to the child 
who is still without the use of rea-
son. In any case, the state of grace 
at the moment of death is absolutely 
necessary for salvation. Without it 
no one can attain to supernatural 
happiness, the beatific vision of God. 
In the case of an adult, an act of love 
may be enough to obtain sanctifying 
grace and to make up for the lack of 
Baptism. To the child still unborn 
or the child just born this path is 
not open. 

Consider, then, that charity to 
one's neighbors means helping him 
when necessary. Also that this ob-
ligation is all the more serious and 

T H E GRAIL 



.urgent when the good to be done or 
the evil to be avoided is greater 
and when the needy person is less 
capable of helping and saving him-
self. Thus it is easy to understand 
the real importance of seeing that 
a child without the use of reason be 
baptized if in serious or certain 
danger of death. 

Certainly this duty binds the par-
ents first of all. But, in urgent cases 
when there is no time to lose and a 
priest cannot be called, you [mid-
wives] must perform the sublime 
duty of baptizing. Do not fail, there-
fore, in this charitable service and in 
the performance of this active apos-
tolate of your profession. May the 
words of Our Lord comfort and 
encourage you: "Blessed are the 
merciful for they shall obtain mercy" 
(Math. 5, 7 ) . And what greater, 
what more beautiful act of mercy 
is there than that of insuring for the 
soul of the child, on the threshold 
of a life just begun and that of ap-
proaching death, his entrance into 
the glory and happiness of eternity! 

Mary—Mode l of Mothers 

As soon as she heard the Angel's 
message, Our Blessed Lady replied, 
"Behold the handmaid of the Lord. 
Be it done to me according to thy 
word" (Luke 1, 38 ) . Her "be it 
done" was a loving consent to the 
vocation of mother. And hers was 
a virginal motherhood and thus dif-
ferent f rom all others. Yet it was a 

FEBRUARY, 1962 

real motherhood in the true and 
proper sense of the word. That is 
why Catholics, when reciting the 
"Angelus," join the remembrance of 
Our Lady's acceptance with "And the 
Word was made flesh" (John 1, 14) . 

The right moral order demands 
that a sincere inner acceptance of the 
office and duties of motherhood cor-
respond to the use of the marriage 
rights. Woman walks along the path 
pointed out by the Creator when she 
fulfills the purpose He has assigned 
to her as His creature. By accom-
plishing the purpose of motherhood 
she shares in God's goodness, His 
wisdom, and His omnipotence, as 
the Angel proclaimed: "Thou shalt 
conceive in thy womb and shalt 
bring for th" (Luke 1, 31 ) . 

Unwanted "blessing"? 

When a married couple genuinely 
appreciate the honor of bringing 
forth a new life, they await its com-
ing with holy impatience. They are 
ready to welcome and care for that 
life. Unfortunately, it is not always 
so. Often the child is not wanted. 
Even worse, it is feared. Under such 
conditions how can people be ready 
to carry out their duty? If only they 
will refuse to cooperate in anything 
that is immoral! Then there are 
prejudices to be banished, apprehen-
sions and cowardly excuses too, all 
obstacles that make motherhood a 
thing to be feared. If parents desire 
advice and help merely to ease pro-



creation of 'new life, to protect it 
and direct it toward its full develop-
ment, such help should be provided 
unhesitatingly Most important in 
these matters is a clear knowledge 
and humble acceptance of the Divine 
law. 

Pius XI, Our predecessor of happy 
memory, solemnly stated the basic 
law of the marriage act and marital 
relations (Encyclical "Casti Con-
nubii," Dec. 31, 1930). "Every at-
tempt on the part of the married 
couple during the marriage act or 
during the development of its natural 
consequences to deprive it of its 
natural power and to hinder the pro-
creation of a new life is immoral. N o 
justifiable reason or necessity can 
change an action immoral by nature 
into an action that is moral and law-
ful ." 

This rule holds good today just as 
much as it did yesterday. It will 
hold tomorrow and always, for it is 
not a mere human law but the state-
ment of the natural and Divine law. 

May Our words be a sure rule 
for every case in which clearness, 
firmness, and determination are de-
manded. 

Sterilization 

It would be far more than a 
mere lack of zeal in the service of 
life if man's tampering affected, not 
just a single act, but the sexual organs 
as such, in order to sterilize and de-
prive them of the power to procreate 
new life. In this case, too, the teach-

6 

ing of the Church is a definite rule 
for inward and outward conduct. 
Direct sterilization, that which aims 
at making procreation impossible, is 
a serious violation of the moral law 
and therefore unlawful. Public au-
thority has no right to permit sterili-
zation under the pretext of so-called 
"justifiable causes," and still less to 
order it or to have it carried out to 
the harm of the innocent. 

This principle has already been 
stated in the Encyclical of Pius XI 
which W e have quoted. Ten years 
ago, when sterilization began to be 
more widely practiced, the Holy See 
saw the need of speaking out clearly 
on the matter. W e then declared 
publicly that direct sterilization, ei-
ther permanent or temporary, in the 
case of man or of woman, is illegal. 
And this is by the power of the nat-
ural law, from which, as you are 
well aware, the Church has no power 
to dispense (Decree of the Holy 
Office, Feb. 22, 1940: Acta Ap. 
Sedis, 1940, p. 73 ) . 

Every effort should be made to 
oppose these unnatural trends and to 
refuse any cooperation with them. 

Rhythm Theory 

Then, here is a serious question 
we must face today. Can the obliga-
tion of being ready to accept mother-
hood be made to agree with the more 
widespread practice of observing the 
naturally sterile periods (the so-called 
agenetic periods of the woman) ? 
This practice seems to be a clear sign 

T H E GRAIL 



of the will to shirk that obligation. 
Advice and aid in this matter 

should not be sought from popular 
publications, but from objective state-
ments of science and from the au-
thoritative judgment of specialists in 
medicine and biology. Instructions on 
the biological and technical aspects of 
the theory should be given by techni-
cians [midwives, etc.], not by priests. 
In this field, Christians realize that 
the norms of morality should be 
known and defended. And the 
Church is the competent judge of 
the final agreement of this theory 
with the moral law. 

There are two possibilities in the 
case. If the practice of this theory 
means simply that the couple can 
make use of their matrimonial rights 
on the days of natural sterility too, 
then there is nothing wrong. For 
by so doing they neither hinder nor 
injure in any way the consummation 
of the natural act and its natural 
results. It is at this very point that 
the application of the theory differs 
from the abuse already mentioned 
which is a corruption of the act it-
self. There is a further difficulty, 
however, when the marriage act is 
permitted on those days exclusively 
(periods of natural sterility). In 
this case the conduct of the married 
couple must be examined more close-

iy-

And now two more possiblities 
must be considered. Suppose that at 
the time of the marriage at least one 
of the partners intended to restrict 

FEBRUARY, 1952 

the marriage right, not merely its use, 
to the sterile periods so that at other 
times the second party would not 
even have the right to demand the 
act. This would be an essential de-
fect in the consent to marriage and 
would make the marriage invalid. 
For the right granted by the con-
tract of marriage is a continuous, 
uninterrupted and permanent right of 
each of -the parties, the one to the 
other. 

If, however, the act be limited to 
the sterile periods insofar as the 
mere use and not the right is con-
cerned, there is no question about the 
validity of the marriage. Yet the 
moral licitness of such conduct on 
the part of the couple would depend 
upon the amount and security of 
moral grounds upon which they 
based their intention. The mere fact 
that the couple do nothing wrong 
in the act itself and are ready to ac-
cept and rear the child which in 
spite of their precautions may come 
into the world would not be enough; 
such conduct does not necessarily 
guarantee that their intentions are 
good and their moral motives un-
objectionable. 

Marr iage—a Vocation 

The reason for this is that mar-
riage obliges to a state of life. While 
conferring certain rights, this state 
also imposes the fulfillment of a 
positive work in regard to the mar-
ried state itself. In such a case, one 
can apply the general principle: a 
positive fulfillment may be omitted 

7 



when serious reasons show that this 
action is not opportune, or that such 
a demand cannot reasonably be made 
of human nature. All this is quite in-
dependent of the good will of those 
obliged by this state. 

The marriage contract, which con-
fers upon husband and wife the right 
to satisfy the inclinations of nature, 
sets them up in a certain state of life, 
the married state. Nature' and the 
Creator impose upon those enjoying 
the right of marriage the duty of 
helping the continuation of the hu-
man race. The special activity which 
gives their state its value is the 
bonum prolis [having children]. Ac-
cording to God's plan, the individual 
and society, the people and the state, 
the Church itself depends on fruit-
ful marriage for their existence. 
Hence, to marry and continuously to 
make use of the marriage right, and 
yet always and deliberately, with no 
serious reason to shirk its first duty 
would be a sin against the very mean-
ing of married life. 

There are, of course, serious mo-
tives that can excuse the couple for 
a long time, even perhaps for the 
whole duration of married life, from 
the positive duty of performing the 
marriage act. Such motives are those 
often mentioned in the so-called 
medical, eugenic, economic, and so-
cial "justifications." From this it 
can be seen that to restrict the per-
formance of the marriage act only to 
non-fertile periods can be lawful only 
if there is a morally justifiable rea-

11 
son. A sane and just judgment can 
determine the presence of such seri-
ous reasons, whether of a personal 
nature or caused by external circum-
stances. But if no such reasons ac-
tually exist, then the will to habitu-
ally avoid having children, while con-
tinuing to fully satisfy their sensual-
ity, is a sign of a false appreciation of 
life, and of motives completely out 
of harmony with true ethical laws. 

Fatal Risk 

Sometimes very delicate cases oc-
cur in which the risk of motherhood 
cannot be taken or must be avoided 
completely; and yet observing the 
sterile periods either does not give 
enough security or must be aban-
doned for other reasons. 

If in reliable and experienced 
judgment conditions absolutely de-
mand a "no" (that maternity must 
not be risked), it would be a mis-
take and a wrong to impose or coun-
sel a "yes." Here we are dealing with 
concrete facts, with a medical not a 
theological question. But in such 
cases couples do not ask for a medi-
cal answer (which, in the case, would 
have to be " n o " ) . What they want 
is approval of a way of performing 
the marriage act that will not carry 
the risk of motherhood. Even in 
these instances every preventive step 
and every direct attack upon the life 
and development of the germ is in 
conscience prohibited and excluded. 
In such extreme cases there is but 
one way open, that of complete ab-

THE GRAIL 



stinence from every complete exer-
cise of the natural act. 

Is Abstinence Impossible? 
The objection will be voiced that 

such abstinence is impossible, that 
such heroism cannot be demanded. 
Today you will hear and read this 
objection everywhere. Even those 
whose duty and ability should make 
them competent judges raise the ob-
jection. In proof of it they argue: 
" N o one is obliged to do the impos-
sible. And no reasonable legislator, 
it is assumed, wishes by his law to 
oblige people to do the impossible. 
But, for married couples long-term 
abstinence in impossible. Therefore 
they are not obliged to abstain. The 
Divine law cannot demand this." 

This false conclusion is reached 
through only partially true state-
ments. To convince yourself of this, 
reverse the argument. God does not 
oblige people to do the impossible. 
But God does oblige married people 
to abstain, if their union cannot be 
fulfilled according to the laws of 
nature. Therefore, in this case ab-
stinence is possible. " Supporting Our 

FEBRUARY, 19M 

argument W e have the teaching of 
the Council of Trent on the observ-
ance, necessary and possible, of the 
commandments. In this section the 
Council quotes St. Augustine: "God 
does not command impossible things, 
but when He commands He warns 
us to do what can be done and to 
pray for what cannot be done; and 
He gives us help so that we can" 
(Council of Trent, Session 6, Chap-
ter I I ) . 

Heroic Virtue 
Therefore, do not be confused by 

all this talk about impossibility. 
Never do anything contrary to the 
law of God and your conscience 
as Christians. It is wronging men 
and women of our times to judge 
them incapable of continuous hero-
ism. Today, heroism is shown in 
a degree and to an extent that would 
have been thought impossible in days 
gone by. The reasons may vary great-
ly, f rom acceptance of sheer neces-
sity to, at times, the service of in-
justice. Why, then, should this hero-
ism stop at the borders of the pas-
sions and inclinations of nature when 

s 



the circumstances really demand it? 
The answer is clear. The man who 
does not want to control himself is 
incapable of doing so. He who be-
lieves he can, will be miserably 
disillusioned if he is counting merely 
on his own strength and does not sin-
cerely and perseveringly seek help 
from God. 

"Human Values" 

For twenty years writers have been 
more and more occupied with "hu-
man and personal values" and the 
need of respecting them. In many of 
their writings even the specifically 
sexual act has its place assigned to 
it in the service of the married 
couple. They make the proper and 
more profound meaning of the mar-
ital right consist in the union of the 
bodies as the expression and actua-
tion of the personal and affectionate 
union. 

Articles, chapters, entire books, 
lectures, especially on the "technique 
of love," are written to spread these 
ideas. They make their meaning plain 
by specific advice to newlyweds. 
They pose as guides to matrimony, 
in order to prevent ignorance, mis-
understood shame, and useless scru-
ples from causing newlyweds to miss 
that which is offered them by God, 
W h o has created the natural in-
clinations. If a new life arises from 
this complete mutual gift of the 
couples, they say it is a result that 
remains outside or, at best, on the 
border of the "human and personal 

10 

values," but that it is not the central 

desire of marital relations. 
According to these theories the 

welfare of the child still hidden in 
the womb of the mother and its 
happy birth would have no more than 
a secondary importance. 

First Purpose of Marriage 

If this were merely a matter of 
placing more value on the persons 
of the married couple than on the 
offspring, one could, strictly speak-
ing, let this question pass. But we 
are up against a serious upsetting of 
the order of values and purposes 
established by the Creator Himself. 
W e are up against the popularizing 
of a number of ideas and sentiments 
directly opposed to the simplicity, 
depth and seriousness of Christian 
teaching. 

* * * * * 

The truth is that matrimony as a 
natural institution does not have as 
its first and inseparable purpose the 
personal improvement of the couples 
concerned. By the will of the Crea-
tor the first purpose of marriage is 
the procreation and education of 
children. There are other purposes 
too. Though also bound up in the 
very nature of matrimony, they are 
not in the same rank of importance 
with the first purpose. Still less are 
they superior to it. They are, in fact, 
subordinated to it. This holds true 
for every marriage, even if it bear 
no fruit, just as every eye is made 
for seeing, although in certain ab-

T H E GRAIL 



normal cases, because of special in-
ward and external conditions, it will 
never be able to see. 

Some years ago W e Ourselves 
made a statement on these purposes. 
Our aim was to disperse all the 
doubts and errors that threatened to 
create confusion about matrimony 
and the mutual relations of its pur-
poses. W e discussed the inner mean-
ing of the nature of marriage, point-
ed to the heritage of Christian tradi-
tion, quoted the teachings of numer-
ous Sovereign Pontiffs, and stated 
the regulations of the Code of Canon 
Law (Canon 1013, par. 1 ) . A few 
years later, in order to correct con-
flicting opinions, the Holy See is-
sued a public decree stating that the 
opinion of certain recent authors 
could not be held. Some of these 
authors denied that the primary pur-
pose of matrimony was the procrea-
tion and education of children. 
Others taught that the secondary pur-
poses of marriage are not less im-
portant than the first purpose, but 
equal to it and independent of it. 

Men—No t Animals 

Does this mean that W e deny or 
minimize what there is of good and 
right in the personal values arising 
from marriage and its fulfillment? 
Certainly not. The Creator has set 
up human beings in the state of 
matrimony for the procreation of 
life. Human beings made of flesh 
and blood, but also endowed with 
minds and hearts. They are not as 

FEBRUARY; 1952 

animals without reason. They are 
called to this vocation as men to be 
makers of their descendants. For 
this purpose God wishes couples to 
be united. Holy Scripture says that 
God created man to His image and 
that He created the human being both 
male and female (Gen.: 27) . And 
we find it repeated in the sacred 
books, that "man must leave his 
father and his mother and unite 
himself with his wife, forming one 
flesh" (Gen. 2, 24; Math. 19, 5; 
Eph. 5, 31) . 

This is all very true and so willed 
by God. But it must not be divorced 
from the primary function of mar-
riage, which is the service of new 
life. All the benefits of life together 
in marriage have been put by the laws 
of nature and the will of the Creator 
at the service of the descendants of 
the couple. And this includes not 
only the common toil of everyday 
life, but also the intellectual and 
spiritual gifts of both, even the 
benefits of the deep spirituality in 
marital love itself. In its full mean-
ing, perfect married life is the com-
plete dedication of the parents for 
the benefits of their children. And 
in its strength and tenderness, mar-
ried love is itself an assurance of the 
most sincere care for the children 
and the guarantee of its being car-
ried out. 

Home vs. Laboratory 

To reduce life together and the 
marriage act to a mere organic func-

IX 



tion for the transmission of seed 
would make of the home a mere 
biological laboratory, whereas it 
should be a sacred dwelling place 
for the family. In Our address (Sep-
tember 29, 1949) to the Interna-
tional Congress of Catholic Doctors, 
W e definitely excluded artificial in-
semination from marriage. In its 
makeup, the marriage act is a per-
sonal act. It is a simultaneous and 
personal cooperation on the part of 
husband and wife. According to the 
very nature of the human agents 
and in the proper performance of the 
act, there is expressed the mutual 
gift which, according to Holy Scrip-
ture, unites the couple "in one flesh 
only." 

This is something greater than the 
union of two seeds. The latter may 
be brought about even artificially, 
without the natural action of husband 
and wife. The marriage act, ar-
ranged and willed by nature, is a 
personal act of cooperation, and hus-
band and wife give each other the 
right to this act when they marry. 

Therefore, when this act is f rom 
the beginning and permanently im-
possible, as it should normally be 
performed, the object of the mar-
riage contract is vitiated. That is 
why W e said: "Do not forget. Only 
the procreation of a new life accord-
ing to the will and plan of the Crea-
tor brings with it, in so perfect a way, 
the realization of the purposes in-
tended. At the same time it is in 
accord with the physical and spiritual 

i t 

nature and dignity of husband and 
wife, and with the normal and happy 
development of the child" (Acta 
Ap. Sedis, 1949, 560) . 

Secondary Purposes 

Hence, the engaged couples or the 
young married couples should know 
that these "personal values," whether 
they relate to the body, the senses, 
or the spirit, are really genuine. 
But they should also realize that in 
the scale of values the Creator has 
put them in the second place, not 
in the first place. 

There is something else which 
runs the risk of being forgotten. All 
these secondary values in the gener-
ative sphere and activity come under 
the specific duty of husband and 
wife, which is to produce new life 
and educate it. This is a lofty and 
noble duty. But it is one that does 
not necessarily belong to the nature 
of a complete human being. There 
is no lessening of the human person 
when one does not bring into play 
his natural generative power. To 
give up this right, especially if done 
for the noblest of motives, is not a 
destruction of personal and spiritual 
values. Our Lord spoke of this re-
nunciation for love of the Kingdom 
of God: "Not all can accept this 
teaching; but those to whom it has 
been given" (Math. 19, 11) . 

To overestimate the generative 
function, as is frequently done today, 
even in its right and moral form of 
married life, is both an error and a 

T H E GRAIL 



misunderstanding. It tends to the 
danger of distracting the mind and 
heart f rom good and lofty senti-
ments. Young people, still without 
experience, and ignorant of the 
snares of life, so easily fall a prey 
to this very danger. And what norm-
al man, healthy in mind and body, 
would want to belong to the number 
of those lacking in character and 
mind ? 

W e add here a brief word about 
the defense of human dignity in the 
use of the sexual urge. 

God Wills It 

The Creator in His goodness and 
wisdom has willed to continue and 
propagate the human race, using as 
His instruments men and women 
united in marriage. He has also 
arranged it so that in performing 
this act, husband and wife should 
experience pleasure and happiness 
both in body and soul. In seeking 
and enjoying this pleasure, therefore, 

couples do nothing wrong. They 
simply accept that which the Creator 
has given them. 

Yet, even here couples must know 
how to practice moderation. As in 
eating and drinking, so in the sexual 
act they must not let themselves go 
without restraint to the impulse of 
the senses. The right norm is this: 
the use of the natural desire to gener-
ate is lawful only in the married 
state, in the service of and according 
to the order of the purposes of mar-
riage. Therefore, only in marriage 
and by observing the law just stated 
can the desire for, the fruit, and the 
satisfaction of this pleasure be law-
ful. Thus enjoyment is subordinated 
to the law of action which causes 
the enjoyment. And not the other 
way around, as some would insist, 
the action being secondary to the law 
of enjoyment. And this law, which 
is so reasonable, regulates not only 
the act in itself, but also the cir-
cumstances of the act. That is why 
one may sin in the manner of per-

When modern man, lacking the satisfactions 
of noble ambitions, devitalized, living with-
out power or prestige, goes through his dull 
monotonous life without joy or beauty, his 
dead existence depends on a fictitious sexual 
life. His sexual joys are moral joys camou-
flaged. He seeks to satisfy them, not having 
the individual or collective force to satisfy 
his real aspirations. These disguises of 
aspirations are the opposite of those which 
Freud indicated. 
—Jean De Menasce in Commonweal 

11 



forming the act, even though the act 
is completed according to its nature. 

Undermining Morals 
Violation of this rule is as old as 

original sin. But in our times there 
is the risk of losing sight of the 
basic principle. At present it is the 
custom to insist in word and writing 
(and some Catholics do it too) that 
the sexual act is necessarily independ-
ent of the primary purpose of pro-
creation. It is said that it has its 
own purpose and value. People want 
to re-examine and find a new rule 
for the order established by God. 
They don't want to admit any check 
on the manner of satisfying the 
natural urge, so long as they pre-
serve the essence of the sexual act. 
Ignoring the moral obligation to 
control their passions, they freely, 
blindly, and unrestrainedly follow 
the caprices and impulses of nature. 
Such a way of acting can but lead, 
sooner or later, to the undermining 
of man's morals, conscience, and dig-
nity. 

Nature might have aimed exclu-
sively or even primarily at the mutual 
gift and mutual possession of couples 
for pleasure. The marriage act might 
have been arranged solely to make 
their personal experience happy in 
the highest degree, instead of stimu-
lating them in the service of life. 
But then the Creator would have 
adopted another plan in ordering 
and arranging the natural act. But 
as God has arranged it, the sexual 
act is totally subordinated to and 

14 

directed in accord with the one 
great law of "generatio et educatio 
prolis"—the generation and educa-
tion of children. He thus made the 
fulfilling of the first purpose of 
matrimony the orgin and source of 
life. 

Human Dignity 

Unfortunately, ceaseless waves of 
pleasure-seeking sweep over the 
world. Married life is threatened 
by the rising flood of thoughts, de-
sires, and acts that are seriously harm-
ful to the first duty of man and 
wife. 

Too often this anti-Christian 
search for pleasure unblushingly 
teaches how to nourish the desire 
for an increasingly intense enjoyment 
in the preparatory actions and final 
completion of the marriage union. 
This mentality presumes that in mat-
rimonial relations the whole moral 
law is reduced to a regular fulfilling 
of the sexual act itself. And it holds 
that all the rest, however accom-
plished, is justified in the expression 
of mutual affection. And they go so 
far as to say that since the marriage 
union is sanctified by the Sacrament 
of Matrimony, all of these circum-
stances are therefore worthy of praise 
and reward where God and the con-
science are concerned. All this teach-
ing completely ignores the dignity of 
man and the dignity of a Christian, 
which demand control of excessive 
sensuality. 

N o ! The seriousness and sanctity 
of the Christian moral law do not 

THE GRAIL 



permit unbridled satisfaction of the 
sexual instinct in the way of mere 
pleasure and enjoyment. The moral 
law does not allow man with his 
intelligence to let himself be dom-
inated so completely, either in the 
act itself or in the circumstances lead-
ing up to it. 

Happiness in Marriage 

Some people think that happiness 
in marriage is directly proportional 
to mutual enjoyment in marital re-
lations. This is not so. Genuine 
happiness in marriage is on a level 
with the respect the couple have for 
each other even in their intimate 
marital relations. They should not, 
of course, refuse as immoral that 
which nature offers and the Creator 
has given. But actually, mutual rev-
verence and respect is one of the 
strongest elements of a pure and 
more tender love. 

This modern cult of pleasure is 
empty of all spiritual value and un-
worthy of Christian couples. Chris-
tians. should know that nature has 
given the instinctive desire for en-
joyment and approves of it in lawful 
wedlock. But again, the satisfying 
of this desire is not the final pur-

pose in itself, but rather it serves 
life. 

Banish from your minds this pleas-
ure-seeking mentality. Do your best 
to stop the spread of literature dedi-
cated to detailed descriptions of in-
timacy in conjugal life under the 
pretext of instructing, directing, and 
reassuring. Really, common sense, 
natural instinct, and a brief instruc-
tion on the clear and simple princi-
ples of Christian morality are usually 
sufficient to calm the' timid con-
sciences of couples. Whatever ex-
planations or instructions are needed 
on particular points should always be 
given with delicacy and in accord 
with the natural law and the healthy 
conscience of a Christian. 

This teaching of Ours has nothing 
in common with Manicheism or Jan-
senism as some try to claim in justi-
fying themselves. It is simply a de-
fense of the honor of Christian mar-
riage and of the personal dignity 
of husband and wife. 

% $ ifc * % 

Invoking upon you the powerful 
aid of Divine light and Divine com-
fort, W e wholeheartedly give you 
Our Apostolic Blessing as a pledge of 
more abundant heavenly graces. 

"Marriage can be wonderful from every point of view, 
when it is a combination of the highest physical delight 
with the highest spiritual development.... Since the 
greatest of all the arts is the art of living together and 
since the highest and most permanent happiness depends 
on it, and since the way to practice this art successfully 
lies through character, the supreme question is how to 
obtain character."—from Marriage by William Lyon Phelps 

11 



Less than a month after the talk to the midwives 
Pius XII answered the criticism it had aroused. This 
time, on November 26, he spoke to the members of 
two national Italian family associations. 

PIUS XII: REPLY TO CRITICS 

AMONG the natural institutions of human society there is none that 
the Church holds dearer than the 
family. Marriage, the source of the 
family, was raised by Christ to the 
dignity of a Sacrament. And the 
family's rights, liberty and high pur-
pose have always been defended by 
the Church, and will always be pro-
tected and supported by her. 

* * * * * 

External Pressures 
Frequently and under varying cir-

cumstances W e have spoken in favor 
of the Christian family. In most 
cases W e hoped to help it, or W e 
called upon others to help save it 
f rom very severe hardships. The 
worst of these is the calamity of war. 
The damages caused by the first 
World War were not yet repaired 
when" World War II ignited a ter-
rible conflagration. It will take much 
time and much patient labour by 
men, and even more trust in divine 
aid, before the serious wound in-
flicted on the family by two wars 
can begin to heal properly. 

There is another evil, one that is 
partly the result of these devastating 
conflicts, but also a result of over-

22 
population and of other improper 
or selfish tendencies. W e speak of 
the housing crisis. All those legis-
lators, statesmen or social workers 
who try to remedy this evil perform 
a most valuable service to the family. 
They also serve the family when they 
fight the scourge of unemployment 
and insufficient family wage. Then 
the mother will not be obliged, as 
too often happens, to get a job, 
but will be able to devote herself 
more to her husband and her chil-
dren. To work for improved school-
ing and religious education is also 
a precious contribution to the good 
of the family. So is the fostering of 
a healthy naturalness and simplicity 
of habits in family living. T h e 
strengthening of religious convictions 
and the development of a n . atmos-
phere of Christian purity will free 
the family from harmful influences 
from outside and from all those al-
luring excitements which arouse dis-
ordered passions in the minds of 
youth. 

But the family must be preserved 
today from a still greater misery: 
slavery to the state. There is a ten-
dency to consider the family as a 

T H E GRAIL 



mere organism at the service of the 
social community whose only pur-
pose is to produce a sufficient mass 
of "human material" for that com-
munity. 

Internal Corruption 

But still another danger has been 
threatening the family for a long 
time. And at present its growth has 
become so considerable that it could 
be fatal because it attacks the family 
in its very roots. W e refer to the 
wholesale undermining of morals in 
marriage. 

During recent years W e have taken 
every opportunity to define the es-
sential points of moral doctrine about 
marriage. More recently W e treated 
that doctrine as a whole in an effort 
to expose the errors which have cor-
rupted it. At the same time W e 
gave a positive demonstration of the 
meaning and purpose of the doctrine, 
of its importance and value for the 
happiness of husband and wife, of 
the children, and of the family as 
a whole. This doctrine also strength-
ens the foundation and superstructure 
of all society, f rom the home to the 
State and even to the Church. 

Marriage—Font of Life 

At the center of that teaching, 
marriage appears as an institution 
at the service of life. Closely con-
nected with this principle is another 
which is one of the essential foun-
dations not only of morality in mar-
riage but of social morality in gener-
al: namely, that any direct attack 

FEBRUARY, 1952 

on an innocent human life as a means 
to an end (in this case to the end of 
saving another l i fe) is unlawful. W e 
have illustrated this in accordance 
with the constant teaching of the 
Church. 

Innocent human life, whatever its 
condition, has a right to be protected 
against any direct deliberate attack 
f rom the very first moment of its 
existence. This is a fundamental 
right of the human person. And it 
applies throughout the whole Chris-
tian view of life. Hence, it is as 
valid for the life still hidden within 
the womb of the mother as for the 
life already born and developing out-
side of her. It is as much opposed to 
direct abortion as to the direct killing 
of the child before, during or after 
its birth. In both profane and ecclesi-
astical law, distinctions are made be-
tween these various phases of the 
development of life that is born or 
as yet unborn, and as regards certain 
civil and penal consequences of at-
tack upon that life. Whatever the 
foundations for such distinctions may 
be, all these cases involve a serious 
and unlawful attack upon the in-
violability of human life. 

Mother vs. Child 

This principle holds good both for 
the life of the child as well as for 
that of the mother. Never and in no 
case has the Church taught that the 
life of the child must be preferred 
to that of the mother. It is incorrect 
to put the case with this alternative: 
either the life of the child or that 

17 



of the mother. No. Neither the life 
of the mother nor that of the child 
can be directly attacked. In the one 
case as in the other, there can be 
but one obligation: to make every 
effort to save the lives of both, of 
the mother and of the child. , (See 
Pius XI, Encyclical on Christian Mar-
riage, Dec. 31, 1930.) 

One of the finest and most noble 
aspirations of the medical profession 
is the search for ever new ways of 
ensuring the lives of both. But in 
spite of all the progress of science, 
there may still remain, now and in 
the future, cases in which the death 
of the mother will be risked, cases 
when it is the mother's wish to bring 
to birth the life that is within her, 
and not to destroy it in violation of 
the command of God: Thou shalt 
not kill! In such instances man must 
make every effort to help and to save 
right up to the last moment. And 
whatever the outcome, he must bow 
respectfully before the laws of na-
ture and the dispositions of Divine 
Providence. 

Value of Life 

But, it is objected," the life of the 
mother, especially the mother of a 
large family, is of incomparably 
greater value than that of a child 
not yet born. The application of 
this theory of equalizing values in 
the case before Us has already been 
accepted in juridical discussions. The 
reply to it is not difficult. The in-
nocent human being's right to life 

18 

does not depend on his greater or 
lesser value. More than ten years 
ago the Church formally condemned 
the killing of life that was considered 
"without value." Those who know 
the sad events that preceded and 
provoked that condemnation, and 
those who are able to reckon the 
terrible results that would follow if 
one were to measure the inviolabil-
ity of innocent life according to its 
value, know well how to appreciate 
the motives that determined that con-
demnation. 

Besides, who can judge with cer-
tainty which of the, two lives is in 
fact the more precious? W h o can 
know what path that child will fol-
low and to what heights of achieve-
ment and perfection he may reach? 
Two greatnesses are being compared 
here. But one of them is an un-
known quantity. 

Heroic Mother 

A forceful example comes to mind 
which some of you may already 
know. Its repetition will not lessen 
its effectiveness. The incident hap-
pened in 1905. At that time a young 
lady of noble birth and of still nobler 
sentiments was suffering the effects 
of a frail and delicate constitution. 
As a young girl she had been ill 
with a slight case of pleurisy, which 
in time seemed to be cured. Later, 
after contracting a happy marriage, 
when she felt a new life springing 
in her womb, she soon became aware 
of a peculiar physical indisposition. 

T H E GRAIL 



The old trouble had become active 
again. The two competent doctors 
that attended her were thoroughly 
alarmed. In their opinion there was 
no time to lose; if the gentle lady 
was to be saved, a therapeutic abor-
tion would have to be performed 
without delay. The husband also 
realized the gravity of the case and 
gave his consent to the distressful 
act. The midwife in attendance duly 
made known the decision of the 
doctors and begged her to submit 
to their decision. The mother replied 
with firm voice: "I thank you for 
your merciful advice; but I cannot 
snuff out the life of my child! I 
cannot, I cannot! I feel it already 
throbbing in my womb; it has the 
right to live; it comes from God 
and should know God so as to love 
and enjoy Him." 

In spite of her husband's entreat-
ies and supplications, she remained 
determined and quietly awaited the 
event. A baby girl was regularly 
born; but immediately after, the 
health of the mother began to grow 
worse. The pulmonary lesion spread; 
the deterioration became progressive. 
Two months later she was at the 
limit of her physical strength. She 
once again saw her little child, who 
was growing healthily under the care 
of a robust nurse. The mother's lips 
broke into a sweet smile and she 
passed away peacefully. 

Many years went by. In a certain 
religious order there was a young 
Sister totally dedicated to the care 

FEBRUARY, 1952 

and education of abandoned children, 
tending sick little ones with eyes 
full of maternal love, as if to give 
them life. It was the daughter of 
the sacrifice, who now with her gen-
erous heart was doing so much good 
among abandoned children. The 
heroism of her fearless mother had 
not been in vain! 

But W e ask: Is it possible that 
Christian feeling, or even merely hu-
man feeling, has been so dulled that 
it can no longer appreciate the su-
preme sacrifice of the mother and the 
apparent action of Divine Provi-
dence, which brought forth such a 
splendid fruit from that holocaust? 

Medicine and Marriage 

W e have always intentionally used 
the expressions, "direct attack,on the 
life of an innocent person," and 
"direct killing." Because, for ex-
ample, the saving of the life of the 
future mother, independently of her 
pregnant condition, may urgently re-
quire a surgical act or other thera-
peutic treatment which would have 
as an inevitable result, in no way 
desired nor intended, the death of 
the fetus. Such an act could no 
longer be called a direct attack on 
an innocent life. Under these con-
ditions the operation can be licit, 
like other similar medical treatments, 
granted always that a good of high 
value is concerned, such as human 
life, and that it is impossible to 
postpone the operation until after 
the birth of the child, or to have 
recourse to other effective remedies. 

19 



Since the primary duty of matri-
mony is to be at the service of life, 
W e express Our highest gratification 
and Our paternal gratitude to those 
generous mothers and fathers who, 
for the love of God and with trust 
in Him, courageously raise a large 
family. 

Family Limitation 
On the other hand, the Church 

knows how to consider with sym-
pathy and understanding the real 
difficulties of the married state in 
our day. Thus, in Our last address 
on morality in marriage, W e affirmed 
the legitimacy and, at the same time, 
the limits—in truth very wide—of 
a regulation of offspring which, un-
like so-called "birth control," is in 
accord with the law of God. One 
may even hope that medical science 
will succeed in providing this licit 
method with ,a sufficiently secure 
basis. And the most recent informa-
tion seems to confirm such a hope; 
but in this matter the Church natural-
ly leaves the judgment to medical 
science. 

Sacramental Life 
What is of the greatest value in 

overcoming the many trials of mar-
ried life is a living faith and a fre-
quent reception of the Sacraments. 
From these. sources torrents of 
strength pour forth. Their full ef-

fect cannot easily be grasped by those 
living outside the Church. And with 
this reminder of supernatural aid 
W e desire to conclude Our address. 

It may happen, beloved sons and 
daughters, that one day you will find 
your courage wavering under the 
violence of tempests unleashed a-
round you and even more dangerous-
ly within the very bosom of the 
family. Subversive doctrines are be-
ing preached against the healthy and 
normal idea of Christian marriage. 
Have confidence! The energies of 
nature and especially the strength of 
grace with which Our Lord has en-
riched your souls in the Sacrament of 
Matrimony are as a firm rock against 
which the waves of a storm-tossed 
sea break powerlessly. 

True, the tragedies of the war 
and the post-war period have in-
flicted on marriage and the family 
wounds that are still bleeding. Yet 
in these same years the constant 
faith and firm perseverance of mar-
ried couples and maternal love too 
every ready for untold sacrifices, have 
won true and splendid triumphs in 
innumerable cases. 

With all vigor, then, carry on 
your work, confident in divine aid 
in pledge of which W e impart f rom 
Our heart to you and to your fam-
ilies Our paternal Apostolic Bene-
diction. 

Until the world accepts the principle of the Brother-
hood of Man under the Fatherhood of God, it will be 
compelled to live under a day-in and day-out alert with 
the dread of deadly explosions always imminent." 

President Harry S. Truman 

11 



MEDICAL TESTIMONIES 

Must the Mother die? 

POLLQWING Pms XII's talk to the Italian Midwives, sensational press 
A reports claimed that according to the Pope's teaching, in case of 
difficult delivery every effort must be made to save the life of the 
child, irrespective of the mother's safety. Storms of protest arose.. 
Naturally! But the Holy Father had been misquoted. He said- "To 
save the life of the mother is a most noble purpose, but the direct 
killing of the child as a means to this end is not lawful " 

Physicians, of course, were drawn 
into the discussions on "legal" abor-
tions. The following statements ap-
peared in news columns: 
• Dr. Samuel Cosgrove, professor at 
Columbia University, New York 
City, and practicing at Margaret 
Hague Maternity Hospital, Jersey 
City, spoke at the recent congress 
of leading obstetricians held in San 
Francisco. He stated: "We do not, 
in our hospital, feel we have 'mur-
dered' any mother by withholding 
therapeutic abortions. Heart disease, 
for example, under no circumstances 
is ground for an abortion because 
the handling of women in labor can 
be adroit enough to eliminate shock. 
Therapeutic abortion not only car- ' 
ries a high death rate in itself, but 
it is fraught with other hazards. 
Such an operation is often followed 
by semi-invalidism, sterility, serious 
trauma, a guilt complex and frus-
tration." 

• D r . James H. Beaton, chairman 
of obstetrics and gynecology at St. 
Mary's Hospital in Grand Rapids, 
Michigan, further reports on Dr. 
Cosgrove: "Dr. Samuel A. Cosgrove 
stated in an address before the New 
York Obstetrical Society, March 14, 
1944, that at Margaret Hague Ma-
ternity Hospital there were but four 
therapeutic abortions in 67,000 de-
liveries from 1931 to 1943. At the 
American College of Surgeons meet-
ing in San Francisco recently Dr. 
Cosgrove further reported that no 
therapeutic abortions have been per-
formed at his hospital since his 
original report in 1943. And the 
doctor insisted that there is no justi-
fiable reason for a direct therapeutic 
abortion in the modern practice of 
obstetrics." 

• Dr. Beaton, himself widely known 
in his field, said that the choice be-
tween sacrificing the life of an un-
born infant and that of the mother 

11 



is "entirely theoretical and actually 
does not happen in modern medical 
practice." He emphasized the moral 
code whereby no doctor has the right 
"to destroy life in order to save a 
life." Referring to the frequency of 
therapeutic abortions some fifteen 
years ago in cases of pregnant wom-
en with various diseases and toxic 
conditions, Dr. Beaton insisted: 
"Now, with modern medical knowl-
edge therapeutic abortion is prac-
tically extinct in all good hospitals. 
The modern doctor treats the disease 
skillfully and leaves the normal con-
dition, pregnancy, alone." 

• Dr. Roy J. Heffernan, of Tufts 
College and Carney Hospital, Boston, 
speaking at the same congress men-
tioned above, emphatically declared: 
"Anyone performing a therapeutic 
abortion today does so because he 
is either ignorant of modern methods 
of treating complications of preg-
nancy or else he is unwilling to take 
the time to treat them. Abortions 
are contrary to natural law. An un-
born baby is human, and the medical 
profession is dedicated to the pres-
ervation of human life." 

• British Catholic doctors, answering 
attacks occasioned by the Holy Fa-
ther's talk, issued a statement in 
which they declared: 

"The Catholic doctor who respects 
all life, mother's and child's equally, 
is more deserving of trust than the 
doctor who is prepared to kill the 

22 

child by performing abortions. With 
the advances made in modern medi-
cine, a case where the mother would 
have to be sacrificed to save the 
child very rarely arises. The Hip-
pocratic Oath as well as the Fifth 
Commandment forbid the murder of 
the unborn child. The Pope's pro-
nouncement introduces nothing new, 
and any loss of confidence in Cath-
olic doctors or nurses who have 
shown skill and devotion to duty 
in the past is unjustified." 

• The Reverend Joseph Ryland-
Whitaker, a Jesuit and a qualified 
physician and chaplain of Glasgow 
University, told students: "An in-
teresting point is that modern ob-
stetric practice is coming more and 
more into line with the teaching 
of the Catholic Church. Abortion 
is now considered very bad medically 
and very bad surgically. It is now 
recognized that a pregnancy does 
not usually cause deterioration of 
the mother's health, and very often 
it helps her towards recovery. If 
a thing is bad morally then it is 
bad technically in medical practice, 
and the Church has rendered a great 
service to medicine in pointing that 
out." 

A In his more recent talk, the second 
article in this issue, Pius XII em-
phatically denied that he had pre-
ferred the child's life to the mother's. 
Read the detailed treatment of this 
question in that document of His 
Holiness. 

T H E GRAIL 



John Julian Ryan and Mary Perkins are both well 
known writers. Here they team up as husband and 
wife to outline their ideas on the vocation of marriage. 

Fide» Publishers 

WHEN we were leaving school or college, twenty years or so ago, 
only those boys who intended to be 
priests or brothers, only those girls 
who hoped to be sisters were con-
sidered to "have vocations." The 
rest of us really thought that, since 
we had not been given vocations to 
the religious or priestly life, we had 
no vocations at all. W e knew, of 
course, from our catechism, that God 
had made us to know, love and serve 
FEBRUARY, 1962 

f i i e f i f i i f l G f 

a v o c a t i o n 

BY JOHN A N D MARY RYAN 

Him on earth and be happy with 
Him forever in heaven. But we 
somehow thought, nevertheless, that 
He Himself had no special plans for 
us, that He had not "called" us to 
do anything special for Him or with 
Him. Those of us who managed to 
get married would be fortunate, we 
thought, but not because marriage 
was a way to God. God had not 
chosen us for His special service, and 
so, married or single, our job was 

23 



merely to make a living, have as 
good a time as possible while avoid-
ing sin, and so to pass the time 
until the day of our death. 

How much damage such a foggy 
and false—and widespread-=idea of 
"vocation" has done to souls and 
to the Church, only God knows. 
How many potentially great servants 
of God have turned to frivolity or 
to some false cause, since they 
thought that God had no work for 
them! How many homes that might 
have become nurseries of saints have 
merely tried to be nurseries of suc-
cesses, because they thought that this 
was all that marriage was for! 

But, thank God, in these last 
twenty-odd years, this odd idea of 
God's Providence from which we 
suffered—as if He had plans for 
only five percent of His children!— 
is gradually giving way to the Chris-
tian truth, that God called each of 
us into being, called each of us to 
be a member of His Church, calls 
each of us to do some special work 
for Him towards the establishment 
of His Kingdom, calls us each to our 
own special function in the Mystical 
Body of Christ, to contribute our 
own special happiness to the joy of 
all redeemed mankind in heaven. 
In other words, each of us has a 
vocation. The priesthood and the 
religious life are, of course, the high-
est and greatest vocations; but both 
married life and single life in the 
world are also vocations, and are to 
be lived as vocations, for we Chris-

24 

tians are all "called to be saints." 
What is meant by a "vocation," in 

the Christian use of the word ? First 
of all, it is a state of life to which 
God calls people. Then, it is a state 
of life which has been established 
by God, which is, therefore, itself 
holy and capable of making those 
holy who try to fulfill its require-
ments and cooperate with God's 
grace. And, lastly, a vocation is 
that way or state of life by which 
God wishes those whom He calls 
to it to grow in His knowledge and 
love, to serve Him on earth, and to 
come to share His happiness in 
heaven. 

We all know that the priesthood 
and the religious life are vocations, 
that they fulfill these three require-
ments. But what about marriage? 

First of all, can anybody be said 
to be "called" by God to the state 
of marriage? Yes. As members of 
the human race we were all called 
to marriage in the very beginning 
of things when God blessed Adam 
and Eve and told them to "increase 
and multiply." This call is given 
to the race in general, and ordinarily, 
is not of obligation to any one per-
son. But it is, none the less, a very 
real call, the call which shows God's 
will as to the choice of a state of life 
for the majority of His human crea-
tures. In other words, unless a higher 
call intervenes to the priesthood 
or the religious life, or unless cir-
cumstances show that God's Will 
is otherwise, anybody may rightly 

T H E GRAIL 



consider himself or herself "called" 
to the state of marriage. 

But can it be said that Joe is 
particularly called by God to marry 
Jane, rather than Imelda: that Jane 
really has a "vocation" to marry Joe 
rather than Steve? If Joe and Jane, 
before and during their engagement, 
have been trying to discover and 
carry out God's Will, using ordinary 
common sense, praying for light and 
grace, then it can certainly be said 
that each truly has a God-given vo-
cation to marry the other. And even 
if they got married without due 
thought or care, even if the marriage 
humanly'seems to be a mistake, once 
it is a fact, a marriage becomes at 
the very least a God-permitted vo-
cation, the only way of life by which 
God wants these two people to serve 
Him. (The equivalent kind of God-

FEBRTJARY, 1953 

permitted vocation used often to be 
seen in Europe in the case of girls 
"pushed" by their impoverished fam-
ilies into convents whether they 
themselves would have so chosen 
or not. But God's plans and work 
for each of us are not frustrated by 
our mistakes!) And the more young 
people are accustomed to think of 
marriage as a vocation, to choose it 
in that light and to choose their 
partners in that light, the more each 
marriage will become an intelligent, 
willing and generous response to 
God's call, not a confused reaction 
to instinct, even though God-given. 

We may, then, truly say that peo-
ple are called to the state of marriage. 
May we also say that marriage is 
instituted by God, is a holy way of 
life and capable of making us holy ? 
Of course we may, and we cannot 
help doing so if we read about the 
institution of marriage in Paradise, 
Our Lord's words about marriage in 
the Gospels, St. Paul's Epistles, the 
Marriage Ceremony and Nuptial 
Mass and the Encyclical on Christian 
Marriage. Every pagan culture up 
to our own considered marriage a 
religious institution, considered fam-
ily life to be essentially bound up 
with the worship and service of the 
gods. The Jews, the chosen People, 
knew all this from God's own revela-
tion and decree, and knew also that 
from their marriages, from their 
family life, some day would come 
the Messiah. How much more should 
we consider marriage holy, and cap-

25 



able of making us holy, since Our 
Lord has made it a Sacrament, a 
channel of His life, of His grace. 
Now our marriages are patterned, 
constructed, founded, on the model 
of the union between Christ and His 
Church, made to be and meant to 
be visible images of that union. How 
could God possibly have made it 
clearer that Christian marriage is a 
holy state of life? 

But, yet, married people ordinarily 
have little time to pray, little time 
to be quiet and think about God, 
little time or energy to go out and 
work to establish His Kingdom. How 
can it be said that marriage is a way 
of life which leads us to know and 
love God better, which enables us to 
work for Him, which can unite us 
to Him on earth as a preparation 
to happiness with Him in heaven? 
The objections seem formidable 
mainly because we are so accustomed 
to hearing them; but when we begin 
to examine married life as it is, we 
begin to see more and more clearly, 
not less, precisely why God has made 
it the vocation for the majority of 
His children. For most of us could 
only learn about God's love for 
mankind, about the love which Christ 
has for His Church and for our own 
souls, through experiencing the love 
of a fellow-creature, the full, com-
plete self-donation of one person to 
another which is only possible in 
marriage and in married life. W e 
could only learn how to love God 
with our whole hearts and souls and 

26 

minds and strengths by learning and 
practising complete self-donation in 
marriage, by giving our energy, our 
time, our interest, our life-blood it-
self as they are called for by the 
necessities of family life, as well as 
by that special form of self-donation 
which sums it all up, the marriage 
act itself. Those people whom God 
fits for and calls to a life of celibacy 
for Him, do not need such practice, 
such schooling in both thé perfec-
tions and imperfections of human 
love and human union. They can go 
straight to the reality of the love of 
God and the love of man for His 
sake, to the reality of union with 
Him. But the majority of us need 
the symbol in order to achieve that 
same reality. 

Again, the very relationships of 
family life are those which God uses 
to teach us about Himself and His 
life. Fatherhood and motherhood 
point the way, by their imperfections 
as well as their perfections, to His 
infinite Fatherhood, His perfect Prov-
idence. Childhood teaches us of our 
divine sonship in Christ, as wedlock 
shows both us and our children our 
own relation as Christians, individu-
ally and all together, to Christ Our 
Lord, the Bridegroom of His Church. 
The very real and dreadful damage 
which, as all modern schools of 
psychology have found out and in-
terpreted in different ways, the mis-
understanding and misuse of the 
fundamental family relationships can 
do to our whole personalities, shows 

T H E GRAIL 



the far-reaching and tremendous 
force which they are meant to be 
when they are rightly lived and seen 
in the healing and strengthening 
light and grace of Christ. 

Again, the inescapable activities 
of family life are all meant to be so 
many pictures and reflections of 
God's world-wide goodness, and, a-
bove all, of the Holy Eucharist. All 
our cleaning and washing and tidy-
ing can lead us to appreciate the 
graces of Baptism, and Penance, and 
of what Our Lord went through to 
win them for us. All our polishing 
and decorating and beautifying can 
lead us to glory in what the Holy 
Spirit does for us in anointing and 
decorating and beautifying our souls 
and our lives. And all the time and 
patience we spend for and on our 
children can lead us to a greater 
love of God's perfect care of us, 
His perfect patience with us. One 
could go for books and books. But 
there is no need. After all, God 
chose family life for His Son's Moth-
er and foster-father and for His 
Own Son for thirty years out of 
thirty-three! 

Many historical forces and cir-
cumstances are responsible for our 
lack of appreciation of marriage in 
the past, especially in the recent 
past. This lack is only a part of the 
long neglected lack of appreciation 
of the Christian vocation in general, 
of our great dignity as Christians, 

of the possibilities for life and action 
and happiness which God has given 
us with our Baptism, which He in-
creases with each Sacrament. But, 
thank God, the glories of Christian 
life and work are once more begin-
ning to be unfolded before our eyes. 

Let us all, then, whatever our own 
calling, do all that we can to foster 
the truth that marriage is a vocation. 
For here is one most obvious place to 
begin to foster the truth that every 
Christian has a vocation. If parents 
realize the glory of their own calling, 
they will bring up their children to 
realize that each of them has his own 
vocation. And teach them to be 
on the look-out for signs of God's 

'Will , so that those whom God calls 
to the priesthood or the religious 
life will be ready for His call. When 
parents realize at once the difficulty 
and the grandeur of their own voca-
tion, they will bring up their children 
to realize that God means life for 
each of them to be at once hard and 
heroic and happy. Then those whom 
God calls to be priests and nuns 
will not be afraid of His call. Then, 
also, those whom God calls to mar-
riage will enter it more carefully 
and prayerfully, ready to live it more 
fully and happily, because more 
Christianly, than has ordinarily been 
possible up to now. 

And thus, slowly and in God's 
good time, all things, all work and 
all life, will be restored in Christ. 

FEBRUARY, 1952 27 



READER 
REACTION 

Is the GRAIL safe for Children? 

TJATHERS and mothers have been asking themselves that question during 
f the last few months. The reasons for their concern are 1) our frank 
treatment of love and marriage and 2 ) our occasional use of profanity 
(in the magazine, of course). 

With regard to the first point. Our treatment of love and marriage is 
frank but not immoral. In fact, we feel that it is impossible to develop 
a really Christian attitude toward love unless it is treated frankly and 
honestly. The pious hush-hush treatment and puritanical looking-down-
the-nose at the sacred function of sex are responsible for much of the 
flagrant immorality that we see all around us today. 

So we say: the Grail is primarily for mature readers; read it yourself 
before you give it to the children. If there is something too adult for them, 
they will probably skip over it anyway. 

But if they do wonder about some story or article, encourage them to 
discuss it with you. It will give you a splendid opportunity to tell them 
the truth about sex before they pick up the distorted ideas that are current 
in the alley and on the street corner. 

The other problem is profanity. W e certainly do not approve of it in 
real life. Nor do we believe in printing it just to shock people. But good 
fiction must reflect life, and not necessarily the ideal life. In real life some 
people do use profanity and vulgarity in their conversation. A skillful 
writer can often avoid using such objectionable words in a story. But 
sometimes the actual words are necessary to make the story seem real. 

But there is still another point to be considered. There is nothing wrong 
with the fact that four letter words appear in print. The effect they have 
on the reader is the thing that counts. If a story with strong language 
makes you disgusted, there is no harm done. The danger lies in the possi-
bility that profane language may seem attractive. Here it is difficult to draw 
the line between healthy realism and harmful vulgarity. 

W e try to maintain a norm that will be acceptable to most mature 
readers. Individual parents are the ones to decide what their children 
should or should not read. 

The Editors 

ai 



H b b e £ IK lewsmontb 

DECEMBER ushered in the Li-turgical Year, which begins 
with the First Sunday of Advent. 
Soon after, we celebrated with a 
Pontifical Mass the Feast of the Im-
maculate Conception. Father Chris-
topher preached the sermon. 

Two events during the Advent 
season deserve to be recorded. On 
December 14 we again welcomed 
Players, Inc., of Catholic Univer-
sity. They gave a splendid per-
formance of Twelfth Night despite 
the fact that several of them were 
under nervous tension due to an 
auto accident earlier in the day. 
Less than ninety minutes before the 
curtain was • to go up, four mem-
bers of the cast were stranded fifty 
miles away in Evansville. Thanks 
to Father Gabriel, who offered his 
services as chauffeur and to the 
plucky spirit of the cast, the show 
did go on! 

Two nights later the Chancel 
Choir under the direction of Father 
Theophane treated us to a concert 
of Christmas hymns and carols. 
Father Alaric was the narrator. 

On the 19th the exodus of the stu-
dents began. Another mass de-
parture soon followed. Forty Fa-
thers went to parishes in Indiana, 
Kentucky and Illinois to exer-
cise their priestly powers so that 
Christmas Gifts might be ex-
changed by God and men. 

Then came the night before 
Christmas and at the stroke of 
ten, a song was sung by "Angels." 
In imitation of the heavenly host 
who sang the glad tidings to the 
shepherds, four monks awoke the 
brethren from their rest with the 
Angels' song, "Gloria in Excelsis 
Deo." 

Each one hurried into choir for 
the three hours of praise to the 
God-Man on His birthday. Matins 
was first sung; then at midnight 
the Pontifical Mass was celebrated 
by Father Abbot. Both the joyful 
chants of the Mass and Father Ab-
bot's sermon were heard by lis-
teners near and far through the 
courtesy of Station WHAS in Louis-
ville. Father Raban gave the com-
mentary. 

During the holidays Father Jude, 
now a First Lieutenant Chaplain in 
the Army, paid us a short visit. He 
is still stationed at Ft. Jackson, 
S.C. His division will soon go on 
maneuvers in Texas. 

Bells rang and whistles tooted at 
midnight of December 31. Yet the 
monastery was quite silent. How-
ever the bells did ring on New 
Year's Day, but at 3:45 a.m., when 
they called the monks to Matins, 
the first of the hours of prayer 
which make up such an important 
part of the usual monastic schedule. 

Christopher Jeffords, O.S.B. 

2« 



Why Marry? 
by Charles and Rifa Strubbe 

JOHN glanced up from his paper and planted a husbandly kiss on 
the cheek of his just returned wife. 
"Well, how'd the wedding go? What 
did the groom wear?" 

Mary settled down on the arm of 
his chair. "John, it was simply beau-
tiful. Jane made the loveliest bride. 
And Paul is so distinguished look-
ing. They're a perfect match . . . and 
they have such high ideals, too." 

"Um, that's good," came from be-
hind the sports page. 

"You're not even listening! Jane 
says Paul always listens to her. She 
says she believes a wife should be a 
real companion to her husband." 

"Fine, glad to hear it." 
Mary warmed to the subject. "Oh, 

yes, Jane says the successful wife 

nowadays is the one that realizes 
that there's much more to marriage 
than just having children. Why she 
s a y s . . . . " 

"More . . . ?" John asked, his voice 
rising a bit. 

"Of course. Marriage is mutual 
love and companionship, and helping 
improve each other. Those are the 
really important things, aren't they?" 

"I take it you mean that children 
aren't important." 

"Now don't be difficult, John. 
You' re deliberately misinterpreting 
what I said. Of course children are 
important, but I didn't marry you 
just to have children. I married you 
because I love you, and want to be 

THE GRAIL 



This is an imaginary dialogue 
between a man and his wife. If 
we've made the husband seem a 
little wiser than most, and the wife 
less brilliant than some, maybe it's 
just because we're fed up to here 
with comic strips where Dad is 
treated with amused contempt by 
everybody including the dog, and 
slightly sick of radio and television 
skits which make a joke of his role 
of head of the family and center 
of authority. C. and R.S. 

with you. You know that. Besides, 
we're supposed to help each other 
get to heaven." 

"I didn't want to read, anyway," 
sighed John, abandoning his paper. 
"Tell me something. . . why did you 
work so hard getting dinner last 
night. You bothered serving my 
favorite, pot roast and noodles, salad, 
dessert and all the rest of it. You 
could have got by with throwing a 
greasy hamburger on the table." 

"With prices the way they are, 
pretty soon you'll be lucky to get 

hamburger. Besides, mine aren't 
greasy. But there you go, changing 
the subject when I want to be seri-
ous. You know perfectly well that 
I love to cook, and that I enjoy an 
attractive table." 

John was suddenly serious. "Are 
those really the main reasons for 
your cooking, and working hard at 
i t?" 

There was a moment's hesitation 
before Mary replied slowly, "Yes, I 
think so. No, on second thought, 
I guess not. I cook to feed you and 
the children, and I try to do a good 
job because I want you to be healthy. 
But while I 'm at it, I might as well 
enjoy it." 

"And we couldn't live if we 
weren't f ed?" John asked. 

"That 's right." Mary's tone be-
came impatient. "But I still don't 
see what that has to do with the 
reasons for our marriage." 

John became professorial. "Let 
us elucidate. First, we agree that 
you cook to feed your family—that's 

FEBRUARY, 1952 81 



the primary reason. Second, the fact 
that you happen to like cooking 
makes it nice, but it's not the most 
important consideration. Couldn't we 
apply this to the reasons for our 
marriage ?" 

"I think I'm beginning to see your 
point. But surely there's more to 
eating than just staying alive. 
Shouldn't we enjoy our food?" 

John grinned. "You know how I 
appreciate your cooking. God wants 
me to. That's why He gave us such 
an almost infinite variety of flavors, 
textures, varieties of food. And that's 
why He gave me my healthy ap-
petite, so that I'll want to eat in 
order to live, and so that I'll take 
pleasure in it. But the day that I 
start eating for this pleasure alone, 
eating too much for the welfare of 
my body, that day I'm guilty of 
gluttony." 

Mary poked an elbow into John's 
middle. "From the looks of that 
spare tire, you're in need of con-
fession right now. But I think what 
you're trying to say in your usual 
roundabout way is that just as God 
gives us our appetite for food so that 
we'll stay alive, He makes marriage 
attractive so that we'll have chil-
dren." 

"Go to the head of the class. As 
you said, God makes marriage very 
beautiful—in spite of the universal 
desire of wives to reduce their hus-
band's waistlines. He makes it beau-
tiful so that we'll cooperate with Him 
in bringing new souls into the world, 

32 

for His glory. That's God's purpose 
in instituting marriage." 

"Let's see if I can finish the com-
parison," Mary chimed in. "We eat 
primarily to make our bodies grow. 
We get married to make Christ's 
Body grow. When we have children 
and have them baptized, we're bring-
ing new members to His Body, the 
Church, and that's what makes it 
grow." 

"Correct. That's your lesson for 
tonight." John patted her on the 
head. "Now where's that news-
paper. . . . " 

"Wait a minute. So far all this is 
clear, but I still think Jane and Paul 
had some wonderful ideas. Do you 
mean that having children is the 
only important part of marriage ? 
Shouldn't they pay any attention to 
the personal side of marriage, com-
panionship and all that?" 

"Look, Mary, didn't I just finish 
saying that God makes marriage beau-
tiful? He offers us physical enjoy-
ment, affection, mental harmony, 
even great spiritual joy—in fact, 
everything except a chance to read 
the paper in peace. But these good 
things, though tremendously impor-
tant, are not the first purpose of 
marriage. What they are is part 
of our reward for doing His Will 
in the married state. Being mar-
ried is the way most of us get 
to be happy, believe it or not. And 
God wants us to have this happi-
ness." 

"Furthermore," Mary mused, 

T H E GRAIL 



"marriage is the way most of us get 
to heaven, so I suppose we ought to 
work at making our marriage better 
in every way." 

"The only thing we've got to re-
member," interrupted John, "is that 
none of these important aspects of 
marriage should get in the way of 
the primary purpose. Some people, 
for example, think that the only 
purpose of marriage is sex." 

"Yes," Mary agreed, "when you 
read some of these 'marriage advice' 
columns in the papers, you'd think 
that good sex relations was the only 
thing that mattered in marriage. But 
I don't think very many intelligent 
people fall into that mistake." 

"They can be just as stupid in 
other ways." 

Mary was puzzled. "How do you 
mean?" ' 

"Lots of good people who don't 
look at sex as the be-all and end-all 
of marriage make a different mis-
take. They think that marriage is 
made for their personal spiritual im-
provement. That sounds a lot nobler, 
but it still isn't true." 

"But shouldn't our marriage make 
us holier?" 

"Certainly. It's a Sacrament, isn't 
it? But, for the twentieth time, the 
first purpose of marriage, the reason 
why God instituted this particular 
state in life, is to have children, and 
to raise them." 

Mary took the offensive. "There's 
something wrong with that argu-
ment. We know lots of good couples 

FEBRUARY, 1962 

who haven't any children, even 
though they want them." 

"Well, what about it? The im-
portant thing is the intention. If 
a couple want children, they're en-
titled to the benefits of marriage. 
They're willing to cooperate with 
God, but He doesn't guarantee to 
send children to every marriage. 
Sometimes it's the burden of child-
lessness that gets people to heav-
en." 

"Burden of childlessness," she 
snorted. "You sound just like a man. 
I know plenty of people who think 
having children is the burden." 

"Do you think so?" 

"You know I don't. I don't pre-
tend that I enjoy being pregnant, 
and having the babies, and doing 
endless laundries, and sterilizing 
thousands of bottles, but our house 
would be empty without them." 

"Not to mention our life!" 

Mary was lost in thought. "May-
be one of the reasons why people 
emphasize the personal relations in 
marriage and make them seem all-
important is because they're afraid to 
have children, or too selfish to have 
them. So they talk themselves into 
believing that the marriage is for 
their own personal good. Makes 
them sound so logical—and it surely 
makes their life a great deal easier." 

"Easier, I grant you," John nod-
ded, "but lonelier and less joyous, 
too." 

"Oh, yes! I admit there are times 
when I'd be willing to sell them all 

3S 



for a nickel, after a particularly wild 
day. But that feeling lasts only until 
they're tucked in for the n igh t . . . 
they look so angelic sleeping." 

"That's about the only time they 
do look angelic!" 

"John, you know they're wonder-
ful. Besides, what are you com-
plaining about? You're away all day. 
It gets pretty monotonous, day after 
day." 

"That's one of the reasons why 
people are afraid to have children," 
John added. "It means work, drudg-
ery, responsibility, and giving up a 
lot of personal freedom . . . and a lot 
of bills to pay." 

"Not only that, John, but a lot 
of us women are cowards when it 
comes to having babies. It's no 
laughing matter." 

"No complaints, please. St. Paul 
says, 'Woman will be saved by child-
bearing.' I still think we fathers 
ought to get a little time off our 
Purgatory for the hours we spend 
pacing the floor in the waiting room, 
to say nothing of those 2 a.m. bot-
tles." 

"You're being .flippant, and I'm 
serious," Mary pouted. 

"So was St. Paul!" 
"I know, but don't fool yourself. 

That's the reason why a lot of wom-
en don't want babies. And another 
thing, we have to give up our careers 
when we have children." 

"Sure, but some of the 'careers' 
your friends gave up weren't much 
of a sacrifice. Some of those dizzy 

11 
dames ought to realize that having 
children and raising them is about 
the most rewarding career there is." 

"That's true. I don't know how 
women can think it's more important 
to punch a typewriter than it is to 
train little Christians. If a woman 
has to work, that's something else 
again. Even so, I certainly feel sorry 
for her; she's bound to miss a lot." 

"All right, mine wife, I'll agree 
that mothers give up a lot. But 
remember that Christ said the way 
we'll get to heaven is by doing things 
for others. If we give a poor man 
only so much as a drink of water, 
it's like giving it to Christ Himself. 
Don't you suppose that a mother— 
or a father, for that matter—who 
spends all her time doing things 
for her family is going to be high 
in heaven?" 

"I'm counting on it," replied 
Mary, flapping her elbows like a 
pair of angelic wings. "It used to 
worry me that I was so tied down to 
the house that I had little chance to 
practice the corporal works of mercy. 
Now I'm beginning to realize that 
'charity begins at home' really means 
something, since I can serve Christ 
in you and the children." 

"That's that whole point of mar-
riage, my little seraph," John sum-
med up. "Everything we do in mar-
riage, everything we enjoy together, 
even our love and our spiritual 
growth—all of them are ultimately 
for the service of our children. It's 
a full time job." 



"Brrr, you make it sound forbid-
ding. You mean the ideal mother 
has to give up all her activities out-
side the home, just to dedicate her 
life to her children ? N o more bridge 
or PTA?" ; 

"Calm your fears, little one," John 
pontificated. "Not at all, not at all. 
A woman'll be a better mother if 
she relaxes once in a while. And, 
more important than that, she'll be 
a better mother if she realizes that 
her family isn't off on an island by 
itself someplace. It's part of a par-
ish, a neighborhood, a community; 
and the kind of environment it's 
a part of is going to affect her chil-
dren almost as much as the home 

does. She's got to spend part of 
her time trying to make those sur-
roundings as Christian as she can. 
Raising children starts in the home, 
but it certainly doesn't stop there." 

"You know," Mary mused, "I 
think I 'm going to have a little talk 
with Jane. She's got a lot to learn." 

John stood up and stretched. 
" F i n e . . . now where did I put that 
paper?" 

Mary groaned, "Oh, John, I'm 
so sorry; I just used it to wrap the 
garbage." 

"You didn't! And after all the 
nice things I've been saying about 
marriage!" 

"Now, J o h n . . . . " 

FAVORITE FAMILY PHOTO 

11 



W H A T ' S 

AMERICA aims to give its readers a weekly survey 
of the news with a balanced Catholic 
interpretation of current events. 

C O M M O N W E A L is a journal of Catholic opinion edited by 
laym en. It features a wide range of 
writers including many outstanding Cath-
olic thinkers. 

INFORMATION is a small monthly with a fresh style that 
appeals especially to big-city readers. 
It highlights parish activities of all kinds 
and is very instructive for converts. 

TODAY is published for students. Its approach is 
apostolic, social, and modern. Stimulating 
is the word for it. 

WORSHIP is a monthly for people who are interested 
in the liturgy. Its articles are serious but 
not difficult to read. Formerly called Orate 
Fratres. 

THE S IGN is a magazine of general interest for the 
whole family. Outstanding both for con-
tent and appearance and several times 
winner of Catholic Press Awards. 

11 



M A G A Z I N E FOR 

IF you have ever asked 
that—or thought it, 
glance over this short list. 
You'll be impressed by 
the wide variety of real 
needs served by these 
publications. There isn't 
room to include all the 
worthwhile Catholic mag-
azines. So we picked a 
few outstanding ones. 

INTEGRITY is edited by militant lay Catholics. It 
points out false ideals in modern living 
and explains the Catholic way Of life. It 
has many devoted friends and many 
vehement critics. 

MARYKNOLL is one of the best known among the 
rapidly improving magazines that support 
and report on the mission activity of the 
Church. 

CATHOLIC DIGEST is published in English, five foreign lan-
guages, and Braille. Provides a wide 
variety of wholesome and interesting 
reading gleaned from Catholic and non-
Catholic publications. 

THE GRAIL is a monthly edited by Benedictines. It 
aims to provide a variety of articles and 
stories with emphasis on the worship of 
God and Christian family life. 

11 



T H E M A S S 

. . . a n d M A R R I A G E 

by Rt. Rev. Msgr. Reynold Hillenbrand 

A great leader in the liturgical and family life aposto-
late in our country here points to the source of all sac-
ramental life—Christ's Redeeming Death. 

' Reprint from The Cana Conference Proceedings, Chicago 

THE central moment of all human history was Our Blessed Lord's 
death. Every moment in human his-
tory up to that time converged at 
that one point. And every moment 
in the subsequent history of the 
world looks back to that one mo-
ment in retrospect. The reason is 
that Our Blessed Lord's death re-
stored to us the greatest gift we 
have—our life in God. Because the 
Mass is that death renewed, the most 
important moment in the world to-
day is the moment of the Mass— the 
restoration of all life in God. 

What Heaven Is 

Without understanding our life in 
God we really cannot understand 
either marriage or its connection with 

the Mass. W e have to go back a very 
long way to one of God's decisions. 
God had to give us a heaven, but 
was not compelled to give the kind 
of heaven He actually did. He was 
compelled to give us a heaven where 
we would be completely and entirely 
happy (like the Limbo of unbap-
tized infants) but not compelled to 
give us a heaven where we would 
see Him. 

But He determined to give us the 
maximum kind of heaven. A heaven 
better than which cannot be imag-
ined. A heaven in which we would 
actually see God. So we must, if we 
can, imagine our entrance into heaven 
as a moment in which our minds 
meet with God, look into God, and 
see disclosed His endless and mani-

44 T H E GRAIL 



Fides Publishers 

the life of God. Now, when we step 
into Heaven, we are going to do 
that Divine thing. We are going to 
live as God lives: We are going, to 
see God as He sees Himself, and we 
are going to love God as we only 
can love Him when we actually see 
Him. And that m,eans sharing the 
very life of God. God cpuld not give 
us a better kind of heaven than that 
—a heaven where we would actually 
share His life. 

Divine Life on Earth 

Then God made a second decision. 
He determined that we were not only 
going to have a sharing of His divine 
life in heaven, but we were going 
to share His life on this earth.. He 
wasn't going to wait until we got 
into heaven. And so, when He made 

FEBRUARY, 1952 45 

fold wonders. Seeing God remedies, 
as it were, a condition that obtains 
on earth, where God is dose to us 
(He is in the air we breathe, in the 
floor on which we walk, in our 
bodies, in our souls), yet He is 
strangely distant from us because we 
do not actually see Him. 

When we get into heaven God 
is going to disclose Himself to us. 
Now, looking into God, seeing God, 
means that we are going to share the 
life of God. Why? Well, let us in-
quire what is the life of God? God 
is a spirit. Being a spirit, He has a 
mind and He has a will. His life con-
sists in using this mind and this will. 
The first thing God does with His 
mind is to know Himself as He is. 
And then God uses His mind to love 
Himself as He sees Himself. That is 



the first man and the first woman, 
He gave them not only their own 
lives, the lives of their bodies and 
their souls, but at the same time He 
poured into their souls something we 
always call sanctifying grace, but 
which we had better call The Life 
of God, The Divine Life. When we 
say sanctifying grace, we say that we 
have a gift of God: it is a grace and, 
at the same time, it is something 
that makes us holy, sanctifies us. But 
the words "sanctifying grace" don't 
tell us what that gift really is. How-
ever, when we say The Divine Life, 
The Life of God, we actually see 
what the gift is—a sharing in the 
very life of God. 

That gift, as you know, was lost 
by the first two people. It was lost 
not only for themselves, but for all 
of us. And the world might have 
remained that way; we might have 
been barred forever from seeing the 
face of God. But God determined 
to remedy that—in the most wonder-
ful way possible—by Himself step-
ping into the human race, becoming a 
creature like ourselves, and, as a 
man, bringing back to us our life in 
God. That is what Christ did. The 
whole burden of His life, the ex-
quisite life which He lived, was de-
signed for one thing, to restore to 
the human race their life in God, 
their Divine Life. This He effected 
by His death; He gave back to the 
world at that moment its sharing in 
the very life and in the very nature 
of God. 

This is the moment which made 
the whole world new, because Christ 
Himself was the New Man. And 
He renewed the world because He 
gave back to men their new life, their 
second life, their better life, their 
life in God. From that moment for-
ward the world would be new be-
cause Christ had entered into it to 
make new men of us. Not only that, 
but He made our life in God much 
fuller than it would have been if 
Adam had never sinned and the 
world had persisted as a Paradise. 

The Mass 
The world would be an unrelieved 

tragedy had Our Blessed Lord not 
died. In His death He gave back 
to men their Life in God. And what 
is the Mass ? It is Our Blessed Lord's 
death, renewed upon an altar. The 
great moment in the world, there-
fore, is the Consecration of any Mass. 
When the priest pronounces the con-
secrating sentences over bread and 
wine, there occurs upon the altar ex-
actly what occurred upon the hill of 
Calvary—Our Blessed Lord's death 
in its full and glorious reality. The 
moment of Redemption which re-
stored the Divine Life to the world is 
renewed upon an altar. Just as from 
the moment of Our Lord's death, so 
from the moment of any Mass which 
renews that death, there flows into 
human souls the Life of God. This 
is the moment revived which restored 
to the world our Life in God, the mo-
ment from which we draw our Di-
vine Life. 

40 THK GRAIL 



The Sacrament of Matrimony 

When you pledged your lives to-
gether in the Sacrament of Matri-
mony, there flowed into you an in-
crease in the Life of God. There 
also came into your life the help of 
actual grace, the help that through 
a lifetime will enable you constantly 
to increase that Life in God. As a 
result of the Nuptial Mass you will 
forever be more divinized, forever 
receive a greater increase in the Life 
of God. 

Our Blessed Lord, speaking to the 
Samaritan woman, called the Divine 
Life "streams of life-giving water" 
which would flow from Him into 
the world. We can picture Our 
Lord's death, therefore, as a sort of 
fountain from which well seven great 
streams to inundate, to irrigate, to 
enliven the world. Some of the 
Fathers of the Church have spoken 
as if those seven streams came from 
Our Blessed Lord's open side—that 
there flowed not only the Blood 
which redeemed the world but the 
water which symbolized the Divine 
Life flowing into our souls. And 
one of those streams of life is the 
stream of Matrimony coming from 
Our Lord's death and coming from 
its renewal in the Mass. Therefore 
when you are at Mass you ought to 
remember that it is the restoration 
of your Divine Life and the coming 
of that Divine Life into your lives 
specifically because of the Sacrament 
you have received. 

FEBRUARY, 1952 

Parenthood 
From marriage come children. The 

significant thing about any human 
being is not the fact that God made 
him (wonderful as it is to draw a 
human being of body and soul out 
of nothingness) but the fact that 
God has lifted him to the sharing of 
another life, the sharing of a better 
life, the sharing of His own life. 
Children are great not because they 
are human beings endowed with the 
most wonderful life of body and 
soul, but because, by coming into 
life they will be enabled also to share 
the Life of God. That is why in 
the moment of rebirth (and we are 
all born twice—once of our mothers 
and a second time of God) you as 
parents are never allowed to act as 
the sponsors of the children. They 
are going to have Godparents be-
cause they are entering into a new 
life, the Life of God. You, in a 
sense, surrender your parenthood, 
having in your stead these people 
who are the new parents, the God-
parents of the children. 

The Mystical Body 
Mass is something we do with 

Christ because we are members of 
His Mystical Body. Our Blessed 
Lord might have given the Divine 
Life to the world single-handed. Hav-
ing gone back to heaven, He might 
have distributed it without the help 
of any of His human beings. But 
He wanted to give it through man. 
He wanted to draw men into a very 
close living union with Himself, so 

41 



that where they would be I le would 
be, where they would act He' would 
act. That is why, at the moment of 
His death, He gave the world His 
complete self, His Mystical Body. 

The chief thing He committed to 
that Mystical Body, the thing He 
would do with His members, and 
never without them, was the Mass. 
The Mass is the act of the whole 
Mystical Body. Therefore, the second 
thing we ought to remember at Mass 
time is that we and Christ are one, 
that we belong to His Mystical Body. 

We have to correct a notion which 
is sometimes current among Cath-
olics, that the tightest and most 
compact union is the union of man 
and wife. The most compact union 
on earth is the union of Christ and 
His Christians—the union of the 
Mystical Body. As a matter of fact, 
husband and wife are closer together 
because they are members of Christ, 
rather than because they are man and 
wife. And you are closer to your chil-
dren because you and your children 
are members of Christ, rather than 
because they are your children, flesh 
of your flesh, bone of your bone, 
and blood of your blood. You are 
joined more closely to your children 
because you are all members of His 
Mystical Body, rather than because 
you are all members of the same hu-
man family. 

That is what St. Paul meant when 
he said that marriage reflects the 
union of Christ and His Mystical 
Body—that marriage is the image of 

42 

it. Surely the image is not something 
greater than that which it reflects. 
Not only does your marriage reflect 
the union which you have with 
Christ, but it also reflects the union 
of Christ with Himself. For Christ 
gathered in Himself—one person— 
two very diverse things: the nature 
of God and the nature of man. The 
most perfect marriage that was ever 
effected was effected in Christ—the 
joining of God to man, the joining 
of a human nature and a divine na-
ture in one person, in one Christ— 
and even that your marriage reflects. 
So at Mass time, as members of the 
Mystical Body, you ought to think 
of this union in Christ, and also of 
your union through the Sacrament of 
Matrimony, which mirrors it so clear-
ly and so beautifully. 

Christian marriage is a union in 
Christ. W e must not begin, as people 
so often do, to inspect marriage be-
cause it may be economically advis-
able, or because their temperaments 
fit, because these two people, in all 
probability, will be able to make a 
go of it. No, that is beginning at 
the wrong end: we have to begin 
with the fact that the marriage is 
a union in Christ. And that to safe-
guard that union there flows from 
the death of Christ as renewed in 
the Mass, a lifelong trend of influ-
ence on that marriage. Even if it 
may have been an inadvisable mar-
riage in the first place, even that 
handicap can be overcome in Christ 
because the help from His death 

THE GRAIL 



flows from the Mass into that union, 
into those lives. 

I would like to mention here too 
that because the union of marriage 
so perfectly reflects the Mystical 
Body, we can better understand what 
St. Paul means (it sometimes falls so 
strangely on people's ears) when he 
talks of the subjection of wife to 
husband: "Wives, be subject to your 
husbands." Although people enter 
into marriage equally as persons, 
equal in their love, yet they enter 
into something which has an organic 
structure, just as the Mystical Body 
has. Christ is the Head of the Mys-
tical Body and we are His members. 
So people who enter into this union 
of Christ with His subjects must take 
the structure which He has made and 
which in its very substance also mir-
rors Him: the head of the marriage 
is the man, the body of marriage is 
the woman. The woman is subject, 
as St. Paul says, to her husband as 
the Church is to Christ. It is only 
in understanding the Mystical Body 
that we can understand this structure 
which Christ has given to marriage. 

We Act With Christ 

Because the Mass is the great ac-
tion of the Mystical Body, it is some-
thing that we do together. Christ 
has obtained that we should do the 
Mass together. That is why, at the 
moment of Baptism, He gave us the 
sharing in His Life, the gift of 
Faith, Hope, and Charity which 
transforms our minds and our wills, 
and the gift of Himself—the greatest 

FEBRUARY, 1952 

gift of all. He also gave us a shar-
ing in His priesthood. The character 
of Baptism stamps the image of 
Himself as a priest upon us, so that 
whenever He acts as a priest, and 
He does so at Mass, we are acting 
with Him; so, as Pius XII reminds 
us, the Mass is always done by the 
Mystical Body even if the priest says 
the Mass alone unattended by any 
people. What He does is done by 
all the members of Christ, by every-
one who is a Catholic in the world. 
We are active with Christ at Mass 
time. Because we do act with Christ 
we should translate the action into 
the most complete human terms; we 
should have in our parish churches 
the dialogue Mass; we should have 
a sung Mass, in order to enter more 
fully, more humanly into our action 
with Christ. 

This activity we have with Christ 
is also mirrored in the Sacrament we 
receive. Of all the Sacraments, Mar-
riage is the only one which people 
give to each other. The first and 
greatest of all wedding gifts by far 
is the husband's gift to his wife of 
an increase in Divine Life and the 
wife's gift to her husband of an in-
crease in Divine Life. He gives her 
this lifelong title to all the help 
they will need to make their married 
life beautiful. She gives him that 
same gift. 

Because we are active at Mass 
time we ought to reflect that it isn't 
enough for us to be active with Christ 
at the moment of His redemption 

43 



when He renews it upon the altar— 
but that we have to be active away 
from the altar. Our Blessed Lord 
wasn't content merely to die upon the 
Cross. He wanted what His Cross 
meant brought into people's souls. 
So likewise at Mass time we can't 
be content with being active with 
Christ only at the moment of Re-
demption renewed; we have to carry 
that action into life itself. Our Bless-
ed Lord meant by His death to renew 
the whole world and He meant liter-
ally the whole world—all the things 
of man's life, everything he does. 
He meant to renew economic life, 
political life, international life, to 
bring all these things to a head in 
Himself, to lift them up in Himself. 
He said, "I will draw all things to 
myself." 

Domestic Life 
That includes domestic life as well. 

He wants His redemptive influence, 
His renewing influence brought into 
every phase of life, including family 
life. Who is going to do that? Hus-
band and wife. It was never more 
necessary than now when domestic 
life all over the world is so broken 
up. Therefore vou must be active 
about domestic life, family life, mar-
ried life. It is the responsibility you' 
owe not only to yourself but to our 
particular age. You will be active in 
the first instance by attention to your 
own married life," and in the second 
instance bv the work you are engaged 
in. Translate the activity which you 

50 
learn at Mass, the redemptive activ-
ity which is meant to renew the 
world, to renew domestic life. That 
influence is going to be present in 
your own marriage and it is going 
to be felt in the married lives of 
other people. 

The activity which you have with 
Christ at Mass can never be confined 
to Mass time. It must be carried 
into life. Twice within the past 
three years Pope Pius XII has said 
that any Catholic who thinks he can 
confine his Catholic life merely to the 
Mass and Sacraments, wonderful as 
they are, deludes himself with the 
error of the purely spiritual, the error 
of thinking that the Mass and the 
Sacraments are unconnected with life, 
that they don't penetrate into eco-
nomic and political life, into inter-
national life, domestic life, racial 
life. The influence of Calvary, re-
newed at Mass, must penetrate into 
life. And you as married people must 
see that Christ's redemptive influence 
penetrates into your particular field— 
the family, your marriage—the field 
of your apostolic work. 

The Mass As a Community Act 

If there is anything the world 
needs it is to live and to act to-
gether. And everything that men do, 
working together in economic life, 
uniting in political life, in domestic 
life, everywhere the world needs to 
learn to act together. Where are we 
going to learn this? At Mass time, 

T H E GRAIL 



because the Mass is something that 
is done together. It is acted together 
in every one of its phases, in the 
Offertory, the Consecration, the Com-
munion. 

Too often we regard the Com-
munion as an individual act. Yet at 
Communion we eat that One Person 
in whom we are one—the Head of 
the Mystical Body. And because we 
are receiving the Divine Life we are 
drawn more closely together. The 
Mass, therefore, cannot be conceived 
in any sense but as a corporate act; 
something we do together. We have 
to learn to appreciate this sense of 
oneness and then translate it into 
every field of life. And you who 
are the apostolate of marriage have 
to translate it into the marriage field. 
You have to have that sense of one-
ness in your own marriage and you 
have to transmit it to your children, 
not only by example but by teaching. 
In many instances children were 
given good example but failed to ob-
serve it in their own marriage. So 
for that reason, example is not e-
nough. They must be taught a sense 
of unity in the family derived from 
the Mass. 

The Mass As a Teacher 

The final connection between the 
Mass and the family is this: the 
Mass is our great teacher. This is 
one of the least understood points 
about the Mass. The Mass is a 
teacher—not the sermons you hear at 

FEBRUARY. 19S2 

Mass; not the catechism classes at 
school, not the lectures you may have 
heard, study clubs you may have en-
gaged in, not these but the Mass it-
self. . 

It teaches us to grow in the image 
of Christ, for the Church has at-
tached to the sacrifice the life of 
Christ. We need to heed the whole 
life of Christ—His incarnation, His 
birth, His life, His death, His ascen-
sion. Our constant contact with the 
life of Christ year by year in thè 
Mass will gradually form in us the 
image of Christ. Pope Pius XII, in 
his new encyclical on the Mass and 
the Liturgy, has canonized something 
that has been taught for a long time: 
that whenever we contact an incident 
in the life of Christ we receive a 
special grace to transform us into 
the likeness of Christ. 

ID transforming your own life into 
the image of Christ do it for the sake 
of your spouse. Draw into your own 
life the image of Christ from the 
Mass, and induct your children more 
and more into this great teacher in 
their lives. 

You are engaged in an aspect of 
the family apostolate. This will per-
mit you to inspect your marriage and 
all the things that it means as a mar-
riage and as a marriage in Christ. 
You will be able to appreciate, as 
your life together goes on, the mean-
ing of a marriage in Christ, the 
meaning of Christ's death, and His 
death renewed in the Mass. 

41 



. . AND SO TO B E D — 

m i 

i - I J i Xa. . 

Wm 
THE C U E E M S N E V E R H I R E A B A B V SITTER.— 
THEY J U S T &R|N<3 THEM ALOMG TO pRl\/E U S CPA2V 

T M E R E S WOTHfMQ LIKE FAMILY WQ&HlP OKI SUUDAYs! 





MARRIED LOVE 
We caution our readers that 

such statements as "the reproduc-
tive urge is the source of love," 
"the immediate purpose of mar-
riage is the gratification of the 
sexual urge and fecundation," etc., 
are biological statements that 
would require serious adjustment 
and qualification in a more accur-
ate expression of what Dr. Carrel 
is attempting to say. Farther on 
we read that " . . . sexual inter-
course . . . must retain its profound 
meaning. All senses, especially the 
sense of beauty should participate 
in it." The "profound meaning" 
is the Sacramental meaning and the 
"beauty" is the beauty of the spir-
itual reality of a love that Is a 
small sample of the love of Christ 
for His Church, as is properly 
stressed elsewhere in this issue. 

The Editors 

Reprint from Reader's Digest 

Alexis Carrel, M.D. 

f q ^ ^ i , s i H B l '39)- copyright 
ISM», i He Reader's Digest Assoc., Inc.. 
PleasantviUe, N. Y. 

T OVE is a mysterious thing, in-

- L ' visible, immaterial, yet as real as 

steel. As elusive as smoke in the 

wind—and stronger than death. 

From wild passion, it may grow into 

this selfless, indissoluble affection, 

whose presence in the house even 

a stranger can easily detect. If care-

fully nurtured, it will, in spite of 

the progress of agè and the extinc-

tion of reproductive life, continue to 

48 

expand with the full strength of its 
beauty. 

The origin of love is both organic 
and mental. The substances set free 
in the blood stream by the testicle 
or the ovary have a powerful in-
fluence on affective and intellectual 
activities. They permeate the whole 
organism with sexual desire. They 
inspire selfless love and dedication. 
They illuminate the world of lovers 
with the eternal joy of spring. In 

T H E GBAIL 



other terms, they supply the physi-
ological requisites for the loftiest 
activities of the mind. Whether con-
scious or unconscious, the reproduc-
tive urge is the source of love. Man 
is unity and multiplicity. He has to 
create, love and pray with all his 
organs. 

Today, as in the remotest past, 
youth entertains the charming and 
dangerous illusion of its innate abil-
ity at love-making. In consequence, 
love-making, especially in marriage, 
is frequently not an enduring success. 
For married love is no easy enter-
prise. Unfortunately, the science of 
marriage has remained rudimentary, 
although its development is essential 
both to the happiness of man and 
to the greatness of civilization. 

The immediate purpose of mar-
riage is the gratification of the sex-
ual urge, and fecundation. This urge 
is an inexorable law of nature. And 
it is more than a romantic glow. It 
is the biologic source of aspiration 
and achievement. It can be kept 
fresh and vital if intelligence and 
imagination are given creative scope. 
Such richly shared sex life is a 
cornerstone of marital stability and 
happiness. 

Married love is a creative enter-
prise. It is not achieved by accident 
or instinct. Perfunctory coitus is a 
confession of lack of intelligence 
and character. There is profound 
beauty and even holiness in the act 
of fecundation. We should not for-
get that the Church blesses the sex-

FEBRUARY, 1958 

ual union of man and woman by 
a sacrament. Mothers sometimes in-
flict grave injury by instilling in their 
daughters contempt of sex. "You 
will have to tolerate sex. Often you 
can escape by pleading tiredness." 
All the resources of science and 
technique must be used in order to 
make of marital. relations an ever-
flowing source of mutual joy. 

The problem of marriage is to 
transform mating into an enduring 
union. Male and female are attracted 
by their opposite characteristics. The 
more masculine the man, the more 
feminine the woman, the more pas-
sionate the mating. But sexuality 
permeates both mind and body. Man 
and woman are profoundly different. 
While intimately united, they are 
separated by an abyss. 

An enduring union is thus ren-
dered difficult by the physiological 
and mental disparities that are the 
essence of femaleness and maleness. 
Man is active, hard, logical; woman, 
passive, sentimental, and intuitive 
Her nervous system, her tempera-
ment, prepare her for maternity. 
Marriage is an association of two 
different but complementary individ-
uals. These characteristics of the 
partners are responsible for both the 
efficiency and the difficulties of the 
association. 

Not only are husband and wife 
separated by organic and mental dif-
ferences, but these differences vary 
from week to week, according to 
sexual rhythms. Sexual rhythms are 

« 



incomparably more marked in woman 
than in man. . During the whole 
menstrual cycle, fluctuations take 
place in activity, courage, temper, 
sex . desire. Man also manifests os-
cillations of temper and activity. 
This knowledge should allow mutual 
understanding of various moods, and 
may prevent tragedies. 

Success in marriage requires con-
tinence as well as potency. In other 
words, character is indispensable in 
well-ordered sexual life. Certain pe-
riods, including illness and preg-
nancy, - impose continence. To re-
frain from sexual intercourse dur-
ing married life demands nervous 
equilibrium and moral strength. For 
many individuals, it is true heroism. 
Before marriage, the ideal state is 
chastity. Chastity requires early mor-
al? training. It is the highest , ex-
press i on; of self-discipline. Voluntary 
restraint from the sex act during 
youth, more than any other moral 
and': physical effort, enhances the 
quality of life. The use of prostitutes 
is injurious. For paid love-making 
is? an degradation of the real sex act. 
It lacks the essential quality of pro-
found mutuality. It is without the 
bertisón of beauty. 

" Even truè love may not protect 
Husbandr and ' wife against certain 
dangers of sexual relations. Early 
excesses prevent the full develop-
ment of body and mind. Late ex-
cesses« accelerate the rate of aging 
and. 'dfecay. When exhausted or 
worried' the husband should not be 
M 

induced by an oversexed wife to 
perform the sex act. Reciprocally, 
the untimely ardor of an ignorant 
husband may tire or exasperate his 
undersexed wife. Love is incom-
patible with ignorance and selfish-
ness. Also with disease. Since chasti-
ty in girls, as well as in boys, is 
far from being the habitual rule, 
lovers must ascertain before mar-
riage whether they are free of gon-
orrhea and syphilis. 

There is no apparent natural rule 
for sexual relations. The frequency 
of the sex act varies widely. There 
are sexual athletes as well as weak-
lings. Copulation can be performed 
at any time, while in other mammals 
it takes place only during the heat 
period. Therefore, intelligence and 
self-control must replace instinct in 
the. management of sexual life. The 
enormous variations in individual 
constitutions have rendered impossi-
ble the elaboration of precise rules. 
E$ch couple must take into considera-
tion their physical and mental peculi-
arities. For the failure of married 
life often comes from technical ignor-
ance. 

Lovers are seldom perfectly mated. 
Often the husband has a stronger 
sexual appetite than the wife. Sex 
indifference may be induced by the 
ignorance or brutality of the hus-
band. As in the animal kingdom, the 
female has to be enticed by the male. 

In married life, sexual intercourse 
has a tendency to become a monoton-
ous performance. On the contrary, 

56 T H E GRAIL 



it must retain its profound meaning. 
All senses, especially the sense of 
beauty, should participate in it. It 
is the capacity, through mind and 
spirit, to exalt the symbolism of the 
act that differentiates man from the 
animals. Affection must bestow a 
benediction upon emotional mani-
festations. 

There are abundant resources in 
the field of sensory and psychologic 
stimulation. All the little arts of 
love-making should be brought into 
play. The expected, taken-for-
granted attitude is to be avoided 
by both partners. An infinite vari-
ety of expressions can be given to 
sex love. 

Small attentions kindle conjugal 
affection. Endearing words and ex-
pressions of appreciation should be 
liberally mingled with everyday mat-
ters not necessarily connected with 
sex. How can a woman accept the 
love addresses of a man who at 
all other times ignores or criticizes 
her? In the actual love-making ritual, 
words are as desirable as caresses. 

In woman, sexual excitation rises 
slowly. She needs to be prepared 
for the act. Generally, the mascu-
line orgasm occurs before her senses 
are totally roused. Thus, she is left 
unsatisfied, nervous, perhaps dis-
gusted. In order that she miy really 
consummate the sex act, her husband 
must learn self-control and enlight-
ened technique. It will augur well 
for the future of the race when 

FEBRUARY, 1952 57 

women demand a higher intelligence 
quotient of men as lovers. 

Marriage should provide a proper 
environment for the offspring. The 
slow development of children, the 
necessity of their organic and spir-
itual formation, require permanency 
in human mating. In other terms, 
monogamy and indissolubility of 
marriage. Since the quality of the 
children depends on the hereditary 
endowment of the parents, the wise 
selection of a mate is of the ut-
most importance. Only in this man-
ner can eugenics be realized. 

Between husband and wife, in-
tellectual union is highly desirable. 
Feminine intelligence, although dif-
fering from masculine intelligence, 
is not inferior to it. Girls should 
receive as advanced an intellectual 
education as boys do. In order to 
play their specific part in life, they 
need extensive knowledge. It is folly 
to confine their interests to the de-
tails of housekeeping, or to the so-
called duties of society. Love be-
comes anemic if not helped by in-
tellectual activity. Both the happi-
ness of married life and the future 
of society depend on intelligence 
in love. The main enemy of love 
is the innate selfishness that modern 
education develops- to its maximum 
in each boy and girl. 

The sex act has been deprived of 
its natural consequences by the tech-
nical progress of contraception. How-
ever, the biological law of repro-
duction remains imperative. And 

n 



transgressors are punished in a sub-
tle manner. It is a disastrous mis-
take to believe we can live accord-
ing to our fancy. Being parts of 
nature, we are submitted to its in-
exorable laws. Sterile love may sink 
into monotonous dreariness or selfish 
folly. Generally, the old age of those 
without children resembles a barren 
desert. 

Insufficient fecundity is also dan-
gerous. For the only child is de-
prived of the companionship, form-
ative influence, and help that his 
potential brothers and sisters would 
have given him. In large families, 
there is more cheerfulness and mu-
tual aid than in small ones. It is 
probable that three children are the 
indispensable minimum for the har-
mony of the family and the sur-
vival of the race. The true social 
unit is not the isolated individual, 
but the functional group constituted 
by husband, wife, and offspring. 
Curiously enough, democracy gives 
more importance to the individual 
than to the family. 

We have not yet fully understood 
that love is a necessity, not a lux-
ury. It is the only ingredient capa-
ble of welding together husband, 
wife, and children; the only ce-
ment strong enough to unite into a 
nation the poor and rich, the strong 
and the weak, the employer and the 
employee. If we do not have love 
within the home, we shall not have 
it elsewhere. Love is as essential 

52 

as intelligence, thyroid secretion, or 
gastric juice. No human relation-
ships will ever be satisfying if not 
inspired by love. The moral com-
mand, "Love one another," is prob-
ably a fundamental law of nature, 
a law as inexorable as the first law 
of thermodynamics. 

Those who achieve greatness in 
business, in art, in science, are strong-
ly sexed. There are no sexual weak-
lings among the heroes, the con-
querors, the truly great leaders of 
nations. But sublimated love does 
not need material consummation. In-
spiration may come from the re-
pression of sexual appetite. "If 
Beatrice had been the mistress of 
Dante, there would be perhaps no 
Divine Comedy." 

To conclude: Man and woman 
have no innate knowledge of the 
physical, mental, and social requi-
sites of married love. But they are 
capable of learning the indispen-
sable principles and techniques of 
this complex relation. Prospective 
husbands and wives will be wise in 
applying their sense of material and 
spiritual values to the selection of a 
mate, and to preparation for the 
great adventure. Those who are mar-
ried, and perhaps already disap-
pointed, should realize that failure 
is avoidable, that success can still 
be achieved. For intelligence, which 
has given man mastery over the 
material world, also possesses the 
power to usher him into the realm 
of love. 



SHE WRITES FOR FAMILIES 

Mary Fabyan Windeatt had 
planned to be a concert pianist 
or at least a court stenographer 
and then to marry and have a 
large family of girls and boys. But 
Divine Providence had other plans; 
so she has been writing books 
for teen-agers these past ten years. 
Before that, she was busy writing 
short stories, articles, book reviews, 
dramatic and motion picture criti-
cism, and radio plays in New York. 

The Children of La Salette was 
her latest book, and she is now 
telling the story of the French girl, 
Pauline Jaricot, who did so much 
for the foreign missions. This will 
be her nineteenth book for the 
family book shelf. 

Here are her other books pub-
lished by THE GRAIL: The Children 
of Fatima $2.00; David and His 
Songs (King David and the Psalms 
that he wrote) $2.00; Little Queen 
(That is what the father of St. 
Therese called her) $2.00; Little 
Sister (is Blessed Imelda) $1.50; 
M y Name Is Thomas (says St. 
Thomas Aquinas) $1.25; The Parish 
Priest of Ars (is St. John Baptist 
Vianney) $2.00; The Man on Fire 

(is about the author of most of the 
Epistles you hear read at Mass 
on Sunday—St. Paul) $2.50; Our 
Lady's Slave (is St. Louis De Mont-
fort who loved Our Blessed Mother 
very much) $2.50; The Medal (is 
the story of the Miraculous Medal 
given by Our Lady to St. Catherine 
Laboure) $2.00. 

Other publishers have books 
of Miss Windeatt's also: Hero of 
the Hills (Saint Benedict) $1.75; 
Lad of Lima (Blessed Martin De 
Porres, $1.75; and others. 

Order from THE GRAIL Office, 
St. Meinrad, Indiana. 

Mary Fabyan Windeatt 

is 



TRAINING 
In his message to the midwives the Holy Father 
encouraged them to help make childbearing easier 
and more joyful for parents. In this article Aileen 
Hogan outlines the meaning and philosophy of a 
group training program that fills the need indicated 
by the Holy Father. Miss Hogan is well qualified 
to write on this subject. She has had many years 
of experience in practicing and teaching obstetric 
nursing, and at present she is working with the 
Maternity Center Association in New York. 

The Editors 

HAPPY, healthy, close-knit families don't just happen. Deeply spir-
itual, God-fearing, secure families 
are no accident. They are planned 
for, and worked for, prayed for, 
built day by day, hour by hour. 

Deep in our hearts we know this. 
But there is still controversy as to 
where education for family living 
should start. This makes for futile 
argument. Education for family liv-
ing for each child starts the day 
the child is born. From the very be-
ginning the child is being educated 
for the part he will play in his own 
future family. In the beginning he 
has little choice. He is subject to 

the continual influence of his home. 
The time comes when he goes out 

into the wider circle of school and 
college and business, and he sees 
many ways of living. Eventually he 
wants to marry and start a family 
life of his own. Many of us who 
are interested in the family, and 
particularly in maternal and child 
health, see this time just before 
marriage as late, but not too late 
for education in family living. But 
we have found that the best time 
to teach family living to the adult 
man and woman is the time when 
they are expecting their first child. 

So a program in training for 

54 THE GRAIL 



FOR CHILDBIRTH 
by Aileen Hogan 

childbirth has been worked out. This 
is not a new program. It has been 
built up carefully, gradually over a 
quarter of a century. It is now a 
broad educational program which of-
fers to the parents adequate tools 
with which to build the strong, hap-
py, healthy, secure families they want 
so much. 

There are five units in the program. 
These units are not five separate 
avenues of approach. They are five 
closely woven threads which together 
make the pattern clear. The units 
are: 

1) Positive health for the family. 
2 ) Understanding how babies de-

velop and are born. 
3) Adequate physical preparation 

for childbearing. 
4 ) Support and encouragement in 

labor. 
5) Guidance with early begin-

nings of the new family. 
This is not a program for the 

mother alone. The family is the unit. 
It does not make sense to consider 
a family as a unit and yet offer an 
extended program to only part of 

the unit. The father and " mother 
come to class, they come together, 
to listen, to read, to discuss, to think, 
and to plan ahead. These are weeks 
and months of planning, not plan-
ning only for a layette or for a 
nursery, but planning for a new and 
different life, and the important 
thing is that they think and plan 
together. And each family works 
within the larger framework of a 
team which takes in the doctors, the 
hospital personnel and the commun-
ity agencies which make the program 
possible. 

Positive Health for the Family 

To many this is a puzzling con-
cept. Positive health is more than 
a negative absence of disease. It 
is even more than an overflowing 
vitality, or zest for life. 

In studying the concept of posi-
tive health the parents too often real-
ize that it is just beyond their grasp. 
But the spirit of it will not let them 
go. They dig more avidly for under-
standing, that they may provide the 
coming child with the knowledge 

FEBRUARY, 1952 61 



they themselves did not have. They 
often ask why they did not receive 
this education much earlier, long 
before they even considered marriage 
or children. 

The first step towards positive 
health for the child is that the par-
ents know themselves. The majority 
know pathetically little about them-
selves physically. They think they 
do. They have had a little biology, 
a little anatomy, a smattering of 
psychology, and they are sure they 
know all the answers. 

Physical knowledge of self is not 
inherited. It is acquired by work, 
and under guidance. The State recog-
nizes the almost universal lack of 
knowledge when, by law, it requires 
the couple entering marriage to have 
blood tests made. This is good, but 
it is not enough. Ideally, and think-
ing in terms of positive health, the 
young couple going for this blood 
test would also find a physician who 
would give them a thorough physi-
cal check-up, and what is equally 
important, adequate marriage coun-
selling. 

For example, poor nutrition and 
anemia are responsible for some of 
the most common complications of 
pregnancy. They both yield to treat-
ment. The physician could show the 
young couple how to eliminate these 
two sources of future trouble, and 
how to build up a positive concept 
of family nutrition which would 
rule out that scourge, anemia. 

And how often are the young 

6 

couple told that there is a very real 
possibility that no children will come; 
that infertility is a problem we have 
always with us; that the deepest 
tragedies walk with those who travel 
from clinic to clinic, from doctor to 
doctor in a search for the cause of 
their childlessness. And is it ever 
pointed out to them that large fam-
ilies are not the result of over-
indulgences or excess ? Too few 
know that a disciplined, well planned 
way of life is most often the one 
which allows the cells responsible 
for life to grow strong and mature 
and best able to reproduce them-
selves. 

All these things are emphasized in 
the approach to positive health. Stress 
is put on the need for adequate medi-
cal supervision. The feeling grows 
that medical care is a commodity 
for sale, and people are more and 
more eager to know how to choose 
wisely. By medical care the parents 
mean the services they can expect 
from their doctor, both obstetrician 
and pediatrician, from their hospitals, 
and from the allied community agen-
cies. They should understand the 
quality and the value of the services 
they receive. The parents too often 
think in terms of paying for 
the "delivery" of the baby. Un-
derstanding parents know that an 
equally important service is the eight 
months of care before the "delivery," 
and the three months care after the 
baby has arrived. With this knowl-
edge the parents realize that it isn't 

T H E GRAIL 



a matter of first baby or fourth baby, 
of experience or inexperience. With 
every baby the mother has need of 
competent medical supervision from 
the beginning of pregnancy on, if 
she is to give herself and the baby 
every possible advantage for positive 
health. 

How a Baby Develops and Is Born 

Here the parents follow the de-
velopment of the baby, from one cell 
till that moment when together they 
hear his first cry and for the first 
time hold him in their arms. It is 
a complicated and a detailed story. 
When it is told simply, explicity, and 
well, it works a three-fold magic on 
its hearers. Fear drops away, assur-
ance springs up in its place, and 
before your eyes you see the adjust-
ments of old relationships and the 
growth of new ones. For fear has 
been at the bottom of many diffi-
culties. Uusually it is fear of the 
unknown. This is particularly true 
during pregnancy. There are so many 
whispered things, so much idle chat-
ter, so many tall tales. And always 
there is the fear of being inadequate 
in this new role. These fears belong 
not only to the mother. The same 
fears ride the father, and he has the 
added responsibility of keeping his 
fears to himself. 

As the husbands and wives listen, 
and read, and talk, and think, they 
see more clearly how wonderful the 
growth of the baby is. They see 

FEBRUARY, 1*12 

how marvellously the mother's body 
adjusts and grows to meet the de-
mands made on her. The husband 
realizes that his part in this family 
drama is more important than ever. 
He sees how much his wife needs 
his support, and confidence, and as-
surance. 

One of the great advantages of 
having the father present at these 
classes is that he is the first to sense 
when the mother needs help. Maybe 
she is just suddenly tired, maybe the 
discussion has turned on a subject 
which is of real worry to her. What-
ever the difficulty, we see the husband 
quietly taking over. He may only 
transfer the pencil and notebook 
from her lap to h i s . . . perhaps it 
is the quiet circling of his arm across 
her shoulders. But as the mother 
leans back in her chair, the tensions 
seem to ebb away, and there is a 
sense of unity between them which 
augurs well for the future. W e see 
the same thing happening in the 
group as a whole. Common problems 
call for common thinking, and the 
planning together develops in the 
group a sense of being equal to all 
emergencies. 

Adequate Physical Preparation for 
Childbirth 

This is the phase of the program 
which has been too often singled 
out for publicity and fanfare. Bring-
ing a child into the world does en-
tail great physical effort. So, perhaps 
it is not too difficult to see why many 

ST 



would look only to the physical 
preparation. The "exercises," as this 
phase is called, have little merit by 
themselves. It is only as they are 
understood and mastered as part of 
the whole program that they can 
take their really important part. 

The exercises are simple. They are 
not strenuous and fatiguing. They 
bring ease and relief from many of 
the annoying strains and fatigues of 
pregnancy. They show the mother 
how to cope with her growing, 
changing body, so that she can carry 
her baby gracefully as well as com-
fortably. The exercises bring into 
daily use the muscles which will be 
called on for strenuous work at the 
time of the baby's birth. The mother 
learns how to synchronize her efforts 
during labor. The husband learns 
where his support and encouragement 
is needed, not only during preg-
nancy, but at that all important time, 
the baby's birthday. 

The ability to relax completely 
and instantly, even under strain, is 
one of the most important parts of 
the exercises. This ability is an as-
set at any time, but it is essential 
during labor if the mother is to do 
her work efficiently and With some 
degree of physical comfort. Both 
mother and father, and doctors and 
nurses know that medication, seda-
tion, and even light anesthesia is 
always available, and at times even 
necessary for the safe conduct of 
labor. They also know that there 
is no drug or combination of agents 

58 

which will give complete oblivion 
throughout labor, and at the same 
time be entirely without risk for 
both mother and baby. 

So during the months before the 
baby arrives the parents plan and 
study and work so that they may 
know what is required of them on 
that eventful day. Together they hope 
to bring their baby into the world. 
Together they want to hear his first 
cry, and together welcome him home. 
They know there will be times when 
they need help, and they fervently 
hope that they have chosen their 
allies well. 

Support and Encouragement in Labor 

This is the unit which should have 
the fanfare and the publicity, the 
understanding and the sympathy of 
all those who are interested in mak-
ing the baby's birth a happy, a dig-
nified, and a memorable day in the 
life of the family. Now for the first 
time all the members of the team, 
the parents, the doctors, the nurses, 
the hospital personnel, are together 
and working in unison. A weak 
spot anywhere -can do much to im-
pede the success of the whole effort. 

The parents have done their share. 
They have early chosen a doctor in 
whom they have implicit trust. They 
know that he understands and is in 
sympathy with their desire to bring 
this baby into the World by their own 
efforts; that they want to be to-
gether and conscious when the baby 
arrives, that they want the baby a-

THE GRAIL 



wake and alert from the minute of 
birth. The parents know that under 
the strain of labor it will take their 
united efforts to do their own part 
of the job. They rely on the doctor 
to make the professional decisions 
which affect the health of the mother 
or the baby. They are confident that 
he will make the decisions within the 
framework of their wishes as long 
as he can do so safely. If the parents 
have chosen well there is no one 
who can do more than their doctor 
to help them make this day one of 
the high peaks of living. 

Some of the practical things which 
make this possible are: 

1) Parents taking time to see their 
doctor together. This is a family 
relationship, a professional relation-
ship, a lifetime relationship which 
is being built up. This is teamwork, 
and it is difficult to have confidence 
in members of a team you have 
never seen. 

2 ) Having a first hand knowledge 
of the hospital where the baby is 
to be born. Some hospital adminis-
trators cannot see why the parents 
ask for this tour of the labor room, 
the nursery, and the hospital room. 
They think it is idle curiosity. They 
do not realize that the mother quite 
often has never been in a hospital. 
There aire pictures and fears buried 
deep in her mind that no amount 
of talking will ever erase. In fact, 
nothing erases that fear except seeing 
how simple and quiet and how peace-

FEBRUARY, 1952 

ful a labor room can be. And when 
this is refused them nothing will 
persuade the parents that there is not 
something there to hide, that there 
has not been some truth in the horror 
tales they have heard. Some doctors, 
realizing the importance of this tour, 
and yet knowing how busy hospital 
personnel is, have taken small groups 
of parents on a personally conducted 
tour on a Sunday morning, and have 
felt well repaid for their effort. 

3) Understanding on the part of 
all members of the team that a 
husband's place is by his wife's side 
during labor. This baby is their 
joint responsibility. The wife needs 
the support of her husband's pres-
ence. She wants him there. He wants 
to be with her. And there is no good 
reason, scientific, moral, esthetic, or 
human, why he should not be there. 
If he has the same understanding, 
the same training for labor that his 
wife has had, he will be her best 
support in labor. 

4 ) Knowledge that there are hur-
dles in labor, that there are definite 
spots where even the best trained 
mother will need help. Here she 
should not be asked to make de-
cisions. The doctor knows what the 
family wants. They trust his judg-
ment. He decides when and where 
and what the help will be. Medica-
tion, anesthesia, surgery, all have a 
place in good obstetrics. If the team 
is working as it should this decision 
can be confidently left in the doctor's 
hands. 

69 



Guidance in the Early Beginnings 
of the New Family 

The tools which the parents used 
in their training for childbirth are 
lifetime tools. The parents carry 
them over now to adequate building 
of the new family. The first week 
of the baby's life is an important 
time for the whole family. It is full 
of new and wonderful experiences. 
But often for the mother there is 
also a rugged undercurrent of physi-
cal discomfort. Knowing what to ex-
pect is again the mother's safeguard. 
As long as the mother knows the 
cause of the discomforts, knows that 
they are a normal sequence, and that 
they will not last, then she can take 
them in stride, and enjoy the real 
experiences of this new phase of 
living. 

All through the program a great 
part of the group discussion has 
centered around the time when the 
new baby would be taken home. They 
know that the completeness of the 
physical preparations made will have 
much to do with the ease with which 
the adjustments can be made. Some 
are taking the baby home to a 
nursery suite, some to only a screened-
off corner of a one-room apart-
ment. But they know that these are 
not the essential things. The impor-
tant thing is that their hearts and 

minds are ready to welcome the new 
baby into the family. 

The group discussions on family 
living have ranged far and wide. 
These young parents felt that it was 
not too soon to be thinking ahead 
to the time when this child would 
be leaving them to build a family of 
his own. They want to give him all 
they have by way of preparation, yet 
they want to hold some part of their 
lives intact, alive, and growing for 
that last phase of their own lives, 
when they will be together again as 
a family of two. There is wisdom 
in this, a basic recognition that the 
child is given to them as a trust, 
and only for a while. 

So many come into the group 
weighed down with what is coming 
to be known as a Jehovah complex, 
a feeling that the whole business of 
living is their individual responsi-
bility. Over the months there grows 
up in the group a feeling that no 
family is planning alone, that there 
is always an unseen power present. 
Some call it chance, some call it luck, 
some call it heredity, some call it 
providence. Some know it is God. 
And they rest content in the knowl-
edge that the burdens of life will 
never be too heavy for their shoul-
ders, especially their united family 
shoulders, to bear. 

People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have 
one.—Leo J. Burke, in Saturday Evening Post 

60 



LBT'S T i l l THE W H O l t STORY 

" a b o u t sex 

Edward B. Lyman advises parents to give their chil-
dren both sides of the story at once: 
the physical and the spiritual. 

IN approaching this problem of sex 
instructions, let us dispose first 

of the quaint notion that informa-
tion alone will automatically wipe 
out all sex crimes, guarantee happy 
marriages and reduce our divorce 
rate to zero. 

I suppose that never before has 
material on the so-called facts of 
life been so widely and easily obtain-
able. In fact, conscientious parents 
today are frequently forced to give 
their children certain phases of sex 
instruction long before they are emo-
tionally ready, for fear that they may 
pick it up first f rom companions in 
the wrong way. 

No, we cannot complain of any 
lack of information on the physical 
nature of sex. Yet the wave of sex 
crimes, many of them degenerate, 
continues to fill our papers, frighten-
ing children, worrying parents and 
causing deep concern to police and 
city officials. And our record of 
divorce and broken homes is a na-
tional disgrace. 

Why? 
Could it be that information alone 

is not enough? Could it be that 
teaching our youngsters only the 
mechanics of the sex function is no 
more a guarantee that they will use 
that function in the way its Divine 
Author intended than teaching a 
group of army recruits the mechanics 
of anti-aircraft weapons can insure 
the peace of the world? 

Perhaps we can simplify matters 
if we set down a series of connected 
facts: 

1. You and I were created by a 
Supreme Being whom we call God. 

2. God's partners in this act of 
creation were our parents, for He 
took from each of them a part of 
their bodies in order to produce 
the cell f rom which our own bodies 
evolved. 

3. The human reproductive sys-
tem, therefore, takes on a sublime 
dignity and purpose, for it constitutes 

*i 



the machinery by which the divine 
plan of creation is accomplished. 

4. To make sure that the earth 
would be populated according to 
His plan, God made the urge for 
physical union between man and 
woman one of the strongest of all 
human instincts. 

5. At the same time, in order to 
insure that this physical union be 
surrounded with both the spiritual 
and social safeguards proper to the 
dignity of its purpose, God instituted 
marriage and the family. 

6. Society has come to recognize, 
therefore, as a natural law as well as 
a divine precept, that the physical 
union of a man and woman within 
the bond of matrimony, for the pur-
pose for which it was instituted, is 
morally right and that such relations 
outside the protection of marriage 
is morally wrong. 

7. The instinctive recognition of 
what is right and what is wrong 
in human conduct, which we call 
conscience, is obviously more de-
veloped in some individuals than 
in others. Yet the voice of conscience 
is the most powerful natural brake 
known on immoral conduct. Where 
it is developed by proper character 
training, and particularly where it 
is reinforced by spiritual helps, it 
tends to restrain the inclination to 
evil that is one of the two warring 
forces in our human nature. 

Now some may conclude from this 
that parents should explain the physi-
cal nature of sex and that the clergy 

62 

should handle the spiritual side. 
Nothing, in my opinion, could be 
more unrealistic. 

The story of human procreation 
is a great deal more than the physi-
cal detail of how an ovum is ferti-
lized and grown within the mother 
and finally born into the world, 
beautiful though that story is. It 
is also the story of who desigfied the 
marvelous machinery of the body, of 
the soul which lights a new little 
life, of why we are born as well 
as how. 

You cannot separate the physical 
and spiritual facts of creation any 
more than you can separate body and 
soul. When you do, in both cases, 
you have clay. Nothing else. 

And if this is true of the elemen-
tary phases of sex instruction, which 
involve no great stimulation of the 
imagination and almost none at all 
of the emotions, how much more 
does it apply to any description of 
the marriage act itself? 

For here we are talking to teen-
age youngsters whose imaginations 
are strongly developed and whose 
emotional reactions are easily stimu-
lated and sometimes explosive. And 
sex information is not arithmetic. 
It is a personal thing, intimately 
bound up with the emotional process. 

W e have a solemn obligation to 
see that our childrn, at the same time 
they are given the physical facts about 
sexual union, are taught how to con-
trol as well as how to use this God-
given function. 

T H E GRAIL 



We've covered so far the impor-
tance of putting a moral base under 
sex education and the equal im-
portance of seeing that children get 
both biological and spiritual aspects 
of the story at the same time. 

Now if moral principles are to 
mean anything, they should not be' 
left hanging on the walls like mot-
toes, but made into practical work-
ing tools to use in everyday activity, 
as a carpenter uses his level and 
plumb line to guide him. 

Why is it that one family, with 
every asset of wealth and environ-
ment, will produce a delinquent, 
while another, at the opposite pole 
of surroundings and material advan-
tage, will be happy, good neighbors 
and responsible citizens? 

In the Catholic home, God is con-
sciously made a part of the family 
circle. From babyhood the children 
are taught who made them, to say 
their prayers, to thank God for each 
meal, each new toy. Good humor, 
fairness and tolerance are encouraged 
by example as well as precept. Chil-
dren learn about obedience through 
the extension of divine authority 
to parents and others vested with 
lawful jurisdiction. In short, there 
is a definite relationship established 
in the child's mind from early baby-
hood between the reality of God 
and—through the moral law—every 
human .thought, word and deed. 
There is our design for living. 

In school, of course, the problem 
is vastly more complicated by dif-

FEBRUARY, 1962 

ferences in religious belief, by our 
confusion over the true meaning 
of academic and religious freedom 
and separation of church and state 
and by court decisions in test cases 
which sometimes run into each other 
going and coming. 

We have just reason to be proud 
of our American public school sys-
tem as the finest in the world. What-
ever its shortcomings, it is perhaps 
not too extravagant praise to say 
that it has only one serious fault. 
It is completely godless. 

This is true in spite of the fact 
that the great majority of our public 
school officials and teachers are de-
cent, God-fearing people. The hard 
fact remains, however, that as a prac-
tical matter it is almost impossible 
to mention the name of God in the 
classroom. 

Why is this so important to our 
present discussion? Because true edu-
cation can never be separated from 
values—in this case, moral values. 
And how are we going to lay a 
foundation for moral values with-
out the bedrock of belief in God, 
who gave us those moral values? 

Can we restore the Creator to His 
rightful place in our schools without 
getting involved in sectarian dif-
ferences or overlapping the functions 
of church and state? 

I think we can. I think we can if 
we really want to, if we realize how 
desperately important it is to our 
country that this brave new gener-
ation, which will have the job of 

63 



rebuilding the world, have a sound 
set of moral values. 

How can we accomplish this in 
the schools? Considering the prac-
tical difficulties to be faced, I think 
we might limit our efforts to two 
simple steps: 

1. That our children begin each 
day in school with a little prayer, 
asking God's blessing on their work. 

2. That in all our teaching we 
reverently acknowledge God as the 
divine source, not only of life it-
self, but of the dignity of man on 
which our democracy is founded, of 
the physical universe and of our civil 
rights and duties. 

That's all. The rest can be left 
to the home and the church. 

But there is one more question 
in the field of education which has 
an important bearing on our dis-
cussion of tying in moral values 
with family life instruction. 

It has been the traditional boast 
of many of our distinguished in-
stitutions of higher learning that they 
are primarily concerned, not with 
the mundane and constantly shift-
ing details of daily living, but with 
eternal, unchanging values. Their 
purpose is to equip the student with 
a yardstick, as it were, against which 
he may measure any situation, and to 
sharpen his mental and moral endow-
ments so that he can make his own 
way. 

Now there is considerable to be 
said in favor of this philosophy. 
Yet I venture to suggest that the 

64 

world in which we live today has 
become far too complex for us to be 
satisfied with handing a student a 
set of tools and a blueprint. We 
must also help him build his hbuse. 

To bring this down to our own 
field, suppose we take the question 
of continence before marriage. It 
will do a mother little good to talk 
to her daughter about the virtue of 
chastity, however, unless she can also 
help her decide whether a certain 
amount and kind of petting with a 
certain boy under certain circum-
stances will endanger her chastity 
or not. The application of principles, 
in other words, has become almost as 
important as, and even more diffi-
cult to work out than, the principles 
themselves. 

Well, now we come to the final 
stage of our discussion. Who should 
be responsible for sex instructions? 

There has, of course, been a great 
deal of controversy generated over 
this question, with groups of em-
battled parents and teachers arguing 
whether or not sex education should 
be given in the schools. Yet, as so 
often happens, when you analyze 
all the reasons on both sides, you find 
that the area of agreement between 
the warring factions is much broader 
than where they disagree. For in-
stance: 

1. Nearly everybody agrees that 
children should have competent in-
struction in the necessary facts of 
sex, not only as a matter of right, 
but to protect them from the con-

T H B GRAIL 



sequences of the distorted half-truths 
heard in back alleys which were the 
only acquaintance many of their par-
ents had with the subject when they 
were young. 

2. Most educators and other com-
petent authorities, I believe we can 
assume, agree that the ideal method 
is for parents to instruct their own 
children. The American Social Hy-
giene Association, for one, has 
repeatedly emphasized this principle. 

3. Parents who have taken the 
trouble to think the matter through 
will recognize, on the other hand, 
that the priest, the teacher, the coun-
selor and the social worker cannot be 
left out of any intelligent planning 
on this problem either. Quite the 
contrary. 

In the first place, there will al-
ways be parents who cannot or will 
not undertake this important obliga-
tion themselves. Someone will have 
to teach their children. 

Next, we already have in many 
school curricula subjects like biology, 
home economics, the social sciences 
and so on, which cover certain points 
of sex information or other phases 
of family life education. It would 
be far better, in my opinion, to con-
centrate on perfecting and spiritual-
izing the courses we already have, 
integrating new material into them 
where necessary, than to set up spe-
cial courses in sex education alone. 

Finally, even children from happy 
homes will often come to their teach-
er—if she is a good teacher and has 

FEBRUARY, 1962 

won their confidence—with somé 
question about their bodies or about 
marriage or some problem of living. 
I believe most authorities would 
agree that such situations should be 
handled quietly and naturally on the 
spot, although preferably in private. 

Now when all this is said, we still 
have one very important reservation. 
I believe that group instruction of 
young people in the advanced stages 
of purely sexual matters is psycho-
logically and pedagogically unsound, 
and may be morally dangerous. 

I believe that in cases where it 
becomes necessary for the teacher 
herself to fill the role of parent 
in discussing intimate sex questions 
with a youngster, such instruction 
should be given privately, as much 
or as little as may be necessary at 
the moment, and with proper regard 
both for spiritual values and for the 
characteristics of the individual 
child. 

It would be a tragedy if parents 
and teachers, with the advice and 
cooperation of the clergy, missed the 
opportunity to work together on this 
vital problem—a tragedy in which 
our children would be the innocent 
victims. 

Working together, they can build 
a solid moral foundation—in the 
home and at school—under sex in-
struction and family life education. 
Only thus will they have the dignity 
and purpose God intended them to 
have, and which the new generation 
so desperately needs. 

K 



^tmes m 

Marie-Celeste Fadden returned 
from her European art-fellowship 
tour with little money, but plenty of 
ideas. She came home a few days 
before Christmas and brought with 
her charming and unusual gifts; 
most impressive of all was a collec-
tion of French books for children. 
These were for her little nephew 
and niece: Michael and Koko (Ma-
rianne). Her little "chickens," par-
ticularly Michaei, who is the older, 
were fascinated with the beautiful 
and brilliant illustration in El 
Fiocco and Coquelinette, and 
others. The imaginative yet simple 
66 

drawings told the stories so simply 
(thank heave n!) that you didn't 
have to translate the script. 

By the next Christmas, the kid-
dies were "through" with the 
foreign collection, little Michael 
was at this point asking such ques-
tions as: " W h y did Jesus let the 
men hang Him on the cross?" "l-s 
Jesus undied?" "Where 's Jesus, 
mommy?" and " W h y do we go to 
church?" As you have probably 
experienced, these questions aren't 
too easy to answer to settle the 
mind of a child. 

Marie-Celeste tried that Christ-
mas to find little books such as the 
ones she had found in Europe. 
Only this time she went looking for 
wonderful drawings with the " an -
swers," written in English to boot! 
In some cases she found the " an -
swers" without the charm and gaie-
ty of the foreign books, and in oth-
er cases, she found the charm with-
out the "answers." 

It was about this time that Marie 
thought of writing and illustrating 
books for children grouped as 
"Careers for Children." This was 
to be just a sideline: for her main 
work was painting. She would 
attempt to introduce children to the 
"Life of an Artist," "The Life of a 



there will be four little books on 
the Saints awaiting her! After Saint 
Francis came "Noah ' s Ark " then 

talked to the animals. He became 
a great Saint. They could certainly 
come to understand a saint like 
that; and they would love him. 
So with these thoughts in mind, 
Marie went to work, and came 
home with her illustrations of "St. 
Francis and thè Wolf of Gubbio." 

Little Michael and Koko followed 
the work quite closely and were 
overjoyed in watching its progres-

"Blessed Martin," and now Koko 
and Michael are anxiously await-
ing "St. Benedict, the boy who 
changed the world." 

The illustrations tell the story, 
so that children who can't read, 
still understand what the story's 
about. The script is kept very 
simple, so that First Graders can 
follow it themselves. 

Order from GRAIL Office, St. 
Meinrad, Indiana: Noah 's Ark 
$2.00; The Wolf of Gubbio $1.50; 
The Magic Carpet $2.00; The Boy 
Who Changed the World $2.00 

Baby Joanne was born about 
this time and is still too young to 
comprehend the little books. But 

Writer," etc. In fact, she had com-
pleted one little book called "Katy 
and her Kitten," the story of a 
little girl who wanted to be an 
artist. This little book was never 
published, because she suddenly 
realized that there were far more 
important and necessary facts for 
children to know. 

Marie had spent quite a bit of 
time in Assisi, and there had fallen 
in love with the simplicity of Sainl 
Francis. He fed the birds and 



^ ^ t t t f ^ recommends: 

PAPAL MESSAGES 

CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE, Leo XIII. 
National Catholic Welfare Con-
ference. An Encyclical Letter of 
Feb. 10, 1880, in pamphlet form. 

O N CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE, Pius 
XI. Pa ulist Press. Probably the most 
frequently quoted encyclical on the 
subject. Pamphlet. 

THIS IS MARRIAGE, Pius XI. Grail-
ville. Pius Xl 's encyclical in simpli-
fied form especially designed for 
high school and college students. 
Pamphlet. 

W O M A N ' S DUTIES IN SOCIAL A N D 
POLITICAL LIFE, Pius XII. Paulist 
Press, 1945. A pamphlet contain-
ing a talk of His Holiness on wom-
an's place In present day life. 

PAPAL DIRECTIVES FOR THE W O M -
EN OF TODAY, Pius XII. N.C.W.C. 
Talk of Pius XII given on September 
11, 1947, showing especially the 
relation of women in industry and 
61 

a select list of books and pamphlets 

about marriage and family life. 

professions to the family and home 
life. Pamphlet. 

GU ID ING CHRIST'S LITTLE ONES. 
N.C.W.C. pamphlet. An address 
of the Holy Father to Catholic 
Action women. 

THE HOLY FATHER SPEAKS TO 
NEWLYWEDS. Family Life Bureau, 
N.C.W.C. A pamphlet containing 
talks given by Pius XII to audiences 
of newly married couples. 

ASCETICAL A N D MORAL . 

THIS TREMENDOUS LOVER, M. E. 
Boylan, Newman Book Shop, 1947. 
Chapter 20: "Marriage and Holi-
ness," a convincing discussion of 
the sources of holiness in married 
life. 

CHRISTIAN DESIGN FOR SEX, 
Joseph Buckley, Fides Publishers, 
1952. A careful, thorough ap-
proach to sex through physiology 
and theology, this book reflects 
the extensive experience of the 



author in sex-education and Cana 

work. 

MARRIAGE A N D FAMILY RELA-
TIONSHIPS, A. H. Clemens, Cath-
olic University Press, 1950. Nine 
selected papers from the Work-
shops on Marriage and Family Re-
lationships, conducted by Dr. Clem-
ens at Catholic University, 1948 
and 1949. 

MARRIED SAINTS, S. P. Delaney, 
Longmans Green & Co., 1935. 
Popular treatment of the unpopular 
subject of virtue in home life. 

CHILDBIRTH WITHOUT FEAR, Grant-
ly Dick Read, Harpers Bros., 1944. 
A doctor's convincing treatment of 
the "normal experience of natural 
childbirth." 

S INS OF PARENTS, Charles H. 
Doyle, Nugent Press, 1951. A 
searching examination into con-
sciences of parents regarding their 
mutual relationships and those with 
their children. 

ACCENT O N PURITY, Joseph E. 
Haley, Fides Publishers, 1948. Em-
phasis on the positive side of sex, 
preparation for marriage, court-
ship, etc., with a guide to sex 
instruction. 

MARRIAGE GUIDANCE, E. F. Healy, 
Loyola Univ. Press, 1948. The au-
thor of Moral Guidance proves that 
he can treat of the specific field 
of marriage just as directly, clear-

ly and convincingly as he did in 
that previous work. 

MARRIAGE, Longmans Green & 
Co., 1942; IN DEFENSE OF PURITY, 
Sheed and Ward, 1945, Dietrich 
von Hildebrand. These works can 
hardly be classed as popular, but 
their popularity is growing with 
married folk who think seriously 
about their state in life. 

SOME NOTES O N THE GUIDANCE 
OF PARENTS, Daniel A. Lord, 
Queens Work, 1944. Specifically 
dealing with sex instructions to the 
young of the family, Fr. Lord also 
suggests to parents modes of char-
acter training. 

SOME NOTES FOR THE GU IDANCE 
OF YOUTH, Daniel A. Lord, 
Queen's Work, 1938. This first 
book of "notes" by Fr. Lord treats 
of character training, disciplinary 
methods, "talks with youth," etc.; 
it is an excellent guide in the 
hands of all educators and those 
working with youth. 

LOVE, MARRIAGE A N D CHASTITY, 
Emile Mersch, Sheed and Ward, 
1939. The author of the monu-
mental Mystical Body of Christ and 
of Morality and the Mystical Body 
here applies the doctrines of the 
Mystical Body and Divine Life in 
their practical implications for mar-
ried life. 

M IND THE BABY, Mary Perkins, 
Sheed and Ward, 1949. A sincere 

69 



and direct effort to harmonize the 
life of the soul and the life of 
the body in the full meaning of 
married life. 

MARRIAGE A N D THE FAMILY, Ed-
gar Schmiedeler, McGraw-Hill, 
1946. A thorough-going study by 
the director of the Family Life 
Bureau of the N.C.W.C. 

THREE TO GET MARRIED, Fulton 
Sheen, Appleton-Century, 1951. 
Inspirational guide, with clear and 
reverent answers to the problems 
of married life. 

THE CHRISTIAN FAMILY, Tilhamer 
Toth, Herder, 1947. Interpreting 
the law of nature and the law of 
God, the author provides doctrinal, 
apologetic, and ascetical materials. 

YOUTH A N D CHASTITY, T. Toth, 
Garden City Press. A bit sermon-
ish, but a practical application of 
the moral principles of chaste liv-
ing to the problems facing the 
young. 

EVE A N D THE GRYPHON, Gerald 
Vann, Blackfriars, 1947. Talks to 
women on the various vocations of 
woman. Yet this tiny book con-
tains eminently practical principles 
for men and women who are seek-
ing union with God in any walk 
of life. 

70 

OUR FAMILY BOOK OF LIFE, De-
signs for Christian Living, 1949. 
A family record book that is mani-
festly different and eminently Cath-
olic—emphasizing the "sacramen-
tal highlights" of the famjly. 

LITURGICAL AND APOSTOLIC 

C A N A CONFERENCE PROCEED-
INGS OF 1949, Cana Conference 
of Chicago, 1950. Ten talks de-
livered by experts on the family 
ideal as promoted by Cana and 
Pre-Cana work. 

THE SOUL OF THE APOSTOLATE, 
J. B. Chautard, Trappist Monastery, 
1946. Harmonizing the active and 
the inner lives of all, married and 
unmarried, who hope to bring 
Christ to their fellowmen. 

C A N A IS FOREVER, Charles H. 
Doyle, Nugent Press, 1949. The 
vital force of marriage in the world 
today. 

THE DESTINY OF MODERN W O M -
AN, W. B. Faherty, Newman Book-
shop, 1950. Discussion of the place 
of woman in society today based 
on the writings of Pius XII. 

THE FAMILY IN CHRIST, the Na-
tional Liturgical Conference Pro-
ceedings, 1947. This set of papers 
of the 1946 Liturgical Week deals 



completely with family life from 
the sacramental sources. 

member of the par ish—and of the 
family. 

THE FAMILY FOR FAMILIES, J. 
Filas, Bruce Publishing Co., 1947. 
Stresses the necessary influence of 
any family on the families with 
which it comes into contact and 
suggests practical applications of 
the realization of this fact. 

THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE 
MASS, Martin B. Hellriegel, Pio 
Decimo Press. Simple and clear, 
including diagrams, this presenta-
tion of the meaning of the Holy 
Sacrifice is most practical for every 

THE WEEK WITH CHRIST, Emerich 
Lawrence, Fides Publishers, 1951. 
Short meditations on the Sunday 
and Holy Day Masses, with special 
application to daily family living. 

MARRIAGE, Fides Album, 1951. 
Picture album aiming at a broader 
and fuller meaning of married life. 

THE CHURCH YEAR, H. Stieglitz, 
Macmillan Co. A set of talks to 
children on the seasons and feasts 
of the Church year. 

PAMPHLETS 

A wealth of material in brief, pop-
ular presentation can be obtained 
from the following publishers: 

ALTAR A N D HOME PRESS, Con-
ception, Mo. 

DESIGNS FOR CHRISTIAN LIVING, 
Box 5948, Westport Station, 
Kansas City 2, Mo. 

FAMILY LIFE BUREAU, N.C.W.C., 
1312 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., 
Washington 5, D.C. 

FIDES PUBLISHERS, 21 W. Superior, 
Chicago 10, III. 

GRAIL PUBLICATIONS, St. Meinrad, 
Indiana. 

GRAILVILLE, Loveland, Ohio. 
LITURGICAL PRESS, Collegeville, 

Minn. 
PAULIST PRESS, 401 W. 59th St., 

N. Y. 19, N. Y. 
PIO DECIMO PRESS, Box 53, Baden 

Station, St. Louis 15, Mo. 
QUEEN 'S WORK, St. Louis, Mo. 

CORRESPONDENCE COURSES 

THIS IS A GREAT SACRAMENT, The 
Catholic Centre, 1 Stewart St., 
Ottawci, Canada. An excellent, 
thorough, positive coverage of 
every angle of married life in its 
whole meaning. It is a correspon-
dence course in preparation for 
marriage. 

FUNDAMENTALS OF MARRIAGE, 
The Catholic Centre, 1 Stewart St., 
Ottawa, Canada. A very fine re-
view of the basic principles of mar-
riage and their practical applica-
tion. This is a correspondence 
course for married people only. 



PICTURE CREDITS: Photographs: Eva Luoma 30, 31; G. Felici 
1, 9; Fides 25, 39. 

Drawings: Joseph Buresch 46, 47; Dom Donald Walpole 21, 73; Ellen 
Menard 13, 23, 48; Marie-Celeste Fadden 67. 

HELP US, GOD 
BY YOUR 
STRENGTH 

OUR BACK COVER THOUGHT 

Struggle between what is weak in 
us and what is strong in us, is a 
necessary element of Christian life 
on earth. If there were no weakness 
there could be no spiritual maturi ty 
in people. Our Lord says plainly 
to St. Paul (2 Cor. 12, 9 ) : "Strength 
is made perfect in weakness." And 
St. Paul says a start l ing thing, " I 
will boast of my weakness tha t the 
strength of Christ may dwell in me." 
This valiant Apostle, whose con-
version was such a great triumph of 
grace over weakness, admits the 
secret of his victory: "By the grace 
of God, I am what I am, and His 
grace in me has not been fruit less 
(1 Cor. 15, 10). 

St. Benedict speaks forcibly of 
this lifelong conflict between self-
indulgence and the Divine life in 
us when he says in the last par t of 
the Prologue to the Holy Rule, "We 
must prepare our hearts and bodies 
to do battle under holy obedience to 
God's command. So let us ask God 
to give us strength for anything tha t 
our na ture finds almost impossible." 

As Christians, in a monastery, in 
the intimacy of marriage, or singly 
in the world, we know tha t t rying 

TO DO WHAT IS 
ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE 

IN OUR WEAKNESS 

and difficult circumstances can make 
the fa i th fu l observance of our vows, 
or even the keeping of the moral law 
seem almost impossible. If , during 
such moral crises and temptations, 
we depend only on our own natural 
strength and resources, we face spir-
itual disaster. 

Pius XII warns Christian spouses 
against a spiritual defeatism which 
insinuates tha t observance of the 
Divine law is impossible in hard 
circumstances. " I t is not f a i r to 
men and women today to judge them 
incapable of continuous he ro i sm. . . . 
Why should such heroism, if the cir-
cumstances really demand it, stop at 
the borders of the passions and in-
clinations of nature? The answer 
is clear. The man who does not 
want to control himself is incapable 
of doing so. He who believes he can 
do so, counting merely on his own 
strength without seeking sincerely 
and perseveringly help from, God, 
will remain miserably disillusioned." 

72 



f¡fprt ^ay, 

George's first thought on awaken-
ing was Myrtle. His last on drifting 
off to sleep was Myrtle. His insides 
dissolved into nervous jelly at the 
sound of her voice; but hardened 
bachelor that he was, he shrank 
from the thought of an open pro-
posal of marriage. Forty years of 
bachelorhood had made him skit-
tish around women, and bound him 
in a straight-jacket of reserve and 
silence in the presence of his Myrtle. 

Myrtle was little help to George. 
Twenty years as librarian had not 
prepared her for the gentle art of 
love. Although she welcomed George 
every Friday night with devotion in 
her eyes, they sat awkwardly at op-
posite ends of the divan 
and the evening's conver-
sation was punctuated by 
long, embarrassing silences. 

The 14th of May was 
Myrtle's birthday, and the 
afternoon before George 
had a flash of inspiration. 
He bought her a dozen American 
Beauty roses and concealed a care-
fully worded proposal of marriage 
in the bouquet. 

On the morning of the 14th, 
Myrtle was surprised by a messenger 
boy from the local flower shop. 

"Happy birthday from George," he 
said as he handed her the bouquet. 

With girlish excitement Myrtle 
received the roses and placed them 
on the piano beside George's pic-
ture. As her birthday passed with 
no word from George, Myrtle grew 
apprehensive. By noon the next day 
everyone in town except Myrtle knew 
that George had left on the morning 
train for Chicago with three suit-
cases and a trunk. 

Days turned slowly into weeks, 
and weeks into months, with no word 
from George. Like the roses in the 
silver vase she kept on the corner 
of her dresser, Myrtle, visibly with-
ered. 

Then one day, almost a 
year later, during spring 
house cleaning while she 
was dusting her dresser, 
Myrtle accidently upset 
the vase of faded flow-
ers and noticed for the 
first time a small yellow 

note in George's familiar scrawl. 

"Darling," it read, "if you love 
me and will be my wife, be at the 
Burlington depot tomorrow morning 
at nine o'clock wearing one of my 
roses. Your loving George." 



// 

HELP US, G O D 

BY YOUR 

S T R E N G T H 

TO D O W H A T IS 

ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE 

IN OUR W E A K N E S S 

Rule of St. Benedict