The Sixties was a time of political and social upheaval in Australia. Young people challenged the traditional values of their parents' generation and actively opposed the decisions of the government. Women demanded equal rights and others called for racial equality and a new consideration for the environment. Many more demonstrated against the Vietnam War, conscription and the nuclear industry.
Although many of these protests were part of wider social movements taking place in other Western countries the advances in communications technology meant that revolutionary ideas and voices of dissent could rapidly be transmitted and received around the world. We were taught to question the role of the “mass media” in shaping the new global village - our English classes were devoted much to the philosophy of Marshall McLuhan – but the fuss our teachers made was lost on me! I wonder what today's students would think of this?
Throughout the Sixties, many young people became disillusioned by what they perceived to be the shallowness and materialism of contemporary society. Towards the end of the decade, many adopted an alternative “hippie” lifestyle. Among other elements, the hippie movement included a rebellious style of dress, a reverence for nature, Eastern spiritual philosophy and experimentation with drugs like marijuana and LSD. These radical changes in society were reflected in the new fashions, hairstyles and styles of music that emerged throughout the decade. While rock 'n' roll retained its popularity, the rise of hippie culture permeated mainstream fashion and music.
Daramalan College in the mid-to-late 60s was a school ruled by the iron will of its headmaster, Father John (“Jock”) McCowage known to us as “The Boss”. For its time, Daramalan was one of the more progressive Catholic schools which fostered the ideal that it was better to help us develop our minds than impose rigid, traditional values upon them. However, counter-balancing this liberalism there was the ever-present conservatism of the old guard, people like Father McCowage, as this excerpt from a school report clearly shows:
“The school has been ... worried by the apparently high standards required by the Universities for Matriculation. That students ... should be excluded is understandable but the solicitude of the Universities to preserve standards may screen out not only the unworthy but also much worthwhile talent which Australia cannot economically lose or even think of neglecting.
“All this, however, does not give much help now in assisting a boy to forward plan for his future. Further, what are the requirements for entry to the Third Division of the Public Service? Definition on all such points appears to be a matter of urgency, urgency inadequately carried out at the level at which the overall planning is carried out.”
Now I don’t suppose that Father McCowage was implying that the only career choice for graduates of Daramalan was the public service although, in 1968, Canberra was essentially a one-industry town dependent on the fortunes of the public service for its survival. While Canberra is the centre of Australian politics, in 1968 its population lacked the means to govern themeselves in town planning, health, education, tourism, urban services and the arts. The 1960s was a time of major growth for Canberra, due largely to Bob Menzies' personal ambition. Australia (and Canberra) were on an economic high but, behind this promising scene, by the end of the decade the conservative political agenda had become inert and conservative opinions seemed out-dated, irrelevant and unsuited to the progressive nature of the times. Perhaps Father McCowage's concerns for the future (and those of many his contemporaries) could be conveniently summarised by these sentiments of his:
“Some parents and some boys appear to regard as unimportant Speech and Drama, and the qualifying subjects: Art, Craft, Physical Education and Music. On-the-spot interviews, or even an ready ear as one moves about, show Australians as a relatively inarticulate people. There are too many aimless wanderers. There is too little appreciation of beauty. There is much vandalism. There is too much shambling deportment; and the rejection of one-third of our twenty year-old draftees lays us open to the charge of being an unfit generation.”
My goodness, he certainly had a way with words, didn't he? However, as students of the time, we were more concerned about our rights to decide if National Service was necessary to Australia instead of worrying about too many draftees being rejected as unfit for cannon fodder. Bear in mind, too, that at 20 years of age, young men could be conscripted into the Australian defence force but they didn't have the right to vote for the government that put them there! The right to vote for 18 year-olds did not come about until the electoral reforms of a Labor Government in 1973.
1968 was a time, too, when the stereotyped views about women were being put to the torch. Although The Female Eunuch was still two years from being published, the first seeds of the Women's Liberation movement were already ripening. In the late 1960s, many Australian women began to question the restrictive roles that society had assigned to them. Many women felt that there was more to life than raising children and taking care of the home.
Others were dissatisfied at being confined to traditionally “female” occupations like teaching, administration and secretarial work. Women marched, protested and pressured governments in a bid to gain equal rights in all spheres of life including the workplace, education, politics and sport. Of course, as boys, we were unconcerned by such things because we had been blessed at birth by two major advantages in life: of being equipped with a Y-chromosome and not having to ask for directions to get wherever we wanted to go!
Against this background, on 25 July 1968 one man, an Italian by the name of Giovanni Montini, dropped a bombshell the effects of which are still reverberating around the world today. I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't recognise his name – you will know him as Pope Paul VI – for he is probably best remembered for his encyclical letter Humanae Vitae. As earth-shattering as the Vatican's position on birth control was (namely, Catholicism's intransigent opposition to the use of artificial contraception by its followers) another momentous letter appeared in the local newspaper a few days later.
I do not propose to comment on the details of either letter for these are matters of individual faith and conscience but I would like to refresh your memory of the second letter, reproduced at right, as it appeared in The Canberra Times of Saturday, 3 August 1968.
For me, having been at Daralaman for less than two months, this was a torrid introduction to my new life in Canberra because it was unprecendented for members of the Catholic clergy go public with their views (and, no doubt, jeopardise their career prospects in doing so) by daring to speak openly against church law. What the hell were these guys thinking? Yes, you can think these things, but have your views appear in print? Well, I can only imagine the storm this must've created over breakfast at the archbishop's residence. I'm fairly sure that two seconds after choking on his omelette, Archbishop Thomas Cahill must've been on the blower thundering a torrent of Gaelic invective at the Father Superior of the MSC mission in Dickson ... to the effect that Jock would've been whisked off to answer His Grace's summons faster than you could say “Beam me up, Scotty!”
Not content to publish the material inconspicuously in the “letters” page, The Canberra Times drew attention to its existence (just in case people supposed such material might go unnoticed by the church hierarchy) by printing on the front page:
Encyclical on Pill not binding, say priests.
In a letter to the editor four Roman Catholic priests in Canberra argue, in good conscience, to use contraceptives does not involve sin.
OK, enter damage control. Three days later, The Canberra Times carried the following front page article:
Stand of Priests ‘Diocese Matter’
Three of the four priests in conflict with Archbishop T. V. Cahill over the Pope's ban on artificial birth control took their normal classes at Daramalan College, Dickson, yesterday and took part last night in an Education Week ‘open night’ at the school.
However, acting on directives from the archbishop and the head of the Sacred Heart Order in Australia, Father J. McMahon, the priests and others occupying offices within the diocese continued to decline to discuss the issue or make any statement on it.
Fr McMahon declined to say from Sydney whether he still planned to travel to Canberra today as indicated earlier.
In response to inquiries the Catholic Church press secretary in Sydney, Dr W. Murray said, “The whole question is one for the Diocese of Canberra-Goulburn, where it happened, as a separate diocese.”
“In consequence of this I do not know if it happens that the archbishop had discussions with Cardinal Gilroy. If they had discussions that would concern the cardinal and would be a private matter between the two of them.”
The priests, in a letter to the editor of The Canberra Times on Saturday, argued that a judgment made by a Catholic, in good faith. to use contraceptives did not involve sin.
The priests who signed the letter are Fathers M. Fallon, B. Hingerty and B. Brundell, of Daramalan, and Father J. Hanrahan, of the Sacred Heart Monastery, Watson.
I don't know the fates of these people – they left Daramalan before the 1969 school year commenced – but I know that Father Fallon has remained true to his vocation and is very active in parish life within Canberra as well as being a prolific author and commentator on the relevance of Catholicism in the modern world. I hope, if he should ever read these ramblings of mine, he will not be embarrassed by me disturbing the past instead of allowing such things to become forgotten memories. For many of us, former students of Daramalan, we will always remember the famous (or infamous) letter of “the gang of four”.
We will remember it, not merely because of the sensation that it caused at the time; in fact, for months afterwards the Australian media (secular and non-secular) paid a lot of attention to stories about clergy and prominent lay Catholics who were openly critical of the official church position on contraception. No, I think we will remember this episode because it brought home to us, impressionable young men (and women, too), that a new era had dawned, that we carried an awesome responsibility to overhaul society and make it better for future generations. It brought home to me the idea that rebellion is a natural right, albeit one that can be exercised in ways that are less “abrasive” than others, but a right that demands respect nonetheless, how it's exercised or our personal views on what is being rebelled against notwithstanding.
I strongly doubt that we were ever in danger of becoming, as “The Boss” had lamented, a generation of vandals.