The tension had been rising for weeks. Among the Louisiana rice marshes and stands of sugar cane around the little (pop. 2,500) town of Erath, 125 miles west of New Orleans, groups of white folks gathered to pass along the latest rumors about the new pastor. Father Labbe was holding catechism classes without the usual row of empty chairs between 650 white and 75 Negro children. He was going to mix the kids all up, people whispered, by putting them in alphabetical order and having them confirmed by the bishop in that order. Father Labbe, it seemed, was out to integrate the church.
There were mass meetings among Erath’s citizens, almost all of them parishioners of Our Lady of Lourdes Roman Catholic Church. A group went to complain to Bishop Jules Benjamin Jeanmard of Lafayette, La. Negro children were warned to stay away from catechism classes. Finally Father Labbe suspended the classes altogether.
One morning Mrs. Lula V. Ortemon, one of the catechism teachers, started out to church. Near the church door she found a group waiting. At least three women began pummeling her with their fists and chopping at her with their shoe heels. Mrs. Ortemon filed assault-and-battery charges against two of them.
Father Labbe found he was being followed everywhere he went, and asked a friend to accompany him as a bodyguard.
Back from a meeting of Roman Catholic bishops in Washington came Bishop Jeanmard and took drastic action. To Erath he dispatched a monsignor to read a letter of excommunication at all Sunday Masses of Our Lady of Lourdes. No individual was named, but those who had caused “a scandal to the church, a scandal to the community” by committing violence against Teacher Ortemon were denied the Sacraments, participation in the Church’s prayers, and Christian burial— until they repented.
Last week the excommunication was lifted; those to whom it had applied, it was announced, had made reparation. The congregation received the bishop’s hopeful blessing, and the catechism class was declared reopened. But Pastor Labbe, though disclaiming any plans for integration beyond the classroom, was not sure peace had really descended among the rice fields. Said he: “We shall have to wait and see what the future brings.”
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