Liberal and Conservative Voices for Justice： John LaFarge, SJ, James Gillis, CSP, and the Northeast Clergy Conference for Negro Welfare, 1933-1944

For a period of some 10 years, two Roman Catholic priests, James Gillis, CSP and John LaFarge, SJ, became unlikely collaborators and colleagues in their common effort to bring greater justice to Black Catholics in the United States. Gillis, a strong political and theological conservative and LaFarge, a much more liberal thinker, were two prominent members of the Northeast Clergy Conference for Negro Welfare, a group that arose on the early 1930s and for the next decade produced documents, programs, and initiated various initiatives to better the life of Black Catholics, initially in the Northeast part of the country and then broadening out its reach in a more general way. The ability for two apparent opposites to collaborate in a common effort to assist an oppressed group tells an interesting story of cooperation between apparent political and religious opposites.

Trauma and Narrative Wreckage in the Biblical Story of Hagar

The story of Hagar （Genesis 16 and 12） figures prominently in Bible＇s patriarchal narratives of both the elected and rejected with respect to divine promise. As the story of an abused foreign woman cast out into an inhospitable wilderness along with her son, the story raises troubling questions about the portrayal of domestic violence perpetuated by those otherwise celebrated as “faithful” within biblical narratives： Abraham and his wife Sarah. In response to the relative silence on the topic of domestic violence among clergy and leaders of churches, synagogues, and other “sacred spaces”, this paper explores a reading of Hagar＇s story that reclaims her value as a human being. With the help of post-Shoah reading sensitivities that expose strategies of dehumanization, this reading makes visible the way in which the ancient writer/reactor of Genesis performs as an advocate for Hagar in the face of the abuse heaped upon her. In so doing, Hagar＇s story is transformed from a narrative about a rejected “other” into one that exposes abuse by the so-called“elected.” Thus read, the story provides support and encouragement for victims in contemporary religious cultures to step forward and tell their stories.

Religious Wear (Uniforms) in Psychiatry

Uniforms represent more than just a body cover. There could be symbols of status, power, authority, values, beliefs, identity, wealth representation, self-protection, health and safety, suppression of individuality and identification on one hand by the wearer. The observers may perceive uniforms differently based on their experiences, expectations, education, perceptual ability, conformity, status, power, self-confidence, and need for trust and communication without barrier or judgment. Forty five adult mentally ill patients (21 female and 24 male) were administered questionnaires with Linkert Scale regarding how approachable or off-putting they find casual and religious wear in social worker. Significantly more patients preferred casual wear to religious. Chi squared test equals 28.689 with p value of less than 0.0001 for four degrees of freedom.

Patrons, Priests, and People: The Parish in Late Medieval England

This article offers a broad survey of the parish as the basic unit within the structure of the medieval English church, concentrating on the period between 1291 and 1535. It sets out the challenges presented by the fact that each parish was different and resisted standardisation, yet individually and collectively played a central role in many areas of the social and economic life of pre-Reformation England. A parish can be examined and analysed as a community; but it was also the focus of many different aspirations and ambitions. This article draws attention particularly to the significance of the parish to its patron (as the person who had the right to appoint the chief local priest), to the clergy (for whom it provided income, and also imposed the duties and responsibilities of the ‘cure of souls’), and to the parishioners as the local community. It also points to the usefulness of jurisdictional records as sources for recovering parish life during the period. While these discussions cannot offer a full picture of the late medieval English parish, they do help to explain how it functioned, and the importance of its role within the religious, social, and economic life of the period.