Watching the World
Vatican Weekly Says Church Collapse Near
◆ A Vatican weekly publication, L’Osservatore Della Domenica, admits that the Roman Catholic Church in the United States is being shaken by a “tremendous earthquake” and seems on the verge of collapse. It says that nearly every day “some new disaster” befalls the Church, such as priests deserting, nuns quitting, theologians searching for secular jobs, and Catholic schools closing. It also stated that Roman Catholic writers were criticizing their church “with a masochistic furor that has few precedents in . . . history.”
Catholic Scholar: ‘No Longer a Catholic Church’
◆ Dr. Malachi Martin, a former Jesuit professor at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome, was once a close associate of Cardinal Bea. The cardinal was the pope’s chief administrator for setting up the Vatican Council. Having closely followed the Council and its aftermath, Dr. Martin, in his book Three Popes and the Cardinal, concludes: “Well before the year 2000, there will no longer be a religious institution recognizable as the Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church of today.”
Priests ‘Exhausted’
◆ Catholic priest Andrew Greely, noted sociologist and educator, stated that this is an era ‘of spiritual and emotional exhaustion for the clergy.’ He predicted that his church will continue to suffer “chaos and confusion” and added: “We don’t care what the pope says and we don’t care what the bishops have to say.”
Baptist Church Decline
◆ Baptist Union churches in Great Britain and Ireland continue to decline. Last year membership loss was 25 percent greater than the year before. The churches reported large losses in youths, ministers and lay preachers.
Successful Heart Operation
◆ Andries Botes, 44, of Kroonstad, South Africa, needed a serious operation to replace a defective heart valve. One of Jehovah’s witnesses, he appealed to the heart team led by Professor C. Barnard of Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town to do the operation without using blood. Barnard is the doctor known for his heart transplants. The Sunday Times of Johannesburg tells what happened: “He [Botes] was turned down as a patient by the Groote Schuur heart team of Professor Chris Barnard. The professor’s brother, Dr. Marius Barnard, wrote to Mr. Botes: ‘In our hospital we do not believe that surgery can be done safely without blood. If you do not see your way open for an operation [using blood] we cannot help you further.’” However, Botes contacted another doctor. With what result? The Sunday Times reported in a headline: “Pretoria surgeon does major heart op[eration] without transfusion.” It noted that an eminent surgeon, Dr. Coert Venter of the Hendrik Verwoerd General Hospital in Pretoria, “replaced a valve in a man’s heart without a blood transfusion.” The artificial valve was inserted successfully and the patient recovered.
Hepatitis Passed to Child
◆ A team of California physicians studied 32 women who developed hepatitis within three months before or after giving birth to babies. An examination disclosed that about half of their babies were infected with hepatitis, and there were indications that changes had taken place in the liver cells of all the children. The babies in the study have now been observed for up to 30 months and continue to show evidence of infection. Researcher Alfred Dunn stated: “We think that the evidence shows that these children will be chronic carriers of hepatitis. Most of them will probably go through life without coming down with the disease but they will be a potential source of infection to others with whom they are in close contact, or to those who might receive their blood by transfusion.”
Synthetic Blood ‘Substitutes’
◆ While there is no actual substitute for blood, scientists are now working on blood replacements that have proved capable of sustaining life in animals despite massive blood loss. Dr. Robert P. Geyer of the Harvard University School of Public Health and his coworkers say that rats evidently suffer no ill effects when a synthetic preparation is exchanged for over 90 percent of their total blood supply. Monkeys live, apparently normally, after a 70-percent exchange. The synthetic product allows the organism enough time to develop new blood, which in a few days replaces the synthetic. Dr. Geyer points out that the reason for the interest in this is the well-known dangers of blood transfusions, which kill and injure thousands of persons each year. The preparation developed by the Harvard scientists has as its base a liquid fluorocarbon which can transport oxygen and carbon dioxide. Dr. Geyer predicts that clinical trials on humans can be expected soon.
Electric Surgical Knife
◆ A New York doctor has invented a surgical knife designed to minimize or eliminate bleeding during surgery. The knife blade is vibrated electrically at about 30,000 strokes per second over a distance of about five thousandths of an inch. The friction of the vibrating blade creates heat which cauterizes severed blood vessels. It is thought that the procedure could make unnecessary the usual ‘tying off’ of veins and arteries during surgery.
Tire Problem
◆ Each year in the United States about 200 million used automobile tires are discarded. At one time most were merely dumped in trash heaps or in country areas. But now many local laws prohibit that. So far, all plans to recycle tires have run into the problem of cost, none coming close to breaking even. One tire manufacturer is installing a smokeless furnace that will burn tires for fuel to provide steam for various uses at the plant. But the furnace will burn only one million tires a year, and it is not certain that the process will prove to be economical.
Fewer Swedes Marrying
◆ The Associated Press reports from Stockholm that there has been a 35-percent decrease in the number of marriages in Sweden in the past five years. It is not that there are fewer Swedes, but more decide to live together without marrying. Hence, nearly a fifth of Sweden’s babies are now reported to be born out of wedlock. Divorces are on the rise, with about one third of marriages breaking up within ten years. The development disturbs many Swedes, because, as one member of Parliament stated: “Children need security” that only the family can provide.
Homosexual Ordained
◆ Delegates of 19 San Francisco Bay area congregations of the United Church of Christ voted to approve the ordination of a clergyman who is a professed homosexual. The San Francisco Examiner reported that the newly ordained homosexual “would not forgo what one delegate described as ‘the pleasures of practicing homosexuality in order to fulfill your calling as a minister.’” When asked how he could be a ‘good’ clergyman without a wife, he replied: “I don’t really feel I need a wife. I hope some day to share a deep love relationship with another man.” The homosexual minister also said: “I believe in the Holy Spirit.” Yet, that Holy Spirit caused to be written at Romans chapter 1 and First Corinthians chapter 6 statements clearly showing that homosexuality is disgusting in God’s sight and that those who practice it “are deserving of death.”
Helpful Ants
◆ Most people view the lowly ant as undesirable. But note what the Russian newspaper Sovietskaya Rossiya said recently: “Operation ‘Ant’ is to be carried through by the Russian Federation’s Ministry of Forestry and the All-Russian Society for Nature Protection over the period 1971-1975. Ants protect forests by killing pests, and it has therefore been decided to register ant-hills and transfer some ants to forests suffering particularly from pests.”
Babies Could Be Saved
◆ A medical correspondent of the London Times writes: “Hundreds of infant lives could be saved each year if expectant mothers could be persuaded to give up smoking by the end of the fourth month of pregnancy.” That conclusion was based on extensive research done by British doctors on 95 percent of all infant deaths occurring late in pregnancy or shortly after birth. The research showed that the risk of a baby dying just before or shortly after birth is increased by 28 percent if the mother continues to smoke during pregnancy.
Isolating Smokers
◆ Employees who smoke are to be isolated at the Department of Health, Education and Welfare in Washington, D.C. Because evidence shows that a nonsmoker’s health can be adversely affected by those who smoke in his presence, the agency has issued rules to separate smokers from nonsmokers. Smoking will not be allowed in conference rooms or auditoriums. No-smoking areas will be established in cafeterias and work areas.
Storm Hits Mexico City
◆ In May, Mexico City was hit by a cloud burst accompanied by “hailstones the size of lemons.” It caused a flood that buried many persons and homes in a “tomb of mud.” A 12-square-mile area in the southern part of the city was affected. More than 20 persons were killed and several hundred injured or missing. About 10,000 were made homeless.
U.S. Trade Deficit Grows
◆ The United States economy has long been plagued by deficits in its internal budgets. But recently even its overseas accounts have been going ‘in the red.’ For the first three months of 1972 the deficit in its world commercial transactions came to $1.5 thousand million. That was the worst yearly start in the history of United States world trade.
How Safe Are Suburbs?
◆ For years, the crime wave in the United States centered in the big cities. But that is changing. Once-peaceful small towns, suburbs and rural areas experienced much higher crime increases in 1971 than large cities. In fact, the increase was about four times that of cities over 500,000 population.
Which Employees Steal?
◆ The publication Industrial Machinery News states: “Employee theft may be the most serious problem we face today. It is 20 times bigger than drugs. In most companies, profits and dividends could be increased 50% at least if the employee theft problem could be eliminated.” It says that 95 percent of all employee theft is committed by so-called “trusted employees,” most of whom have been with the company for more than three years. Saul D. Astor, president of Management Safeguards, Inc., declares: “Production workers, clericals, retail sales people, construction workers—everybody’s doing it. And it’s going on at all levels—from clerks to senior executives. A disturbing number of the people we catch stealing from their employers tell us they are not really doing anything wrong. They say business steals, doesn’t it? We’re just paying business back in kind.”
Memory Clouded by Marijuana
◆ Tests at the University of Kentucky are documenting the impairment of memory of marijuana smokers. Without knowing which they were given, a group of volunteers smoked marijuana cigarettes from which the active ingredients had been extracted while other volunteers were given regular marijuana. Half an hour after the start of smoking, the regular marijuana smokers suffered a significant disruption of their ability to remember.