LOCAL ISSUES, CAUTIOUS MOODS

...One looks for evidence, in the newspapers and in the public forum, that basic political questions are being asked as well-questions such as: Who will speak for the victims of power in this country and abroad...

...Father William Nerin, assigned as pastor in 1966, continues as the principal celebrant...

...There are cutbacks in programs and faculty-and dismissals of teachers, including several on tenure...

...With few exceptions, political discussions focus on local matters and occasionally on presidential candidates...

...Two Catholic colleges, for example-St...

...Liturgical renewal in the Catholic Church began is the Midwest, so it is not surprising to see it continue, though less ambitiously than a decade ago...

...Southern Illinois, in Cafbondale...

...Declining enrollments have begun to hit the larger state colleges (but not the major universities...

...In an editorial about the same time, the editor said, commenting on the wave of X-rated films, that he was more worried about the political pornography in Washington than he was about the skin flicks in the Twin Cities...

...Paul...

...In education and in religion-in the church, rather than the Church-there are some significant developments, although in these two areas, also, the dominant mood is cautious, rather than confident or experimental...

...At a time, in the Midwest and elsewhere in this country, when people appear to be drawing in, it is good to find these persistent communities still asking basic questions about religious celebration and its relationship to people's daily lives...

...The Newman Center at the University of Minnesota, after a couple of years of reorganization, appears to have regained its confidence and sense of purpose...

...All the states face financial problems...

...in the Midwest, as in New England and New York, the state governments have less money to spend for education and the arts this year...

...michael true (Michael True, professor at Assumption College in Worcester, Mass., has his roots in the Midwest...

...Benedict's, a women's college in St...

...With the help of Father William Hunt and the music of Terry Loney, the Center makes full use of the rich tradition of experimentation and community that has characterized liturgies at the Newman chapel for twenty-five years...

...In some of these small, even modest experiments, the positive aspects of Vatican II continue to work...

...One group, the farmers, appears to be more content...

...John's University, in nearby Collegeville-are enjoying rather dramatic increases in enrollment...

...But there is no persistent pattern, as the continuing strength of other church-related colleges indicates...

...Paul Pioneer Press filled the front page of its Sunday edition with encomiums to Ford's "honesty" and what it called his reshaping of the presidency after the disastrous Nixon years...

...or Mankato State...

...On one point, Midwestern farmers, laborers, and professional politicians agree: the Democratic candidate who plays it safe may get the nomination of his/her party, but without a vigorous, issue-oriented campaign, hell never win the presidency...

...in the Midwest...

...Pioneer, published near the headwaters of the Mississippi River, and ending with the Lawton (OMa...

...Most parish liturgies may appear to be packed in ice...

...News of the Helsinki conference dominated the headlines of the Midwestern newspapers in early August, and the conservative, Republican papers took the opportunity to push their favorite presidential candidate for 1976, Gerald Ford, with editorials and feature stories to complement the wire services' favorable picture of the President...

...at that time, the Bemidji Pioneer carried an Oliphant cartoon picturing John Ehrlichman in a Nazi uniform, with a small helmeted figure in the lower right-hand corner saying, "Ve could have a nice country if everyone obeyed orders...

...now go to Purdue, University of Illinois, Cham-paign-Urbana, or University of Minnesota, Minneapolis...

...The Community of John XXIII has survived a much longer period and more dramatic changes, including its resignation last February from the jurisdiction of the local Archbishop...

...According to Eldon Nafziger, a farmer- like his father and grandfather before him-on the rich black clay and brown silt loan farmland near Blooming-ton, Illinois, some of the high prices paid for soy beans and corn in his area are finally going to the farmer rather than to the speculator...

...Two other remarkable liturgical communities suggest that all is not lost, if people insist upon celebrations with a human purpose...

...they meet weekly at the Christ Methodist Church in northeastern Oklahoma City...

...Joseph of Carondelet, and the College of St...

...Minnesotans are confident that one of their native sons will play a central role in the Democratic party...

...In 1973, people in Mid-America were angry or at least discontent about a number of matters-the economy, the lingering Indochina war, and the Nixon administration...

...There is interest in Eugene McCarthy's campaign in Minnesota, of course, and visible support for Fred Harris, whose populist program and direct, knowledgeable approach, speaks to the Farmer-Labor traditionalists in that liberal state...

...but not so successful as to make them vote Republican, one of them said to me, somewhat defiantly...

...Constitution, the principal daily in that arid land just north of the Red River separating Oklahoma and Texas...

...he, along with many others, expects Senator Hubert Humphrey to be a strong contender, even though Humphrey will not enter the primaries...

...Catherine, a women's college administered by the Sisters of St...

...Although a hail storm ruined some crops in Illinois, the corn generally promises a yield exceeding that of 1974 and at a price comparable to last year's...

...For the coming academic year, the same is true, though somewhat more modestly, for the College of St...

...But I was struck by the change in attitude among farmers, small-town merchants, and urban-suburbanites since my last extended tour of the plains two years ago, and pursued that subject in numerous conversations and in several newspapers, beginning with the Bemidji (Minn...

...The St...

...Thus far, however, much of the discussion of presidential candidates in the press sounds like a re-play of the 1972 campaign: the incumbent simply smiles, says nothing, and elicits a favorable response from reporters, while the challengers have to prove themselves every step of the way and still are not taken seriously...

...As a recent statement on "Common Attitudes and Approaches" and on liturgy indicates, this group of about eighty people is both serious and imaginative in purpose...

...This August, the political mood of the Midwest has changed, in a manner that may affect congressional and national elections in 1976...

...In the Community of the Living Spirit, which meets each Sunday in the White Rock Elementary School, the liturgy and celebration of the word center in the congregation, which moves purposefully and vibrantly into its fifth year...

...Thomas, a diocesan school, both in St...

...Farmers in northeastern Iowa look forward to a successful harvest, also...

...The group, with a core of about three hundred people, is ecumenical, with strong assistance and leadership provided by a diocesan Catholic priest...

...Joseph, Minnesota, and St...

...And in what way is the American president, whatever his/her name, a threat to human life on this planet...

...Twenty miles west of Milwaukee, Waukesha is a town of about 40,000, principally farmers, suburbanites, and working class people...

...Midwestern journalists, as well as the syndicated columnists in the Kansas City Star and the Daily Oklahoman, anxiously report signs of calmer times (and in the process rewrite the history of the 1960s), predicting a return to normalcy in tones reminiscent of Calvin Coolidge...

...but in the Waukesha, Wisconsin, Community of the Living Spirit and in Oklahoma City's Community of John XXIII, the church lives...

...Students that once went to Indiana State, in Terre Haute...

...Senator Walter Mondale, a popular figure, has said that he is no longer a presidential candidate...

...They continue to develop in a way that is impressive, particularly to anyone interested in seeing what a celebrating community can become...

...Park College, outside Kansas City, an old school formerly allied with the Presbyterian Church, almost closed at mid-year, and has now combined resources with Grace-land College, a fundamentalist college in southern Iowa...

...They share their weekly cel-lection with the United Farm Workers or local peace and justice projects, dispensed by the Community Witness Committee to people in need...