By Thea Jarvis and Gretchen Keiser

Archbishop John F. Donoghue has decided to assign diocesan priests to Holy Cross Parish, Atlanta, and the Emory University Catholic Center as of next June, and has asked the Dominican order to relinquish pastoral care in both places.

The archbishop met in Atlanta last week with Father Alberto Rodriguez, OP, Prior Provincial of the Southern Dominican Province and a former pastor of Holy Cross, and told him of the decision.

The Dominican order has pastored Holy Cross Parish since 1976 and has overseen the campus ministry at Emory University since the early 1980s.

The Aquinas Center of Theology at Emory University is independent, with visiting scholars, including Dominicans, on its faculty, and will be unaffected by the change, Archbishop Donoghue said in an interview.

The decision is “not because of any dissatisfaction with the Dominicans. It is because of a need the diocese has now” to place in parishes the number of new priests being ordained for the Archdiocese of Atlanta, the archbishop said.

“We have so many men coming along I actually needed parishes for these men,” Archbishop Donoghue said.

The archdiocese will ordain a priest in December and expects to ordain nine priests over the course of 1995. They also expect to ordain eight in 1996 and nine in 1997.

The Dominican order, which is one of 10 religious orders staffing parishes in the archdiocese, was selected because the order has only one parish here, namely Holy Cross, the archbishop said.

Asked about immediate concerns raised that other orders, particularly orders with a smaller presence here, could also be asked to leave, the archbishop said he did not have such a policy or a plan to ask other orders to leave.

The archbishop said he had been asked immediately by the Dominicans to reconsider his decision but, after reconsulting with members of the Priest Personnel Board with whom he reached his original decision, he has reaffirmed his decision.

The intention is for the transfer to take effect in June 1995 at the time of normal clergy reassignments, he said.

The archbishop said he first raised the possibility with the order last summer when a request was made to add a new Dominican ministry and he declined, saying that it was possible Holy Cross Parish would be returned to the archdiocese in the future.

Parishioners learned of archdiocesan plans for Holy Cross last weekend, when an announcement drafted by a group of parish leaders was read at each of the scheduled Masses.

“Archbishop Donoghue has requested that the Dominican Fathers give up Holy Cross parish and leave the diocese of Atlanta,” a lay person announced just before the closing hymn, adding that “a committee of parishioners has formed to initiate a process to appeal this request and to reverse the decision.”

Parishioners were also informed that beginning Sunday, Sept. 25, “and every evening following, this community will gather to pray and offer one another encouragement and mutual support during this time of waiting.”

Father Edward Everitt, OP, in his sixth year as pastor of Holy Cross, said he is “really saddened” by the prospect of the Dominican departure from the archdiocese “not only for myself but for the members of Holy Cross.”

“We have worked together as a team of Christian people,” he said. “It’s a great parish.”

In the 18 years the Dominicans have administered for the archdiocese, Holy Cross has experienced significant expansion and growth. Over the past five years, church membership increased from 800 to 1800 families including 300 Vietnamese and over 200 Hispanic families.

Parish staff currently includes three Dominican priests one of whom ministers to the Hispanic congregation of Holy Cross and Our Lady of the Americas mission in Chamblee. The parish also helps support a Vietnamese Religious who provides pastoral care for the large Vietnamese community there.

Father Everitt said he regrets the loss of the Dominican presence at Emory, where the order is currently represented at the university’s Candler School of Theology and the Aquinas Center of Theology, founded by the Dominicans in 1987.

The order has had a “a very positive influence” at Emory, Father Everitt said, introducing internationally renowned Catholic theologians to the campus population and providing pastoral leadership for the Catholic community there.

This semester, Father Benedict Viviano, OP, Ph.D., visiting professor from the Ecole Biblique in Jerusalem, is teaching a Scripture course at the Aquinas Center. Father Robert Keller, OP, Ph.D., teaches at Candler and serves as Catholic campus minister.