Saint Ursula Academy - Scroll Yearbook (Toledo, OH)

Page 26 text:

Youth and the Press ET us suppose that we have just had a hard day at school. Numbers! Figures- both of the genre geometrical and poetical! Our mind is spinning with them. Dinner being not quite ready, we decide to saunter into the library and see if any of the current periodicals have found their way to our mailbox. Much to our delight, this week's Squiflt is lying on the stand. Now just to sit down in our favorite chair and relax. After reading for some minutes, we throw the magazine down in disgust. A narrative that appeared to be good clean fun has once again turned out to be one of those cheap, sordid, triangle love affairs. How can we relax completely when there is such trash to excite our poor tired minds. It is when we are weary that we most enjoy reading, but it is then also that our minds have the least resistance to such temptations in black and white, which are found in too many newspapers and magazines. Public taste, it seems, has become so degenerate that it revels in such Hotsaml And it is all through such a powerful instrument as the press. The novels that are so highly recommended by the supposedly reliable Book-of-the-Month clubs simply reek of uncouthness and vulgarity. No wonder, then, that the youth of our proud nation cannot make our nation proud of them in return. They are taking their first steps toward adulthood and the most foreboding of stumbling blocks have been thrust into their paths-the stumbling blocks of the intellect. Fortunately we can turn to our Catholic Press which, armed with the Grace of God, has spent every effort to give us such invaluable aids as the Legion of Decency, the Roman Index, and well-informed Catholic critical agencies to be our guides and our protection. We should be grateful for the Catholic Press and help it by our cooperation. Let us hope that its influence will ever be felt until every vestige of salacious writing has been banished forever from the printing presses of the world. SALLY O'CONNELL '45 Our South American Blunders OUTH of us exists a group of countries which every day are becoming more and more paramount in the interests of the United States. In our efforts to establish a friendly feeling between North and South America, misunderstandings have developed-blunders caused by the false conceptions that both countries entertain, the one of the other. It has been a general surmise that Latin Americans have been reared on the three R's of revolution, romance, and rumba. They in turn believe we are entirely a simple, methodical, mercenary people who are constantly in a hurry. It is hard to comprehend which idea is more erroneous. Until these misconceptions are rectified, we cannot become better friends. Whence, we ask, has come this false notion of us? Our government sends repre- sentatives who speak no Spanish and who know nothing of the rich historical, cultural, Catholic traditions of these neighbors to the South. Furthermore, the simple untraveled I.atin Americans who outnumber the better educated one hundred to one, are taken in by the war psychology to spread false concepts of the United States, carried on so suc- cessfully by the Germans. Finally, our Hollywood productions do us untold injury in portraying us either as two-gun gangsters or habitues of cafe society. In our efforts to gain the friendship of the spent, lent, and actually given to them over twice their own treasuries on themselves. Being Latin them resent our patronizing attitude. The more North Americans bearing gifts. These existing barriers and past failures do Good Neighbor policy, it means rather that we neighbor by being more sincere in our attitude representatives. South American countries, we have as much money as they spend out of America's Rich Uncle only makes suspicious of them say, Beware of not mean that we should scrap the should make it authentically good and by dispatching more congenial RUTH HILLEBRAND '45 24 THE SCROLL

Page 25 text:

odlsn 0 0 WJ' 7'Va'4 Q That Vocations May Flourish Recently, Our Holy Father made an appeal to all praying Catholics to petition God that the present world distress might not hamper priestly vocations. This plea of the Sovereign Pontiff makes us appreciate more fully how important is the apostolic mission and how necessary it is that we make a daily memento in our prayers that God's Vineyard be renewed with young missionaries who will bind up the spiritual and moral wounds of humanity, in a world gone mad with the griefs and horrors of war. The question that faces all thoughtful Catholics today is: Will there be enough priests to strengthen the faith of the people confused by the terrors of this terrible war and help to keep their faith and hope and charity strong and determined and tender? Apropos of the subject, we might compare the present conflict with the scourge of the Black Death which swept across Europe in the sixteenth century. It was because so many priests thus died untimely deaths that ordinations were accelerated, and some- times vocations not brought to maturity culminated in laxity on the part of the clergy- thus giving an impetus to the so-called Protestant Reformation. It is the duty of every loyal Catholic to keep this intention, so earnestly promulgated by the Vicar of Christ, in his daily prayers, so that history will not be tempted to repeat itself. There are many young Catholic boys in the armed service who might otherwise have answered the call to the priesthood but who felt it a patriotic duty to serve their country in her great hour of need. Will these young men, when, and if they return, retain their original desire to follow the call, or will they, perhaps, come home with an altered outlook and anxious for more worldly pursuits? After the war our broken world must be rehabilitated, and how is this to be done without the religious guidance of God's ministers? Let us sincerely pray with all our heart in the words of our Holy Father the Pope: That the present world distress may not hamper priestly vocations. MOLLY WHALEN '45 Finale T WAS four months ago that we first practiced marching to the strains of the tradi- tional Melody in F . Now that the curtain is about to ascend and the orchestra is tuning up, we are more than a little expectant. Attired in our spotless uniforms and spectators, and bedecked with American Beauty roses, we are quite confident that the Class of 1945 will be outdone by none. As our turns come one by one, we listen closely tc the music. Da-dum-da-da-dum, da-da-dum, -da-da-tum--the bass notes of the wind instruments take us back to our freshman days-to the ups-and-downs of getting going -dark days to be sure-but relieved by the happy sophomoric string idyll, after having been duly initiated into the joys and sorrows of Latin, history, geometry, and home economics. Lovely, lovely melody-da-dum-da-da-the beautiful rhythm insinuates itself into the very marrow of our memories and we see ourselves the efficient organizers of the junior-Senior Prom. At this point an unrehearsed sour note jolts us to the realistic remembrance of the man-power shortage, which brought on the last resort of lullaby singing for a younger brother or two. Like time, the tune marches on. We find ourselves nearing the footlights. It is the Hnale-the fourth and last measure. Fragments of wistful cadences bring us to visualize Scroll work, Class Play, Senior Retreat, and May Crowning. Mixed emotional chords flght for the mastery, but the regretful minor wins the contest as we make our final curtsy before this audience, which has assembled to witness the class of 1945 bid farewell to S.U.A. Granny BAKER '45 THE SCROLL ' 25

Page 27 text:

My Grandmother Embarrassed to Tears OST people have someone be- sides their parents to turn to in time of need. In some cases it is an older sister, brother, aunt, or uncle, but I have my grandmother. She is a very sweet person, and very understand- ing. Since she lives with us, I can talk to her at any time of the day or night. Never is she too tired to listen to my joys or troubles, whatever they may be. Her mannerisms are very interesting. Her likes are numerous and her dislikes are few. She likes the sound of young voices, noise never upsets her. There is nothing she likes better than to find the small neighbor children at the door, pa- tiently waiting for her to give cookies from her never-empty cookie jar. She enjoys ice-cream so much that at any hour of the night, even if she has been sleeping, she will get up to eat some. Sauciness, disobedience, or any wrong- doings are in the category of her dis- likes. She always says that these things were not allowed in her day, so why now, But she is not old-fashioned, quite the opposite. She approves of short skirts, slacks, and the like, that came in with this generation. But, perfume has found no way into her life. She wouldn't use perfume if, as she says, my life de- pended on it. She always sees to it that the family is on time. Indeed, she even sets the clock ahead about ten min- utes or so. But what would we do with- out dear grandma? My grandma is more than just a grand- mother to me. She is also my godmother, and therefore I feel closer to her than to my paternal grandmother, had she lived. Yes, she is my pal, and I feel that my grandmother, although she is seventy- eight, will stay with us a long time yet. MARY Davies '45 When someone lightly emits this fa- miliar phrase, I have to smile to myself. I'm carried back to our big red barn on Grandmother's farm in the country. We really used to work up a powerful appe- tite sliding down the haystacks, winning the corn-cob lights, and walking the nar- row beams over the haymow. It was while performing one of my feats of dexterity on the haymow beams that my poor pride was cut to the quick. As I looked down I discovered that cousin Timmy had removed the ladder- one of his not so practical jokes. I could do one of two things at this point- either jump the terrifying distance be- tween the beam and the ground, or slide off the edge and pray that I might pleare land in some hay. I chose the latter course but Heaven turned a deaf ear to my plea for a soft landing. Not ten seconds later I was suspended in mid-air, the helpless victim of ceaseless derision. I felt like Raggedy Ann, hanging on that nail by the seat of my snow pants. I was embarrarred to learf. MARY DOWNIEY '47 Desolation Life flouu against 4 rm:-let cheek! Life lafxghr through many 4 Jaddening frort! Bill where I kneel, Mi!!-still I Jeek Euzlearing friefzdr that I have lost. Parmcm MURPHY '48 THE SCROLL 25