MOTHER ANGELICA: THE REMARKABLE STORY OF A NUN, HER NERVE, AND A NETWORK OF MIRACLES
by Raymond Arroyo
Doubleday, 2005
400 pages, $23.95
Available in bookstores
Few are indifferent about Mother Angelica, the steel-nerved nun who, 25 years ago, established the Eternal Word Television Network, the world's largest religious media empire that today reaches more than 100 million viewers.
Some use superlatives that would embarrass any nun. Others mumble, “She's a saint, but hard to take.” “Progressive” Catholics say Mother Angelica ignored Vatican II; “traditional” ones insist she's saving the Church. Time magazine called her “the most influential Roman Catholic woman in America.” Lee Iacocca considers her “the patron saint of CEOs.”
In a 1994 cover story, the National Catholic Reporter reviled her, saying “anyone who watches EWTN will have to conclude that Catholicism is a Disneyland of pseudo-miracles, with a piety that exalts Mary over Jesus, more determined to squelch the Spirit than allow him or her to speak.”
The truth may lie in Raymond Arroyo's fascinating biography. A former Associated Press reporter, Arroyo's writing credits include National Review and The Wall Street Journal. Of course, he is also news director and lead anchor for EWTNews, a connection that might suggest bias. Rather, it afforded him access to the nun's mind that other biographers could only have wished for. He had her ear. He became privy to her greatest joys and most surprising secrets. In these pages, he presents both.
Describing Rita Rizzo's childhood, Arroyo describes how, abandoned by her father and reared by a possessive, depressed mother, she became her own “parent.” Through it all, her faith developed. Arroyo explores her physical suffering as a young woman and her healing by the prayers of a local mystic, an event that prompted Rizzo to dedicate her life to God.
In 1944, she entered Adoration Monastery in Cleveland. Arroyo shows how her survival skills and powerful personality caused problems with the Poor Clares — and how these qualities soon thrust her into a world beyond the cloister.
Beginning with an addition to the monastery, her interest in construction led to numerous projects, eventually producing the magnificent $50 million Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Alabama.
Arroyo weaves into a rich tapestry the swatches of Angelica's extraordinary life: devotion to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, elevation to abbess at age 37, conflicts inside and outside the Church, work in radio and as an author, surgeries and hospitalizations and, in 1978, the event that “would decisively change Mother Angelica's life forever” — her first visit to a TV station.
The nun “ogled the compact studio with something bordering on covetousness,” he writes. “‘Lord, I gotta have one of these,’ Angelica whispered in a private prayer. Then almost as soon as it was out, she hesitated, ‘What would 12 nuns do with this? I'm a cloistered nun, and I don't know anything about television.’”
But, moments later, when informed that $950,000 would buy a studio, Angelica replied, “Is that all? I want one of these.” How she got it and used it is an engrossing tale. It is amazing and inspiring to look back now on what she has accomplished.
Ann Applegarth writes from Roswell, New Mexico.
----- EXCERPT: Weekly Book Pick ----- EXTENDED BODY: Ann Applegarth ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: Workplace Cooperation DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:FAMILY MATTERS
As a manager, I put a high value on cooperation and collaboration. I don't like unnecessary conflicts, or the stress that comes when employees are angry or yelling at each other. But some employees just seem to like to instigate and antagonize for no apparent reason.
Because of your temperament and circumstances, you place a high value on harmony. But if forced cooperation masks problems, it can create deeper issues.
Obviously, not everyone “plays well with others.” You want to talk openly with everyone so you can discover any simmering discontent. Then you'll be better positioned to let everyone know that cooperation is what you expect and require.
Here's an example. I once had a job hiring and managing mental-health clinicians for a big military contract. Their job was to go overseas and help military adolescent dependents with personal problems. I would interview the prospective employees, check references, assess their fitness for the specific work, and decide who could succeed in an overseas military environment.
Determining their clinical skills wasn't so hard. Figuring out whether they could succeed in the military culture, and on foreign soil at that, was a tougher call. But we got better at matching the person with the assignment and things went rather smoothly, except for one thing: If they didn't work well with the commander and the school principals, all was for naught.
It didn't matter how well the clinician worked with the kids and parents. If the principals didn't want the person on campus, and if the commander didn't want the person on the installation, the counselor would fail. And we had a few who inadvertently or intentionally alienated the principal or the commander and put us in a bind where we had to send them home — at considerable cost to them and us.
Then I changed our hiring policy. After we determined that the applicant was qualified, we would make a tough request. It was called “Cooperation or Else.” It went something like this:
“If we send you overseas, you must work cooperatively with the base commander and with the school principals. If one of them wants you fired, with good or bad reason, we will have to dismiss you — even if it isn't your fault. We can't afford to have any problems with these people, no matter what. Are you confident enough in your abilities to work with potentially very difficult people? We will provide suggestions and support, but there is little more we can do beyond that. We want you to understand that it is totally your responsibility to make sure that you have a good working relationship with the commander and the principal. If they tell us they can't work with you, we'll have to send you home. Are you still interested in taking the job under those conditions?”
What happened? Well, a handful told us they would not take the job under those terms. The rest said that they were so confident in their abilities to work with others, no matter how difficult, that they took the job. We never again had a problem with the principals or the commanders regarding our employees.
Here's the lesson: As a manager, you should never assume that every staff member values cooperation. Many do not — unless they are encouraged or taught to do so. Employees will rise to high expectations regarding cooperation if they are trained and told ahead of time that it is a very high priority.
Also, while we cannot control other people, if we are totally focused and committed to cooperation ourselves, it's amazing how beautifully it can come about —even under trying or unfair circumstances.
Art Bennett is director of Alpha Omega Clinic and Consultation Services (aoccs.org).
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Art Bennett ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Hope Emerges From Grief in Colombia DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Latin American Correspondent
OCAÑA, Colombia — The murder of three priests in one week was a shock too hard for most Colombians to take. It was so hard, in fact, that even President Alvaro Uribe decided to reconsider his “no deal” stand against guerrilla forces, thus opening new hopes of peaceful negotiations in Colombia.
And the tragedies have led to a new role for the country's bishops in mediating in the country's long-standing insurgency.
“It may sound contradictory that the brutal murders of three priests are bringing a serious hope for peace,” Bishop Luis Castro, president of the Colombian Bishops' Conference, told the Register, “but on the other hand, it is very much in the Gospel's logic: The seed must fall and die to bear much fruit.”
The wave of murders that changed Colombia's political landscape started Aug. 15, when Fathers Vicente Bayona, 49, Jesus Mora, 60, and two contractors were murdered by armed men in the northern city of OcaÑa, a zone where two Marxist guerrilla groups and one paramilitary group are active.
Despite the fact that no one claimed responsibility, police immediately blamed the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (known as FARC) the largest guerrilla group.
Bishop Castro issued a statement condemning the murders as crimes that “dishonor those who committed them, and that thwart the aspirations of reconciliation and peace that the Church preaches.”
Only 48 hours later, Father Jesus S´nchez, pastor of El Limón in the central province of Tolima, was murdered while teaching at a small rural school. According to Bishop Castro, the priest was dragged out of the class by a group of militiamen and “shot in the most cruel and brutal manner.”
“As we learn about this criminal and sacrilegious act, we implore forgiveness and conversion for the authors of such horrendous crimes, whoever they may be,” Bishop Castro said.
For the local bishop, Abraham Escudero Montoya, of the Diocese of Espinal, there was no doubt who the authors were. He explained that Father S´nchez had repeatedly been threatened by members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia because of his fierce opposition to the draft the guerrillas were forcing on local young men.
“The murder was a new blow to a people that cannot bear any more violence or bloodshed,” Bishop Escudero said.
Church ‘Not a Target’
The murders were used by the government to rally further support for Uribe's controversial but partially successful hard line against guerrilla groups. Unlike his predecessor Andrés Pastrana, who tried to establish a dialogue with the guerrilla groups and even created a “safety zone” for them, Uribe has established a new approach to the guerrilla groups.
Since he assumed power in 2002, Uribe announced that no negotiations would start with any such group unless they lay down their arms. His strategy brought a successful peace deal with the paramilitaries, and his military offensive has expanded safety zones and put Marxist guerrilla groups on the defensive.
The strategy also has paid significant political dividends: More than 72% of Colombians support Uribe.
But on Aug. 22, a surprising breakthrough completely changed the landscape.
Though the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia has been blamed for all the murders, a competing Marxist rebel group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), issued a statement claiming responsibility for the murder of Fathers Rozo and Mora.
In the statement, the National Liberation Army said the attacks were due to “intelligence and tactical errors.” It also said the Church is not one of its targets and that it continues to consider the Church “a bridge to facilitate a political solution to the country's civil conflict.”
The statement also said that the act “will not go unpunished,” and that the group would take the necessary measures in accord with its own “wartime rules of conduct and humane ethics.”
Less than two hours after the statement was released, the Colombian Bishops Conference issued a quick response of “forgiving just as Our Lord told us to do.” It also made a dramatic call to all parties involved to stop the bloodshed.
“As far as the Church is concerned, we forgive the ELN for what has happened,” said Bishop Castro. “We will continue to dialogue with them and with all of the illegally armed groups in order to achieve the elusive peace.”
Bishops Mediate
But probably the biggest surprise was Uribe's sudden announcement that he accepted an offer made by the bishops to serve as mediator between the government and the Marxist rebels.
On Aug. 23, after paying a visit to the Colombian Bishops' Conference and holding a private meeting with its members, the president gave the go-ahead to the bishops to help negotiate a cease-fire.
“The president's change of mind is quite close to a miracle,” explained Carmen Elena Villa, a journalist who covers religious issues for El Colombiano. “President Uribe went to the conference for a courtesy visit, while the bishops had only the issue of abortion in their agenda. And all of a sudden, this significant change in policy comes out,” Villa told the Register.
In fact, Uribe announced that “the government accepts the Church's efforts for a preliminary dialogue aimed at a ceasefire.”
According to former Sen. Carlos Otarola, “Even if the acceptance of the Church's mediation is a carrot-and-stick tactic to deal with the guerrillas, it definitively opens a door for a peaceful agreement.”
The murders and the surprising turn they have sparked have brought new attention to the critical role priests and religious play in Colombia.
According to the bishops' conference, the number of priests murdered during the last five years has risen to 32.
“Although the guerrilla organizations have not systematically obstructed the mission of Church personnel, they have often threatened them and forced them to leave some areas,” says Bishop Fabi´n Marulanda, secretary general of the bishops' conference.
In the last years, 54 religious have been threatened, and five bishops, 18 priests and one missionary have been kidnapped, while 71 churches have been either destroyed or seriously damaged.
Nevertheless, “priests and religious keep carrying out their mission and vocations keep flourishing,” Bishop Marulanda said. “It seems that the powerful witness of courage and sacrifice is inspiring the new generation of priests and religious.”
Alejandro Bermúdez is based in Lima, Peru.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Alejandro Bermúdez ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Austin Roots, Catholic Fruits DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Even within the wildly diverse world of alternative pop music, the Rock Bottom Choir is an unusual entity.
Consider: How many artists played on major commercial radio stations found their muse in a confessional at Medjugorje? How many bands making contemporary Catholic music have major-label ambitions and credibility in the secular music community? And how many spiritual CDs are funded by Gene Simmons of Kiss?
The Rock Bottom Choir, a collaboration of musicians prominent in the musical incubator that is the Austin, Texas, music scene, can claim all these oddities as parts of its life story.
The band's lead singer and songwriter, Matt McCormack, was a self-described “buffet Catholic” when his life — and his songwriting — were changed during a profound conversion experience at Medjugorje.
Christ spoke to his heart during confession, he says, telling him he'd lost his way. “I promised him I would make this record,” says McCormack.
The fruit of that promise is “For All the Saints, Vol. 1,” which is currently in rotation on adult-alternative and rock radio in the Austin area. “It's a kind of floaty, atmospheric record,” says the bandleader. “I wanted to make an ‘apparitional soundtrack’ of what I'd experienced.”
“It took me a while to get it together,” he adds. “When you want to write songs and relate them to each other and deal with the same subject matter, it takes longer.”
Helping McCormack with the songwriting was Will Sexton, a noted songwriter and guitarist, and Ryan Carter, lead singer and guitarist for another popular Austin band. They formed Rock Bottom Choir with George Reiff (bass), Joey Shuffield (drums) and Bill Carter (banjo and mandolin).
McCormack was able to fund the project with money received from Simmons for the rights to one of his songs. The album was recorded quickly; Michael Thompson, touring keyboardist for the Eagles, helped produce and overdub multiple instruments onto the tracks.
You can hear this collaborative spirit in Rock Bottom Choir's distinct sound, which conveys a laid-back sense of musical joy.
A good deal of space is given to the individual instruments to explore and flesh out the melodies. This airiness meshes well with the lyrics, which are simple and direct. “I wanted the lyrics to be like prayers for children,” McCormack explains. “Lyrically, it comes across as very childlike, very universal.”
Having said that, McCormack is quick to point out that he's leery of being cast in the “Christian rock” category.
“I'd hate it to be labeled if it means I'm not going to reach someone else who might not think like that,” he explains. “We've gotten more love out of mainstream radio than Christian, because you have to go through Nashville, and they'll veto anything with the Blessed Virgin on the cover. I like standing up for what I do, but I like mainstream radio, too. I'd be cheating myself if all of a sudden it was, ‘Matt McCormack, a Christian artist.’”
Catholic Cool
At the same time, McCormack acknowledges a simple reality of the music industry: It's not known for harboring a special love for Catholics in its heart.
“Our lawyer just got back from Los Angeles and he was telling us, ‘Man, this is the hardest sell in the world,’” he explains. “I'd like to get a record deal and distribution, a way to turn people on to this kind of thing. We lucked out here [in Austin], because everybody knew who we were before it came out. They listened with open ears. But that won't be the same for us in Chicago or Detroit.”
Biases or no, the word on Rock Bottom Choir is slowly gaining exposure. EWTN recently added the album's first track, “How Great Thou Art, Pt. 2” to its Catholic Jukebox.
“The music we play is what I believe is the best of the best — not just the quality of the music, but the lyrics have to be right on the money,” says Thom Price, EWTN's director of programming. “What we tend to focus on is giving praise and honor to God. When I heard ‘How Great Thou Art,’ I thought that song really works for the show.”
Jennifer Sparrow, webmaster for the Oblates of Divine Mercy website (saint-faustina.com), heard about the band through a fellow oblate in Massachusetts.
“They have a very cool and distinctive sound — one that, I think, is not traditionally connected to ‘Jesus music,’” she explains. “Rock Bottom Choir has a sound that could attract people who may not otherwise listen to Christian rock. Maybe someone will listen to one of their songs and really think about God for the first time in their life.”
Says EWTN's Price: “When the music is right on in lyrics, and it sounds good — like something you would hear on secular or Protestant radio — then that is an evangelization tool.”
Musical Toolbox
McCormack emphasizes the role music can play as a tool of evangelization and catechesis.
“If people listen and say, ‘Oh my God, what am I doing?’ then I've made them think,” he says. “If our music makes them think about Christ or spirituality for one second, I've done my job.”
Meanwhile, he's hopeful that Rock Bottom Choir can accomplish this by reaching a wide audience.
“We've been getting great, high-profile gigs. We'll do L.A. at the end of September, and I'm hoping for a short tour in October. I'm already writing for the next record and I'm so excited about it. Hopefully, we'll find our niche. I think there are other people out there who think like I do.
“Music plays a huge part in spirituality, with people turning to it as they're trying to get their heads straight,” he continues. “With my music, if they get it, then man that's awesome. If they don't, I understand. But I think that, if you listen, you'll take in the message whether you want to or not.”
Iain Bernhoft writes from Spokane, Washington.
----- EXCERPT: The Rock Bottom Choir hits the high notes ----- EXTENDED BODY: Iain Bernhoft ----- KEYWORDS: Arts -------- TITLE: Campus Watch DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Hit Piece
In reference to Boston College law professor Charles Baron, who was criticized by the Newman Society for signing a legal brief in support of removing Terri Schiavo's feeding tube, the Globe reports almost in passing that Baron “has written in favor of physician-assisted suicide.”
The article — which includes no third-party defenders of the society — also includes the definition of heresy, which the paper's sources say, is a “rare” occurrence in Catholic higher education.
Had they been contacted, other experts might have pointed out that “the obstinate denial or obstinate doubt … of some truth which is to be believed by divine and Catholic faith,” does happen at Catholic institutions with some frequency, though usually by simply not teaching the truth or only including it as one among many versions of “truth.”
Rise in Vocations
IRELANDONLINE, Aug. 24 — Vocations are up in Ireland, and officials are saying the legacy of the late Pope John Paul II has played a role. Only eight ordinations took place in all of Ireland this year
For the second year in a row, St. Patrick's College, the national seminary in Maynooth, has seen a rise in the number of students — the first increases in two decades — as 19 began the school year there in late August, bringing enrollment to 75 from 63 last year.
Father Kevin Doran, national vocation coordinator, said the intense media attention to John Paul's life, death and message produced a “heightened awareness” of vocation in many.
Death of a Founder
ASSOCIATED PRESS, Aug. 26 — Msgr. Alfred Horrigan, the founding president of Bellarmine College, now Bellarmine University, died Aug. 25. He was 90.
In 1949, Archbishop John Floersh chose Msgr. Horrigan — a philosophy professor at what is today Spalding University — to found Bellarmine, Louisville's only men's Catholic college, and he remained as president for 24 years.
Msgr. Horrigan oversaw the merger with Ursuline College, creating a co-ed student body.
Slow Start
Advocates had “pushed for a Catholic high school north of Dallas to meet the demand of the growing Catholic population,” reported the Dallas daily.
Officials attributed the lower-than-expected enrollment at the first Catholic high school built in the Dallas area in 35 years, to a few factors, including an overestimation of how many of the 600 students turned away annually from other Catholic high schools would become John Paul II students. They expect enrollment to rise as the state-of-the-art school becomes known.
Marriage T-shirts Okay
After institute attorneys sent a letter to school officials explaining the students' First Amendment rights to wear expressive clothing, school officials made no further attempts to discourage the T-shirts.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: The Luckiest Man in New Orleans DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Raymond Arroyo, news broadcaster for EWTN, feels like he has dodged two bullets.
The face of “The World Over” program on the Eternal Word Television Network cable channel was born and raised in New Orleans, then moved away at age 18 to attend New York University. He went home to New Orleans in 1999 when he and his wife had their first baby. They lived there until they evacuated as Hurricane Katrina approached.
He spoke with Register staff writer Tim Drake from Hanceville, Ala., days before the release of Mother Angelica, his biography of the founder of EWTN.
This interview will appear in the Sept. 11 issue of the Register. Those of us watching coverage of the devastation and death in New Orleans can't help but link the two.
I lived in New York for eight years. My heart ached when the towers fell, but New York held. When the towers came down it was an awful tragedy, but the city held.
Here, we don't have the city. It's all gone.
This isn't just the cathedral and the Superdome being damaged, this is a way of life ending.
Are we going to go through the trouble of rebuilding? That is the real question, but who will go back? Who will we rebuild for? We don't know the extent of the devastation.
You're not getting the real visuals, the on-the-ground stuff. You have the world looking at it, but they can't get in.
How did you make the decision to evacuate for Katrina?
I was in Birmingham doing the show Friday night, Aug. 26. When I saw the trajectory of this hurricane, it looked a lot like Camille and Betsy. I knew from my history lessons in New Orleans what could happen, and I just had a feeling. So, I called my wife and told her to pack some things and the kids to be ready to evacuate. I landed at the New Orleans airport at 10:30 a.m. I didn't want to sit in 48 hours of traffic or axe my way out of the attic with a 14-day-old daughter, so we evacuated.
We loaded our Toyota Sienna minivan and departed at 2 p.m. on Saturday.
What part of the city did you live in?
We lived in Metairie, a suburb, three blocks away from Lake Pontchartrain. From the sketchy reports we're getting, our neighborhood is under five to eight feet of water. My guess is that the house is a goner. The important thing is that we are alive and made it through this apocalypse.
What was it like getting out of town?
As we drove out, the angels were smiling on us. It was like the path was cleared for me. There was no traffic. All of the gas in our neighborhood was gone. We got on the Interstate and within 20 minutes I was able to fill up the car. It was unbelievable.
Yet, we could find no hotels anywhere. When you're in a storm, you hold onto momma, so I called Mother Angelica.
I said, “Look, I have no place to go.”
They invited us to come stay at a guest house in Hanceville, Ala., near the shrine. It took us 6 1/2 hours to get there. By and large, we were blessed.
What did you pack?
Very little. I had the wherewithal to grab my wardrobe. I grabbed six suits and shirts so I would be able to work.
With the book tour coming up, I threw my books in. I also took some of my stack of bootleg Sinatra CDs. Everything else I left.
It was hard leaving my books and my music, but you can't eat Graham Greene first editions. As you reflect on your diplomas and even all the signed letters, you realize it's all passing. It's not important.
Thankfully, the book is done. That's a real blessing. God's timing is always right, even when we don't understand it. Something ends and something begins.
What are you hearing from friends in New Orleans?
One friend told me that they got out of the house with the clothing on their backs, three relics and a statue of Mary. I have friends who are wandering around with 12 people with them. They have no source of income and no place to go.
There are snakes, alligators, open gas and oil lines, live electricity, bodies and sewage in this nasty pool that is weaving its way through our homes.
This is going to sit there for weeks or more.
New Orleans is the bowl where you have to pump water out, but where will they pump the water to? The devastation is just massive.
There are still people trapped in their attics. There are aunts and mothers and fathers floating through our city.
This is a very Catholic center of our country. It has the highest per capita number of prayer groups and the most Eucharistic adoration chapels in the country. The spiritual import of that if these people should scatter will be significant.
It's also called a center of sin.
Yes. There are many who will say this is a judgment from God. That comes from people who have a misunderstanding of what New Orleans is.
Mardi Gras is not New Orleans. The sacred and the profane march lockstep in New Orleans. Some of the holiest people in the world live in that city. I can't imagine it is a judgment. If it is, God's aim is off. He drowned all the good areas — East New Orleans, Lakeview, Metairie. The French Quarter is five feet above sea level. It will most likely survive.
I understand your grandfather lost his restaurant?
Yes, the restaurant, Tony Angelo's, was one of the best-known local institutions. Frank Sinatra used to go there. My grandfather had been in the restaurant business for 50 years. The restaurant was lost when the 17th Street levee broke.
You were just set for the release of your biography on Mother Angelica. How will this impact the book's release?
The press releases for the book went out yesterday. When the media saw that I lived in New Orleans there was a feeding frenzy. I appeared on CNN and was scheduled to be on Larry King in two weeks, but they called asking if I could be on sooner.
The book comes out Sept. 6 and I start a 30-city tour. It's surreal, but at least I have work to go back to. A lot of my friends don't.
What are your thoughts as you watch the devastation on television?
I mourn for some of the things that are gone, but I have my family. Thank God, we're all together. I am the luckiest man from New Orleans.
I understand Mother Angelica's principle of living in the present moment. That's what helped her battle with her infirmities. I have a similar perspective.
I mourn for the city and the loss of this great Catholic cultural hub more than I mourn the loss of my home. New Orleans is a state of mind and a culture. I came back to New Orleans because I wanted my children to experience that liturgical culture.
What do you think you will do?
EWTN is going to give us a place to live in while we get back on our feet. There are pieces to be picked up, and we will have to make a decision about where we will go. I don't know if I could return and rebuild and place my family in that jeopardy again. In 18 years growing up, we never once evacuated.
Tim Drake writes from St. Joseph, Minnesota.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Drake ----- KEYWORDS: Inperson -------- TITLE: Can Benedict Save Europe? DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Ten years ago, on my first visit to Europe, there were obvious signs that the Church was in trouble.
I was staying with a friend outside of Delmenhorst, Germany. On Sunday morning, we asked our German host to take us to church. He kindly walked us to an impressive and imposing 900-year-old structure.
The doors were locked.
“I guess they aren't having services today,” he told us.
The irony of seeing this beautiful old church empty on a Sunday morning reminded me of the Latin phrase, “Lex orandi, lex credendi” (how one worships shows what one believes). A Europe that does not worship is a Europe that does not believe.
Germany didn't have time for God, even on Sunday morning.
My second visit to Germany, for World Youth Day, was utterly different. Yes, the signs all still suggest that Christianity is on the wane in Europe.
But it wasn't that week.
The usually-empty churches were completely packed with young Catholics from around the world. They were there to spend a week celebrating Christ with the Pope. I was one among nearly 8,000 journalists covering Pope Benedict XVI's first visit outside of Italy since his election.
We got used to Pope John Paul II's World Youth Days — he has held them annually for the past 20 years, with big, international gatherings every two or three years. About 12 million young people have seen him there, in some of the largest crowds in the history of the planet.
The good Lord helped bring out the crowds to this one — how poignant that the Pope's first foreign trip should be to the place of his birth! But all the same, Pope Benedict was a massive public draw — showing a spark of hope amid the old locked churches of his homeland.
It's a nation that needs that hope.
That modern Europe is suffering from a grave illness, there can be no doubt. One in every five Germans believed that the United States was responsible for the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Prostitution is legal throughout Germany. Pornography is rampant.
According to George Weigel's book The Cube and the Cathedral (2005, Basic Books), Germany has a per-capita gross domestic product equivalent to Arkansas, and Europe is committing demographic suicide. No western European country has a replacement-level birthrate. Germany alone will lose the equivalent of the population of the former East Germany in the first half of the 21st century.
The modern German despair has roots in the fresh wounds of history. Germany was the Christian nation that was most directly tarnished by the atrocities of World War II. When the battles ceased, they left behind the disillusioned, declawed Germany of today.
Like a physician, Pope Benedict — the leader of the largest Christian Church in the world — has traveled to a place that he sees as suffering from a profound illness. It is an illness that has metastasized far beyond Germany. The vast majority of Europeans believe that they have no need for God.
His visit to a Jewish synagogue in Cologne during World Youth Day was historic. It was only the second time a pope visited a synagogue since the days of St. Peter.
Pope Benedict described the atrocities of the Nazis as an “insane, racist ideology born of paganism” that happened “because the holiness of God and the sacredness of life was not recognized.”
“I bow my head before all those who experienced this manifestation of man's inhumanity to man,” said the Holy Father.
It was one of those events at Cologne that I found difficult from a journalist's perspective. Only one reporter — from Time magazine — was allowed to witness it. But here's what he said about it:
“There was something happening that went beyond words. It was in the way the Pope listened so intently to his hosts. It was the warm, two-hand embrace he shared with the young rabbi. It was in the somber cadence of his voice as he recounted Nazi atrocities, and the utter silence in the synagogue to hear his every breath. It was, in other words, in the German Pope's very presence, which was his own initiative as soon as his trip was scheduled to come to Cologne for the Catholic World Youth Day. The synagogue's standing ovation for Benedict was confirmation that German Jews appreciated the gesture.”
The next day, a German newspaper called him “The Pope of Hope.” Pope Benedict's visit to Germany was not only providential, but it was filled with hope. Many remarked at how happy Pope Benedict appeared on this trip. He was all smiles.
Pope Benedict's antidote is to call Europe back to its Christian roots. In Cologne, the new Benedict called Europe to those things that it seems to have forgotten. He called them to attend Sunday Mass. He called them to adoration of Christ. He called them to believe in the Eucharist. He called them to holiness.
By hosting World Youth Day in Germany, he has also shown Europe what it might look like with the energy, enthusiasm and joy of faithful young people. The hope of Europe — and indeed the world — resides in the young.
Weigel recalled how when World Youth Day was held in Paris in 1997, a broadcast journalist posed a question to Paris Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger.
“Why, in the middle of summer holidays, had so many young people come to Paris to pray?”
In his response, Cardinal Lustiger said that it was “generational.” He told the journalist not to read the young's experience through his own. Having grown up empty, the young had found Christ and his Church, and they did not see belief as incompatible with intellect.
John Paul II and Benedict XVI both came from the generation of Europeans who turned away from God. They both experienced the ravages of totalitarianism and war. But they share something with this new generation, too.
John Paul came from the East, battled communism, and helped tear down the Berlin Wall. Benedict comes from the West. His job is battle secularism and atheistic humanism and tear down a stronger wall — the one Europeans have erected against the faith.
Like Jesus Christ, whom he represents, he addressed the crowds on the shore of the Rhine from a boat. It was as if he were speaking to all of Germany when he said:
“Some of you might perhaps describe your adolescence in the words with which Edith Stein, who later lived in the Carmel in Cologne, described her own: ‘I consciously and deliberately lost the habit of praying.’ … To all of you I appeal: Open wide your hearts to God! Let yourselves be surprised by Christ. Let him have ‘the right of free speech’ during these days. Open the doors of your freedom to his merciful love.”
Will Germany listen to its native son's invitation? Will Europe?
My 11 days in Cologne taught me that anything is possible. A 32-year-old woman told me Benedict's words were “drawing me closer to the Church.” One after another, irreligious Germans told me that they had been moved by their encounters with pilgrims and the Pope.
Pilgrims at this World Youth Day stayed with local families. They told me stories of how their host families, originally not fans of the Pope, sat awake late at night until the pilgrims returned, then listened to their stories, basking in the excitement. The stories turned the hearts of many of these families. Hearing them reminded me of how Christianity first spread — through faithful conversations over the dinner tables in Jerusalem and Greece — and Rome.
Here in Cologne, more than 1.1 million pilgrims from more than 200 nations flocked to that singular table to share in the Church's Eucharistic feast. That can't help but have a lasting impact on Germany and Europe as a whole.
Will Pope Benedict sow the seeds of Europe's new springtime? Europe's very future depends upon it.
Tim Drake's blog is YoungandCatholic.com
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Drake ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: God and New Orleans DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:EDITORIAL
There was no town like New Orleans.
It was reviled as a center of sin, but praised as a center of Catholic piety. It was defined by both the innovations in its music and the old-world touches in its architecture.
In songs and in literature, it has always been used to evoke the best in America culture — it was a key ingredient for William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams and Catholic novelist Walker Percy. Arlo Guthrie found America on “the train they call the City of New Orleans.”
And now it's gone.
“Oh my God, oh my God,” said Mayor Ray Nagin, breaking down on live television as he saw images of the destruction hurricane Katrina left in its wake. “We're looking at the worst natural disaster in American history.”
EWTN's Raymond Arroyo described life there now: “There are snakes, alligators, open gas and oil lines, live electricity, bodies, and sewage in this nasty pool that is weaving its way through our homes.”
The drowning of New Orleans is a focal point that stands for Katrina's massive damage strewn across four states.
It's hard to imagine the devastation. We've all heard the stories. A 70-year-old woman stranded in Biloxi, Miss., ventured out to find aid but rushed back to her ruined home when she saw dead bodies. Evacuees at Red Cross shelters in Alabama, asked what they need, answered “temporary work.” Whole families are wandering from place to place with nothing. But it's New Orleans that is entirely lost, and it's leading people to ask: Why?
Some religious believers have suggested that the hurricane was God's judgment on the city. Arroyo had a sharp answer to that.
“If it is, God's aim is off,” he said. “He drowned all the good areas — East New Orleans, Lakeview, Metairie. The French Quarter is five feet above sea level. It will most likely survive.”
Others blamed the wrath of the gods of nature for the hurricane.
“Now we are all learning what it's like to reap the whirlwind of fossil-fuel dependence,” wrote Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy Jr., blaming Republicans in particular. “Katrina is giving our nation a glimpse of the climate chaos we are bequeathing our children.”
Those who blame our environmental wrongs for every natural disaster that visits us are twins with those who blame our sins: They are both convinced that the evils of man cry out for vengeance. The difference is that religious people rely on the Ten Commandments to identify our sins. Kennedy cited Nature magazine.
Others suggested that God isn't involved at all.
A National Public Radio commentator reported that the severity of hurricane seasons comes from natural changes in temperature over the Atlantic, then added: “If this was the result of intelligent design, then the designer has something to answer for. … Are hurricanes part of some mysterious design?”
Job and his friends ask similar questions — and God's answer is surprising. He catalogues the wonders of the world that Job can't fathom, from the stars to the oceans. But Job isn't won over until God describes a hippopotamus in excruciating detail. Only then does Job repent of having challenged God.
The message for us is clear: If we can't even understand a hippo, why do we expect to understand the grandest mysteries of the universe? God ups the ante in the crucifix, identifying suffering as the place to meet his love.
That's the conclusion Raymond Arroyo came to. He described the “small lesson” he learned from the destruction of his childhood neighborhoods, his home and all the photographs, books, music CDs and personal letters he has assembled in his lifetime.
“Ultimately, you're in God's hands,” he said. “The truth of the matter is, this is how we exist every day, but we live in the delusion that we're in control. Moments like this reinforce the reality of our fragile lives and the reality of God's awesome power.”
Arroyo is trying not to mourn his possessions but to cherish his family, who got out of New Orleans alive.
The Big Easy, the Cajun city of jazz, is gone. No one knows when or how it will be rebuilt. But it's best to apply Arroyo's lesson to New Orleans: God is a mystery, and life is his greatest gift. The streets, the elaborate graveyards and the clubs are a great loss — they are precious things that can never be replaced.
But the loss of so many lives is immeasurably worse.
Appropriately, Louis Armstrong and Billie Holiday said it best:
“Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans / And miss it each night and day? … I miss the moss-covered vines, the tall sugar pines / Where mocking birds used to sing. … But there's one thing more — I miss the one I care for / More than I miss New Orleans.”
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: Teachers Matter DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:FACTS OF LIFE
Almost two-thirds of respondents to a recent Associated Press/America Online News poll, 63%, said they remember a teacher who changed their lives. Almost half of those pointed to a teacher at the high-school level. An interesting aside: Women proved more likely than men to remember their elementary school teachers.
Source: CNN, Aug. 17
Illustration by Tim Rauch
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Tim Rauch ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Letters to the Editor DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Unleash the Force of Catholic Fiction
First of all, I want to commend Barb Ernster for her Aug. 7-13 article, “What the Catholic Storytellers See.” Such stories calling attention to Catholic writers and their efforts as Catholics to engage the culture of today are much needed.
But I must make a correction. The article said my book The Longing was rejected by Catholic publishers. This was not the case. I didn't submit my book to Catholic publishers. Because my book is a work of fiction rather than theological, I wanted it exposed to more widespread readership — non-Catholic as well as Catholic. So I sent it to the secular publishing establishment. There I found it almost impossible for an unknown author to get a reading by an agent or traditional publishers. Therefore, I turned to self-publishing through AuthorHouse.
What I hope to do with my writing is to tell a good story that will bring the reader closer to God and present the truth and beauty of our faith — not heavy-handedly, but in a way that will increase the faith of the Catholic reader as well as, hopefully, attract others to it.
Another important aspect that is often overlooked in such writing is the opportunity to further understanding between religions. Such understanding is essential to building the foundation for the time when we fulfill Christ's will that we all be “one.” I have been happy that The Longing has gotten good response from both Protestant and Catholic readers.
JOAN MAHOWALD Crosslake, Minnesota
The authors cited in “What Catholic Storytellers See” (Aug. 7–13) are right on the mark. Catholics today are hungry for good fiction that doesn't denigrate their beliefs. For too long we have left storytelling in the hands of those who are indifferent or hostile to the faith. Yet Catholic publishers have neglected the fiction market, underestimating the power of stories to touch hearts. Think of Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel about slavery that influenced the attitudes of an entire nation.
Like author Joan Mahowald, I couldn't find a publisher for my novel Windmill Gardens, which touches on the theme of Divine Mercy. After Catholic publishers told me they were not interested in fiction and “Christian” book publishers said “no Catholic stuff,” I too self-published and have found a ready market.
I do disagree with Flannery O'Connor's quote that fiction should not be evangelistic in nature. If it's a well-written story, why can't it evangelize too? There should be room in the Catholic fiction market for a wide variety of styles. Pope John Paul II called on us to redeem the culture, and presumably that includes contemporary fiction. Jesus taught by means of stories. Maybe it's time we do the same.
CAROL ANN TARDIFF
Troy, Michigan
Redistribution Is Wrong
The writer of the letter titled “The President Is Not Pro-Life” (Aug. 7–13) claims that President George Bush and Sen. Rick Santorum are not pro-life, revealing his liberal approach to solving society's problems: Let government redistribute more wealth.
When I grew up in the 1930s, institutions all supported the moral order and the traditional family — not only churches, but government, schools, unions, the media and entertainment. Now, 70 years of liberal social engineering have undermined the moral order and almost destroyed the family. Read Sen. Santorum's commonsense book It Takes a Family.
Adjusting taxes will have no measurable impact on abortion. The Supreme Court opened the floodgates and will have to close them.
But this will only happen when conservative senators approve the president's nominees for the Court over the resistance of liberal Democrats — the worst of whom are Catholic!
GREG SHINSKEY North Sandwich, New Hampshire
All Apologies
I have a bone to pick with Father Andrew McNair and his recent column, “The Case for the Senate's Apology” (July 24-Aug. 6). He takes up the case of the Senate apology for long ago not passing anti-lynching bills. They recently voted to apologize. Great!
What perplexes me is that he castigates Sens. Thad Cochran and Trent Lott for not co-sponsoring the resolution. Did the other 98 senators co-sponsor the resolution? If not, why did he single out these two senators? Could it be that they are from the state of Mississippi? Having lived in that state for 16 years, and followed politics since the '70s, I can say that Sens. Lott and Cochran are two of the most morally ethical men in the Senate. The blacks appreciate them, and they are voted in easily every time, and I believe that Mississippi has percentage-wise more black voters than any state in the union. These men have both been in the Congress for more than 30 years.
If Father McNair will look at the voting records of these two men, he will find that they uphold the Catholic ideals — both men are Christians, though not Catholic — and lead exemplary personal lives. Hopefully, Father McNair will stick to religious matters in the future, not politics!
MARY E. DEPRISCO
Naples, Florida
Morality and the Mushroom Cloud
I remember my father telling us kids that President Truman's decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was morally wrong, as the commentary “Effects of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Still Being Felt” (Aug. 7–13) stated.
As I studied this in college, it dawned on me that my father, who was 18 at the time and was on his way to the Philippines from Hawaii when the bombs were dropped, was part of the invasion force. The next time I talked to him I asked him if he would have been part of the invasion of Japan. His answer was that he was sure of it. Even though I may have never been born if Truman had not ordered the bombings, I know that what Truman ordered was a grave moral evil.
However, I also know that there is no way we can know if the act was a serious sin. Full knowledge and full consent of the will is needed for a sin to be serious. Perhaps the Pakaluks are not aware that there is no distinction in Catholic doctrine between serious sin, grave sin and mortal sin. No one has a window to look into another man's soul. Whether a serious sin was committed is for God to decide, not man.
JOSEPH HAHN
Hampshire, Illinois
Solutions or Distractions?
Pertinent to “Church Has Paid Out Over $1 Billion Since 1950” (Media Watch, June 26-July 20:
As we reflect on what has happened in the last few years, and how we have met the clergy abuse scandals, some are now raising questions not about he decisions made or the programs created, but about the time and energy that were expended, perhaps at the expense of larger social problems. Intramural disputes within the Church have served as a distraction from efforts to change the world.
In our world, where abuse of children is endemic, the Church has in reality done a uniquely superb job in dealing with it, but within its own confines. In the meantime the world outside has largely ignored the problem and done nothing that compares with what the Church has accomplished. To bring our crisis under control we have created lay review boards, we have repeatedly done audits to meet the charter, we created the Virtus program to deal with local requirements and, with questionable legitimacy and usefulness, created Voice of the Faithful.
The point is that, in each program, there are meetings after meetings, endless discussions and speeches, time in communication with the Vatican and reams of reports. The danger is that we may not look out beyond the windows of our concern, and not see Christ walking in the streets in line with the unemployed, with the widowed, the divorced, the hungry, the lame, the blind, the imprisoned and the homeless.
What about them now, and those socially abused by the injustices of our society? Shall we begin anew to re-focus our attention and exert the same energy and creativity for the Kingdom that Christ promised?
LAWRENCE PETRUS
Rocky River, Ohio
The Brain Can Amaze
It should be noted that the diagnosis of “persistent vegetative state” (PVS) is a clinical diagnosis; that is, it is made by examination of the patient at the bedside, and bears no predictable relationship to brain size (“Feeding-Tube Horrors,” Commentary, July 24–Aug. 6).
We also know that the brain has tremendous redundancy and that intensive therapy can recruit parts of the brain that were quiescent.
A medical examiner is a pathologist, not a clinician. He certainly is qualified to report on the extent of brain atrophy, but he cannot conclude that this confirms the diagnosis of PVS. I would certainly put more credence in the reports of family members and nurses who saw Terri Schiavo daily and observed her responsiveness than in a static description of brain atrophy.
The medical examiner's report resolves nothing.
ROBERT J. SHALHOUB, MD
Vienna, Virginia
The Story on Oratories
I read Father Groeschel's commentary titled “Following the Work of the Holy Spirit” (Aug. 7-13), about Catherine of Genoa and the oratory she began. I am extremely interested in this form of evangelization. I am in my mid-20s, and feel called to reach out to other people my age, searching for the truth in the Catholic faith. I would like to find out some information of how to go about setting up an oratory in my area. Thank you so much for your time and for encouraging the truth of our faith.
MARY ZIMMER
Lincoln, Nebraska
Abuse Double Standard?
I very much enjoyed the interview of Teresa Kettelkamp (“Victims of Abuse Get a New Advocate,” May 22-28) and I also feel embarrassed as well as extremely disappointed that some of our priests committed these abuses.
In addition, I truly feel a great deal of empathy for the victims.
That said, I am also very upset with the settlements that have and are taking place. Unless the bishops or the parishes in which these priests reside have been involved somehow with a case, I do not see why the priests involved aren't the ones being sued, and not the Church.
Recently, in my own area, there was a coach and a teacher accused of abusing children under their care. From what I can gather from the media coverage, I do not see the school districts being sued in these situations.
I am glad my Church is willing to compensate the victims of abuse by priests, even though I feel the abuser is the one responsible (unless the bishop was complicit), and should be the only one held accountable. However, extracting huge amounts of money from the Church — even to the point of bankruptcy — is not fair if it is true that school districts are not sued when a teacher abuses a child in his/her school.
ED LODI
Campbell, California
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Opinion -------- TITLE: Spreading Democracy: Sept. 11 Changed Bush, Too DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:A few years ago, presidential candidate George W. Bush made it clear that he didn't like nation building.
“I don't think our troops ought to be used for what's called nation building,” he said. “I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war.” When it comes to helping weak or collapsed countries, Bush stated firmly what he would do as president:
“I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I'm missing something here. I mean, we're going to have a kind of nation-building corps from America? Absolutely not.”
That's what presidential candidate Bush believed then. This is what President Bush believes now: “Rebuilding Iraq [and Afghanistan] will require a sustained commitment from many nations, including our own: We will remain in Iraq as long as necessary, and not a day more.”
In his second inaugural address, he expanded that concept beyond just the nations with which we've been in conflict:
“All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: The United States will not ignore your oppression, or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you.”
Many think the president made a big mistake expanding his position on nation building. The president's critics argue that when Iraq ceased to be a clear, present and imminent threat to the United States with its alleged weapons of mass destruction, our mission in Iraq should have ended. Moreover, critics point out that we fought and worked hard to build our own democracy. No one else did it for us. We should give other people that courtesy.
In spite of mounting criticism, the president plans to stick to his nation-building policy. Is he right to do so?
The president's nation building policy seems to rest on several key ethical principles. Take, for example, the ethical principle of international solidarity. This principle reminds us that we all belong to one human family. As such we have mutual obligations to promote the rights and development of all people across communities, nations, and the world, irrespective of national boundaries. More precisely, richer nations have responsibilities toward the poorer ones.
Before 9/11, the United States believed it could safely brush aside the pandemonium in out of the way places like Afghanistan.
Not any more.
The Bush administration understands now that the greatest threat to U.S. security will come from weak and dysfunctional states. I think the president sees nation building as an effective way to combat terrorism. As he said in his second inaugural, “The defense of freedom requires the advance of freedom.”
Isolationism, a mind-your-own-business foreign policy, is dangerous. Pearl Harbor taught us that, and after World War II and at the beginning of the Cold War, when the United States thought rebuilding Germany and Japan would ensure peace, we were right. It did.
The president appears to think the same will work in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nation building understood as international solidarity represents an ethically compelling way to work for peace.
The president's nation building policy also includes the virtuous endeavor to spread democracy. While Catholic Social Doctrine doesn't officially endorse any one form of government, it sees the diffusion of democracy as a moral good.
In his encyclical letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (On Social Concern), Pope John Paul II said, “Nations need to reform certain unjust structures, and in particular their political institutions, in order to replace corrupt, dictatorial and authoritative forms of government by democratic and participatory ones. This is a process which we hope will spread and grow stronger.”
President Bush also hopes that the democratic process will spread and grow stronger in the world. He sees nation building as an effective way to do this.
Moreover, political experience shows that democratic participation in decision-making is the best way to respect the dignity and liberty of people.
John Paul emphasized the ethical value of democracy in his encyclical letter Centesimus Annus (On the Hundredth Anniversary of Rerum Novarum). He stated:
“The Church values the democratic system inasmuch as it ensures the participation of citizens in making political choices, guarantees to the governed the possibility of both of electing and holding accountable those who govern them, and of replacing them through peaceful means when appropriate.”
All of this nation-building zeal to some sounds like a type of neo-colonialism. Who are we, many say, to jump-start democracy around the globe? Isn't that presumptuous? Hardly.
We need to keep in mind an important distinction. Colonialism seeks only the self-interest of a particular nation at the expense of others. But democratic nation building seeks to promote the ethical principle of the international common good, which benefits everyone. It's not based entirely on self-interest like colonialism.
The international common good refers to the sum total of all the political, social and cultural conditions that make social living possible. Democracy inherently promotes these conditions. Moreover, the international common good puts in place the infrastructure for the diffusion of political and economic rights. These rights range from voting and free speech to food, shelter, work and education. To call nation building colonialism or imperialism falsifies the truth of the matter.
Our mission to spread and to defend the precious gift of freedom will demand hard work, sacrifice and determination. This fact could tempt us to raise the same question as the biblical Cain: “Am I my brother's keeper?”
Christians and all people of good will have only one answer to this: Yes.
Legionary Father Andrew McNair is a theology professor at Mater Ecclesiae College in Greenville, R.I.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Father Andrew Mcnair, LC ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: Diocese of Tucson Approaches End of Bankruptcy DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:TUCSON, Ariz. — The Diocese of Tucson's bankruptcy proceedings will come to an end Sept. 23. Compared to proceedings in the Archdiocese of Portland, Ore., and the Diocese of Spokane, Wash., which remain mired in conflict, reaching a settlement has been orderly and cooperative.
It has been less than a year since Sept. 20, 2004, when the diocese became the second in the United States, after the Archdiocese of Portland, to seek federal bankruptcy protection from the tide of lawsuits demanding ever-higher judgments to compensate for claims of sexual misconduct by clergy and religious.
Now, there is a final settlement that the diocese, the claimants, insurance companies, parishes and other creditors can accept, and U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge James Marlar has cleared the way for final distributions and discharge of the case.
In a letter to the clergy, religious and laity of the Diocese of Tucson, released to coincide with the filing of the final settlement agreement in late July, Bishop Gerald Kicanas wrote, “God works, sometimes in mysterious ways, but God works. Throughout the history of the Church, crisis has led to conversion and a deepening of faith. Maybe that will be our experience.”
“We must also move forward with the mission of the Church,” he added. “Care for the sick and the poor, spiritual nourishment for those who are searching, formation of the young, fostering vocations and reaching out to the littlest and weakest among us remain critical priorities of our mission.”
The agreement, negotiated under Chapter 11 of the federal bankruptcy code, provides approximately $22.2 million for settling 77 claims of sexual abuse, as well as establishing a fund for responding to additional claims that might arise from previous wrongdoing by clergy. The settlement is funded by $14.8 million provided by insurers, $5.58 million from the sale of diocesan property and $2 million to be paid by parishes.
What started with controversy and dire potential for loss by the diocese and its 75 parishes is concluding with general accord, said Susan Boswell of Quarles & Brady Streich Lang, attorney for the diocese.
“Everybody has cooperated to come up with something that would provide for distributions in a reasonable amount of time,” she said. “The result isn't all that simple. It's an 85-page plan, but it has been accepted by the creditors and all are being dealt with.”
Not Without Pain
Diocese of Tucson spokesman Fred Allison said the fear of a protracted struggle helped move the reorganization forward.
“I don't think this process was painless for anybody who had anything to do with this, but an overall commitment to collaboration existed throughout the process, even in the tort creditors committee.”
He said crucial to the settlement was the successful settlement of insurance claims with four underwriters, ending several years of disagreement over which company was responsible for claims. In a final agreement with the insurers, St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance agreed to redeem its liability policies for $1 million and Pacific Employers Insurance, along with Century Indemnity Insurance and the Motor Vehicle Casualty Company, agreed to pay $3.5 million. Hartford Fire Insurance agreed to pay $7 million and First State Insurance Co. paid $3.3 million to redeem their policies and settle the claims.
Allison said the most surprising part of the settlement was the sale of 85 properties owned by the diocese, which earned $2.6 million more than the expected $3.2 million.
“It was difficult to lose that property, which was set aside for future expansion,” he said, “but the auction went well and, in combination with what was negotiated with the insurance companies and what was contributed by the parishes, set the stage for the diocese to emerge from Chapter 11.”
However, the sacrifice could have been much greater, noted the attorney for the parishes, Michael McGrath, of the Tucson law firm of Mesch Clark & Rothschild.
Approximately $16.6 million of the $20.7 million in assets held by the diocese were from the parishes. Although restricted construction funds were not threatened, there was $2.3 million in the parish deposit and loan fund, as well as $4.7 million in parish loans to the diocese.
If the funds had been incorporated into the settlement of the sexual abuse claims, approximately $14.7 million in parish expansion and remodeling projects would have been delayed or canceled.
Many projects were put on hold during the Chapter 11 proceedings, McGrath said. “The parishes agreed to freeze the deposit and loan fund until the situation was resolved, but that money is being released. In addition, the loans will be repaid by the diocese over the next 10 years, along with 2.5% in interest, starting in October or November of this year.”
McGrath said, “The sex abuse victims, the diocese and the parishes benefited, and the worst-case scenario was avoided. Everyone's happy with the way things have turned out.”
Attorney Clifford Altfeld, who, along with attorneys Lynne Catigan and Kim Williamson, represented the sexual abuse tort claimants, said, “There's no amount of money that can adequately compensate the claimants.” However, there's a “tremendous cost in terms of emotional distress the longer this bankruptcy process goes on,” he said.
“Getting it resolved is a tremendous non-financial benefit,” Altfeld added, “and holding the diocese accountable goes a long way toward furthering the healing process.”
Other Cases
As far as offering a template for settling the other two bankruptcy cases in Spokane and Portland, the Tucson Diocese settlement is only indirectly beneficial, said Mary Jo Tully, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Portland.
“The situation's so different, there's not a lot we can learn from it,” she said.
Unlike Tucson, where the status of the parishes was never litigated, Portland's claimants have petitioned the bankruptcy court for a decision on whether parishes should be considered assets of the archdiocese. This has resulted in a counter class-action claim by parishioners, which will go before the bankruptcy judge on Oct. 11.
Until that issue is resolved, Tully said, the archdiocese cannot even begin to draft a settlement agreement.
Meanwhile, Bishop William Skylstad of Spokane said he will appeal a federal bankruptcy court's ruling that parish properties must be included in the Spokane diocesan assets used to settle millions of dollars in clergy sex abuse claims.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Patricia Williams of Spokane ruled Aug. 26 that civil property laws prevail in a bankruptcy proceeding despite any internal Church laws that might bar a bishop from full control over parish assets. Diocesan lawyers had argued that in Church law parish assets belong to the parish itself, not to its pastor or to the bishop. They said that, while the diocesan bishop was nominally the owner in civil law, even in civil law he only held those properties in trust for the parishes themselves.
“It is not a violation of the First Amendment,” Williams wrote, “to apply federal bankruptcy law to identify and define property of the bankruptcy estate even though the Chapter 11 debtor is a religious organization.”
Her ruling, if upheld, would vastly increase the diocesan assets subject to the abuse claims and would up the ante nationwide for any other diocese considering that approach to resolving sexual abuse claims against its clergy.
Last December, the Spokane Diocese filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 of the federal Bankruptcy Act, citing $11.1 million in assets and $83.1 million in liabilities, mostly from people seeking recompense for childhood sexual abuse by priests. It did not include parishes, parish schools or cemeteries in its list of assets.
Victims' lawyers claimed that the bishop had more than $80 million in assets under his control if he included the diocese's 82 parishes, 16 diocesan and parochial schools, and various cemeteries and other properties that he claimed he held only in trust.
Bishop Skylstad, who was traveling in Eastern Europe when the ruling was announced, said in a statement that the diocese would “appeal this decision because we have a responsibility not only to victims but to the generations of parishioners … who have given so generously of themselves” to build up the Church in eastern Washington.
In his statement, read to reporters by diocesan Vicar General Father Steve Dublinski, the bishop said, “The court's decision has national consequences. Its impact will be felt not just by Catholic communities but by many other church communities of any denomination, of any faith expression.”
Philip S. Moore writes from Vail, Arizona.
Catholic News Service contributed to this report.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Philip S. Moore ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: National Media Watch DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Biased Research Appears in Medical Journal
Five researchers from the University of California-San Francisco reviewed nearly 2,000 studies and concluded that legislative proposals to allow fetal pain relief during abortion were not justified by scientific evidence.
What the study didn't reveal is that one of its lead authors is an abortion clinic director, and the other once worked for NARAL Pro-Choice America.
Catherine DeAngelis, editor-in-chief of the Journal, said she was unaware of the authors' backgrounds. She admitted that the article could create the appearance of bias and could hurt the Journal's credibility.
According to a recent study published in the journal Archives of Disease in Childhood — Fetal and Neonatal Edition, ultrasound videos taken of infants within the womb revealed 28-week-old babies crying in response to noise stimulus. Until recently, it was believed that infants only cried when air had entered the lungs after birth.
Woman Murdered Because She Was Pro-Life
WPVI, Aug. 23 — A 25-year-old Philadelphia man confessed to killing his girlfriend because she would not have an abortion, said the website for television station WPVI.
Stephen Poaches was arrested and confessed to killing Latoyia Figueroa and her unborn child. Poaches admitted to strangling the 24-year-old woman when she told him that she did not believe in abortion. He was charged with two counts of murder. Police were close to arresting another man who had helped Poaches dispose of the body.
A funeral for Figueroa, who was five months pregnant when she went missing in July, was held Aug. 26 at Saint Peter the Apostle Church in North Philadelphia.
Buffalo Diocese Expects ‘Radical’ Changes
The Buffalo diocese organized a 25-member commission to study the statistics and determine how the diocese can best downsize.
Shifting populations from urban to suburban, financial difficulties and a shortage of priests are forcing the change.
“If there's one thing we know, it's that we can't maintain the status quo,” said Sister Regina Murphy, diocesan director of research and planning.
Buffalo is among several dioceses that are downsizing. Rochester, N.Y., has closed 27 parishes since 1997. Green Bay and Milwaukee, Wis., and Pittsburgh are also experiencing similar trends.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Sell Low, Buy High DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Nine years ago, on the verge of becoming Catholic, I had a long phone conversation with a good friend from my Bible-college days. In the course of our friendly but spirited discussion, I made a passing comment about the Church being “the Body of Christ.”
My evangelical-Protestant friend immediately asked, “Where do you get that?”
“From the Bible,” I replied. “Paul describes the Church as the Body of Christ in several of his letters.” I mentioned 1 Corinthians 12, Colossians 1 and other passages.
Although surprised by his question, I understood his consternation. After all, I'm a former evangelical myself. I recalled how, in studying Catholic doctrine and theology as I read my way into the Church, I kept encountering verses I had either never noticed before or had not paid much attention to.
The conversation came to mind when I recently read the following passage in a new book: “If Christ and his Church are one, then a great deal of Catholic doctrine simply follows naturally. In a word, ecclesiology represents the crucial difference between evangelicals and Catholics.”
The book was not written by a Catholic, but by an evangelical, Mark Noll. Titled Is The Reformation Over? An Evangelical Assessment of Contemporary Roman Catholicism (Baker, 2005), it takes a careful look at what separates Catholics from evangelical Protestants and concludes that, although many issues remain divisive, the biggest obstacle to union are beliefs about the nature and purpose of the Church.
Noll writes that some evangelicals make the joke that “the main difference between us and the Catholics is ecclesiology. They have one and we don't.” Although stated in jest, the comment acknowledges that many “Bible Christians” have a “low” ecclesiology while Catholics (and the Eastern Orthodox) have a “high” ecclesiology. Put simply, most evangelicals believe the Church is a secondary or peripheral issue while Catholics, as the Catechism explains, believe “the Church is the goal of all things” (No. 760).
This “high” view is not only unacceptable to many evangelicals; it upsets them.
Yet, more and more evangelicals are becoming Catholic or seriously examining the Catholic faith because they recognize that the Church is indeed “the household of God” and “pillar and support of the truth,” just as the great Catholic theologian, Paul of Tarsus, describes it (1 Timothy 3:15).
They believe that the Church is the Body of Christ and the Bride of Christ, as Paul explains in his epistle to the Ephesians. The realize that a high view of Christ and of salvation demand a high view of the Church because it is through the Church that Christ is proclaimed, known, met and embraced. This is especially true in the Eucharist, when “we who are many” are made into “one body” by partaking of the “one bread” (1 Corinthians 10:17).
I think Noll is correct in identifying ecclesiology as the central issue in evangelical-Catholic relations. This is good news for Catholics since talk about the Church as the Body of Christ should be natural. This is also good news for evangelicals since the Catholic view of the Church is biblical, Christo-centric — and consistent.
Carl E. Olson is editor of IgnatiusInsight.com.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Carl E. Olson ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Schismatic Bishop Meets With the Pope DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:VATICAN CITY — Serious disagreements remain between the schismatic Society of St. Pius X and the Holy See. That's the bad news.
But after the head of the society met with Pope Benedict, there's finally some good news to report, too. Both sides are showing a strong desire to take concrete steps towards reconciliation on both sides.
This was the conclusion following a closed-door meeting Aug. 29 between the superior general of the society, Bishop Bernard Fellay, and Pope Benedict XVI, at the papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo.
The Vatican said that both sides “were aware of the difficulties” and that each party demonstrated “the will to proceed forward step by step and in a reasonable time frame”.
The Society of St. Pius X, which had requested the audience, stated that the 35- minute meeting took place in a “climate of calm.” The society's statement added, “We broached the serious difficulties, already known, in a spirit of great love for the Church. We reached a consensus as to proceeding by stages in the resolution of problems.”
However, the communiqué concluded with the hope that “the Holy Father might find the strength to put an end to the crisis in the Church by ‘restoring all things in Christ.’”
Behind the scenes, Vatican officials are positive yet skeptical about the meeting and concede there is much ground to cover. As far as the society is concerned, the audience gave them legitimacy.
“It shows clearly that we are Catholics, that we do recognize the sovereign pontiff as head of the Church, and we wanted to give him the deference to do this,” said Bishop Fellay, who also met Pope John Paul II in 1999.
Members of the traditionalist society do not see themselves as schismatic. The Church, they say, should reconcile with them. Founded by the late French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in 1970, the priestly fraternity is dedicated to the exclusive use of the Tridentine rite, which had been the form of the Latin Mass from the Council of Trent in the 16th century until the 1960s.
The society is opposed to certain changes that occurred during the Second Vatican Council and, in particular, rejects liturgical reforms and conciliar approaches to inter-religious dialogue and ecumenism. They say current abuses and crises in the Church reinforce their position.
Archbishop Lefebvre built a seminary in Ecône, Switzerland, in the early 1970s to train priests. In 1988, Lefebvre consecrated four bishops — one of whom was Bishop Fellay — without authorization from Rome. All four bishops and Lefebvre were excommunicated, a penalty for which John Paul II had given forewarning.
To restore relations, the society demands that the Holy See first make two concessions: a “universal indult” that would recognize the right of Catholic priests throughout the world to celebrate the Tridentine Mass without special permission from their bishops, and the repeal of the excommunication order.
For its part, the Vatican demands that the society first submit itself to the authority of the Pope, and recognize the resolutions adopted by the Second Vatican Council. Neither side has made much headway in its demands, although talks did resume in 2000 through Ecclesia Dei, the Holy See commission set up by Pope John Paul II to provide pastoral help to Lefebvre's followers and headed by Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos.
As prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had been involved in these talks. In the past, he has dismissed many of the society's claims, but looked upon the fraternity as an occasion for an examination of conscience.
“We should allow ourselves to ask fundamental questions about the defects in the pastoral life of the Church,” Cardinal Ratzinger said in 1988. “Thus we will be able to offer a place within the Church to those who are seeking and demanding it, and succeed in destroying all reason for schism.”
Pope Benedict is also known to be very sympathetic to the Tridentine Mass. For these reasons, Bishop Fellay has spoken of Benedict's papacy as a “glimmer of hope.”
In a Sept. 1 interview with the Register, Bishop Fellay said he remains “rather optimistic” but added that much will depend on decisions Benedict makes in the autumn. “We just want to see what the first steps of the Pope will be, for example about the Curia, the Mass, the liturgy, the synod on the Eucharist and what will be done there”, he said.
Bishop Fellay is most confident about allowing widespread use of the Tridentine rite. “That's my greatest expectation, definitely”, he said. “We certainly do expect something now.”
Theoretically, such a move would not be much of a difficulty; both John Paul II and Benedict XVI have encouraged diocesan bishops to make a “wide and generous” use of the permission to celebrate the old rite. The Society of St. Pius X, however, sees this as a first step to inflicting “a deep and efficacious breach in the progressivist system”, and according to Bishop Fellay, this could be problematic.
Moreover, the society's hubristic spirit and attitude towards the Church, not to mention internal difficulties within the fraternity, have led Vatican officials to seriously question the chances of reconciliation.
In a letter posted on a website shortly before the Aug. 29 meeting, one of Bishop Fellay's colleagues, Bishop Richard Williamson, launched a vitriolic attack, stating that the “web of deceit” had been “spun by the Vatican for too long.” It was a case, he wrote, of “welcome to my parlor, said the spider to the fly.”
Bishop Williamson added, “The war goes on between the friends and enemies of the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Bishop Fellay failed to allay concerns when, speaking Sept. 1, he noted that his colleague's apprehensions about the meeting were held by “the majority” in the society. He denied there were internal divisions, but when asked if certain groups within the fraternity might unilaterally seek reconciliation with Rome, he admitted that may happen “here or there.” In September 2004, the Society of St. Pius X suffered its worst dispute for years when two priests broke away following an internal disagreement with Bishop Fellay.
Yet for the moment, discussions with the Vatican will continue as before. Cardinal Ratzinger's election as Pope is seen as providential towards healing the schism and has injected new hope.
“The first impression is positive,” said Bishop Fellay, adding cautiously, “it's only an impression”.
Speaking in 2001, Cardinal Ratzinger conceded “the road is still very long” and lamented the “narrow-mindedness that makes the process of reconciliation problematic.” But, he added: “I desire, hope and pray that this wound will heal. … We must do everything possible to return to these brothers their lost confidence.”
Edward Pentin writes from Rome.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Sharon's Letter Puts Vatican-Israel Talks Back on Track DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:VATICAN CITY — It is hardly equivalent to the end of the Cold War, but a brief chill in relations between the Vatican and Israel is clearly over in the wake of an explanatory letter from Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Still to be resolved, however, are longstanding taxation and property rights issues regarding Church properties in the Holy Land that some believe were the real trigger for this summer's diplomatic spat.
“The situation has returned to the point where we can sit down and discuss common issues. It was in everyone's interest that things calm down,” a senior Vatican official said Aug. 29.
Israeli Ambassador Oded Ben-Hur — who delivered Sharon's letter to Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican secretary of state, in late August — said that explanations on both sides had smoothed things over.
“Cardinal Sodano told me himself that the case was closed,” the Israeli ambassador said. “We are quite satisfied with the situation now and look forward to talks in the future.”
In fact, the Register learned in mid-August that negotiations on tax and property rights for the Church in the Holy Land had already resumed before Sharon extended his olive branch.
Angelus Anger
The souring of relations began in late July, when an Israeli government spokesman harshly criticized Pope Benedict XVI for his Angelus address. During his traditional Sunday message, the Pope condemned recent terrorist attacks in London, Turkey, Egypt and Iraq but omitted reference to a suicide attack on the Israeli city of Netanya that left five Israelis dead.
The Israeli spokesman called the omission a “deliberate” and “immoral” omission that “cried out to the heavens,” and accused the Holy See of wishing to legitimize terrorist attacks on Israel. Further strong words came from Religion Minister Nimrod Barkan, who complained that Pope John Paul II had repeatedly failed to condemn Palestinian terrorism.
In response, the Vatican secretariat of state noted in a statement that the attacks Benedict mentioned had taken place two to three days before the Pope's remarks, whereas the Netanya atrocity took place nearly two weeks earlier. It also reminded Israel that John Paul, who had done so much to build relations with Israel, made “numerous and public” condemnations of terrorist attacks on Israel.
The Secretariat of State added that the Holy See could not condemn every attack on Israel because Israel itself often retaliates in contravention of international law. The statement concluded with a terse warning that the Holy See would not “take lessons or instructions from any other authority on the tone and content of its statements.”
Diversionary Tactic?
Soon after the exchange, some sources suggested the Israeli outburst was a stunt manufactured by the Israeli foreign ministry to divert attention from the stalled negotiations with the Holy See.
According to observers, the talks have so far failed for two reasons: ministerial inattention to the bilateral relationship, and some Israeli unease with the 1993 Fundamental Agreement that established diplomatic relations between the two states.
Under the terms of the Agreement, the Church should gain control over a good deal of property and be accorded some de jure tax exemption rights. But Israel has failed to ratify some rights and eroded others in recent years, partly because it is worried about granting the same concessions to non-Christians and partly because of the lost revenue and property involved.
However, with the U.S. government pressuring Israel to fully comply with the Agreement, some analysts speculated Israeli officials were anxious not be seen stalling the talks yet again and consequently cooked up a diplomatic dispute to forestall American criticism.
If so, the officials apparently acted without Sharon's approval. Even before the Israeli prime minister issued his conciliatory letter, sources told the Register that the highest levels of the Israeli government were furious about the flap over the Pope's remarks. The government spokesman who criticized the Angelus address reportedly received a “real dressing down” from the prime minister's office, and bilateral negotiations resumed in mid-August.
Rabbi David Rosen, the international director of interreligious affairs at the American Jewish Committee, said the dispute was a “lamentable storm in a teacup” caused by “undiplomatic stupidity.”
“Paradoxically,” added Rosen, who has been involved in the Vatican-Israel negotiations, “for the first time the Prime Minister's Office is involved and seems to be pushing things along.”
Sharon's Letter
In his letter, Sharon said that Israel, as a country scarred by “Islamic terrorism,” was very sensitive to any attempt to differentiate between attacks on Israeli citizens and attacks on citizens of other countries.
Sources said that when Ambassador Ben-Hur presented Sharon's letter to Cardinal Sodano the cardinal reassured him that the wording of the papal Angelus text was simply an oversight.
Ben-Hur said that in his letter Sharon also underlined his government's commitment to concluding negotiations with the Vatican on the taxation and financial issues regarding Church institutions in the Holy Land.
Sharon said he had instructed his officials to make every effort to wrap up an agreement with the Vatican, Ben-Hur said. The prime minister also stressed that both sides shared responsibility for reaching an agreement and that, in his view, Israel had made “fair and generous” proposals on the issue.
Israel has given similarly positive signals during six years of negotiations over the issues, only to later stall on concluding an agreement. In an interview in mid-August, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, the apostolic nuncio to Israel, said that he is not authorized to disclose why reaching an agreement has been so difficult. But he did acknowledge that the cause of the delay runs deeper than a merely a lack of attention by senior Israeli officials.
Archbishop Sambi declined to predict if the current round of talks will finally resolve the issue.
“There will be an agreement but I don't know when,” the archbishop said. “The talks will be concluded when common ground is found.”
(CNS contributed to this story)
Edward Pentin writes from Rome.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Taizé After Brother Roger's Death: 'A True Time of Grace' DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:TAIZé, France — Since it was founded in the late 1940s by Brother Roger Schutz, the 100-member ecumenical community of Taizé has had an influence on Christianity far out of proportion to its small size.
As a token of that influence, more than 10,000 people flooded into the French village Aug. 23 to attend Brother Roger's funeral Mass, which was celebrated by Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. The 90-year-old Taizé founder was murdered a week earlier by a mentally ill Romanian woman during a prayer service.
Brother Roger's successor as the leader of the Taizé community is Brother Alois Leser, 51, a German Catholic who has been a member of Taizé since 1974. Brother Alois spoke via e-mail with Register correspondent Edward Pentin shortly after the funeral.
How is the community coping with the death of Brother Roger?
The way he died was shocking and totally unexpected, and we do not yet have the words to express what the significance could be. But we were astonished, with so many thousands of young people present, how serene everything has remained. Our community prayer was interrupted for a few seconds, and then the singing began again with even greater intensity.
It is astonishing, but these days have been for us a true time of grace.
Did Brother Roger leave a will or guidelines as to how he would like the community to continue?
At the very beginning of the community, Brother Roger wrote a text called the Rule of Taizé. Later he changed the title to ‘The Sources of Taizé’.
That text gives the basic guidelines of our life, but more important than a written text, he communicated to us a way of life which carries us forward.
What in your opinion is Brother Roger's greatest legacy?
At his funeral I mentioned two important convictions of his, although there are certainly others. The first was the words he often repeated: ‘God is united to every human being without exception.’ That confidence lies at the root of our ecumenical vocation.
And the second was his emphasis on kind-heartedness, which is not an empty word, but a force able to transform the world, because through it God is at work.
Some reports say that Brother Roger must have secretly converted to the Catholic Church as he received Holy Communion from Pope Benedict at Pope John Paul II's funeral. Did he ever convert to the Church?
Brother Roger's entire life was a passionate search for unity beyond the old and new divisions between believers in Christ. He believed that reconciliation was really possible, and that it has to begin within each one of us. He made no secret of his conviction.
Pope John Paul II's funeral was not the first time Brother Roger received holy Communion in Rome. Already in Krakow when he was invited by Cardinal Wojtyla for a pilgrimage of miners, and for 25 years in St. Peter's, he took Communion.
He described his personal journey in this way: ‘I found my own Christian identity by reconciling within myself the faith of my origins with the mystery of the Catholic faith, without breaking fellowship with anyone.’
Have you always been Catholic?
Yes, and I have discovered more and more that catholicity means that the Church is open to the gifts of the other traditions as well. That's how we try to live in Taizé.
What is your vision for the future of Taizé?
We will continue on the way that Brother Roger opened for us, which at present means welcoming all the young people who visit us. We will attempt to be faithful to the main intuitions of Brother Roger and at the same time open to the new challenges that will certainly present themselves.
How do you see Taizé's role in promoting an authentic ecumenism during the papacy of Pope Benedict XVI?
On the day after Brother Roger's death, the Pope read a letter he had just received from Brother Roger, who said to him: ‘Our Community of Taizé wants to go forward in communion with the Holy Father.’ It was the last letter that Brother Roger wrote.
Since the decisive meetings Brother Roger had with Pope John XXIII, the community has always been attentive to the ministry of a universal pastor. Ways need to be found for this ministry to foster reconciliation among all the followers of Christ.
Do you foresee great strides made in ecumenism with this Pope?
Pope Benedict XVI insists very much on the spiritual dimension of ecumenism, that the search for reconciliation among Christians not just be a matter of ideas but of concrete acts, of a life.
But of course, this does not only depend on him but on many other Christians too, from all the traditions.
As the Holy Father said to the ecumenical representatives in Cologne, ‘I think that we must listen to [Brother Roger], from within we must listen to his spiritually lived ecumenism and allow ourselves to be led by his witness towards an interiorized and spiritualized ecumenism.’
Edward Pentin is based in Rome.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Edward Pentin ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Prolife Victories DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Media Step Up
WORLDNETDAILY.COM, Aug. 17 — Pro-abortion activists “have never experienced anything like the pounding Naral took … for its outrageously false ad against Supreme Court nominee John Roberts,” observed activist Jill Stanek in a guest commentary for the Web opinion page.
“In fact,” wrote Stanek, the Naral commercial that implied Judge Roberts' approval of abortion clinic violence and the organization's decision to pull it several days later will “go down in pro-life history as a significant event, a turning point when MSM — mainstream media — finally began to publicly scrutinize” pro-abortion advocates.
Pointing to changing public attitudes about abortion and the impact of alternate media, including Web bloggers, Stanek observed that, “a year ago, MSM wouldn't have questioned them.”
She added that pro-life election results, “low ratings, and canceled subscriptions” have helped the mainstream media to begin to present both sides of the abortion issue.
Pro-Life Plates Expand
Nordeen and her husband Kenneth see the pro-life tags as a way to support “those volunteers that actually help women in need.” To succeed, Nordeen will propose an amendment to state law, which now permits specialty plates for some two dozen approved causes.
Nordeen's goal is to find 3,000 people interested in purchasing the Choose Life license plate before she moves forward. For more information or to sign the petition, call (781) 224-0404 or write to merry@gdwks.com
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: Where a Privileged Prince Became a Poor Priest DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Nature and man have collaborated to make Loretto, Pa., a perfect place for a pilgrimage.
High in the Allegheny Mountains, the small town can boast not only of its scenic surroundings but also of its gracious Basilica of St. Michael the Archangel (feast day: Sept. 29).
Best of all is the story behind the structure: The basilica stands on the site of a humble log church built in 1799 by an unusual missionary — a priest who was a prince.
Prince Demetrius Augustine Gallitzin was born in 1770 in The Hague, Netherlands, where his father was the Russian ambassador. The father came from one of Russia's oldest and richest noble families. Princess Amalie, the boy's mother, was a brilliant woman who held salons for the intellectuals of her day. Baptized a Catholic, she did not practice the faith until she experienced a conversion in 1786. The 16-year-old Prince Demetrius shared his mother's new-found devotion.
After the prince's education was complete, his father urged him into the military. It was a life the boy heartily disliked. He served time as aide-de-camp to an Austrian general, but made a poor and unwilling officer. The parents decided that two years of travel might help the aimless young man and sent him to visit the United States in 1792, accompanied by a priest-tutor.
The pair landed in Baltimore with a letter of introduction to Bishop John Carroll. Here Demetrius was attracted to the French Sulpician priests who had fled the French Revolution and founded a seminary in Baltimore, the first in the new country. He was saddened to learn of the lack of priests to minister to Catholics on the frontier. The young prince decided to become a missionary.
Bishop Carroll had his doubts. Although he had tried to attract young men to the priesthood, few survived the seminary or the rigors of ministering to the people scattered in the backwoods. Here was a pampered young nobleman, a recent convert used to a life of luxury, wishing to become a missionary. It seemed that his only qualifications were that he spoke both German and English and was an excellent horseman.
With misgivings, Bishop Carroll permitted Demetrius to enter the seminary. His parents sent anxious messages trying to dissuade him, but the young prince did well in his studies at St. Mary's Seminary and was ordained a priest in 1795. He was the first man to receive all the orders, from tonsure to priesthood, within the boundaries of the original 13 colonies.
Sanctified Surroundings
The new priest began his ministry in Baltimore but his assignments often carried him far from the city. On a pastoral visit in the Allegheny Mountains, he fell in love with the beautiful area, and his heart went out to the families struggling in poverty. Many were Catholic — yet had rarely seen a priest and, in fact, hardly knew they were Catholic. Why not found a colony for them on this wilderness frontier, build a church and set up mills and shops to improve both their religious and economic life?
With permission from Bishop Carroll, Father Gallitzin purchased land for the colony with money lent him on the strength of the vast inheritance he expected to receive from his family. He sold tracts to settlers on easy terms, then built a church, sawmills, tanneries and other facilities for his growing flock. He named the colony “Loretto” after a Marian shrine in Italy. Today the town of Loretto is near another community named in the priest's honor, Gallitzin.
Financial woes dogged the missionary and until his death he was never free of debt. Trustingly, he often gave out sections of land for which he was never paid. The worst blow came when the Russian government barred his inheritance because he had become a Catholic priest. Throughout his years on the frontier he did not receive any salary but supported himself, orphans, and the poor from the produce of his farm.
For 20 years Father Gallitzin was the only priest ministering to the Catholic settlers of central and western Pennsylvania. The rugged mountain area had virtually no roads. He visited his flock on foot and horseback, never daunted by heat, cold, snow or mud — or by the rough hospitality of his poor flock. A fall from his horse caused serious leg and internal injuries and, when this ended his ability to ride, he rigged up a sort of horse-drawn sled. In this odd vehicle he would recline and travel through the mountains in all kinds of weather.
Other troubles plagued him. Protestant settlers from the east were moving into the area, often bringing with them the anti-Catholicism of the times. When it was discovered that the priest had once borne the hated title of “Prince,” he was accused of being an aristocratic monarchist, a papist and an enemy of the common man. Undaunted, Gallitzin spoke out bravely and wrote powerful tracts in defense of the Catholic faith. At times there were serious threats against him and he found it necessary to carry a pistol.
Spent for God
By the close of 1839, the 69-year-old priest was in failing health. Thin and stooped, he walked with difficulty. Often his voice gave out during homilies and he would end up weeping softly. A doctor counseled him to moderate his work, stop hearing confessions in the drafty church — and stop making the rounds bouncing along in his ridiculous sleigh. He ignored the advice.
On Easter Monday, 1840, Father Gallitzin could not rise from his bed. He had not neglected a single labor throughout Lent and Holy Week. He made out a will, leaving all his possessions to the parish. They consisted of several horses, two cows, two violins and 574 books. Surrounded by many of his devoted parishioners, on May 6 of that year Father Demetrius Gallitztin died.
After a procession through the town, as the Miserere was chanted, the priest was lowered into the ground in an $8 coffin. Today his body rests in a tomb near the impressive Basilica of St. Michael the Archangel at Loretto.
The stone church was built in 1901 near the site of Father Gallitzin's original log chapel. The entire cost was $150,000, a gift to the people of Loretto by Charles Schwab, at that time president of the United States Steel Corp. Schwab had been born in the area and spent much of his youth there.
In 1996 Pope John Paul II named the edifice a minor basilica. The humble site of prayer had become an honored place of pilgrimage.
Rita Reichardt writes from La Grange, Illinois.
Planning Your Visit
Mass is celebrated daily at 7:30 a.m., Saturday at 4 p.m. and Sunday at 8 and 10 a.m. Nearby is a shrine dedicated to Our Lady of the Alleghenies, which has been named the official Marian Shrine of the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese.
Getting There
The picturesque mountain towns of Loretto and Gallitzin are east of Johnstown, Pa., and west of Altoona, Pa., off of Route 22. The basilica is at 321 St. Mary Street in Loretto. For more, call (814) 472-8551.
----- EXCERPT: Basilica of St. Michael the Archangel, Loretto, Pa. ----- EXTENDED BODY: Rita Reichardt ----- KEYWORDS: Travel -------- TITLE: Higher Ground Faith and Terror Filled Nuns Fleeing the Flood DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:NEW ORLEANS — Families fleeing from the destruction of Katrina had a difficult time. Religious communities — with patients, pets, and their employees' families in tow — had it worse.
The Little Sisters of the Poor have weathered hurricanes before at their Mary-Joseph Residence for the Elderly here, but on Aug. 27, they knew something was different.
“This one we realized was of a size that was way beyond ‘beyond,'” Mother Paul Mary Wilson, superior of the New Orleans community, said. “They had been saying, ‘This is the big one.'”
Indeed it was. On the Mississippi coast, the storm killed more than 100 and leveled neighborhoods. In New Orleans, the storm broke the levee holding back Lake Pontchartrain and flooded the parts of New Orleans that are below sea level leaving countless people stranded or drowned.
On the morning of Aug. 28, the sisters embarked on an Exodus-like evacuation of the home's residents. They set out in two chartered buses and five vans holding 12 sisters, 64 residents, several employees and their families, two members of the Sisters Marianites of the Holy Cross from a nearby convent, five dogs, two cats and only the most basic supplies. The trip normally would have taken 75 minutes. Instead, it took 10 hours because of the volume of traffic leaving New Orleans.
The Little Sisters and their elderly residents from New Orleans were just one of many Catholic communities and families to be affected by Hurricane Katrina, which struck Florida's Dade County Aug. 26 and hit Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama Aug. 29.
EWTN's News Director Raymond Arroyo was among those who fled that city Aug. 27 before Katrina struck. A resident of New Orleans, Arroyo packed the family mini-van and took his wife, 10-day-old daughter, two sons and mother-in-law to Alabama, where EWTN is based in Irondale. The family was staying temporarily with nuns in Hanceville, Ala., at a guest home of Our Lady of the Angels Monastery.
“You live an abandoned life in New Orleans,” said Arroyo, whose suburban house is about seven minutes from downtown near Lake Pontchartrain. “And you don't know what that means until moments like this. Ultimately, you're in God's hands. The truth of the matter is this is how we exist every day, but we live in the delusion that we're in control. Moments like this reinforce the reality of our fragile lives and the reality of God's awesome power.”
Arroyo said the city has a strong devotion to Our Lady of Prompt Succor, who is patroness of both New Orleans and Louisiana. Before the storm hit, he said, representatives of the Archdiocese of New Orleans appealed to people via emergency radio to pray to Our Lady of Prompt Succor and to say the Rosary.
The sisters whose order introduced Our Lady of Prompt Succor to New Orleans, fared well during Katrina. Twelve members of the Ursuline Nuns (Roman Union) survived the storm by remaining in the buildings that house their convent, the Ursuline Academy of New Orleans and the National Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor. They also took in 25 other people who needed shelter.
Sister Deana Walker of Crystal City, Mo., provincial secretary of the order, said she received a phone call Aug. 30 from the brother of one of the New Orleans sisters saying everyone was fine and that the buildings had some water damage, but no broken windows. The sisters' campus is near Loyola University.
“This is a very old building,” Sister Deana said, “and it's weathered a lot of things before so they probably felt pretty confident staying with it.”
Nine Little Sisters of the Poor, who operate the Sacred Heart Residence for the elderly in Mobile, Ala., also survived Katrina by remaining in their home.
Mother Marcel Joseph McCanless said the building's roof sustained some damage and the home lost about a dozen large trees.
“Other than that and some leaks, thank God, we were all protected,” she said. The home also has been on emergency power, meaning there is no air conditioning and only limited lighting.
Although much of Mobile is flooded, Mother Marcel said the flood waters had not reached the residence, which is sheltering 50 extra people in addition to the 75 residents.
“We didn't even think of evacuation because the worst was supposed to hit New Orleans,” Mother Marcel said. “Our focus was really on our Little Sisters and our dear residents in New Orleans. For that reason, we are just sort of here and weathering it and praying for them more than for ourselves.”
In the wake of the hurricane, the Internet has been abuzz with articles about how Katrina is a sign that more destruction is imminent if people don't repent
Arroyo, whose book about Mother Angelica was launched this month, said many people are trying to draw spiritual messages from Hurricane Katrina.
“That is beyond me,” he said. “I think there are smaller lessons we have to draw from and ultimately for me, it's ‘What are the important things in life?’ Is it my home and my bedroom and my nice new furniture, my prized book collection, the CD collection I've spent 30 years building? Or is it my children, my family, my wife?”
Judy Roberts writes from Graytown, Ohio.
Catholics Reach Out
New Orleans is under water, but in addition to Louisiana, Mississipi, Alabama and Florida have all been declared federal disaster areas by President Bush. Aid is urgently needed for food, water and clothing. Catholic agencies have already begun helping.
Catholic Charities USA
2005 Hurricane Relief Fund
PO Box 25168
Alexandria, VA 22313-9788
CatholicCharitiesUSA.org
(800) 919-9338
Based on past disasters, possible long-term services that Catholic Charities may provide include temporary and permanent housing, direct assistance beyond food and water to get people back into their homes, job placement counseling, and medical and prescription drug assistance. In fact, Catholic Charities agencies in Florida are still providing services to help people recover from last year's devastating hurricanes.
Says Catholic Relief Services: “Though our mission is overseas, our hearts and prayers are with those in the United States devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Learn how to help through our sister organization, Catholic Charities.”
Knights of Columbus
Charities USA, Inc.
Gift Processing Center
PO Box 9028
Pittsfield, MA 01202-9028
Attention: Hurricane KATRINA Relief
KofC.org
The day after Katrina hit, the Knights of Columbus made their initial gift of $40,000 in aid.
There are nearly 50,000 Knights in the tri-state area devastated by Katrina. In addition, more than 45,000 live in Florida, where Katrina delivered its initial blow before growing into a Category 5 hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico.
One hundred percent of contributions will go directly to hurricane relief, and all donations to Knights of Columbus USA are tax-deductible.
The Knights of Columbus has provided significant relief for other recent disasters, providing more than $500,000 to victims of the Asian tsunami and $1 million for families of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Catholic World Mission
Katrina Relief
33 Rossotto Drive
Hamden, CT 06514
(203) 230 3802
CatholicWorldMission.org
The not-for-profit international relief organization plans to provide material and spiritual aid in the aftermath of Hurrican Katrina. Two Legionary priests are in the Houston Astrodome ministering to those affected by the disaster. They will help coordinate Catholic World Mission efforts as the group puts resources at the disposal of local bishops for whatever needs meet the bishops' priorities.
----- EXCERPT: HURRICANE KATRINA ----- EXTENDED BODY: Judy Roberts ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: St. Louis Requires Texts That Meet The Catechism DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:ST. LOUIS — Sandy Ahrens grew up in a Protestant church that provided only informal instruction in the faith.
Now a Catholic convert, Ahrens' two children attend the parish school of religion at St. Robert Bellarmine in St. Charles, Mo. She appreciates the fact that the Archdiocese of St. Louis is monitoring the religion textbooks her children are using.
“It's good to know that everything is being approved and looked over,” she said.
Ahrens provides home religious instruction to her children, who just completed grades 7 and 8, using Ignatius Press Faith and Life series. At St. Robert Bellarmine, where Carol Breckle is the parish's school of religion director, they use the Faith First series published by Resources for Christian Living.
The archdiocese mandates that only religious-education materials found to be in conformity with the Catechism of the Catholic Church are to be used in Catholic schools and parish school of religion programs.
As such, the archdiocese looks to a national bishops' board for direction. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Ad Hoc Committee to Oversee the Use of the Catechism, formed in 1994, has been reviewing texts since 1996 for how faithful they are to the Catechism.
It's an effort to ensure that children like the Ahrenses are being instructed in the truth — and not someone's opinion of it or someone's spin on it.
Both Faith and Life and Faith First are among 95 religious education texts that have been declared in conformity with the Catechism.
Breckle said the archdiocese, headed by Archbishop Raymond Burke, is very clear about the importance of using texts in conformity with the Catechism, and that she would not want to use anything that was not.
In addition, the archdiocese, one of 20 being examined in a Register investigation, monitors the materials being used by requiring educators to submit a report at the beginning of each school year listing textbooks and the certification status of teachers. A random check of parishes and schools in the archdiocese found that all were using texts in conformity with the Catechism. Only one — St. Monica's in Creve Coeur, Mo. — was using a questionable series — and only in one grade.
For eighth graders, the parish uses Silver Burdett Ginn's Connect leaflet series, which was published in 1994 before the review process began. Although Silver Burdett Ginn was the first publisher to submit its texts to the ad hoc committee, the company has not sought a declaration of conformity for Connect.
Ray Latour, president of Silver Burdett Ginn Religion, said the company decided to publish new junior-high texts as part of its Blest Are We series, and submit them for review rather than invest in a revision of Connect. The older series, he pointed out, carries an imprimatur and “nihil obstat” ensuring that it is free of doctrinal error. However, according to Msgr. Daniel Kutys, executive director of the bishops' Office for the Catechism, a declaration of conformity goes beyond those by assessing both the correctness and completeness of a text's doctrinal presentation.
Silver Burdett Ginn continues to keep Connect on the market because students respond favorably to it, Latour said.
Kids Like Glossy
Christina Sanders, coordinator of religious education at St. Monica's, said teachers in her parish wanted to continue using Connect even though it does not have a declaration of conformity with the Catechism because teens liked it better than a conventional textbook.
“The textbook format makes them feel very juvenile,” she said. “The Connect series is more of a glossy magazine-type series, which has been better received not only by the students, but also by the eighth-grade teachers.”
Sanders said teachers supplement the leaflets with textbooks bearing the bishops' declaration of conformity with the Catechism. Other grades at St. Monica's use the Silver Burdett Ginn This Is Our Faith and Blest Are We series, both of which are in conformity.
When the bishops began reviewing textbooks, the ad hoc committee, headed at the time by Archbishop Daniel Buechlein, OSB, of Indianapolis, identified 10 significant areas in which the vast majority of materials in use at the time were deficient:
— the Trinity;
— the divinity of Christ;
— the Church's teaching authority;
— a Christian understanding of man;
— God's initiative in the world (not just man's);
— the transforming effects of grace;
— the sacraments;
— original sin and sin in general;
— the Christian moral life;
— God's judgment.
Under the review process, publishers voluntarily submit texts to the ad hoc committee and receive a report listing changes required for a conformity declaration. The committee also identifies “recommended” and “suggested” changes, neither of which is required. However, Archbishop Alfred Hughes of New Orleans, the current chairman of the committee, said in 90% of the cases, publishers make all the changes.
The bishops' committee initially reviewed elementary texts because those were the first to be submitted by publishers, Msgr. Kutys said. Recently, the committee has been concentrating on high school texts. A list of books found to be in conformity with the Catechism is updated quarterly and posted on the bishops' website (www.usccb.org).
Dioceses Respond
Among other dioceses that are part of the Register series, policies on the use of catechetical texts and their enforcement vary. For example, both the archdioceses of Baltimore, headed by Cardinal William Keeler, and New Orleans, led by Archbishop Hughes, direct educators to choose books from the bishops' conformity listing. Archbishop Hughes also makes sure his archdiocese's policy is being followed by asking what textbooks are being used during his parish visitations.
By contrast, in the Diocese of Buffalo, N.Y., headed by Bishop Edward Kmiec, catechists are told to choose books that are in conformity with the Catechism, but not all of them are aware of the bishops' conformity listing or even the importance of selecting books from it. As a result, some programs and schools are using outdated books or materials that have not been reviewed by the bishops.
John Vitek, president and chief executive officer of St. Mary's Press in Winona, Minn., estimates that only a third of the dioceses in the country have mandated using books bearing the conformity declaration in parish and school programs.
‘They Let Us Know’
In St. Louis, the parish or school using an out-of-conformity text is the exception, said Msgr. John Unger, associate superintendent for religious education in the archdiocese. When one is identified, which he said rarely happens, he talks with those responsible — for example, the pastor and religious education director or principal — to find out why.
Deacon Jerry Stoverink, director of religious education at Sacred Heart Parish in Crystal City, Mo., which uses the Faith First series published by Resources for Christian Living, said that indeed happens.
“Each year they send us a sheet that asks us to put what we're teaching and what grade levels,” he said. “If we happen to put a text on there that's not on their approved list, they let us know.”
Told about St. Monica's Parish in Creve Coeur and its use of the Connect series, Msgr. Unger said he planned to look into the situation. However, he said he would be more concerned if a large number of children were affected or if the entire parish was using out-of-conformity materials. St. Monica's program has about 90 students in grades 1-8.
The archdiocese still does its own reviews of books, not to determine conformity with the Catechism, but to assess age appropriateness, the quality of the teacher manual, methodology, use of sacred Scripture, sound liturgical suggestions, inclusion of prayers, the parent component and religious artwork. Only books with the declaration of conformity with the Catechism are reviewed.
Judy Roberts is based in Graytown, Ohio.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Judy Roberts ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Breakthrough in Stem-Cell Research DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:PITTSBURGH — A discovery by University of Pittsburgh medical school researchers is a boon to both families and pro-family activists.
They have found morally obtainable cells that could be stand-ins for embryonic stem cells.
Many newborns develop jaundice, a condition in which the skin has a yellow tint. But extra fluids, and sometimes a few days under special lights to dissipate the bilirubin built up in their system take care of the anomaly.
Not in the case of two of Katie and Floyd Martin's four children.
They inherited Crigler-Najjar disease and are among about 200 children around the globe born with a liver that lacks the enzyme required to process bilirubin, a blood waste product. The Martins' 12-year-old daughter had a liver transplant last year, and doctors are struggling to find an effective immuno-suppressant drug so she doesn't reject the liver.
Their 15-year-old son is on the transplant list. For now, the 6-foot, 160-pound teenager relies on the lights to keep him alive and stop bilirubin from causing brain damage.
“He's very tall and strong and healthy. It's really tough,” Katie Martin said. “I dream of gene therapy or cell therapy — something that wouldn't knock him down as hard as surgery,” said Katie, a Mennonite who has written a book, God's Golden Children.
Many of those affected in the United States are Pennsylvania-area Amish or Mennonite families.
Looking for a way to treat such conditions spurred University of Pittsburgh medical school researchers to a recently announced discovery: neonatal cells in the human placenta that bear a striking resemblance to embryonic stem cells.
The discovery may have implications far beyond the researchers' own specialty of repairing livers. In its announcement, the university said that under the right laboratory conditions, “amniotic epithelial” cells could be directed to form liver, pancreas, heart and nerve cells, and thus could be used to regenerate other tissues and organs and heal nerve damage.
Stephen Strom, associate professor of pathology, is the study's senior author. His focus is cell transplant to repair and regenerate livers, a promising therapy. “The problem is the only livers we get are the livers rejected from transplant.”
Benefit of the Doubt
Aware of the moral and ethical problems in the field of embryonic stem-cell research, Strom and his colleague Toshio Miki, focused on placentas.
“We wanted to generate a lot more cells for transplant and that's what moved us into the stem-cell field,” Strom said.
The Church has been fighting embryonic stem-cell research that requires the killing of a human embryo, which science shows is a unique boy or girl from conception to eight weeks, with their own unique DNA and normal life expectancy.
Even before stem-cell research came on the scene, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in the 1987 instruction Donum Vitae stated that the “human being is to be respected and treated as a person from the moment of conception and therefore from that same moment his rights as a person must be recognized.”
Strom, who is also a researcher at the university's McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, said he avoided conducting research with embryonic stem cells, not for religious reasons but because he is not sure when life begins.
With four million live births a year, placentas are now treated as medical waste — so there is a ready supply available, the researchers noted. The study is published online in Stem Cells Express and will appear in the journal Stem Cells. The researchers began looking at the viability of the amnion, the outer membrane of the amniotic sac, as a cell source in late 2001. The following year, the university licensed the technology to a company now called Stemnion LLC. As part of the agreement, Strom and Miki will receive license proceeds, according to the University of Pittsburgh. Both have served as paid consultants and hold equity in Stemnion.
The amnion is comprised of cells that have very similar characteristics to embryonic stem cells, including the ability to express two key genes that give embryonic stem cells their unique capability for developing into any kind of specialized cell, the researchers report.
Those two genes, Oct-4 and nanog, are required for self-renewal and pluripotency — the ability to develop into any type of cell.
The amnion, derived from the embryo, forms as early as eight days after fertilization. That, Strom surmised, means it is very close to an embryonic stem cell. He calls it a “neo-natal stem cell.”
Animal testing of placental-cell transplants into livers must take place before the federal government can approve treating people, but Strom hopes to begin experimental human-cell transplants using the cells within two to five years. Recipients would still need immuno-suppression drugs but with the cells, the body's reaction will probably be much less than with an organ transplant, Strom said. The University of Pittsburgh is a pioneer in cell transplantation.
Senate to Vote
While the Pittsburgh study appears promising from a research and treatment standpoint, it is unlikely to change the tenor of the national stem cell debate — as witnessed by the response of Pennsylvania's two senators.
The Senate is poised to vote on overturning President Bush's 2001 directive that federal funding be allowed for research using lines derived from embryonic stem cells derived prior to Aug. 9 of that year. Pro-embryonic stem-cell research Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., is co-sponsoring legislation to expand that funding to include “discarded” in-vitro fertilization embryos. Senator Majority Leader Bill Frist announced this summer that he supports the bill, which passed the House of Representatives 238-194. President Bush has promised to veto it.
Asked whether the Pittsburgh findings would make a difference in Specter's stand, his spokesman, Bill Reynolds, said the senator believes “all forms of research need to go forward so you can figure out the best route to take.”
On the other hand, Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., called the University of Pittsburgh discovery “just more evidence that ethical and scientifically sound alternatives to embryonic stem cells exist.”
David Prentice, scientific adviser to the Family Research Council, said the study shows the potential of adult stem cells. No cures or treatments have yet been developed using embryonic stem cells, which were first cultured in 1998.
“This report is significant because they showed not only this capability but also the lack of tumor formation, unlike embryonic stem cells,” Prentice said. “This is a wonderful source of adult stem cells.”
Strom and Miki, a pathology instructor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, found that the placental cells appear to be very similar to embryonic stem cells without two of the major embryonic stem-cell drawbacks: They do not generate random tumors, called teratomas, and they do not need to be cultured on a bed of mouse feeder cells so they avoid trace contamination.
On the other hand, they do not live virtually immortally as embryonic stem cells do, although they can still double in population about 20 times over without needing another cell type as a feeder cell layer.
Others are also exploring the potential of these placental cells, Strom noted.
He hopes to apply cell transplantation to children with Crigler-Najjar disease soon. Katie Martin is right to worry, Strom said, “This is a lethal disease.”
“My son's between a rock and hard place. What's he supposed to do?” asked the Mifflinburg, Pa., mother. “He's seen what his sister's gone through, and yet he knows what happens if he waits too long. We just pray for direction, for the right thing to do.”
Valerie Schmalz is based in San Francisco, California.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Valerie Schmalz ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Mary Is Queen of Heaven, Not Pope DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Mariaphobia is the irrational fear of Mary.
In my last column I remarked that the surprise, for many Evangelical converts to the Catholic faith, is how much smaller Mary is to the Catholic than she is to the evangelical. For the evangelical, “the Catholic Mary” looms large as a kind of ur-goddess.
The fear that pre-occupies the evangelical imagination is that, say what Catholics will, once the convert is safely inside the Church, the priest will produce the brain chip implant and you will be reprogrammed to adore and worship Mary by the Vatican's Mind Control Laser Platform in Geosynchronous Orbit above North America.
But the reality, when you finally get past the irrational terror of Mary and enter the Church, is that nobody thinks she's another God, as you feared. Instead, you find that a small minority of Catholics think she's another Pope.
It's funny, really. Each religious tradition has its own genius and its own pathologies. On the pathology side of evangelicalism, particularly its charismatic flavors, one finds (in a peculiar minority of evangelicals) a frequent anointing of “prophets” who have the end times mapped out in one way or another.
Usually, this involves heavy doses of Daniel, Ezekiel and Revelation, as well as ingenious interpretations of events in Israel, bar codes, and numerical evaluations of some world leader's name.
But lest Catholics clap themselves on the back too much, it must be noted that the convert is tempted to mutter “different religion, same pathologies” when he enters the Catholic communion only to be greeted by a small but earnest cadre of apocalypse-minded Catholics who center exactly the same sort of prognosticating, not around Daniel, Ezekiel and Revelation (after all, we're Catholics; we don't read the Bible more than we have to) but around some alleged revelation of Mary involving chastisements, asteroid impacts, three days of darkness, and weird commands issued to the pope or the bishops of the world.
The queer thing about this particular subculture in the Church is that it appears to hold to the notion of “Church Governance by Apparition.” A certain sort of Catholic can get the notion in his head that the Church is governed, not by the bishops in succession from the apostles and in union with the pope, but by a series of private revelations from Mary.
Such Catholics are often not particularly cautious about distinguishing between public and private revelation, still less about whether a Marian apparition has been approved by the Church.
Indeed, the creepier and more apocalyptic the “revelation” the more such a Catholic will be certain that its rejection by the Church is a sign of apostasy and imminent judgment on the sinister Masonic/New Age/Jewish conspiracy at work in the hierarchy.
So if an alleged Marian apparition starts claiming that the pope must define this or that teaching as dogma, or starts telling Catholics to save up beeswax candles to prepare themselves for the three days of darkness that are just around the corner, the apparition enthusiast will often regard it as a judgment on the pope — not on the reality of the “vision” — if the pope does not salute smartly and do whatever the latest visionary is demanding.
This is, however, to fundamentally fail to grasp what the Church has always taught with the authority of Christ.
A Marian private revelation is no more binding on the Pope than it is binding on any other Catholic. The governance of the Church remains the task of the Church's Christ-appointed governors, the bishops. Mary does not supersede them in their proper and Christ-appointed role, and authentic Marian apparitions never try to do so. If the magisterium judges a Marian revelation to be authentic, the Holy Father or the bishops may well act in obedience to it (as, for instance, when Our Lady of Guadalupe requested the building of a Church and Our Lady of Fatima requested the consecration of Russia to her immaculate heart).
But in such cases, the magisterium is still left to act in freedom. It is not obliged to practice government-by-apparition, and apparition enthusiasts overstep their bounds when they declare a pope or bishop “apostate” if they fail to live up to the apparitionist's level of enthusiasm.
This basic counsel to trust the Holy Spirit in leading the Church comes hard for many people. The spectrum can be wide in such matters. Some people are the kinds who immediately rush off to start praying the Rosary and light candles to water stains on a highway underpass in Crawfordsville, Ind.
Others don't find even Church-approved apparitions and private revelations particularly helpful to them and therefore don't bother with them much.
That's their right (the Church doesn't say you must believe in the stories of Fatima and Guadalupe, just that you may) but the sensible thing to do is to trust the Holy Spirit to guide the Church as he promised he would.
Otherwise, we can find that our passions become so engaged in defending our views that, should the Church rule against us, we end up placing our view of private revelation over the Church's and condemning the Church for its “erroneous” approval or disapproval.
Mark Shea is Senior Content Editor for CatholicExchange.com.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Mark Shea ----- KEYWORDS: Commentary -------- TITLE: Vatican Media Watch DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Castel Sant'Angelo at Risk of Collapse
REUTERS, Aug. 30 — Italy has said it will pump more than $1.2 million of emergency funding into Rome's Castel Sant' Angelo after a newspaper published an exposé of its decay, including holes in the walls, faulty wiring and crumbling brickwork, Reuters reported.
“The problems faced by this extraordinary monument that represents the heart of Rome demands an extraordinary effort,” Culture Minister Rocco Buttiglione told reporters.
The imposing fortress overlooks the Tiber River and backs onto the Vatican City. It was originally a mausoleum for Emperor Hadrian in 139 A.D. and later became part of the city walls, medieval citadel, jail, refuge for besieged popes and more recently a museum that draws hundreds of thousands of visitors each year.
Newspaper Editor Calls John Paul II ‘a Martyr’
EXPRESSINDIA.COM, Aug. 26 — The editor of the Vatican newspaper said that Pope John Paul II was a “martyr” even though he survived a 1981 assassination attempt, reported the Indian news service ExpressIndia.
Mario Agnes, editor-in-chief of the Vatican daily L'Osservatore Romano, told an annual pro-Catholic political meeting that the stones in St. Peter's Square where John Paul's blood was shed should be preserved because it was the blood of “an authentic martyred Pope.”
Ever since Pope Benedict XVI announced May 13 that he was putting John Paul on the fast track for possible sainthood, there have been questions about whether he could be declared a martyr. Doing so would remove the need for the Vatican to confirm that a miracle attributed to his intercession had occurred after his April 2 death for him to be beatified.
Aide Recalls John Paul II's Last Hours
ASSOCIATED PRESS, Aug. 27 — As he lay near death, Pope John Paul II was aware of the crowd in St. Peter's Square below his apartment window and calmly viewed death as a “passage from one room to another,” a longtime secretary said in an interview broadcast Friday night.
“He heard everything,” Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, said in an interview with TG5, an Italian television station, in Krakow, Poland where he was installed as archbishop. “He heard the square, he heard the prayer, the presence of the young people. The Holy Father heard, because he was conscious right to the end, almost to the end, even the last day.”
Archbishop Dziwisz said the last words he heard the Pope say were totus tuus, the Pope's Latin motto for “completely yours,” dedicating himself to the Virgin Mary. He said a nun who was near the Pope in his final hours told him that she heard the Pope say, “Let me go to the Lord.”
“We were at his side in these last moments,” Archbishop Dziwisz told TG5. “For him, death was really a passage from one room to another, from one life to another.”
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Vatican -------- TITLE: Video Picks ... Passes DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ: PICK
(1959)
Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ: PICK
(1925)
Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ: PICK
(2003)
Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, General Lew Wallace's sprawling, red-blooded, reverent 1880 historical novel of a first-century Jewish prince's changing fortunes and chance encounters with Jesus Christ, was a runaway bestseller in its day, for decades outselling every other American novel — until the 1936 release of Gone With the Wind.
According to Wikipedia, the novel spawned a number of stage adaptations — including one that replicated the famous chariot race with live horses, full-size chariots and a series of treadmills. But it was the newer medium of cinema that would best dramatize Wallace's novel, perpetuating its blend of spectacle, melodrama, and piety to later generations after the original work's length and archaic style would make it all but inaccessible.
This week, two of those adaptations come to DVD in a new four-disc set boasting superior digital transfers and numerous extras. The top-billed version, of course, is William Wyler's classic 1959 version starring Charlton Heston, which won an unprecedented 11 Academy Awards and is the only American film honored for religious significance on the 1995 Vatican film list.
The other version is less familiar, but all the more noteworthy for it: the equally spectacular — perhaps even superior — 1925 silent version directed by Fred Niblo (The Mark of Zorro) and starring silent screen heartthrob Ramon Novarro. At nearly 2½ hours long, the silent version is still an hour shorter than the 1959 version, yet the story is essentially the same, and the scale similarly astounding.
The set piece everyone remembers from the 1959 version, of course, is the chariot race. The 1925 version is at least comparable here — but it excels in the story's other key action sequence, the epic sea battle in which the title character escapes his fate as a galley slave.
Both versions bring the same reverent reticence to depicting Christ, never showing his face (or, in the sound version, making his voice audible). The silent version additionally uses two-strip Technicolor for the religious scenes, as Cecil B. DeMille did his resurrection sequence in the silent 1927 King of Kings, giving these scenes a special aura of significance.
While this hyper-reverent approach would never work for a whole biblical film, the style of melodramatic spectacle Hollywood cheerfully applied to such biblical subjects as The Ten Commandments is also problematic, and certainly neither approach would do for a life of Christ film. Ben-Hur gets around this dilemma by keeping the Gospel story in the background and making another more appropriate tale the subject of its melodrama.
One other version of Ben-Hur is worth mentioning. In 2003, Charlton Heston reprised his greatest role, if in voice only, in an animated made-for-TV version from the director and producers of the “Greatest Heroes and Legends of the Bible” series.
Though no classic, the animated Ben-Hur easily outclasses the “Greatest Heroes and Legends of the Bible” series (as well as the comparable “Animated Passion” trilogy directed by Richard Rich), simply because the drama is so strong and is less dependent on the story adaptation. (The absence of cheesy songs is also a major plus.)
The animated Ben-Hur is a great way to introduce even the youngest, who might not be ready for the epic length or action violence of the live-action versions, to this classic tale of adversity, heroism, forgiveness, and redemption.
CONTENT ADVISORY: Both live-action versions of Ben-Hur on the four-disc set contain action violence and battle scenes. The silent version also contains brief partial nudity. The animated version contains no problematic content.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Steven D. Greydanus ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Full of Life DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:PRIEST PROFILE
In his short time with Priests for Life, Claretian Father Mark Clarke has become convinced that the Gospel of Life must be preached from the pulpit on a regular basis.
Since joining the national organization in July as a full-time priest associate, Father Clarke has visited parishes in many parts of the country to celebrate Mass and preach at all weekend Masses.
“People have come to me after Mass to say they've waited 30 years to hear a priest mention abortion from the pulpit,” he says. “For every one parishioner who may walk out because you're talking about abortion, there are 10 who are grateful.”
He adds that the seven itinerant preachers for Priests for Life do not labor to “make up for the priests who do not mention abortion.”
“We offer resources, we offer encouragement,” he explains. “Most priests are pro-life, but many priests do not mention abortion from the pulpit because there are always women in the congregation who have had abortions. They're afraid of opening wounds. But our experience shows that the topic must be raised for full healing. We condemn abortion, but we don't condemn the women who have had abortions. We always preach about the love, mercy, forgiveness and acceptance of God. In this way, we can help bring about reconciliation.”
Father Clarke, who joined the Claretian Missionaries in 1994 and was ordained in January of 2003, is spending a year with Priests for Life with the permission of his community to see if he is called to join a new religious society, Missionaries of the Gospel of Life.
The formation of the new society was announced last March by Father Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, who has opened headquarters in Amarillo, Texas, under Bishop John Yanta. The society is in the process of having its constitutions approved in Rome, Father Pavone tells the Register, and its formation house in Amarillo will begin accepting candidates in October. The lay associates program of the society is already in operation.
In addition to his preaching duties, Father Clarke oversees the formation house in Amarillo and works with the men who are applying to enter the new society.
“Father Clarke brings to Priests for Life a longstanding commitment to the defense of life as a full-time ministry,” Father Pavone says. “I met him years ago, and back then we discussed the idea of having him join a community like this. He knows what this calling is, because it has been in his soul for a long time. He brings an understanding of what a missionary is, because the Claretians are missionaries.”
Claretian Calling
Father Clarke grew up in Los Angeles, where he was a certified emergency medical technician working for the city's fire department before entering Chapman University. After receiving a degree in chemistry and doing some graduate course work at California State University in Los Angeles, he worked for five years as an analytical chemist in the pharmaceutical industry.
He had felt a call to the priesthood in the eighth grade, he said, and in 1994 he finally decided to respond.
“God called me back in the midst of my work in the secular world,” he recalled. “I developed a devotion to Mary and became interested in the Claretians because our full name is Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. God was calling me to become a missionary.”
In 2002 he graduated from the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas, where he wrote his master's thesis on the U.S. bishops' statements on abortion in the context of the family, health care, justice and peace, and respect for life. After ordination, he was assigned to San Gabriel Mission, one of the 21 historic California missions founded under the inspiration of Blessed Junipero Serra. Much more than a museum, the mission offers 10 weekend Masses in English, Spanish and Vietnamese, and has a teeming youth ministry that Father Clarke directed.
Claretian Father Ralph Berg, pastor of San Gabriel, tells the Register that Father Clarke was popular with the young people of the parish.
“They related to him very well because he was a younger priest and he was very hardworking and full of life,” Father Berg says. “He also coordinated the liturgy committee and worked with many other people in the parish. He was always outside the church after Masses saying hello and talking with people.”
Father Berg was on the committee of Claretian priests who approved Father Clarke's release to work with Priests for Life and possibly enter the new pro-life society.
“Pro-life work is very important in the Church today,” Father Berg says. “Anything that a priest can do in this area would be very commendable, and I know he will do well.”
Father Clarke calls the formation of the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life a “historic and prophetic” undertaking. “The bishops have called abortion the fundamental human rights issue of our day, so we need a priestly society devoted exclusively to the issue,” he says. “Priests by their ordination are called to be preachers of the Word, ministers of the sacraments and leaders of the community.
“This is exactly what the pro-life movement needs right now,” adds Father Clarke. “We need this ministry of priests to stand up for the unborn, speak out against injustice, sanctify the people through the sacraments and lead the people as we evangelize and live out the Gospel of Life.”
Stephen Vincent writes from Wallingford, Connecticut.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Stephen Vincent ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: On 'the Hill,' Catholic Women Are at Work DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:The Church-state debate has taken center stage once again in Washington, D.C., with the nomination of Judge John Roberts, a Catholic, to the Supreme Court.
The story of the role of faith in public and political life can also be told in less notable ways, through the experiences of three Washington women from Catholic colleges who bring their faith to work.
Dori Rutherford is an experienced Washington insider who openly draws from her Catholic faith to perform her government job. She works in the Department of Labor's Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, helping community-based nonprofit groups access federal funds. She deals mainly with small organizations that are not familiar with the government-grant process and don't have the budgets to hire professional grant writers.
“My job requires an understanding of the ways in which organizations of faith operate to help people in America's communities who are the most difficult to serve,” she explains. “My work revolves around empowering faith-based and community organizations to do more for people, and to do it more effectively. My Catholic faith is a perfect complement to my work.”
The White House Department of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives was set up by President George W. Bush, with Jim Towey as head of the main office. Each executive agency has a faith-based office, like the Department of Labor's Center of Faith-Based Initiatives, which works with the White House.
Rutherford grew up in Pittsburgh and graduated in 1993 from Christendom College in Front Royal, Va., with a degree in political science and economics. She went to Washington to work with the conservative Heritage Foundation on domestic-policy issues and later managed the foundation's weekly lectures and seminars.
She got her first taste of a government faith-based program when she moved to Indianapolis to work for the mayor's “rebuilding families” program. Two years ago, she joined the Labor Department.
Married for six years, she and her husband, Jim, are expecting their first child in September.
Christendom helped her grow in the faith by “teaching from an unabashedly Catholic perspective,” she says. “I learned the historical and philosophical aspects of the Catholic tradition, which gave me a more profound understanding of the things I believe.”
In her work, she has seen ex-inmates turn their lives around through the help of a faith-based group the Labor Department funds, and witnessed a small nonprofit take a $25,000 grant and build the organization to almost double in size to serve more needy persons in the community.
“You get to see the results of your efforts,” she says.
‘Whatever It Takes’
Muffy Lewis' story has a Catholic “That Girl” quality to it. A young woman with no experience in politics goes to Washington and, within a week, she's working for a major pro-life lobbying group. A few months later she is hired by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., and drafts anti-abortion legislation that last spring passed the House of Representatives.
“Some people spend years trying to get a break in D.C., so my story is surprising,” she admits.
Lewis grew up in Miami, Fla., attended Catholic grade school and a private high school there, and chose Boston College because of its Catholic reputation. Yet from her first class, she was surprised at the lack of commitment to basic Catholic teachings among some faculty and students.
“I was a routine Catholic at the time who didn't know much about the faith,” she recalls. “I wasn't able to argue with some of the things that were taught.”
After graduating in 1993, she returned to Miami and worked various jobs till a chance encounter with a committed Catholic couple changed her life. “My mother, two sisters and I spoke with them for four hours, and we were sobbing because what they said about the faith was so beautiful,” Lewis says. “They mentioned that their children went to Franciscan University in Steubenville, and I just said to my mother, ‘Whatever it takes, I have to go there.’”
She attended to a summer conference in Steubenville and enrolled in the master's program in counseling. “That conference opened my heart,” she says. “I had nine years of Catholic education and never before had I been at Eucharistic adoration and Benediction. When they brought the Blessed Sacrament in procession, I looked up at Jesus and heard him say my name and that he loved me. I knew I had to go to confession and change my life.”
After earning her master's degree, she moved to Washington with a sense that God wanted her there. At a routine meeting with Ros-Lehtinen, Lewis said she'd love to work with her. The congresswoman referred her to the Susan B. Anthony List, which hired her immediately to work on pro-life issues. Ros-Lehtinen offered her a job a few months later. She is now legislative director in the congresswoman's office.
“Everything I do goes back to my education at Steubenville,” says Lewis. “It was like a three-year spiritual retreat and immersion in Catholicism. I know that this is all God's work, putting me where I am. It has been a very strange route to Washington, but I love what I'm doing.”
Applied Talents
Working in marketing and business development for a major Washington law firm may not sound like an ideal job for a committed Catholic. But Adrienne Johannes says she lives her faith at work by aiming for excellence and ethical behavior — and serving as a quiet but firm witness to others.
“It's always a struggle to practice your faith to the fullest, but you don't have to be a social worker or feed the poor every day to do so,” she observes. “Even in the world of law, finance and capital, you can apply the tenets of the faith. It is very important that we find our personal talents, develop them and apply them in a way that brings benefits to others. In my job, I help develop new businesses here and overseas that benefit economies and give people jobs, income and a better life.”
Born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, Johannes got her start in Washington by working for four years for two of the state's senators, Frank Murkowski and his daughter Lisa Murkowski, who took her father's seat when he was elected governor.
Johannes was home schooled through high school and then went to the University of Dallas. The change in climate was dramatic but the school's solid Catholic character made her feel right at home. She graduated in 2000 with a degree in politics and soon after moved to Washington.
The past presidential election and the current debate over the views of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts have made faith an important issue in Washington, she says.
“It's exciting that we're having these debates about the place of Catholicism in the public square and politics,” she adds. “You can't really separate your Christian faith from your public life. You have a duty to shape society according to moral laws, and that means having these great discussions about faith.”
Stephen Vincent writes from Wallingford, Connecticut.
----- EXCERPT: More Catholic grads bringing the Gospel to the world ----- EXTENDED BODY: Stephen Vincent ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: Court Upholds Military-Abortion Restriction DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:SEATTLE — The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the military can continue to ban the funding of abortions for its personnel and their families — except in cases where the life of the mother is threatened.
The case before the federal court, widely considered one of the most activist in the United States, concerned a 23-year-old woman — identified only as Jane Doe — who procured an abortion in 2002, after learning that her child suffered from anencephaly — a condition characterized by undersized or missing parts of the brain. Most sufferers are stillborn, and the rest usually die within days or weeks of birth.
In an opinion that expressed great sympathy for the mother, the three-judge panel of the appeals court overturned a lower court ruling that held that the Congressional ban on federal funding of abortions by Tricare — the military medical care system — was unconstitutional.
The Army Times reported that the plaintiff has not yet decided whether to appeal the finding.
“The 9th Circuit read a law and upheld its meaning,” said Richard Doerflinger, Deputy Director of the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C.
“It would have been sad if they had tried to create a right to kill unborn terminally-ill children [as the lower court did],” he said.
Northwest Women's Law Center in Seattle represented Doe in the case. A request from comment went unanswered.
But her attorney — Lisa Stone — was quoted in the Army Times as saying that she saw no reason to protect the life of a terminally-ill, unborn child. Court documents indicated that Doe's doctors had also urged her to have an abortion.
“Here, there is no human life, there is no potential,” Stone said. “Therefore it's irrational to apply the statute.”
Stone characterized Doe as “somebody whose strong desire to be a parent [went] awry and [was] denied appropriate medical care.”
Mothers of anencephalic babies often resent that they are expected to abort. On the Internet, Anencephaly.net lists several memorial sites for these babies, and encourages mothers “to carry their babies to term with anencephaly or any fatal defect.”
The mother of Mary Elizabeth Karg writes, “I always knew that my baby needed me to protect her and to be her voice from the time that she was conceived. I am so very thankful that I was able to hold her and see her beautiful face.”
Faith Aminah Shabazz's mother says: “Faith was born in March of 2001, and lived until October, 2003. She brought joy into the lives of all those who knew her.”
Said another baby's mother: “As the malformation is usually detected during a pre-natal scan, parents are confronted with a choice between life and death — a choice often made with very little information of what is in store for them. It is with this in mind that I have made the choice to share the story of the brief, but wonderful life of our anencephalic daughter, Anouk. I hope that it will be of help to you and impart courage.”
One Exception
Doerflinger argued that such statements are not only morally repugnant, but fail to apply the law equally and are violations of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, in No. 2274, makes clear that prenatal diagnoses should never be used to decide that an unborn child should die.
“Prenatal diagnosis is morally licit if it respects the life and integrity of the embryo and the human fetus, and is directed toward its safeguarding or healing as an individual. … It is gravely opposed to the moral law when this is done with the thought of possibly inducing an abortion, depending upon the results: A diagnosis must not be the equivalent of a death sentence.”
Michael Elliot, a spokesman for Tricare, said that government regulations prevented him from speaking about specific beneficiary issues, but provided the Register with the text of the military regulation concerning abortion — which specifically excludes coverage for cases of anencephaly — as was the case with Doe's child.
It reads: “The statue … prohibits payment for abortions with one single exception — where the life of the mother would be endangered if the fetus were carried to term. Covered abortion services are limited to medical services and supplies only. Physician certification is required attesting that the abortion was performed because the mother's life would be endangered if the fetus were carried to term. Abortions performed for suspected or confirmed fetal abnormality (e.g., anencephalic) or for mental health reasons (e.g., threatened suicide) do not fall within the exceptions permitted within the language of the statute and are not authorized for payment.”
The court's decision means this statute will continue to be policy for the military.
Explaining that it was Congress, not the military, who set the policy, a Defense Department spokesman in Virginia — who spoke anonymously — noted that the military did not fund abortions for members of the armed forces and their families before the decision, and will continue that ban on funding.
Doerflinger said that he hoped that this decision marked a turning point for the 9th Circuit Court. He pointed out that in 1996, the 9th Circuit had struck down a law in the state of Washington that banned assisted suicide, ruling that “there was no rational basis for the law with regard to terminally ill patients.”
That ruling, Doerflinger explained, was reversed 9-0 by the Supreme Court.
“Perhaps,” he said, “the 9th Circuit has learned its lesson.”
Andrew Walther is based in Hamden, Connecticut.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Andrew Walther ----- KEYWORDS: News -------- TITLE: Society Has Need of God and Children DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:Register Summary
Pope Benedict XVI traveled to Rome by helicopter from his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo for his Aug. 31 general audience. From an open car, he greeted the 11,000 pilgrims who were gathered in St. Peter's Square.
Pope Benedict continued his series of teachings on the psalms and canticles of the Liturgy of the Hours, focusing on Psalm 127. This psalm, the Holy Father explained, reminds us that whatever we do can only bear fruit if it has God's blessing. Without the Lord, all our efforts will ultimately fail.
“A strong society is built on the commitment of all its members, but it needs the blessing and support of God who, unfortunately, is often excluded or ignored,” Pope Benedict XVI noted. “The Book of Proverbs emphasizes the preeminence of God's action for a community's well-being,” he added. The Holy Father also pointed out that the psalmist was well aware of the primacy of God's grace: “When we peacefully and faithfully relinquish our freedom to the Lord, even our works become solid and capable of bearing lasting fruit.”
The psalmist also reminds us, he noted, that the gift of children is a particular blessing from God, both for the family and for society at large.
“Procreation is a gift that bears life and well-being for society,” he said. ‘We are aware of this even today as we see before us nations a declining birth rate has deprived of their freshness, their vitality and their future, embodied in their children. Over it all, however, towers God's presence, bestowing blessings, as a source of life and hope.’
Psalm 127, which we just heard, presents a rather lively scene that unfolds before our eyes: a house under construction, a city with its guards, family life, night watches and daily work — both the little and big secrets of daily life.
Over it all, however, looms a decisive presence, the presence of the Lord, who hovers over man's doings as the incisive beginning of the psalm suggests: “Unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build” (verse 1).
Of course, a strong society is built on the commitment of all its members, but it needs the blessing and support of God who, unfortunately, is often excluded or ignored. The Book of Proverbs emphasizes the preeminence of God's action for a community's well-being, and it does so in a radical way, by affirming that “it is the Lord's blessing that brings wealth, and no effort can substitute for it” (Proverbs 10:22).
God Grants Prosperity
This wisdom psalm, a fruit of meditation on the reality of everyday life, is largely based on a contrast. Without the Lord, all our attempts to build a stable house, to construct a safe city, and to make our labor fruitful, are in vain (see Psalm 127:1–2). With the Lord, on the other hand, there is prosperity and fruitfulness — a family that is peaceful and enriched by children and a city that is well fortified and protected, free from constant worry and insecurity (see verses 3–5).
The text begins with a reference to the Lord, who is depicted as the builder of the house and the watchman who watches over the city (see Psalm 121:1–8). Man goes out in the morning so he can work to support his family and contribute to the development of society. This work consumes all his energy, causing his brow to sweat (see Genesis 3:19) throughout the entire day (see Psalm 127:2).
Yet, the psalmist tells us without any hesitation that all this labor is in vain unless God is at the side of the one who labors. Indeed, he even tells us that God rewards his friends as they sleep. By doing so, the psalmist wishes to exalt the primacy of God's grace, which gives durability and value to what man does, even though it is characterized by limitations and will pass away.
When we peacefully and faithfully relinquish our freedom to the Lord, even our works become solid, and are capable of bearing lasting fruit. In this way, our “sleep” becomes a time of rest that is blessed by God, meant to cap activity that has meaning and lasting value.
The Gift of Children
At this point, we move on to the other scene depicted in this psalm. The Lord gives us the gift of children, seen as a blessing and a reward, a sign of life that continues on, and of salvation history that moves forward toward a new stage (see verse 3). In a special way, the psalmist exalts “the children born in one's youth.”
Not only will the father who has had children in his youth see them in all their vigor, but they will also be his support in his old age. Consequently, he will be able to face the future with security, having become like a warrior, armed with those sharp and victorious “arrows” that are his sons (see verses 4-5).
The purpose of the image, which is taken from the culture of the time, is to extol the security, stability and strength of a large family, as is repeated in the following psalm, Psalm 128, where the portrait of a happy family is sketched.
The final image depicts a father, surrounded by his children, who is greeted with respect at the city gate — the seat of public life. Thus, procreation is a gift that bears life and well-being for society.
We are aware of this even today as we see before us nations a declining birth rate has deprived of their freshness, their vitality and their future, embodied in their children. Over it all, however, towers God's presence, bestowing blessings, as a source of life and hope.
Trust in the Lord
Spiritual writers have often used Psalm 127 precisely to exalt God's presence, which is crucial in order to proceed along the path of goodness and of the Kingdom of God. Thus, a monk named Isaiah, who died in Gaza in 491, recalling the example of the ancient patriarchs and prophets, teaches us the following in his Asceticon (Logos 4,118): “They placed themselves under God's protection, begging for his assistance, without placing their trust in some work they had accomplished. God's protection was for them a fortified city, because they knew that without God's help they were powerless and, out of humility, they repeated with the psalmist: ‘Unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build. Unless the Lord guard the city, in vain does the guard keep watch’” (Recueil Ascétique, Abbey of Bellefontaine, 1976, pp. 74–75).
(Register translation)
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Education -------- TITLE: World Media Watch DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:FAMILY MATTERS
Australian Archbishop Answers Critic
ABC ONLINE, Aug. 29 — An Australian archbishop said the Church has the right to comment when political issues have a moral dimension, the online edition of the Australian Broadcasting Co. reported.
Hobart Archbishop Adrian Doyle, in response to a Tasmanian politician who described Church leaders as “uninformed, ignorant and unhelpful,” on the issues, said not only does the Church have the right to comment, but is expected to comment.
“We're in a no-win situation,” he said. “There are people who criticize us for not speaking up loud enough and often enough, and now we're told that we have no place in the conversation at all.”
Bishop Imprisoned for 28 Years Dies
ASSOCIATED PRESS, Aug. 28 — Bishop Xie Shiguang of Mingdong, China, a leader of the country's underground Catholic Church, died Aug. 27 of leukemia, Associated Press reported.
Bishop Xie was first arrested in 1955 by Chinese authorities “because of his loyalty and obedience to the pope,” and released a year later, Vatican radio reported Aug. 27. He was arrested again in 1958 and jailed until 1980, the report said.
The bishop was also imprisoned from 1984-1987, and finally for two years starting in 1990, and was kept under surveillance by authorities until his death, the radio report said.
The Vatican praised Bishop Xie as a “courageous witness to Christ.”
Islamic Extremists Forcibly Shut Down Javan Chapel
ASIANEWS, Aug. 29 — A group of about 200 Islamic fundamentalists forcibly shut down a Catholic Chapel in Margahayu, which is linked to the Buah Batu's parish church in West Java, shortly after the 6:30 pm Saturday Mass, AsiaNews reported.
Right after Mass, the Islamists approached the celebrating priest, Father Iwan Pr, and told him to immediately close the chapel and stop all liturgical service.
The report said the forced closing is indicative of the Islamic fundamentalism that is growing in Indonesia.
In the last year, militants for the Islamic Defender Front, a local extremist group, forcibly closed 23 Christian churches. Muslim leaders like former President Abdurrahman Wahid have called on the government to “intervene quickly and decidedly” to defend Christians.
Russia Records More Abortions Than Births
MOSNEWS, Aug. 23 — Russia had approximately 100,000 more abortions than births in 2004. The reason for the carnage, the country's leading obstetrician told the Russian news service MosNews, is to avoid the costs of raising children.
Russian women had 1.6 million abortions compare to 1.5 million births. One-fifth of the women who had abortions were under the age of 18, said Dr. Vladimir Kulakov, vice president of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. “Many more” abortions weren't reported, he added.
According to LifeSiteNews.com, the Mary Mother of God Mission Society operates a crisis pregnancy center and post-abortion counseling service in Vladivostok. Father Myron Effing said some women have had as many as 30 abortions because of a lack of hope for the future. He said the Russian government also severely restricts working visas to those seeking to enter the country to do religious work, including pro-life work and education.
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life -------- TITLE: A Ground-Zero Convert's Olympic Gold DATE: 09/11/2005 12:00:00 PM CATEGORY: September 11-17, 2005 ----- BODY:On Sept. 11, 2001, Jason Read awoke to the sound of his mother's sobs as she watched television.
“Look what's going on!” she said, pointing to the images of the World Trade Center on the screen.
At 21, Read was the youngest person in New Jersey to be named chief of a rescue squad, the Amwell Valley Rescue Co., stationed one hour outside Manhattan.
He was a baptized Lutheran who “has a big heart and is not afraid to show that heart,” says his mother, Joan Read.
Jason was a competitive rower who says, “My dad always instilled in us this belief that we were leaders.”
Shortly after the second plane crashed into the south tower, Read was racing to a command post to help coordinate 800 rescue workers in a staging area and field hospital.
“The feeling at Ground Zero was very positive,” Read adds. “It was: ‘Okay, we've got to find people alive.’ I developed quite a strong bond with a lot of the guys I worked with, but I don't know their names. They are just faces behind respirators. But I trusted them with my life and they trusted me with theirs.”
Read worked for the better part of the first week with little, if any, restful sleep.
“Early on Friday morning I stopped to rest for a bit and the next thing I knew, a medic at the southwest treatment center started an IV on me and wanted to take me to a hospital, but I wouldn't let them,” Read says. “There was just so much work to be done.”
The huge effort took its toll.
“The scene at Ground Zero was enough for any normal person to have nightmares for the rest of his or her life,” he says.
Amid the horror, Read says two particular moments will mark his life.
He describes the first: “We were pulling out quite a few young guys, guys close to my age, who were not intact.
“I remember one of the fire department chaplains leaning over, giving the last rites to a number of very young guys that we had to take away. You look at the loss of life, see him administer the last rites. … It provoked me to want to become a Catholic after I had gotten a handle on things.”
The second: returning across the Hudson River to Jersey City at 1 a.m. on Sept. 15, Read was caught between the ruins he had come from and a cheering crowd that received him.
“Everyone started singing and cheering,” said Read. “We looked like we'd been to hell and back, covered with pulverized concrete and building materials. And there were all these little children holding candles and singing the national anthem. To go from the worst of the worst and see this, it was a profound experience.”
With the drop of the adrenaline rush and a moment to reflect on what had just happened, the trauma would now take a personal toll on Read.
Doubts and questions filled him.
“I had a sense of apathy about all things in the world that had meant so much to me,” Read says. “Did I really want to row anymore? Did I want to be chief of a volunteer rescue squad? What did it mean? All those people had been killed. Game over. Mortality became reality in a matter of seconds.”
The day after returning from Ground Zero, Read went to Mass.
His dad was Catholic, though not practicing, so it was the only Church he remembered having gone to at all, many years before.
Coming back to the Mass, he says, was “emotional and revitalizing. I prayed very hard — for the first time in my life.”
There were some questions that only God could answer.
Yet this moment was not enough to heal the deep wounds of the disaster. That would be a long process.
Read's mother was worried about the changes she saw in her son after Sept. 11, as the silence grew and he would wordlessly go straight to his bedroom after supper.
“There were night sweats, nightmares, withdrawal, communicating in monosyllables,” Joan Read remembers. “This wasn't my son. And I told him, ‘I'm really worried about you.’ He kept saying, ‘I have everything under control.’ But I was worried.”
One day, when she asked him to do a small chore, he exploded, saying, “You have no idea what I have seen! You have no idea!”
At first Joan was surprised, but as she sought to understand, she realized this explosion was really an opening of his heart, the first step of a healing process. He had finally acknowledged what happened to him.
“I told him, ‘Jason, I totally understand, and I love and support you,’” she recalls.
That love helped him get better. “Will he ever forget what he saw? No,” says Joan. “Is he beyond it? Yes. Does he use it as an inspiration? Absolutely.”
That's where Read's rowing comes back into the picture — in a big way.
“The spring after Sept. 11, he came to Columbus and we trained together,” recalls a teammate, Bryan Volpenhein of Ohio. “He was searching for a reason, for a meaning in life and what he should do next. Rowing gave him a way to put his emotions into something.”
The search also drove him to find meaning in life in a deeper way than he had previously known.
Father Tom Mullelly, chaplain of the Olympic rowing center at Princeton University, had been a friend of Read's since the summer of 1997. Now he helped the athlete in his search for a deeper faith.
At the Easter Vigil Mass in 2002, Read came into the fullness of the Catholic Church.
He called the day “one of the happiest days of my life.”
“I'm a better brother, uncle and son,” Read says. “Now I understand how precarious life can be, how quickly things can change. And I am grateful for each and every moment.”
The internal victory was echoed by many external victories as Read won medals and championships in rowing.
“After Sept. 11, I changed my approach to rowing,” he says. “I no longer was fueled by vengeance and anger to beat other crews. My desire was to become the absolute best rower — for America.”
These achievements were crowned in Greece, at last year's Olympics. Read led America's men's-eight team to win the gold.
“I have a larger purpose, and I'm not ashamed to say that I'm doing this for my country,” Read says. “Just remembering the spirit of volunteerism and the resilience our country showed — that's so emboldening to me. If you can harness that kind of positive energy, you can do great things.”
Genevieve Yep originally wrote about Jason Read for Faith & Family magazine, the Register's sister publication.
www.FaithandFamilyMag.com
----- EXCERPT: ----- EXTENDED BODY: Genevieve Yep ----- KEYWORDS: Culture of Life --------