The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1921-08-27

- itSAltO ~ III - SFNR--
Full sURvEY-NEcESSITY OF
CHURCH LEADERSHIP EMPHA-
SIZED-HOsPITALS AND PAR
IsH SCHOOLS GREAT AGENCIES
OF BENEFIT-WoRk BEING
DONE IN LAKE COUNTY,
OREGON.
The survey of rural parishes and
missions in Lane county, Oregon,
conducted by Rev. Edwin V. O'Hara,
| under the auspices OF the Social
| Action Department of the N. C. w. c.,
has been completed and the report
| filed. Partly in the nature of religi-
Gus census, it goes beyond that and
| discovers the proportion of tenancy
among the parishioners, the co-opera-
| tive societies and special credit facili-
| ties in the county, home convent
ences, the opportunities the people
have for the care of their health, and
the religious needs of the several mis-
sions in the county and how the needs
are being met. In addition, Father
| O'Hara, upon the basis of the survey,
| outlines a program Of Catholic rural
action, which he considers of general
application in the United States.
Features of Suggested Program.
The more important features of the
program Father OHara summarizes
as follows:
| 1. A sense of the critical Importance
of the rural religious problem must be
developed in the Catholic body
| 2. The rural clergy should study and
promote all practicable rural co-opera-
tive enterprises.
| 3. A revision of rural domestic
economy must be promoted to make
the farm home attractive to women.
| 4. Sisters hospitals in the county
should be multiplied and their oppor-
tunities for social service be develop
ed with the active cooperation of the
rural parishes.
5. Creation of rural social and rec
reational facilities; colonization with
a view to reinforcing religion with
social bond.
6. Widening of intellectual interests
OF the countryside; especially en-
cOuraging those agencies which sub
serve religion.
| z. Developing strong rural religious
centers and employing means of religi-
Gus instruction adapted to rural condi-
tions.
Church Leadership Essential.
Father O'Hara emphasizes in his
report the leadership which the
| Church must undertake in rural life.
Since the country is the prolific
source of population he says, cit is
obvious that the Church which min
| listers to rural congregations is assur-
| ed of the future of the city as we'll as
| in the country. The neglect of the
| country by the Church will mean not
merely the loss of numbers in the
| future, but the loss of leaders, because
the country has been the natural train
| ing school of individualism and initi-
alive, as it has been also the most
| favorable field for the development of
| religious yOcations. The Church is
called to rural leadership not merely
from the legitimate motives of self
interest but also because of it's pecu-
liar fitness in helping to solve the
rural problem. The rural problem is
chiefly social problem and the
Church is a social agent. In the
| sparsely settled rural districts few
social agencies have cohesive force
enough to survive, and no other
agency can exert the profound social
the Church can exert through long
period of years"
In the first section of the report,
| Father O'Hara recommends that rural
pastors and the Church, in general,
| call to the attention of Catholic farm
ers the work of those agencies which
| help them to improve methods of pro-
| duction, obtain better credit facilities
and organize for marketing. After a
| report on home comforts and the work
of the women on the farms in his
| parish, Father O'Hara adds that mo
| agency comes in closer contact with
| the rural home than does the Church,
and none can more appropriately or
successfully bring influence to bear to
mitigate the hard and unfair condi-
tons of life in which so many farm
women live and rear their families,
or which cause so many others to
desert the farms for the convenience
of city life. The Church, by endeavor-
ing to improve farm home conditions,
will take an effective step both toward
the solution of the rural problem and
toward approving it's own ministry to
the farmer"
Rural Hospitals Great Need.
Lane County has the advantage of
possessing a Catholic hospital, and in
the report Father O'Hara indicates
the benefits which the whole COM
munity has gained from it. The pres
ence of the hospital has brought to
the n-Catholics of the county a
touch of the universal charity of the
Church. Care of mothers in child
birth has been one of the greatest of
the services which the hospital has
rendered to Catholics and non-Catho-
lies of the surrounding country, and
great loss of life among both mothers
and infants has been checked. Father
O'Hara points out also now hospital
in rural districts can carry to the farm
4 ~