Friday, February 23, 1968
the record opinion page
Page 3
THE OTHER SIDE; The Micro-City Project
By Dr. Edward L. Henry
Chairman, Government Department
On Dec. 20 the Ford Foundation released to the public the details of a grant of $182,000 to St. John's for research on Minnesota Micro-Cities, the small cities in Minnesota. Subsequently, feature stories on the project originally appearing in the New York Times and the National Observor have appeared in periodicals all over the nation.
Basically the study has three objectives that we shall attempt to meet:
1) gathering common data on ten small outstate cities in Minnesota in the 10,000 to 50,000 size range for comparison purposes.
2) doing.a number of monographs on small city subjects such as consolidation, intergovernmental relations, sources of political leadership, impact of airport location on the economy, etc.
3) acting as a catalyst in stimulating research on the problems of small cities. Among other activities in this respect a number of regional and national conferences on the "small city" will be promoted.
The latter objective is already being accomplished and letters expressing interest and support have come in from all parts of the nation. Several federal departments in Washington have expressed interest in the project as
well as a number of colleges and universities. Clearly, it has already been established that St. John's has selected a research area in the social sciences that has been grossly neglected.
Research in colleges and universities in recent years has been criticized, and in many cases, legitimately. Fat foundation and governmental contracts have sometimes diverted university resources away from their primary, traditional mission of teaching the students.
This particular Ford grant, I believe, escapes most of this criticism, and where it can be criticized the good outweighs the bad. Small colleges have not suffered from a plethora of research but rather from its absence. Research in proper proportion is a wonderful device to liven up classrooms, to keep teachers alert in their
Dr Henrv professional fields, to permit students
to swim a bit in the main stream, to
Stncuiy
e
When devils drive the reasonable wild
They strip the adult century so bare
Love must be regrown from the sensual child.
—W. H. Auden
From his voluntary submersion in a Trappist monastery in Kentucky,
. \ Thomas Merton suffers willingly through being a monk, writes books (The
Seven Storey Mountain), and actively contemplates life, the world, human
beings, and his Church. In his latest book he recognizes the absurdities in
all of these things.
An envelope crosses his desk, cancelled with "The U.S. Army, key to peace." (?) A whale washes ashore off San Francisco, dead of ulcers. "Anti-Americanism in the world today is a hatred as deep and as lasting and as all-inclusive as Anti-Semitism. And just about as rational." He focuses on the absurd in Communism, politics, Kennedy's assassination, and today's -) feverish quest for, yet guilt about, happiness—"We feel guilty if we are not happy in some publicly approved way.. .can a happiness that is absolutely free, costs nothing at all, has never been advertised in Life, be genuine? It turns out to be the only kind that is genuine!" About the conservative monk who says Mass angrily at the new altar facing the people, digging his fist violently into his stomach at the nobis quoque peccatoribus, Fr. Merton muses, "Liturgical hara kirP" Finally, he chillingly avers, "It is desperation, not P love, that makes the world go round."
Fr. Merton demonstrates a remarkable facility for discovering and isolating truth. And he is often able to convey even deep truths, because he usually states them simply. Polysyllabic appellations infrequently supervene. He writes on tall thoughts with short words. He also utilizes a rare commodity today—common sense. "Even in countries where most men have plenty to eat and (it is affirmed) more than enough opportunities for sexual gratification, much deeper and more fundamental needs are felt. Chief of these is the need for meaning'1' He agrees with Bonhoeffer's doctrine of "Christian world-; liness," inasmuch as earthly life plays the penultimate to the ultimate joining with Christ. (Well, he's not wholly simple.)
The best application of his common sense, though, is to a critical appraisal of his "Church of baroque seals and Renaissance chanceries" juxtaposed with its IBM machines. "The Spirit is stifled in paper." He wishes "religious life were less of a perpetual cold war, on a very amiable level of course, between subjects and superiors." And he deplores the lack of "religious seriousness" of the monastery, which "is like sandlot baseball compared with the j big-league seriousness of General Electric. It may in fact occur to many, /'• including the monks, to doubt the monastery and what it represents. Who doubts G.E.?" (This, of course, was written before G.E. started selling radioactive color TV sets.)
But it is over our "suicidal age" that he becomes angriest. Our endless nuclear stockpiling and mankind's predilection toward war receives the mercilessly glaring light of hard-hitting common sense. "It is one thing to trust in God because one depends on Him in reality, and quite another to assume He will bless our bombs because the Russians are atheists and He cannot possibly approve of atheism." After hearing an H-bomb costs only 5 $250,000, he wonders, "Was there ever such a bargain? I ask you, who can give you more destruction for your dollar?" And, the crux, "Is it believable that we can resist getting all that we have paid for?" It is really pointless to argue about the morality of war. John XXIII in Pacem in Terris "simply says that war is a sin because it is inhuman."
Oh, the name of the book is Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (1966). It's
a collection of jottings, short essays, quotations, observations, and thoughts
^ about everything from Aquinas and Brecht to the Yin-Yang and Zen. And
how refreshing to read a book in which the strongest expletive is "vomited
out in the desert." Greg Thibodeau
inject prudence into classroom deliberations. I can see several direct benefits to St. John's as an educational institution:
1) Urban problems by their nature are inter-disciplinary in scope, perfect subjects for a problem approach to liberal arts education and about as close to "real life" decision-making (which is not monistic in nature) as one can get inside college walls. If you are a sociologist, economist, political scientist, psychologist, historian, or even a theologian (note Cox's Secular City) there is an interest here for you.
2) One of the difficulties small colleges have faced in the past has been their inability to keep capable staff people who do have research curiosity. All of us know men who have left the staff for this reason here at SJU. In the social sciences this handicap may be dissipated by part-time research during the school term or full-time summer research for those who are resourceful with ideas.
3) There is the probability of additional staff in some departments which will bring the student into contact with more instructors in his major field than formerly. Too, this diversity enriches and enlivens the staff members themselves by additional interchange with men in their own discipline.
4) This type of contact with the real problems of the community can help to break down the moat of insulation from the community that too frequently has caused the rest of society to term colleges "ivory towers" and professors "dreamers." There IS room for detached meditation in college life—but there is also room for involvement in the community about us. This is the new direction that higher education is taking today—and it represents a broadened and significant role for it.
5) Too, this venture represents a new chapter in the Benedictine adaptive resiliency to the problems of their times. Historically the Order has responded to the needs of their communities whether it was to educate the children of medieval peasants or to send "peace corps" monks to teach farming methods to the Goths. Today this Benedictine institution is seeking to respond to the needs of the secular city about which Bishop John Wright has said "there is no concern so secular but that it can lead us to God."
6) Let us not forget the potential impact on the student who can be enriched and motivated either through elemental research himself or by contact with faculty members who are so engaged. The student today is demanding relevance, and educational psychologists tell us that the motivation thus engendered makes the learning process easier, more efficient. Our social science laboratory surrounds us and we should make use of it.
7) Finally, the prospect is present for a cooperative system of research that involves other small colleges about the state. It could draw them or at least certain of their departments more closely together in a common schol-larly endeavor.
These are prospects—not realities—as yet. There is a potential here, a great one. The Ford Foundation has made an act of faith that the small college, generally overlooked in research grants, can exhibit resourcefulness, empirical skill, and team spirit. St. John's and perhaps some other Minnesota colleges along with us will have to prove that Ford's confidence has not been misplaced.
Council Reorganized To Begin Spring Term With New Life
By Rich Fuchs
The St. John's University Student Council has taken on a new look for the 1968 Spring Term. A set of Council committees has been established with the hope of curing a certain stagnancy which has been impeding creativity and effectiveness in student government.
The Council has been divided into ten committees, each dealing with specific areas of campus life. One of the main purposes of this new system is to decentralize the governmental powers, delegating them to different agencies. Instead of just a few doing most of the work, all of the Council members would be called upon to do their share. Each committee has a chairman who is responsible for the area to which he is assigned. These chairmen will act as advisors and arbiters to their respective committees.
Due to outside claims of ineffectiveness and apathy, the Council is trying to renovate itself in search of an efficient and operative form of government.
The most promising addition to the new Council is the Council Evaluation Committee. This will provide the Council with a chance to get constructive and critical analysis from both outside and within. Student President Jim Borgestad is optimistic about the future of this new committee system and hopes to see a marked improvement in Council effectiveness. These committees are designed to stimulate the individual counselors interest and responsibility in student affairs. The new committees and their members are as follows (asterisk indicates chairman):
Officers: Jim Borgestad, President; Rich Dietman, Vice-president.
Finance: *AIan Steichen, Jim Borgestad.
Student Service: *John Sail, Greg Skwira, Jim Vivaldelli, Norwood Banks, Gene Trowbridge, Dan Wha-
len, Mel Meier.
Academic: *Terry Aronson, Bob Elmer, Greg Heille, Rick Althoff, Charles Ward.
Inter-campus: *Tom O'Connell, Tim Casey, Bill Smoley.
Social and Rec: *BiIl Sweeney, Doug Ray, Tom Yencho
Student Cabinet: *Rich Dietman.
NSA: *Jim Voight, Gene Ranieri, Peter Lind, John Nolan.
CSCA: *Alan Steichen.
Assistant Sec: Tom Davis, Lyle Whitcomb.
Stumpf Suffers Lack of Interest
By Tom LaLiberte
From long winter months' work will come the winter issue of the Lower Stumpf Lake Review. The "Stumpf" is presently at the printer with hopes of arriving sometime early in March for distribution.
For anyone who is unfamiliar with the "Stumpf," let it be made clear that it is not a review of the latest pollution problems, nor is it the biannual Flynntown newspaper. The Lower Stumpf Lake Review is a literary magazine published by the students of St. John's.
The history of the Lower Stumpf Lake Review began in 1926 when it was first published as The Record Supplement. In 1940 it was issued four times a year as The Quarterly. The title Sketchbook was adopted in 1948 and then in 1966 the magazine underwent another transformation when the present title originated. The name Lower Stumpf Lake is an older name for the lake that is more commonly known to us as the Watab.
The present issue consists predominantly of selections of poetry, with a few critical essays and short stories, a few satirical works, and a photography spread by Dan Boyar-ski, a senior art major. The works have been contributed by Johnnies, friends and members of the faculty.
This year's staff members are all new to the production of the magazine, since all of last year's staff was composed of seniors. This year's editor, Hank Moore, a junior majoring in English, expressed a feeling that much of the style of the past has faded; that the "Stumpf" is no longer the representative magazine it once was or tried to be. Now it only seems to serve as sort of a status symbol to have a copy.
The staff consists of only six members this year, these being mostly juniors. Moore emphasized that the prevailing attitude of the staff is good, but there has been a definite lack of enthusiasm on the part of the student body which is evident in the limited amount of material that was submitted for the winter issue. Hank feels that perhaps we are due for a change in format; the present magazine seems to stir fewer literary minds or perhaps the number of literary enthusiasts is decreasing.
PHOTO CONTEST
Sponsored by CSB-SJU Academic Bulletin Committee More than $50 in cash prizes
Plus publication in academic bulletins and other campus publications CATEGORIES: Journalistic or creative photographs of life at the College of St. Benedict and St. John's University: 1) campus activities; 2) classroom scenes; 3) campus scenes RULES: 1. The contest is open to all CSB-SJU students and faculty.
2. No limitation on the number of entries per contestant.
3. Entries must be black and white photographs, any size.
4. Entries must be identified with the contestant's full name and local address typed on a gummed label and attached to the back of each photograph.
5. Entries must be submitted to Mr. Cliff Sakry, Public Relations Office, Room 125, Main Building, CSB or to Father Alcuin Siebenand, OSB, Public Information Office, Room 149, Main Building, SJU, not later than March 15, 1968.
6. Entries will be judged on content, originality, photographic technique, and suitability for reproduction purposes in the academic bulletins. The decision of the judges will be final.
7. Each entry becomes the property of the sponsors and presupposes reproduction rights for the contest sponsors. Negatives of the winning photographs must be made available for use by the sponsors.
8. Awards will be announced the week of April 1, 1968.
First Prize—the cover selection...........$25
Second Prize...........................$15
Third Prize.............................$10
Additional prizes—for each photograph used in the academic bulletins___........$5
9. The sponsors reserve the right to grant more awards or fewer awards than announced, or no awards, if the entries are not of sufficient merit.
